Stourbridge Shuttle tipped as future of rail travel
It covers less than a mile and trundles along at a maximum speed of 20mph with the engine of a car – but the Stourbridge Shuttle is being held up as the way forward for the national rail network.
A new book by leading railway author David Henshaw hails it as an icon in his new book, The Great Railway Conspiracy.
Mr Henshaw says the Parry People Mover rail bus, which ferries over 500,000 passengers a year on the three-minute link between Stourbridge Town and Junction stations, could be used to bring back into use branch lines which were axed by Dr Richard Beeching 50 years ago.
The ultra lightweight piece of rolling stock, which has been in operation on the Stourbridge line for four years, is made by Cradley Heath based Parry People Movers Ltd and is powered by a 2.3 litre car engine.
The Stourbridge People Mover, which bears the London Midland livery, carries 60 passengers but the company has been offered grants of more than £1 million to develop a version that would hold twice that number and could travel at up to 50mph.
"It could be the future for many lines," said Mr Henshaw, aged 53, who lives in Dorset. "I travelled on the Stourbridge Shuttle recently and it was brilliant – it was a Sunday afternoon but it was very busy. The most impressive thing is that it saves on fuel and pollution and is cheaper to run."
John Parry, chairman of JPM Parry & Associates, the company behind the People Mover, welcomed the book, saying: "It's about time someone noticed what we are doing. We believe that, in the four years that our People Mover has been operating at Stourbridge, we have saved the public purse well over £1m." The Stourbridge Shuttle – also known affectionately as The Dodger – runs every 10 minutes from 6am to midnight.
It weighs just 10 tons and uses only one gallon of fuel per hour, using kinetic energy to boost acceleration.
The People Mover replaced a 40 ton sprinter diesel carriage with a 14 litre engine that used to do the journey – but could only manage four trips an hour.
Parry People Movers has now won a £700,000 order to supply a larger version of the vehicle, to carry 100 passengers, for a sugar factory in rural Turkey.
The company is also on the brink of clinching a deal worth more than £1m to supply People Movers for a new residential and leisure complex in Georgia, USA, and is working on plans for a 120-seater model. There are also proposals for a £5m passenger line on a freight track from Dudley and Brierley Hill to Stourbridge, which could use People Movers.
