Great Western Coffee Shop

Not good today......I was on the 1542 from Plymouth - Paddington which got to Reading 35 minutes late - held up at Tiverton, Taunton, Pewsey and Newbury by a "lack of platform staff" (according to the announcements made by the exasperated sounding TM) - as is usual for Up Westcountry HST services on a Sunday, the service was ridiculously overcrowded, full and standing in 1st class as well as standard with luggage everywhere.......it does however seem that those of us who were on this service have got off lightly judging by the latest news below.........................


Cancellations to services between Plymouth and Newton Abbot


Due to slippery rails between Plymouth and Newton Abbot trains have to run at reduced speed on all lines.
Train services running through these stations may be cancelled, delayed by up to 120 minutes or revised. Disruption is expected until the end of the day.
Customer Advice
Tickets dated 20/11/2016 will be authorised for travel tomorrow 21/11/2016 for those passengers affected by this disruption.
Further Information
An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Trouble between Westbury and Castle Cary as well.

Good job you were only travelling from Plymouth and not further west....

Fingers crossed for Tuesday then.  I've got a day trip to St Austell for a meeting in a brewery!

Sleeper's going to be late too............


21:15 Penzance to London Paddington due 05:06


This train will be starting late from Penzance and is expected to be 90 minutes late.
This train will no longer call at Bodmin Parkway.
This is due to slippery rails.
Further Information
Passengers boarding at unmanned stations will be provided road transport to their nearest manned station.

Keep them firmly crossed..........
More from the Exeter Express and Echo (http://www.exeterexpressandecho.co.uk/severe-weather-warning-issued-for-exeter-east-and-mid-devon/story-29919654-detail/story.html)

At least I won't be a victim of the usual riposte as I'm not actually organising the meeting!  ;D

And what riposte might that be?  ;D ::) :o  :P

I am sure my colleague from North Somerset will be along shortly with a far better pithy comment than I could manage....

Thank you for that tribute, bobm, but I don't want to be a prophet of doom: bar that, I'm sure the St Austell Cornish best will do a proper job for you.  ;) :D ;D

Told you...

The irony is that I was actually sitting at home, enjoying a bottle of gently chilled Sharp's Doom Bar, when this topic developed ...  ::) :o ;D

Most ales will get you sozzled.

Tribute, Proper Job and Trelawny get you Snozzled.

Lest we lose some of our readers with all these real ale references, may I offer a link to the St Austell Brewery's range (http://www.staustellbrewery.co.uk/all-our-range) here?

(I am not a shareholder, and have no financial interest: posted here purely for public information).  ::)

..........always nice to have a lie-in on a Monday morning............

21:15 Penzance to London Paddington due 05:06


This train has been delayed from Penzance by 183 minutes and is now 148 minutes late at Castle Cary.
This train will no longer call at Bodmin Parkway.
This is due to slippery rails.

79 minutes late into Paddington.  The one the other way left 200 minutes late, but has recovered all but 15 minutes of that by Saltash.

It should recover that at liskeard. Monday mornings it has a 10-15 min wait at liskeard normally.

Flooding reported on Twitter between Swindon and Bristol Parkway (also reported elsewhere as landslip at Hullavington). Paddington to Cardiff trains cancelled and Swansea services diverted.

Westcountry Passengers with tickets dated 20/11 who were told they could use them today due to yesterday's chaos in Devon/Cornwall will not be helped by the cancellation of the 0844 from PNZ-Paddington, fastest service of the day due to a train fault.

I notice also that the Golden Hind was routed via Bristol and Swindon this morning - arriving in Paddington some 33 minutes late.

I see now that Taunton and places west are now cut off from London and the North by rail  .......

Cancellations to services between Castle Cary and Westbury
  Due to heavy rain flooding the railway between Castle Cary and Westbury all Westbury lines are blocked.

Cancellations to services between Taunton and Bristol Temple Meads
  Due to heavy rain flooding the railway between Taunton and Bristol Temple Meads all lines are blocked.

Alterations to services between Yeovil Junction and Exeter St Davids
  Due to flooding between Yeovil Junction and Exeter St Davids the line is blocked.

just 2 days heavy rain.....more drainage work needed methinks

and more lineside clearance to prevent 'leaves on the line' and blocked drains.

agreed.  The worst thing here is that the sites of flooding are predictable in that they have  flooded previous winters.  The Chipping Sodbury tunnel regularly floods and yet a solution has yet to be found.  It isn't like it is on a backwater either.  It is a mainline (in fact the only mainline deemed important enough to be electrified in the foreseeable future).  NR needs to do better. 

