Great Western Coffee Shop

Many people travelling by train are choosing to do so, rather than by car, for environmental reasons, and are also very switched on to the "plastic-free" message. However few if any stations have a tap where people can easily fill up a water bottle. It would be great if each station had an easily accessible tap for drinking water. It doesn't need to be a complicated fountain, just an outside tap, and if there is concern about water wastage, staff could turn the supply off overnight.

Already one in between the ladies and the gents in the Temple Meads subway. Very slow flow and nearer to warm than lukewarm. Not recommended. The fountains I encountered in Rome last week, in even more arid conditions, were cold clear and with a good strong flow. The plastic bottle merchants between the Vic Em monument and the Colloseum had very very few takers.

Is that the/a water fountain trumpeted by Network Rail last month, or a predecessor tap?

https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/passengers-take-on-plastic-with-refill-revolution - press release dated 18th June 2019.



Welcome to the forum, Johnp1234 . 

Chuffed's answer above starts to answer you (and show some thought has been given to this) for the very largest 20 or so stations in Great Britain. But the other 2500 or so are under the management of franchised train operating companies, all of which (except Cross Country) manage the stations at which they're the predominant or only operator.

In our own neck of the woods, GWR operate 207 stations and they too are aware of the desire to reuse bottles - at the recent Community Rail conference they were handing the out, and indeed I have one on my desk as I write.  However, there's a considerable issue in actually providing suitable water to fill the bottles at many stations.

As an example, there is no water main onto the platform at my home station of Melksham. As and when safety briefed volunteers look after the planters there, they tend to have to carry water with them when they come to the station, or beg water from a couple of the local businesses which neighbour the station. Speaking with others right across Great Britain, this is a far from unique situation - indeed, I suspect it applies to the majority of stations.  I would suspect, though, that the smaller stations are worse off.

Carrying on with my example, there's a building that the Melksham Rail User Group would very much like to see in use as a cafe and with toilets, information, etc - owned by Wiltshire Council and just across from the station.  However, even there, there's an issue because the water supply into the building is through old lead pipes and the lead content in the water is (I'm lead to understand) some eight time what is acceptable.  Fine for the loos, but not for a cafe or to drink.  I don't know if our problem is unique - but so much railway infrastructure dates back to the age of lead pipes and even where the old station has been demolished and something else put on top, the problem still exists.

Staff turning a tap off at night ... are you looking at staffed stations, and then ones that are staffed up into the evening  ;D - but having asked that, I would suggest that a vandal proof (next problem!) tap which is spring loaded and only supplied water when pressed would be the answer.

OK - that's my penneth - anyone one else with thoughts??


 

It's very easy to get bogged down on this issue which is what has happened in my home town of Bradford on Avon, where the Town Council secured funding for 3 new water fountains months ago, and even bought the fountains, but none are yet operating because they have tied themselves up in red tape.
The station at BoA must have a water supply from which staff fill their kettle, and fitting an outside tap is a few hours work for a plumber.
There are always reasons not to do things but we need to cut through the red tape and just do it on some issues.
If we want more people to travel by rail, which is absolutely the right way to go compared to travelling by car, we need to make life easy and promote the full range of environmental measures to help people make the right choices.
ps. thank you for letting me post on this issue!

To answer your question grahame, the Temple Meads tap is the much trumpeted one by Network Rail. Methinks, they should have consulted the Romans who knew a little more about the storage and transportation of water. Indeed I think one or two of their 11 aqueducts in and around Rome are still in use today !

I agree that provision of a drinking water tap should not be complicated in most cases.
Vandal resistant taps are not hard to source or expensive. Almost all stations have a mains water supply, if not on the platform then at some other part of the station.

Useful not just for humans but also for dogs.

There's a phone app available called Refill which shows the locations of free water fountains around the country. There's some information about it here:

https://refill.org.uk/get-the-refill-app/ (https://refill.org.uk/get-the-refill-app/)

As an example it shows that one is available on Platform 12 at PAD.

It's not just water fountains the app will point you to. Several well known brands will also fill up your bottle from their taps for free. eg. Costa, Starbucks, Wetherspoons etc. Don't know if every outlet will do this but the app is very useful in pinpointing your nearest options.

From last month's GWR Community Rail conference

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/water1_cr.jpg)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/water2_cr.jpg)

Now - perhaps we should look to the time when these are a daily site and people ask "why are you posting another picture of a GWR water bottle"?

The second picture says 'Engaging communities in their railways".  Should alternate bottle say "Engaging railways in their communities", or is there enough of that already?