Great Western Coffee Shop

Nothing has moved between Reading and Twyford for the last 90 minutes as of 09:50 today.

Major disruption on all services in the area as a result.  Will take many hours to get back to normal.

Just had the good news at work that my request for a job move from London to Reading (much nearer my home) has been accepted although it won't happen until the end of the year.

In a way I'll be sorry to no longer travel regularly by train but I've well and truly come to the end of my tether. I know this sort of thing is not FGW's fault (although their level of customer service in such situations can be quite lacking) but I've had enough. I really have had enough.

Yep pretty hopeless this morning, turfed off at Maidenhead around 0830 and told to speak to staff on platform (naturally there were none to be seen), another train arrived about 0900 which everyone boarded but only to hear the driver warning of further lengthy delays so gradually everyone disembarked - hung around for an hour or so listening to sporadic "apology" type announcements which were just about audible albeit in a very heavy foreign accent, went for a coffee and having checked FGW website realised that nothing much was moving so decided to take advantage of local buses which were allegedly accepting tickets and work from home...........bus arrived, driver knew nothing about ticket acceptance however was sensible enough to take the word of the dozen or so unhappy customers who boarded.

Agree with BBM, customer service not brilliant, much staring at screens and scratching at chins when asked what is going on although one lady was proactive enough to be directing people to local bus services.

I escaped the London commute a few years ago and now only have to go as far as Reading however that too is often a rollercoaster ride as it was today - several v important meetings missed, however only saving grace was that Boss (coming from other direction) was also caught up in the same problem so sympathises!!!

Hope it gets sorted out before the evening peak, good luck all!

And now also delays between Bath and Chippenham due to a lineside fire.

Yet another bad day in FGW land!

The signalling between London and Reading, especially around Maidenhead and Twyford, appears to be totally unfit for purpose with, I would estimate, at least one significant issue per week along with many minor delays.  I am left pondering if the planned upgrades (Crossrail and electrification) have meant that focus has been moved from BAU maintenance and replacement (I'm not suggesting that safety is compromised here, just that these issues regular may have been resolved if there were not bigger plans to upgrade the infrastructure in the future).  Very few evening peak trains reach Reading on time, I have heard stories of commuters being delayed for 5 of 5 weekly journeys on a semi regular basis, I am usually on the 6.05 Frome service and get off at Twyford, this rarely arrives/departs Twyford on time and the connection to the Henley service is usually only made by the platform staff at Twyford going against company policy and delaying the Henley train.

I understand that FGW get compensation from Network Rail when infrastructure issues create significant delays.  I also wonder if the compensation received is greater than the cost of such delays (overtime and customer compensation) to the extent that FGW are not unhappy with the situation, especially as they approach the end of their franchise?  If this is not the case why don't FGW demand that the issue be resolved, obviously, that could be happening behind the scenes but I have seen no public comment by FGW that would suggest this is happening?

Don't get me started on how FGW manage the fallout and passenger communications when this happens.  Staff at Paddington seem to rely on the public aps on their smart phones for information rather have confidence in what they are being told by FGW and train managers either hide from passengers or make the "I don't know why" announcements regarding delays.

I am assured that it is, and the public won't be told generally, as there is a non-slagging off in public agreement between rail bodies/operators

If FGW are trying to address this behind the scenes I suggest they need to re-think how they are doing this as the problem is not new and is getting worse not better....

I hear it is at the highest level :-)

..........then you can be assured that nothing will happen..............this problem has been ongoing for years and nothing ever seems to resolve it, I suspect that resolution was always going to be tricky/expensive and so it has been deferred and deferred.......I for one agree with Silver that Crossrail is now being prioritised at the expense of everything else and that FGW/NR are happy to suck it up in the meantime with the usual platitudes.

With the honourable exception of individual members of staff, the concept of "Customer Service" is completely alien to FGW, I too have seen staff not only at Paddington looking up information on their own smartphones rather than being able to advise customers themselves...........and now the weather is getting slightly warmer I'm pretty sure we'll have a load of delays/cancellations due to "poor rail conditions" by the end of the week..............

fyi, customer facing staff have mostly been issued with company BlackBerrys - so if that's what you see, they ain't personal....

Nope, it is normally the Train Times ap on iPhone/Android or similar that I see them using and several have told me is far more accurate/timely than the information they receive from their employers.

Ditto, I was told exactly the same thing by two FGW employees.

This stretch of line is being resignalled.  You will see new equipment cupboards and buildings appearing over the next few months.  The existing signalling is not immune to 25kv overhead electrification.