And I'm on a train currently being held at Swindon because of flooding in Box Tunnel. It's getting like the Great Game of Britain when someone puts those pesky train signals on my route.

Chippenham -> Trowbridge -> Bath Spa ?

GWR reporting flooding issues:

Swindon-Bristol Parkway
Swindon-Bath Spa
Westbury-Castle Cary
Taunton-Weston super Mare
Liskeard-Looe

All the best to those travelling home tonight. And well done to everyone at GWR and Network Rail in attempting to keep some sort of service going whilst the rain continues to come down.

Ollie on Twitter has announced that Bristol Temple Meads is CLOSED due to safety and crowding issues.

TransWilts peak train cancelled even though I'm in some doubt as to just where the flooding is - so it might be that the HSTs are being sent that way.   Reports that the Melksham help point is being less than helpful ... but excellent feedback from GWR Help (thanks, Ollie!) and I've passed that though to my reporter.

P.S. If you're reading this, Ollie - sorry about the terseness of my message on Twitter ; I find it very hard to ask nicely and quickly in just 140 characters ...

Yup, just had a quick look at the current road status and the primary routes through the GWR region - A303, A30, A38, M3, M4 & M5 - all currently unaffected by the weather. Couple of minor congestion issues and single lane closures due to accidents (M4 & M5), but that's it.

If Highways England can cope with poor weather conditions, Network Rail really should pull their fingers out and sort basic infrastructure issues like draining and flood protection.

edit - to clarify my point

Yes HSTs, one of the two Pad-Bri services, now being diverted via Melksham in both directions. The other services going via Badminton with the line having reopened albeit with speed restrictions.

.............maybe everyone should stop worrying quite so much about spending tens of millions of £ to address once in a generation events like Dawlish, and instead focus on making a railway across the region robust enough to deal with entirely predictable weather events such as two days of heavy rain and leaf fall?

I have just this minute received an e-mail from the Great Western Railway press office announcing that,

One TransWilts round trip (peak one, naturally  :( ) cancelled ... the 18:52 off Swindon still showing as running, and there is room on the single line for 2 x HST + 1 other per hour. Looks sensible in the circumstances.  

Biggest TransWilts problem is how to avoid the help point giving out silly and incorrect information - if it were only linked to Twitter it would give realistic answers rather that "catch the Stagecoach bus to Swindon" which goes no nearer the station than 3 miles away ... or "get yourself a taxi an claim back" which with the lack of a phone at the station, and a lack of £20 spare in the wallet, may not be all that easy!

I'm on the same train as JohnR. We've joined forces to use all the tools at our disposal to see how we will get to our destinations. Said tools are useless when you have neither WiFi or mobile data. Just passing through Sodden Chipbury tunnel.

I'm trying to get to Taunton and, as I write, both routes from Bristol TM (via Yatton and via Westbury/Castle Cary) are closed.

See attached for more........

Apparently the temporary closure was to allow disembarking passengers room to get out of the station whilst holding back passengers intending to board. I wonder if anyone found the keys to the Bonaparte and Queen Anne gates.......just shows how Temple Meads improvements can't come soon enough.

On the 1645 Cross Country ex Bristol running via Westbury,  line at Bruton now apparently reopened.  Flooding at Flax Bourton had gone when we left , but line was flooded at Uphill and they were waiting for PW to inspect. 1445, 1513 and 1544 Cross Country services all cancelled at Bristol.   

Falcon? - https://tiscon-maps-stagecoachbus.s3.amazonaws.com/Timetables/South%20West/falcon%20web%20revised%20Sept%2016.pdf

Flooding in Chipping Sodbury Tunnel is a predictable occurrence when there’s a lot of rain, but I can’t recall Box Tunnel being similarly affected.  I hope the lowering of the track last year for electrification isn’t a contributory factor…. 

From NRE

Heavy rain is flooding the railway between Taunton and Bristol Temple Meads which is causing disruption to journeys between these stations. Trains may be amended, cancelled or delayed by up to 60 minutes. Disruption is expected to continue until the end of the day

Customer Advice for Great Western Railway customers:


You may use your rail tickets on the following:

CrossCountry on reasonable routes.

Buses of Somerset routes 21, 21A, 21C between Taunton and Bridgwater / Highbridge & Burnham / Weston-Super-Mare

First Buses on routes:

126 between Weston-Super-Mare and Weston Milton
 X1 between Weston-Super-Mare and Weston Milton / Worle / Nailsea & Backwell / Bristol                                             
 X5 between Weston-Super-Mare and Weston Milton / Worle / Bristol Parkway
 X6A between Yatton and Nailsea & Backwell / Bristol
 X8 between Bristol and Nailsea & Backwell
 X9 between Bristol and Nailsea

Customers with tickets for travel today Monday 21st of November who have been unable to or do not want to travel due to flooding may use tickets on Tuesday 22nd November.

