Great Western Coffee Shop

Bit late but have been away for the weekend.

Friday afternoon trying to get home early ready for a weekend away so arrived at Oxford in good time to buy a ticket and catch the 1520 service to Worcester.

Train replaced by a 166 turbo, apologies made by announcements but we all just about got onboard with standing in the door entrances and along the middle of the
carriages.

After waiting 10min, announcement the the train is waiting for a TM , 5min later, this train is cancelled due to lack of a TM , please go to the information desk where alternate road transport HAS been arranged (very quick work I thought^..) so 200+ passengers move across the footbridge to the information desk.

Chaos ensues^..attempt made to arrange black cabs to the furthest stations, but half the passengers are still making their way across the bridge, as soon as the black cab drivers waiting in the taxi rank realise what is happening the queue of taxis vanishes.

Attempt made to get coaches but now nearly 4pm on a friday afternoon this was never going to happen, so they tried to arrange 20+ private cabs.

The next train along the cotswold line is the 1649 service from Oxford (1552 from paddington) which is infamous for its overcrowding on fridays so staff were keen to keep us waiting for the taxis, but by 1640 it was obvious that a journey by road was going to take longer than waiting for the next train so probably 25% of the passengers remaining who had not got on a taxi yet squeezed onto the 1649.

Just as the train was leaving the taxis started arriving at the station, the one for Charlbury arrived in Charlbury just as those passengers on the train were walking away from the station.

Given that they must have known about the shortage of staff at least an hour in advance (when the train departed Paddington) it would have been much more helpful to advertise part cancellation in advance, especially with the gap in services before the next train of almost 90min.

Probably ended up with a 100min delay on a 20min journey.

And cancelled again today (9 June) due to a train fault. Presumably the notorious 1552 PAD:WOS service will be expected to pick up a fair chunk of the displaced passengers.

[later edit] - seems there was another class 180 failure as the 1552 was a turbo... to say it was cosy would be an understatement.

From what I saw yesterday taxis were displaced for 1W41 15:20 from Oxford and yes 1W47 was a 3 166. Today there seems to be yet more problems as 1P27 09:01 from Oxford to Paddington is a turbo vice 180 however the weather is rather warm as of recent.