FGW's Twitter account now reporting signal failure at PAD affecting platforms 9-14.

Yep got kicked off the 6.05 Frome on p10 and moved to another train on p5. Running late into Twy now.

Of course it works both ways.  I arrived at Paddington to 20:22 expecting to get the 20:45 and ended up on a late running 20:00 to Swindon.

I've learned (a while ago) to check the trains before leaving work (or the area around there) for Paddington.. It saves on needless time spent there when I can be in the office/pub with friends near work whilst I wait for the delays to sort themselves out  :)

I've seen track gangs laying new cabling and installing cable troughing as well as replacing track mounted equipment such as AWS magnets and TPWS grids all along the Thames Valley routes so there is work going on.  I think large sections of the route have already moved over to axle counters as well which are supposedly more reliable than Track Circuits.   CrossRail will be using the same infrastructure though, track and signalling, as we have now to Reading so there's not really argument that's it been abandoned.  If the infrastructure isn't sorted soon and we have failures like today then with the number of trains planned the outcome will be far worse.  A failure in 5 or 10 years and the backlog of trains will be massive before control even realise there's a problem.

As for the lack of information, to be honest, that's never going to change regardless of the operator.  When you've got nearly a combined total of 60 trains arriving and departing Paddington every hour at the height of the rush that's a heck of a lot of trains and staff to reorganise and as a result provision of information will suffer as the emphasis is on getting the service recovered.  There's a lot of things that need to be considered, it's not a case of simply picking a train and then running it.  Passengers don't realise that a signal failure like at Twyford this morning will affect the entire FGW network, as far afield as Penzance and it will last most of the day. 
Platform staff will not get information other than what is on the screens or being announced over the PA because there's simply not a effective way of doing so when there's so many trains and changes involved.  Plans change within minutes.  By the time staff receive information by whatever means, it'll be incorrect, and they can't be expected to remember the status of every single train that is affected.  There's certainly no point in abusing staff which we've seen plenty of today.   A controller hasn't got time to inform every single member of staff.

The cost to FGW is big though.  Overtime, taxis (our taxi bill is staggering, the furthest I've been sent in a taxi is from Swansea back to Paddington just to work one train). increased fuel usage, right down to contractors that come into the depot to carry out specialist work like UATs or air con work to find there trains aren't there. 

Staff have been issued with Company Blackberry(s). On these phones there are several staff/internal apps. TyrellCheck, Customer Assistance and Rail Replacement are the apps.

I have also heard that it is quicker and more accurate information via the apps, CCLDB and tyrell rather then relying on the CSL2 manager to distribute info.
Info has to come from Swindon to the next level manager which then takes time to distribute it to local Duty Manager who in turn takes time to radio it over to the staff that have radios. Quicker to get it yourself off tyrell.

There is indeed an agreement that there is to be no slagging off other TOCs/NeR in public.

One tool I've found useful recently is the FGW Twitter account @JourneyCheckFGW. It's been going for a few months but it appears to be somewhat unannounced and experimental, as the account page says: "This is a test of an RSS to Twitter feed of the First Great Western JourneyCheck service." Last night on my way to PAD, after having seen that the 1706 was cancelled, I received the very welcome and timely message that the 1703 would stop additionally at TWY. I hope this service can be developed and made more public, at the moment the account only has 311 followers compared to 104,000 on the main FGW one!

Yes, I found that a while ago - SWT has a similar feed.

..........judging by the content on the FGW twitter feed after yesterday's dual fiascos I would imagine those who maintain it are feeling pretty battered and bruised today - well done to them for maintaining the service in the face of a lot of angry/upset customers, they were far more informative and up to date than anything at stations yesterday! 

The problem with those Blackberries is they have quite a small screen which isn't much use for navigating internet sites like Genius.  I haven't seen the other staff apps so I can't really comment on how easy they are to find information & navigate.
What they need though, and there is talk of it, is something like an Pad mini with a much bigger screen.

Let's hope the focus is on fixing the underlying issue rather than simply managing the fallout from this by giving staff iPads!  That said better information flows to employees would help a lot.

The point that is often missed is that the promised improvements to signalling etc. have been in the works for many years.  Passengers, who pay a large proportion of our salaried to use this service, need some convincing that the service will improve given that we have been promised these fixes and they are yet to materialise and our experience is that things are getting worse not better.  Crossrail is still a few years away, are we to expect that the service will continue at the current level or deteriorate until that comes on-line?