CrossCountry customers may use Great Western Railway on reasonable routes

An overview, from the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-38049907):

You would certainly hope not now the wires won't be going through the tunnel for the foreseeable future.

I'm not sure what time this information was sent out by NRE, but the last X5 to BPW leaves at 15:45 from Weston and the last X6a has gone from Yatton (the last bus is 18:45) as I write this. Anyone travelling this evening needs to check carefully that there is actually a bus before relying on what appears to be a good series of options.

Latest.....

Agree, whilst of course there are some road closures, these are mainly minor or local routes.
Most motorways and other major through routes in the south west are open whilst most rail routes are closed or very severely disrupted.

Left JohnR at BRI who get the 1827 stopper to NLS (left 20 late). I pondered the following stopper to TAU (1855) but saw there was a late running CrossCountry service due to head west. Still sat on that train waiting a driver. Severely regretting not getting the Taunton stopper now.

Except that there was a lot of work done three or four years ago to try and improve the position, and we were promised that it would be a much less frequent occurrence.

From my mailbox:


... how true.

And from an email from Mark Hopwood's team - a good technical snapshot

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/flood_status_20161121.jpg)

I used the falcon last Monday and is something I would recommend. Bristol to Taunton is £6.50 single and it will ditch you at blackbrook by the holiday inn.

Han and Chewie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Falcon) to the rescue, eh?  ;) :D ;D

Update at 2000. Still at BRI waiting a driver. The following XC is also held here for staff reasons. Who gets the tip first? Who knows? I've just let another GWR local go.

Sorry to hear that. What was wrong with the 1915 HST that ran?  Surely a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush on such a night?

Both Up and Down sleepers cancelled tonight.

Any news on how GWR plan to get their customers to/from the Westcountry this evening and/or cater for those stranded? Virtually everything long distance cancelled.....is it going to be road transport, hotel accommodation or a combination of both?

I was comfortably accommodated in XC 1st awaiting a driver who was always 20 mins away. Yes I could have bailed and got a stopper or that 1915,  but when you have a TM telling you you're on your way soon you tend to stick with the known unknown. Until the 1915 got the tip no one knew it was going west of BRI.

Regarding Chipping Sodbury IIRC the issue was water from the rock in the cutting entering the tunnel and the drainage not being able to cope. Unfortunately to prevent flooding downstream, the Environment Agency limit the rate of discharge out of the drainage system NR built a pond to store water in havy rain but that is limited by the land available. So not a very satisfactory solution, but all they were allowed to do.  Short of the EA allowing a higher discharge or building a tank to seal the cutting, not sure what else can be done.

Regarding Box tunnel IIRC there is a gradient all the way through the tunnel so it should not flood.  I know Corsham sation site has flooded int he past is it there?

Update 2100.

All Devon and Cornwall bound passengers on the three XC services held at BRI (1744, 1844, 1944) were, at around 2030, directed to buses.

Said buses were not yet available. bignosemac, knowing how these things pan out, spoke with an XC TM and got a taxi docket for Taunton. A fellow passenger overheard this conversation and is now with me in said taxi on the M5.

My ETA at Taunton should have been 1714. I left Stroud (agreeable lunch and gin or 3 with bobm) at 1514. I will now be around 4.5 hours late into Taunton. I have no qualms about blagging a taxi ahead of those who were shepherded onto buses. Yes, many won't know that they can at least ask. I asked. I got. As I got the cab I'll probably not submit a delay claim to GWR. They might well say no any way. Weather being outwith their charter.  

XC delay repay on the other hand does pay out for the weather. Although as you opted not to take the stoppers there weee options to get you sooner?
Seen on Facebook now, was going to ask which one you are on!

I'm currently up inn Lancashire, where things are pretty much the same. My niece got a train from Blackpool North heading for Hull. She got stuck at Leeds for a while, but found her way via Doncaster. It hasn't been First's day at all - Transpennine has been badly hit.

I guess getting a taxi might be regarded as slightly fortuitous, given that three services left Temple Meads for Taunton after you arrived at the station, the earliest which would have got you into Taunton at around 2020?  And it's not as though you were comfortably ensconced on the XC train all along, as you were on Platform 4 about 10 mins before the first of those GW trains departed from there just 1 minute late.  So I'd say you passed up several opportunities for the railway to get you back after admittedly a very long and delayed journey from Swindon. Still, I hope you get to your destination without any further delay.

This is the scene at Taunton at 2155, still no buses, customers waiting in pouring rain.

