Japanese "Bullet" train takes first trip Ashford to St Pancras

If your mind is easily boggled - cop this ....there will be 7.9 million spectators in 16 days for the Olympic Games 2012 and 1.5 Million over 11 days for the Paralympic we detailed what this meant in a post on Friday, August 17, 2007

Olympics 2012 - In Xanadu did Khubla Khan ... getting you to East London .. on time

The "Olympic Javelin" high speed shuttle rail service, will take 7 minutes from King's Cross, St Pancras to Stratford International station carrying 25,000 passengers per hour (Raise eyebrows here) with 1,200 passengers on each 6 carriage train per trip - that's one train leaving St Pancras every 3 minutes .. and arriving evry 3 minutes.

Pause here to note that the the new high speed trains will be of main line design with fewer doors than suburban rolling stock access will be relatively slow - especially for disabled visitors for Paralympics. They also have 354 seats in single class accomodation.(BBC)

Those passengers not disabled or with children in prams, will presumably be carrying, rugs, cushions, bags with food, drink, newspapers, binoculars, cameras, jerseys, waterpoofs, umbrellas to add to the fun of the event.(Raise eyebrows here)

The good news is that the first of the Hitachi made "Olympic Javelin" ( romantically called Class 395 in the UK) trains which are being supplied in a £250Mn contract for 28 trains based on the Japanese Shinkasen trains for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link has shipped from the Kasado factory.

It should arrive in Southampton at the end of this month followed by 3 more before the end of the year and the remainder by end 2009.These will be based at the Channel Tunnel Ashford depot and the first train will be trialled (it has already been fully tested in Japan) in early October 2007.

Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), is due to become fully operational on November 14 2007. .(Raise eyebrows here)

All the trains are to be named after Britons associated with speed - preferably not enhanced by the use of drugs, so ruling out Linford Christie and Jockie Wilson.

Well the Daily Mail today reports that - The British bullet train: 'Javelin' races to London for its 140mph debut, it is not of course a British train ...and as the non- elected Transport Minister Lord Adonis pointed out, this was not their debut in service.

The trains are still being tested and he was one of the first excited passengers to try out the new service.

He said: 'When these trains enter service next year (probably 18 months late - BBC report "another year") they will transform the journeys of large numbers of rail passengers travelling between Kent and London - in some cases halving journey times.'

The Javelin yesterday completed the 56-mile journey from Ashford in Kent in just 37 minutes - shaving 46 minutes off the standard 83-minute trip (BBC video) - when in service it was announced for the first time that travelling on this service for Kent commuters will pay up to 35 % more than the standard fare. An Ashford - London annual season ticket is being quoted at £5,385.