I said yesterday that in my experience we have, on average, a major incident every week.  Well yesterday we had two separate incidences one in the morning and the other in the evening which rather proves that point.  Whilst I would never support passengers abusing staff etc. I understand the many years of pent-up frustration can result in this happening.  It is never acceptable but FGW need to understand why this happens and take some accountability by both ensuring the underlying issue is addressed and staff receive information and training to be able to deal with problems. 

I was late for both morning and evening appointments yesterday as is frequently the case, I get no compensation as a season ticket holder as thresholds for discounts seem to magically just be achieved no matter how bad the service is on the ground.  I now arrange my diary based on the expecting to be late e.g. the first direct train from Henley should get me to my desk for 8.30, but if I know I need to be at my desk for 8.30 I get an earlier train and normally drive to Twyford and pay to park as the connection can be a bit flaky.  If I have an evening appointment that I need to be at I arrange to work from home or leave mid-afternoon, yesterday I didn't do either and I was late - fortunately this was only a social catch-up.

......more than anything yesterday highlights the lack of resilience in the system all around.....generally (very generally) speaking in my experience the overall service is acceptable in terms of reliability, however recently there have been a lot more signal/train failures & it seems that it only takes one thing to happen to totally throw everything into chaos, and every time it's the same story, a virtually non existent service for hours, staff who don't know what is going on and/or disappear at the first sign of any disruption.

It was pointed out that a recent problem was caused near Slough by a cable dating back to 1969 being "disturbed" - with all this engineering work that is going on, why is 45 year old kit still being relied upon? Surely that should be prioritised for renewal?

Suicides are different, there's nothing that can be done to prevent someone who is that determined..............but leaves falling off trees? Weather being too hot/cold?

You would perhaps have thought that there would be some sort of high profile apology and/or explanation today from fgw together with instructions on how to get compensation but there is nothing - at least not on their website or at Reading this morning.

Here's a radical suggestion - link FGW/NR pay rises and bonuses to customer satisfaction figures - you'd be surprised how quickly resources would be found and attitudes would change!

And watch the employees get even worse as they wont care. Why would an employee bust their backside if they know that the customers will always remember the single bad incident and not the normal okay days. The NPS figures are not as reliable as they used to be.

Remember customers always moan about something, if its about air conditioning not working on trains that are c.1970s, or the train being 2 mins late or the fact they cant use their network railcard at 0726 on a Tuesday.

Now of course if executive grade staff started loosing pay including NeR based on performance, PPM and RTR.............

I do believe that the "enabling work" for crossrail and OHLE is what is causing these constant signalling problems.


In regards to 1969 kit still being used, if it works, is working then why fix it? Stuff that was purchased back in those days was built to last more then 15 years. These days NeR buy the cheapest crap they can find which lasts around 10 years and then its in a different CP so don't care.

So do I....disturbing kit/cables that have lain (probably undisturbed since installation) after 40 years is bound to cause problems....


To prevent the kind of disturbance that we're discussing? Called Preventative Maintenance....NR don't believe in it. At all. That's what caused the fire in the Marylebone tunnel too.

To prevent the kind of disturbance that we're discussing? Called Preventative Maintenance....NR don't believe in it. At all. That's what caused the fire in the Marylebone tunnel too.
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......absolutely right - "let's wait until it goes wrong and then try to fix it" summarises one of the major problems...........prevention is always better, safer (and normally cheaper) than cure.

and "customers always moan about something" succinctly sums up the general attitude of the the organisations involved to their customers.

As far as customers always remembering the "single" bad incident (well there was two yesterday!!!), customer satisfaction figures would be smoothed over a year to account for particularly bad periods..........incentives can be provided for good performance, and if the employees genuinely "won't care" - firstly re-train them, then discipline them, then sack them if necessary, and employ those who understand what it is to work in a public service industry, where the customers pay their wages.

That's how the real world works.

It doesn't  help that a lot of the 1960s resignalling cables on the ex BR-WR are buried.  I'm sure we will suffer quite a few more cable strikes whilst the electrification mast piling work is underway :P

Mega apologies now appearing on the NR LCD screens at major stations.

Are you really saying that the railways don't use CAT scanners to identify buried utilities or undertake other due diligence before piling operations?! Even when it is a known fact that there are buried cables?

Searching for "journeycheck" on Twitter brings up...FGW, ATW, FCC, SWT, TPE, FSR, GA, VT, LM. Don't know if they're all live or if I've missed any. It's @JourneyCheck followed by the abbreviation above without spaces.