I did indeed pass up other services. First decision was to get on the 1744 XC as it was due to depart around 45 late possibly ahead of the next stopper. Only on boarding did l learn there was no driver. Do I run back for the stopper? Ichose not to. Hindsight tells me I should have. Subsequent departures were also possible. But at every point in the two hours I was sat on the XC there were pointers to suggest we may leave at any moment. My own knowledge added to what I was being told by XC staff on the train and GWR dispatchers at BRI. The situation at Uphill (flooding) was ever changing. The first unit through reported it being borderline passable. Line was briefly closed again. I know trains got through but XC weren't sending anything west - likely for reasons to do with stock and staff displacement ahead of Customer Service reasons.

Yes, I agree I could have made better decisions. But only in hindsight. Last decision to ask for taxi worked out. However I would have accepted a "no" with good grace and joined the queue for buses.

BNM I think you did the right thing in the circumstances by jumping in a cab........message now on GWR twitter feed....."we are unable to guarantee to get customers to their destinations".

The Voyagers pictured were the 1844 and 1944, on P11 and P12. I was on the 1744 on P8.

Tomorrow could be fun, with trains out of position.

Looking at some of the horrendous delays this afternoon for trains running via the Badminton line makes me question the decision to continue to try and run trains via that route.  Delays of up to 2 hours for some unlucky passengers.  For South Wales trains, surely the better option would have been to run via Gloucester (as some services were doing).  Even for diverted Temple Meads trains it might have been faster to run up to Gloucester and back down.

Going forward, surely a turnback facility at Standish would be useful? I know some will say that it is very rare for there to be problems on both lines via Badminton and Box, but the causes are correlated, so not completely unexpected. A relatively small step which would improve resilience and probably prove it's worth a couple of times a year.  

A young friend of mine (actually, one of the musicians who performed on the Folk Train on the Trans Wilts line a few Christmas's ago) has been regaling friends online with her attempted train journey from Chichester through Bristol and back down home to beyond Truro this afternoon, this evening and now tonight. The latest is that she's been stuck in car park in Taunton for the past three hours waiting for a promised rail replacement bus heading south. The only money she has on her is the anticipated cab fare home for when she eventually arrives in Truro. People apparently started a singalong to keep themselves warm while they hung around the car park and have been given free coffee, except it then transpired there is nowhere to wee. So now they are cold and uncomfortable and still a long, long way from home (oh, and her phone battery is running out....)

I've heard from friends here in Taunton that cabbies on the town side rank were providing far better info to those waiting for buses than any (in fairness just 3 on duty) GWR staff.

I've heard that at least 4 cabbies offered free local rides. I'm also told that access to a toilet was arranged by the cabbies.

They said anyone travelling yesterday could travel today....has today now become tomorrow for those tickets?

If there are three Great Western Railway staff on duty at Taunton Station, why are the station toilets not open for use by delayed passengers?

I'm watching (from afar, though here in LA they had their first rains for six months last night and it tipped it down) and able to look a little detached.

On one hand, for every cancelled or seriously delayed train there are dozens of individual stories being written and people having very real disruption, and the very real upset of now knowing what's going on and / or being told something which turns out to be not exactly right (ranging from the over-optimistic to the downright wrong).

On a second hand you have the very real issues of the operational staff doing there best to keep the systems running and to make decisions in a changing situation based on what may be incomplete information, possibilities and probabilities that may sometimes mean hindsight would have been wonderful and lead them another way

And on the third had you have the customer facing staff with minimal true operational elements in their work who are doing their best in many cases to inform but, frankly in some cases, really hate the job when they've got to deal with angry and demanding (sometimes rightly, sometimes wrongly) passengers.

I've just written that to help clarify my thoughts and see all the sides of the picture.   The "solution" doesn't come on the day / evening that this is happening - it comes in the planning and the systems.

* In getting the network databases right so passengers don't get told to catch a bus that's a three mile walk away

* In getting the engineering and warning systems right so that closures and semi-closures are minimised, and problems alerted before trains get sent out and stuck.   The 13:55 Cardiff to Paddington left Bristol Parkway 15 minutes late, and Swindon 264 minutes late (due 14:59, actual 19:23) and I really wonder at such a delay

* In having customer facing staff being ever more customer aware. It may not be as simple as it sounds but - really - station loos should be open if there are multiple staff around, and staff should take far more the "my job's really important to help today and I'm proud of what I do" rather than "I'm dreading my shift"

It WAS exceptionally bad ... Blockage on the B&H at Urchfont, near-blockage at Melksham (I presume that was the culvert that we were told had been fixed?), at Corsham, and at Sodden Chipbury left only one single track thread connecting Paddington to Bristol and the West Country - and that in danger of being closed.   Then other pieced of the Jigsaw - west of Westbury and west of Bristol - knocked out too.

