The Sunday service is excellent news, in exceedance of the minimum specification.
I note the Lincoln service will mostly be terminating at Grimsby, not Cleethorpes, which suggests for most of the day that Barton to Cleethorpes will run as a 'standalone' service. From a crewing perspective I see three potential options for the majority of services:
1. Continue using TPE crew
2. Abellio set up a crew depot in either Cleethorpes or Grimsby
3. Probably the least likely of the three, use crew from Lincoln changing at Grimsby to/from an en-route Barton to Cleethorpes service. This option would have been a lot easier if most/all Lincoln and Nottingham services ran through to Cleethorpes
A varient of option three would be to have Lincoln crews pasdipa or even taxiing Grimsby to Cleethorpes. I suspect Nottingham crews may well also end up working at least to Grimsby, not sure whether they already do.
From the Right Honourable Member for Epsom:
https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/east-midlands-south-eastern-and-west-coast-partnership-franchise-updates
Some questions in Parliament from Hansard:
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-04-11/debates/97686E18-4BE6-4D7F-914B-96F43098DC84/EastMidlandsRailFranchise
Confirmation that Arriva were disqualified in addition to Stagecoach
https://www.railjournal.com/financial/dft-confirms-arriva-disqualification/
A brief piece on the franchise from the Transport Focus newsletter.
https://www.transportfocus.org.uk/news-events-media/news/transport-user-voice-may-2019-train-company/?utm_source=GM&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Transport+User+Voice+-+May+2019&utm_term=Transport+User+Voice+-+May+2019&utm_content=34967&gator_td=MO9bMhcps9EKkaS47Ef6eUpiCuTMa9kHlXIz7vt3tHx6pept7NAKFiDJUmbsC35MgwrYFvY0Yaiq2BRuPQu16eiG9z2V7pkZrmFuMZ7RQgJQNvNTSCXxh4gxVuP134WJ3v2UFxcJVlTQK5eFb%2bENj%2bsppaHuBLlbxFmNKGowydd%2feaPfH1ia58Hdl%2fA24bjVtbf80NOhTACwXqYRF%2bFPb%2f4LZReTzK3IWddbs1KnGTAIwaXZQperYtetVGOlSSDv
I feel at this stage that it is important to point out that the contract hasn't actually been signed yet and we are still in the standstill period.
Standstill period to end 8th May..
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-05-07/debates/70FF91EF-640B-45C0-8655-951C7E146FF8/EastMidlandsRailFranchise
https://www.abellio.com/news/ps600-million-improvements-east-midlands-railway-abellio-confirmed
The legal battle between Arriva, Stagecoach and the DfT has now been concluded. Arriva settled out of court with the DfT. The case between Stagecoach and the DfT went to the High Court, with the DfT winning. Judgement for those who wish to read through the legalese:
https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/2019-rail-franchising-litigation/