TaplowGreen
I agree with bribes incentives for staff who do a good job. Thing is there needs to be consistency. Some Managers will give an employee a ^10 Argos voucher for assisting in an incident off duty, and others would say "Tough your in uniform get on with it, Sorry you want Overtime as well?!!!" If you respect your staff they will respect you.

I know of another TOC (Which isnt FGW btw) who would send personalised thank you letters to each employee involved in a major disruption (What would know be a CSL2 Severe Red or Black). These would be inked signed by the then Disruption Manager and it would also include a voucher to redeem or save up. e.g. Points make prizes.

But you need managers who respect their staff. If you respect the staff and not treat them like........ then they will respect you back. If you get a manager with no experience straight out of uni who then starts telling a staff member of 10 years experience how do you think they are going to feel? Also customers need to respect the staff (which is never going to happen) your more likely to get the answer you want.

........much rhetoric about staff respecting each other and customers respecting staff, however I note you omit any requirement for staff to respect customers? Was this accidental or just indicative of a prevailing mindset amongst staff?

There is a vast amount of Plan Preventative Maintenance done, most of it at night in the dark when the trains are not booked to run while all the "customers" are tucked up in bed.

There is also a huge investment in live remote condition monitoring, every point machine, point heater, every signal, power supplies, is being connected up to monitoring centre where proactive response can be made before hopefully something fails (of course there will still always be some kit failures).  Then there are the NMT's (New Measurement Trains) the yellow trains you see traveling around, they collect vast amounts of data that aids the focusing of maintenance and repair.

Yes staff do get trained and retained for managers and team leaders the place is called "Westworld" errrrrrr I mean Westwood an in house training facility that is recognised by the of the rest of the industry as being industry leader and is envied by them, there has also been major investment in front line training schools, Paddock Wood, Basingstoke, Walsall to name a few; and NR's apprentices get their first year training at HMS Sultan by the same organisation that trains the Royal Navy!



Yes CAT scanning is done.  The team doing the piling would know the cables are there a trial hole will have been dug.  With the age of the cables a direct strike may not be needed to cause them to fail.

To be quite honest with you, if buried cable has been located there isn't much excuse for damaging them.

Are the pilings being installed by rotary or percussion methods? If either of those methods, considering the depth of the piling is so shallow, disturbs these signalling cables then in my opinion (and yes I do know quite a bit about piling and drilling boreholes...) the cables must be in an alarmingly delicate state of repair!!

Respect is a two-way street. If you're not willing to give it, then you definitely don't deserve it.  Unfortunately there's a minority of passengers who don't understand that principle and think that being abusive and aggressive from the outset is going to achieve something. 
I'd happily help out anyone who is polite and reasonable where I can.  Someone at the other end of the scale, not a chance.

I am sorry to report that I have witnessed a couple of cases in which passengers behaving in a rude, aggressive or threatening way HAS produced the desired result, though of course I would still not condone such behaviour.

In one case large "fines" were being imposed, unreasonably in my view, on board a train. Those passengers who behaved in a calm and polite fashion had to part with several hundred pounds.
Those who behaved more aggressively and threatened to "deal with" the RPIs were not "fined"

I am not sure the signalling issue at Twyford was Electrification  related, the GW Electrification works are not that far East yet and Crossrail is between Maidenhead and Burnham.  Unless it was trial hole digging that caused it.

The piles used are steel tubular dia approx. 750mm length 5 metres upwards, they are driven by a vibration manipulator fitted to an RRV, and that this cannot drive in they bring out a bigger "hammer"

A "narrow" thought, not looking at people in general, but at members.  On the forum here, our members do show a respect back and forth between staff and passengers.   The very act of staff members signing up and answering questions from passengers is in itself a tremendous positive acknowledgement of the passengers - THANK YOU to those staff members; not said enough, but "we appreciate you".

Passengers asking question here - and that includes new sign-ups with a "What the $%^&" first post are also seeking and respecting the information coming back from the staff.

And, for everyone, what a positive attitudinal difference it makes to be aware of the metrics of the other "side" - to be understanding in the circumstances of things not running perfectly, and perhaps being able to make better travel decisions too based on the understanding of what's going on.