I suspect that information system corrections, an ethos that makes team members proud to help as best they can, and an honesty that says "we don't know at the moment, but will get back to you within half an hour, even if that's to tell you we still don't know" would go down wonders.   Looking across at the world of flying, there's one particular airline I use.  They get delayed like others - but the difference is that they give a slightly longer, more technical explanation of what's going on and make their passengers feel like "we're all in this together".

Talking the "we're all in this together" ... I wonder if there's a case on community rail lines / services to have one or two key volunteers who'll go down to more major unstaffed stations at times of disruption and explain what's going on, who to call, perhaps co-ordinate taxis and generally say keep people informed.  Away from forum messages, I've had - again - feedback today that tells me that outright wrong information's been dished out from call centres remote from the issues - probably resulting in extra expense for GWR and certainly in some very, very bad customer stories that are totally unnecessary.

Looks likely that Exeter to Taunton will remain shut for a good portion of Tuesday as well as Cowley Bridge Junction (an old flooding 'favourite') is now under water.

Several billion would need to be spent to rectify all these locations that are prone to flooding.  Perhaps the argument for a HS4 line to the West Country should come back into the spotlight?  I say that partly tongue in cheek, but there's no doubt starting from scratch means everything can be properly engineered from the start rather than very old formations patched up.  Certainly a benefit of HS2 will be its much greater resilience to flooding.

Not a problem. Understandably frustrating, particularly when combined with the comms issues for the service.

Cowley Bridge out - again - certainly re-enforces in my mind the desirability of multiple routes to each major part of the UK - and not ones which share fragile pinch points either.  A triangle at Cowley Bridge, with the side to be added in the form of a flyover (or at least with one high level track) and a joining up of Okehampton via Tavistock.   But that doesn't sort out the other points as you correctly say - and there are others such as Maidenhead, Athelney and Royal Wootton Bassett which have flooded very recently too. 

I might argue against calling it HS4 as I'm not convinced of the total need for HS, but I can see the desirability of additional lines for additional traffic and engineered to be above any flood possibility.   Old Oak - Greenford - High Wycombe - Bicester - Oxford - Didcot - Swindon - Westbury - Yeovil - Exeter - Okehampton - Plymouth he asks, tongue in cheek?

There is one step in the right direction - once the water recedes the line at Cowley Bridge should reopen quicker than in the past after all the location cabinets were raised up following the floods over Christmas 2012. 

It seems at least two GWR services from the West Country this morning are diverting via Honiton - which has reopened after also being blocked for a time yesterday.

Needless to say - that's one non essential journey not being made today!

Trip to a brewery? I would say that is an essential journey!

It's ironic that using GWR drives most of it's customers to drink, but don't count on them to get you there!!!  ;D

Cowley Bridge flooded for the third consecutive year - and note this Network Rail proposal from 2014.... (incidentally, where are the 'inflatable sausages' (to use NR's own description) that are supposed to be deployed at the first sign of potential flooding at that location).
http://www.networkrail.co.uk/news/2014/oct/A-solution-for-the-continual-flooding-at-Cowley-and-Stafford-bridges/ (http://www.networkrail.co.uk/news/2014/oct/A-solution-for-the-continual-flooding-at-Cowley-and-Stafford-bridges/)

At least, on the positive side, trains to and from Paddington and the Westcountry are now being routed via Honiton and Yeovil Pen Mill

Have any down trains been diverted yet?  The 07:06 is terminating at Taunton and the 07:30 is still shown as calling at there.

The 07:30 goes 'round the houses' anyway, so I suspect that will terminate at Taunton, but it would appear that GWR/NR are constantly reviewing the situation as nothing showing yet as of 09:00

State of play at Cowley

https://twitter.com/CrossCountryUK/status/800984678618566656/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Most amusingly GWRs update to the radio stations says to use xc with ticket acceptance in place between Exeter and Taunton. Heard it on both radio Plymouth and pirate fm on my way back from work.

Some photographs of Cowley Bridge here:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cx2esy4UQAA6_s2.jpg
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cx2eIXGVQAAYT_v.jpg

I'm now at my step-dads in Langport. Got here at 0850. Should have been here at 1900 last night. Thankfully my sister in Taunton was able to put me up last night.

As seen in the photos posted earlier, with some ballast being washed away at Cowley Bridge in the floods it is being suggested the line may be closed for "a couple of days".

