Today I was thinking, although the majority of the UK rail fleet now centres around multiple unit trains, locomotives are still vital, especially in freight, special services (such as sleeper trains and charters), and in departmental work. Due to privatisation though, the process of withdrawing old locos when they reached the end of their lives and replacing them with new ones has broken down since the demise of BR.
This means we have a partly aged and mismatched fleet, with the oldest regular service loco being a class 20 dating from 1959. 9F steam locos were still produced AFTER this was built! Yes, class 66s and now class 70s have come some way in replacing the large stocks of first generation traction, but due to increasing demand, new locos have not been introduced fast enough in order to cope, leading older locos to be retained.
Primarily, the old locomotives in question are class 47s, 37s and 20s, with 08s, a few 31s and Southern region Electro-diesels still hard at work. With many of these locos reaching or topping 50, I imagine that sooner or later their numbers will dwindle further, and by 2020 I doubt many of the above will still be in service, although I admit the possibility for some to remain.
What new locomotives can we expect to see in this time?
What will they look like? What will they be designed for? Where will they be built?
This is the proposed topic for this discussion, and I'm sure several other members have had the same thought.
To begin with, we have the DRS Vossloh Light diesel locomotive:
http://www.rail.co.uk/images/3810/or...-will-look.jpg