Only missed the point by about a mile and reinforces my impression of the culture which exists, still in the dark ages........ It always amazes and amuses me in equal parts how so many of the servants of the "railway industry" clearly regard paying customers as an inconvenience to be tolerated at best, treated with contempt at worst...I really think you'd prefer it if you could run empty trains all day without pesky passengers being part of the equation..........but then again there would be no-one to pay your wages?  ;)

You're going to have to help me here.  Where about's have I suggested that?  Come and spend a day in the life of a member of platform staff


Some days yes!!!!  :D

Electrification is nearly all the way from Didcot to Tilehurst with stantions already erected.  They have been vegetation clearing through Sonning Cutting the past few days in readiness for piling.  Plus there is the odd piece of piling in the Taplow to Burnham area with upgrade work and additional piling carried out on the existing electrified sections from Hayes

That's one of the reasons why I believe RPIs and TMs should carry body cameras to ensure consistency. 

THe fitrst thing someone of that ilk would do is to spit on the camera lens....wouldn't be much use in reality

Im all for all customer facing staff to carry cameras and also make it very obvious they are cameras as well. Easier to prosecute the abusive customers. Spitting on the lens would still be an offence, and can be very easily wiped off.

If you, the customer, start respecting the staff instead of treating them as something you've stepped in and stop preaching "I have a gold card wipe my backside" then maybe the staff might actually care for you. If something goes wrong and a passenger comes up to a staff member and starts preaching about how they pay the wages, have a gold card, etc etc they are likely to only do the bare minimum for them.
If you are polite to them, not abusive, then it is likely they will go out of their way to help.

TaplowGreen
It seems from your posts that you are one of the people who would treat staff with contempt to get your own way, you are the only one who mentions paying the wages of staff. If thats one thing that seriously narks off staff that's the "I pay your wages" comment, and you wonder why staff have to respect for customers. Im sure you do not pay in excess of ^25k a year for a ticket, so as such you do not pay for just the wages of one individual member of staff.

Still?.....what offence would that be? (serious Q, not referring to any abuse here, and NOT generally spitting at the person wearing it, but directly at the camera)

Spitting on person = common assault
Spitting on camera = criminal damage

Merseyrail have used body cameras for years, with high successful prosecution rates as a result.

I'm not condoning rude behaviour by anyone, but I have long thought that passengers are frustrated by the lack of adequate compensation for delays and lack of service.  If a passenger is inconvenienced but knows that they will receive adequate compensation after the event then they are more likely to go upon their merry way without hassling staff, or at least stand grumply but in silence.  In my view TOC's hide behind their frontline staff in this regard.
If you take TFL as an example how often do you see their staff being hassled and abused?  I'm sure it happens but I've never seen it, or been tempted to involve myself in 'discussions'.  Instead you can get the full cost of your ticket back for a 15min delay.  Simples.

oooh, I have. And I have serious concerns about the use of the BTP as a 'weapon', even after simple disagreements.

Witnessed twice now....

Disagreement (no verbal or physical threats made - purely some disagreement between (over-zealous on one occasion) platform staff and passenger. Both resulted in Staff member radioing for BTP. Next thing - tannoy announcement for BTP member to attend. Passenger arrested regardless & interviewed off-site. Offered myself as witness both times. Call from BTP later. After my quick phone interview (obviously backing up passenger's story), turns out both passengers had been de-arrested, with no further action.

On asking the BTP officer whether they felt their time had been wasted, they both agreed. Suggested that in itself was a criminal offence, both BTP officers took my point, and I suspect TfL staff are shortly to be reminded that the BTP are for staff safety - fine if they are physically / verbally threatened, but NOT for sorting out staff/passenger disagreements.

Oh, that was twice in a little over a week at two different stations. The officers said it was happening on an almost daily basis on the tube. Hope it doesn't catch on on the railways

I kind of disagree, if I feel my safety is being jeopardised I'd call for the BTP rather then wait to be assaulted or abused first

If a member of the public was in the same position, it would be seen as I stated if one called 999.

In the two situations I witnessed - as I said, no raised voice, no verbal or physical threat, purely disagreements.

The BTP were in my (and the BTP felt the same) view, being used as a weapon against these customers, the staff members well knowing that it results in arrest & questions, and a big waste of customers time. Just to get their own back. It's happened to me in the past too, and if it ever happens again, I shall be pressing a complaint through the BTP that there time was deliberately wasted. And with LU against said member of staff.

It is plainly unfair on customers to have to go through automatic arrest like that.

In response to a few recent posts on here can I just say that I would never condone rudeness, shouting, sarcasm, contempt, condescencion, threats or any other antisocial behaviour towards railway staff under any circumstances, no matter what the delays.

I have worked in Customer Service/Client Management from very junior up to very senior levels in various sectors in both Private and Public sector for over 25 years often in circumstances far more fraught than on a railway platform, so I have a good idea of the challenges that both side face.