The down sleeper west of Exeter was ran by 153-green 150-153 combination. Just seen the stock ECS returning through liskeard

As it currently stands GWR Journeycheck shows all West of England services from Paddington terminating at Taunton for the rest of the day but I understand there is a hope that some may be able to divert via Honiton and continue into West Devon and Cornwall.

I hope they do - after all three services in the other direction have, which will lead some on those trains to have the expectation they can get home again by train. 

NRE tweeting Cowley Bridge clopsed until at least tomorrow COP (close of play)

Not sure if you meant closed or collapsed but both probably apply!  ;D

*closed, sorry

Something more fundamental needs to be done at Cowley Bridge rather than continued repairs which are only good until the next time it rains heavily.
The 2014 proposals to remove the three weirs should be completed as soon as possible as the first stage, with the line between Castle Cary, Yeovil  and Exeter being doubled throughout as a backup.

Looks like the 10:06 from Paddington has gone via Honiton.

Yes it did (and a few Up morning servicies as well).  The 'new' signalling arrangements on the WoEL got stretched in the process.... ;)

I did read on a twittery-thing of a BBC reporter this morning that some had been trying to get from Exeter to Canterbury for two and a half days....

Not trying very hard I think

https://mobile.twitter.com/newstigger/status/801011241120473088

How many void days coming out of this I wonder?

None probably, "out of the control....."

I was at Temple Meads at 15.30 yesterday, to catch the 15.44 to Oldfield Park. It was due on platform 7 but then moved to platform 1 about 10 minutes before departure, so all us waiting passengers went down the subway to get to platform 1 via platform 3. On platform 3 the 15.30 to Edinburgh was cancelled, and there was a large number of passengers just standing around on that platform right in front of the barriers. This made it very difficult for us to get to platform 1 as they were blocking the whole of the most narrow bit of platform 3, and must have been making it difficult for anyone to enter through the barriers.

What I couldn't work out is why none of the staff on platform 3 asked the passengers standing there to move down the platform a few yards, as the blockage was very obvious.

Exeter Panel used the Train Describers on the panel to aptly show what the problem was on the line between Tiverton and Exeter yesterday:

(http://i598.photobucket.com/albums/tt68/bignosemac/Capture_zps4uqgemlj.jpg)

 ;D

Thought you might appreciate hearing the end of this story. Remember, this is a young girl, travelling alone. We last left her in Taunton at about 11pm, having set out 12 hours before from Chichester. Here we are, in her own words:

"It was taxi from Taunton in the end. They called all the taxis they could for miles around, but obviously the roads were all blocked too, so they let us onto taxis as they arrived, and it took hours. Bristol had booked all the coaches.

They ran out of hot drinks before they got to me. Station staff made an executive decision and ordered takeaway pizzas for everyone - unfortunately they turned up and there was only pepperoni or ham and pineapple. Nothing else. Myself and the other vegetarians did try manfully not to look like we were sulking (bearing in mind most of us hadn't eaten since lunch time and this was getting on to midnight and it was freezing cold), but I don't think we were too successful. I shared peanuts with a couple of lads (not a euphemism), and then a taxi arrived going as far as Plymouth.

When we got to Plymouth it was packed and there was no food there either, or any coaches or trains. Luckily the taxi driver offered to take us on to Truro, where all of us in the taxi were going, because he said that his company had booked him to go as far as Penzance (or Penjance as he called it), and he needed to get the mileage in anyway.

So he put the post code for Truro station into his Sat Nav and we drove onwards through the night, in silence, occasionally letting out tired gasps and screams when the car aquaplaned. It was biblical weather and some bits of the roads were more like rivers.

And then the taxi driver stops the car at Chiverton roundabout at 3am, which is about 5 miles from Truro, a lot of it unlit roads with no pavement, and says we have to get out there, in the middle of the storm with all our luggage, or pay him £25 to take us into Truro.

I think he expected us to meekly pay him. But none of us had any money on us anyway, and he had certainly underestimated exactly how close to breaking point we all were by then.

We weren't having it. We didn't have it. There were 4 of us and one of him. There was no violence, but it came out in a variety of ways...the lady in the front started getting tearful, another person started calling the police...my own particular reaction was to give him a stern telling off.

In the end he drove us into Truro, where myself and another passenger got another taxi onwards together - which I managed to pay for because a very, very kind person, who I won't embarrass by naming them, had earlier sent me some money online when they saw my predicament.

And then crisps, hot water bottle and bed.

And that's all the story."

So the taxi drivers were taking the piss out of displaced passengers with "services" not guaranteed by GWR?

