www.thisisessex.co.uk - Friday 9th December

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Reliability gong for trains

Train operator c2c, which runs services through Basildon, has won another award for its high-tech trains - it's been voted the most reliable in the UK.

In the past year, each of c2c's class 357 Electrostar trains travelled an average of more that 43,000 miles before developing any fault that led to a delay of more than five minutes.

The company has now received a Golden Spanner award - the rail industry equivalent of the Oscars.

Leila Frances, route director for c2c, said: "Our trains are among the most most modern in the country and have been key in putting c2c at the top, of the league for punctuality, which currently stands at 96.9 percent for the year for peak trains and 93.4 percent for all-day services.

"The fact that the trains are so reliable is in no small measure the result of efforts by the maintenance team that looks after them at East Ham depot."

Peter Slattery, chairman of the Rail Travellers' Association, agreed that the reliability on the Fenchurch Street line had improved, but said customer service now needs attention.

He added: "Since operators have been concentrating on the trains, everything else has been ignored. This means that when things do go wrong, they go spectacularly wrong."

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Webmaster comment : See our performance page for details of c2c's current performance figures and our disruption log for entering details of any details you experience on c2c.