In my (almost 20 years) as both a commuter and long distance rail traveller I have seen pockets of excellence from individuals going the extra mile to help, as well as poor service ranging from outright rudeness to indifference - overall, I would say that Customer Service in the rail industry is below average - I think this is in large part due to public service organisational culture - ie you've got no choice but to use (for example) FGW so like it or lump it, and a failure to appreciate that there is more to good Customer service than just dealing with complaints - there is no motivation to use it to enhance the customer experience as there is no real competition or incentive to do so.....there are also a lot of hidebound old fashined attuitudes to customers  which really have no place in 2014 and would not be tolerated in a more dynamic environment....expecting your customers to "respect" you is a moot point - politeness and reasonable behaviour should be the norm, but customers are paying for a service and those working in public service industries have chosen a role where they are going to face frustrated customers at times when that service isn't delivered and really need to be up to dealing with this professionally or perhaps ask themselves whether they are in the right job?

Anyway, lets hope we don't have too many more days like Monday and that FGW/NR learn the lessons........not overly hopeful on that I have to say!

I'm not going to claim this didn't happen, I wasn't there etc but when we call the BTP out to an incident, even if its just a heated argument or a drunk and disorderly all they normally do is have a word and try to diffuse the situation.  Even on occasions when we've wanted individuals or groups removed from the station or arrested they haven't done so!!  In 15 years I've seen the BTP make two arrests.  One punch up between passengers on a station and the second time is when a drunk person couldn't get a seat, started verbally abusing the CH, starting smashing up the buffet car, assaulted the TM and then decided to sit down on the tracks in front of my train.... and even then it took them a while to finally arrest him!!
Even if there's been an assault of some description the BTP don't just show up tasers armed and arrest someone straight away on the instruction of a member of staff, again that's my experience, you've obviously had other and I'm not doubting that.
Everytime they make an arrest its paperwork for them, if they can avoid it they will sometimes to our dismay!

I suspect its different on TfL and the railway? That's my experience at least. Both cases - at Baker Street & Liverpool Street, both were summarily arrested and taken off. Of course release means you are somewhere just off Oxford Street....

In the case I was involved directly in a while ago now, there is a Managers office at this station & we were both taken & separated there. No arrest. It turns out the staff member had previous for complaining...

Probably eyeing a few days off with stress!!!

Common assault, which is the usual offence selected, requires a compulsary arrest.  For the record, common assault doesn't just mean that someone hit someone, but is valid if someone has cause to feel threatened.

I know, the Crossrail electrification piling is only as far West as 23 or 24 mile post and the GW electrification piling is on as far east as Kennet Junction around 34 mile post, there is approx. 10 mile gap between piling, it could due to trial pits or it could be totally un related to electrification.


As a general comment about -

No one not matter what business they are employed in should have to put up with verbal or physical abuse for a customer or client; it is not the employee on the train, platform, ticket office, barrier line that has caused the delays to the service most of the time they are doing the very best to find out what is going on and to assist people who are less able to assist themselves (and does include drunkards in suits)

No one in the rail industry sets about to see what chaos they can cause to the travelling public

Totally agree - but some appear to be clouding that with having a disagreement & getting their own back when losing the discussion.

BTP based on TfL/LU are a completely different kettle of fish to the ones on NR.

TfL BTP will arrest and ask questions later, NR BTP try their hardest to get out of doing any work at all.

Oh and TfL fund BTP very very heavily. NR/ATOC pay the basic. Not that I'm implying that TfL give BTP arrest targets, and people get wrongfully arrested, no of course not!

In regards to spitting on camera, it's criminal damage. Spitting on a person is an assault oh and if the BTP were clever enough it would be an offence of "obstructing a railway servant exercising their duties" if carried out on railway land.

But is part of their duties to film customers?.....just in case?

Further to the no slagging off other railway companies/orgs. Heres a message from Mark.

"I will be signalling very clearly....." - I can see what he's done there!  ::)  but seriously he "will" be? why has it taken this latest fiasco for him to take some action? I doubt NR are exactly shaking in their shoes at the prospect.

I think there's a word missing ...."again"

He could probably save himself some time and cut and paste the email he sent the last time and the time before etc.....

.........do you think the "signalling" he will be using is maintained by Network Rail?

Just received...

Disruption has been reported between your selected stations London Paddington to Maidenhead.
- General disruption along the line caused by signalling problems may lead to delays after leaving .

So that worked well then.

Journey checker states -
 
My guess its likely to related to Monday morning fault.

Great, just great.... This should make for a pleasant journey home, currently showing 28C here in London.