That's some story. And full marks to the young lady for her fortitude, good sense and for standing up to that taxi driver. I hope he no longer has a job. And this should be sent to Mark Hopwood, Chris Grayling, Paul Maynard etc etc and included in all the training days/ inquests of what went wrong on Monday and how or how not to deal with them. Full marks to the staff at Taunton for the pizzas and for throwing the rule book out of the window and showing some much needed compassion. And many kudos and thanks to ALL those who went beyond ( and sometimes far beyond) the call of duty to do whatever they could in an horrendous situation. AND NO THANKS to that uncaring very small minority who by their actions last night turned their back on the situation (not my job, guv) and all the useless mandarins, accountants,politicians and bureaucrats who by their blinkered bean counting vision, helped create the circumstances that led to last night.

I am very sorry that poor young lady had to endure such a journey.  I hope, at the very least, that she sends the whole thing to GWR Customer Services.  The taxi driver from Plymouth needs to be identified and dealt with - what he did was unforgiveable.

Also, and this needs to be very sensitively done, the staff at Taunton need to be praised for their initiative in buying the pizzas but gently asked to bear vegetarians in mind if they need to do it again.

Let's hope the Peninsula Rail Task Force report launched yesterday in Westminster leads to some very serious investment to minimise the possibility of this happening again.  Anyone in London who thinks the problem in Devon is only the sea wall is getting a terrible reminder that it is not.  Cowley Bridge needs properly sorting, pretty much whatever it takes.

The Network Rail spokesman on BBC Spotlight last night explained work to provide a new culvert is due to be finished in 2018 but admitted that until then that section of line was at risk.

He also stated that the booms used in the past had not been deployed because of health and safety considerations.  He claimed by the time they had the warning from the Environment Agency it was dark and it was decided it was not safe to have workers trying to erect them in poor light with fast flowing water.

He also stated the line would reopen a lot sooner than it had in the past because of the raising of the location cabinets above the floodwater.

I note that some trains are now running as far as Tiverton Parkway.  Was there a blockage between Taunton and Tiverton Parkway preventing this until this morning?

Hopefully once common sense prevails & HS2 is cancelled or drastically scaled back, some of the colossal resource set aside for that white elephant can be redeployed elsewhere to resolve problems such as this.

That resource is borrowed money for *capital* investment. Improvements are not capital, thus the money wouldn't be available in the same way. It's something most don't understand. The works you mention would have to fight for taxpayers taxes....and the NHS is likely to have higher urgency.

GWR have just tweeted saying that Network Rail are on course to have the lines open at Cowley Bridge tomorrow.

CrossCountry have been running to Tiverton the whole time. GWR to Taunton. There isn't adequate platform and sidings at Tiverton to turn lots of trains, Taunton has its 5 platforms and also some sidings if needed to get trains out of the way.

Looking at the Exeter TD messages from the last 24 hours it seems that although some services did run through to Tiverton Parkway in the morning, they were terminating at Taunton later in the day.

Even if XC do run through to Tiverton Parkway all day today, this seems to be a change from previous occasions when GWR ran through to Tiverton with XC terminating at Taunton or Bristol.

CrossCountry are keeping their options open it seems. They've made no Short Term Planning (STP) or Variation (VAR) to their timetables. Westbound XCs are merely terminating early at Tiverton Parkway this morning. Later services where the rolling stock is not due to work back may terminate earlier.

I'd hazard a guess that Network Rail are working their butts off at Cowley Bridge and, although they are publicly saying 'tomorrow', are hoping they may have the lines open later today.

BBC Devon webpage report opening at 13.00 today.

T3 has just been removed from E41 and E56 on the Exeter TD.  Looks like 1C79 and 1A83 are running through.

Indeed - with a 40mph speed restriction.

And even if the entire HS2 budget was made available that only equates to about £4-5bn per year.  I'm not going to pretend that wouldn't make a difference, but there would be all sorts of pulls on that money each year - capacity increases, new stations and routes, as well as trying to weather proof loads of locations around the country.  It might be quite some time (late 2020s?) before all these flooding issues could have enough money thrown at them from the HS2 fund.

I expect when the floods subside they'll be loads of talk and little action. Again.

If the damage took weeks to repair each time, the priority might be higher....

Certainly it would appear that raising the equipment cabinets reduced the closure time and cost of repairs so that when the floods waters had subsided it was just a case of repairing/relaying ballast that had been displaced.

I'll be interested to see what effect the equipment raising at Hinksey and Maidenhead has over the coming years - Hinksey of course also had the track level raised.

A question...would the signalling configuration permit temporary stabling at the Tiverton Junction loops so that all timetabled services could call at Tiverton Parkway? And even if this was possible would there be any gain from so doing?

