Hitachi celebrates two successes at the National Rail Awards 2015 - Karen Boswell MD of Hitachi Rail Europe Wins Outstanding Personal Contribution in Rail

Hitachi Rail Europe Ltd. (HRE) is delighted in the success of Managing Director, Karen Boswell in winning the 2015 National Rail Award for Senior Outstanding Personal Contribution.

The award recognises Karen’s outstanding work during her time as Managing Director of East Coast Main Line Ltd.

Karen has been recognised for her excellent work in turning around the performance of East Coast improving customer satisfaction, people engagement, profitability and the business reputation.

At the same ceremony Hitachi Rail Europe Ashford Train Maintenance Centre was highly commended in the Maintenance Team of the Year category.

The commendation recognises the Ashford team for its work in implementing an innovative and new maintenance regime for Southeastern’s Hitachi Class 395 Javelin™ rolling stock at its flagship Ashford Train Maintenance Centre which increased the availability of trains in support of the new timetable.

The team was judged on its ability to show how the maintenance team at Ashford have set new standards for the industry, exceeding customers’ expectations. 

In congratulating her Ashford train maintenance team Karen Boswell said;

“I am thrilled for the team at Ashford as I know every one of them has worked tirelessly in ensuring HRE’s flagship centre of excellence sets the highest standards in partnership working and customer service. Congratulations to the team on this great achievement.”

Karen went on to say;

“It’s always about the people and the legacy that you leave behind. I am proud to be a part of another great team in Hitachi Rail Europe to share new goals and successes with in the future.”

Nigel King, Fleet Manager at Ashford Train Maintenance Centre said,

“It’s great to receive this commendation which recognises the hard work of the entire team in Ashford. We worked very closely with our partners at Southeastern to ensure that we delivered a forward-thinking service delivery and maintenance strategy, which has at its heart the passenger experience on the Class 395 Javelin™ train.”

Mark Johnson, Engineering Director of Southeastern said;

“We are extremely delighted that the engineering team in Ashford have been recognised for their very hard work implementing the changes to the maintenance regime. As a result of their hard work, we are now able to put more trains in traffic than ever before, enabling us to deliver the best service we can for our passengers.”

The new maintenance system in Ashford was created by HRE in order to allow Southeastern to achieve its 2015 targets for the number of trains in service during peak hours. By implementing this pioneering maintenance program, desired fleet mileage saw an increase of 18% and the number of trains running during peak service was increased from the original 25/29 to 26/29.

The National Rail Awards are recognised as among the most prestigious accolades in the Rail Industry.

The award for Maintenance Team of the year is judged from the customer’s point of view. The panel seeks to determine where targets have been exceeded as well as areas where minimum inconvenience to customers has been demonstrated. The judges also seek to identify where the maintenance team’s work has set new standards by which others in the industry will be judged.

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