Parry People Movers
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Parry People Movers (PPM) is a British company manufacturing lightweight railbuses that use Flywheel energy storage (FES) to store energy for traction.
[edit] Usage
Although it is not the only place where such tests have been carried out, the flywheel technology was tested on the Stourbridge Town Branch Line in the West Midlands during 2006. Since Central Trains had no plans to introduce a Sunday service for the branch, the initiative was brought to test a PPM50 model on the branch on Sundays.
The trial was intended to be for one year only and, indeed, the winter timetable introduced for 2007 did not include any Sunday services on the Branch Line.
The initiative is being looked at as a serious option for replacement of the Class 153 single-car DMU that currently works the Branch. This is costly and the service's future is often brought into doubt by the minimal profit it makes. The more environmentally-friendly and far more efficient PPM 50 would increase this profit.
Any decision will not be made until after the franchise reshuffling, which could see the management of the Stourbridge Town Branch Line change hands to another rail operator.
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