I've decided its pub o'clock

Currently sat on a stopper out of reading stopping at every signal for a couple mins each. Appears to only be affecting the relief lines as the mains are running at full line speed

When I travelled from Reading to Maidenhead earlier only the main lines were open.. But that was just before five so not really peak..

I'm currently sat on the main line just outside of Pad. Theey are running normally. That is we moving very slowly between each signal as they seem to most days.

Out of interest, how well do the customer ambassadors work with providing information during disruption at Reading/Paddington?  They were employed as a pure customer service role afterall.

Whenever I've asked one for travel advice, usually about expected departure times during disruption of some sort, they usually just point/look towards the screens and claim they don't know any more than that...

My experience is that they are fairly ineffective during disruptions, although in fairness they are swamped with people, but do plenty of good work helping the less well informed when it's all going to plan.

Three signals on the UP relief were constantly flashing through all aspects (ie flashing red, yellow, red). 

The Customer Ambassadors or "Ribena Girls" the latter phrase being banned as apparently there are men Ambassadors, tend to be for "meet and greet" and to priority board groups or vulnerable people.

However when the s**t hits the fan and CSL2 is declared they become pretty useless ive been told. If it isnt on the blackberry or in their little book they become bemused as super guard has said.

Oh and they are on nearly ^30k a year to walk around looking pretty.
--

The issue was that signals were flashing or bobbing. Apparently the track circuits were bobbing which were making the signals go through the sequence constantly.
Oh and Up Relief closed due to a 4th signal failing. Two track railway contingency put in place.

That would be the relief lines?  Though perhaps "slow" is more descriptive this evening!  ;)

You should know the Great Western has to be different. Everywhere else calls them Fast and Slow. But no GW has to call them main and relief.

That's because they're all slow  ;)

Main slow and relief slow...  ;D

Another outstanding performance yesterday after Monday's fiasco.........maybe the flashing signals were FGW's CE signalling to Network Rail as he promised? "Help, the railway isn't working, what shall we do?" ::)

Further signalling problems at Hayes this morning delayed me by about 30 mins. 

This is proving to be a very bad week, my once per week average has now been blown out of the water.  We need four/five good weeks now to get it back down to that....

Track circuit failure at Airport Junction after a Connect passed through.  This results in that section of track basically showing as occupied and in turn locks the points in position.
There was also a bridge bash at Burnham this morning as well.

I understand that the "bridge bash" was actually frustrated customers banging their heads against the bridge in frustration after the appalling service this week continuing this morning!  ;D

It's quite possible.  Hopefully the run of failures has ended on the GWML now and gone somewhere else!  Liverpool Street got it bad this morning, a tree down on the overheads, a points failure at Liverpool and a lightning strike damaging signalling equipment at Romford!

And another lightening strike twixt Beaconsfield & Gerrards Cross on Chiltern

I don't now why, but signalling equipment seems to be very susceptible to lightning nowadays.  I'm sure it never use to be.

Does anyone know what the problem was at Twyford?

Cable fault, wasn't it?

Old signalling that consisted of mechanical semaphore signals, lit by oil lamps was immune to lightning damage except in the rare case of a direct strike on a signal box, and even that affected only a short length of line and could be worked around. Track circuits if used would be powered by local batteries.
Telegraph  communication with adjacent boxes was required for block working, but even if this failed a limited service could be run.
Mains electricity was not essiential, and in some cases was not even provided.


Modern signalling control centres control large areas and a single lightning strike, fire, cable theft etc can disable signals over a wide area.
As fewer and fewer ever larger control rooms take over ever larger parts of the network I suspect that large scale failures will become more numerous.

As signalling becomes a matter of computers - down to very small ones - sending data about, things ought to begin improving. It's true that light bulbs are more vulnerable than steel cables, and electronics still more so, but modern electronics has some protection built in at chip level and where wires go out into the world. More importantly, the longer-distance communications can be done via optical fibres - which are nearly immune to lightning - and using multiple alternative routes and IP networking. And if an electronics box is damaged, it's a standard module that can be swapped and customised for its task by a download. So the time and effort for repair come down sharply too.

I think all of these benefits should come in the GWML resignalling now underway, though not to the rest of the network until much later.

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh Estate Agent speak ......... do you between Beaconsfield & Gerrards Cross on Chiltern


Railways are very susceptible to direct lightning strikes due to the large amount of highly conductive material that runs for miles and indirect strikes.