And to repeat a previous assertion of mine - the situation at Cowley Bridge could be significantly improved by replacing the existing A377 embankment, which blocks nearly 70% of the Exe / Creedy floodplain width, with an elevated roadway. This would stop so much of the wet stuff being diverted onto the railway. It would also tie in quite nicely with the large amount of work currently being done by the EA to mitigate the flood risk further south.


 

That work was a relatively low cost solution, and it works!

Proven, achievable and cost effective.  This is precisely the kind of thing NR should be rolling out nationwide.  But instead they are talking of things like "the digital railway".   

Not that there is anything wrong with a "digital" railway, of course!

But the digital railway is a solution to a different problem - capacity and service recovery. So that cannot be compared.

The "digital railway" is probably a lot cheaper than actually laying new track and physically expanding the network. Once the "digital railway" has been implemented and we out grow that what do we do next?  Money needs to be invested now in expanding the current network to make it fit for purpose for the next 20 years, not short term fixes.
You try and cram more trains onto the network you've got to cut down turn around times at terminus stations. The more trains you try and cram on the longer it will take to recover the service after any kind of failure.   

I thought the digital railway meant giving passengers the finger...

 :o ;D

............that's hardly new, it's been the attitude for decades!!!  :D

Best of all do do both. 

Still the digital railway will not stop the track being washed away in the floods

Hmm.  Perhaphs NR could stick a digit in to plug the leak in the river exe........ :P

Well it did last one day  ::)

no it is fine where it is needed, but if you are going to roll something out nationwide, then weather resilience makes more sense (because the whole country gets weather) than the digital railway (because the capacity benefits that brings will not be needed everywhere and on some routes extra capacity could be provided by the traditional means of adding an extra carriage).   

.....deja vu?  :(   http://m.plymouthherald.co.uk/trains-to-plymouth-cancelled-as-large-waves-hit-dawlish/story-29940904-detail/story.html

From that Plymouth Herald (http://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/trains-to-plymouth-cancelled-as-large-waves-hit-dawlish/story-29940904-detail/story.html) report:


There's the answer, then: don't try to use Voyagers through Dawlish.  ::) :o :-X

What is the likelihood of the new GWR bi-modes surviving the Dawlish spray? I do not know whether it was a pure coincidence, but one of the recent late night test runs of the new train was cancelled on the same night that high winds coincided with a high tide at Dawlish.

If they don't work in those conditions Hitachi are in breach of contract.  IIUC it is a specific contract requirement.

I don't think we know, really, what specification was agreed by GWR and Eversholt with Hitachi for these AT300s. It might not be the IEP version, which is in any case pretty vague:

Though you'd think they would need to be fit for the route they were obtained for.

Was on an HST heading to Penzance going past Dawlish a few years ago when there were high seas and a strong wind. Driver said we'd be waiting for a lull in the waves before moving on so would be there a couple of minutes. The children in the American family sitting around the table opposite me said they wanted to smell the sea air. So Mum Dad and the two children go out to the vestibule to get a good snort of the Devon atmosphere. A couple of very large waves later they came back drenched to the skin but I wasn't disappointed though they lived up to their stereotype. There was the usual whooping and comments about a wild ride I associate with those from the USA. The mother had to quickly go to the ladies and put another top on because she was now sporting the wet t-shirt look.

 :o :P ;D

The sea was starting to look a bit rough when I passed around 1pm yesterday - and that was just after low tide.

(http://www.mbob.co.uk/rforum/dawl2811.jpg)

Lots of delays and alterations from/to the Westcountry today due to "slippery rails"............is this because of leaves or that other rare and extreme atmospheric phenomenon in the UK, weather that is a bit chilly/frosty?  ???

leaves. NR don't appear to have done aas good a job as recently. I think one of their units has suffered a failure?

Probably a bit of both.  In other words, frosty leaves.  Some of the worst slipping I've encountered actually came on a fairly benign but cold autumn morning with little wind and no overnight rain at all.  Leaf residue coated in a hard frost meant the railhead was very treacherous though making rather a mockery of the adhesion forecast of 'yellow' for that day.

It depends on the train, too. Our leaf problems seem to be over now, and in any case it wasn't Wokingham where the slippage mostly happened, it being pretty level anyway. But I heard one train struggling for adhesion tonight - 34046 Braunton, as it happens, on a rare planned stop here.

Which is  reminder that whatever the problems now, they were far worse with steam. Or they would have been with trains of today's length - I don't suppose anything the length of the Cathedrals Express stopped at Wokingham, as the platforms only held four coaches. Even now the 10-car extension is still being built, so there's less than 160 m allowing for the loco + friends behind the signal sighting line.