Does London,England still use electric trains for mail delivery ?

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

I was looking at an old Reader’s Digest book titled “Strange Stories,Amaziing Facts” (1976),and they had a story about the Royal Mail Service using electric trains that run above ground and below in coffin shaped cars.

This was developed in 1880,after attemps to use pneumatic (air) tube cars proved not such a good idea due to the copper and leather pipes valves corroding in the salty air in the South Devon Railway section.The article also states that the rats chewed on the railway.

The article said that in 1914 a variation of Brunel’s system-the protoype of the electric train was designed that now moves the mail around London in a similar way.

This book shows a print date of 1976.So is this system still used in London today ?

2

No, the system closed in 2003.

Have a look at http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A3826019 and http://homepage.ntlworld.com/c.karslake/mailrail/html/home.html for more info

Tony

3

I was in London in 1965 and they delivered milk in small 3 wheeled electric delivery things, do they still use them??

4

Very much so. More recently, a few years ago in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, the Post Office were trying out a battery powered delivery van made by Ford. Ford claimed it had a range of 250 miles and top speed of 80mph. But as the experiment seems to have been dropped I guess their claims were optimistic. There are some cities in France where they have special parking bays for electric cars where you can leave them to be charged up while you go shopping/work/whatever.

5

Thanks owlsroost.I was hoping someone across the pond would answer [:D] .

Does any of the structure of it exsist,or was it razed ?

6

As far as I know all of the tunnels remain intact.

There were proposals when the system closed to redevelop it for commercial deliveries to stores and businesses, thus reducing road traffic in the centre of the city.

So far these proposals have come to nothing although as there is now a “Congestion Charge” (ie a fee to be paid for all road vehicles) in London it may only be a matter of time.

My understanding is that the system was still considered efficient until closure but the trains and infrastructure were worn out and the investment required to update them was prohibitive.

7

I think one other reason for its closure is that in the 1990’s the Post Office stopped using the various passenger termini which the PO tube connecte (ie Paddington, Euston, King’s Cross and Liverpool Street) and started using a new terminal at Wembley, which is not served by the PO tube.