While fibre optics does give a high degree of immunity to lightning there is a lot of local cabling from the fibre nodes to the signalling equipment on track, even if a fibre was taken direct to the remote devices (which it is not) there is still the power supplies that can get taken out by.

Even electrification is not immune to lightning dc rectifiers and track circuit breakers can flash over and 25kV track circuit breakers have been known to flash over as well.

I read this post last week feeling rather smug - we have heritage signalling in this part of the world.

Alas, today it's gone into meltdown. I arrived at Foregate St to catch the 07:00 to B'ham only to find the 06:14 HST to Padd'n still sitting in the platform.

Fortunately the unusual track layout at FS meant that the 07:00 could be sent through platform 2 so as to avoid Shrub Hill.

Here are a few broader comments about last Monday (14th). I was going to go from Wokingham, via Reading to join someone, then via Paddington to Ilford. I was a bit late in checking so when I found out that "sorry dear, trains are off" it meant a quick call to redirect my companion to get the 10:42 Waterloo train, which I joined at WKM.

There was no information about disruption at Wokingham - no signs, or announcements, or anything on the CIS. Since a lot of people go via RDG-PAD this seems odd. If I'd set off towards Reading and then found I had to come back again I would have been really cuniculus infelicissimus. "Not our railway" doesn't really apply - it is, and SWT sell tickets for it. The train was full, of course, and I had to stand. That was no surprise to us, but for a lot of those trying to board it along the way it was - again no information.

I did think about getting off at Staines and getting the next train from Windsor, trading minutes for being less crowded. In the end this looked more hassle than it was worth, since there was a lad with a bike in the way. He was being very good, holding it stood on its back wheel so it took up least space, but it was hardly a good idea. If we had stopped sharply it could have been quite messy. If cycles are not allowed on peak trains, and this one was far more crowded, I presume he could have been told to get off. Mind you, at Feltham space was found for a wheelchair, which seemed an odd choice of train. Of course that had to go on its booked service, and carriage, to get the ramp there for him to get off.

There could have been an announcement suggesting that people change trains at Staines, but there was none at all. Looking at the people waiting to get on, they had not been advised that they could pick another train. Of course I have no idea how many people would actually choose to be 15 minutes later just to be almost certain to get a seat.

Given the timescales, it is probably just not feasible for SWT to adapt their service to cope with displaced passengers. But they might make an effort to help their own customers, as well as the FGW refugees, avoid the worst consequences. Pontius Pilate, where is thy railway?

It looks like Twyford is having a day off and so the line down to Basingstoke has decided to break instead:

Cancellations to services at Reading
Owing to signalling problems at Reading fewer trains are able to run on Basingstoke bound lines.
Impact:  Train services running to and from this station may be cancelled or delayed by up to 10 mins at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.
Customer Advice:First Great Western Trains from Reading to Basingstoke will be running hourly instead of half-hourly.

Never one to be distracted by anything tangential - SQUIRREL! - I had to whizz that one through the Google TranslatyThing TM.

Interestingly 'cuniculus infelicissimus' translates as 'The mine, the poor' - after which I felt none the wiser, and not much better-informed.

Then I realised there may be some advantage in trying 'cuniculus felicissimus' - and lo! Out popped 'happy rabbit', as though from a hat. Now I understand what you mean; as is often the case with great art, it was worth a little investment to try to understand.

Lightning again today:

At Paddington now, things are pretty rammed. I don't know if this is normal for 4pm on a Friday.

I like how they're using a guy on a totally inadequate megaphone to give some information, instead of the PA system that would cover the entire station and let more than about 5 people hear. All I could make out is that ticket restrictions have been lifted.

I was at Twyford at the time of the lightning strike.  We had two or three flashes of lightning and a bit of thunder and suddenly this massive strike accompanied by a deafening clap of thunder.  Very frightening, I even ducked for some reason!

Believe SouthWest Trains are also suffering the effects of a lightning strike.

Yes, at Surbiton. Currently, their alerts page (and National Rail) says:

Oh dear.

I note that FGW do not list SWT as an alternative from Reading, though as far as I can see that is now running almost normally, though there were some effects of the problems at Waterloo.

Guessing the storm must be heading West.  Surbiton was the location of the lightning strike for SWT

When did it strike / the signalling fell apart?

My train has left Paddington (fortunately didn't have to join the scrum) but it is wedged. I'm guessing there almost certainly will be huge delays passing through Twyford. We're currently on the main line around Southall.

FGW reporting on Twitter no HSS until the: 1803 to WoE then hourly, 1830 to Bristol/Weston Super Mare then hourly, 1845 to South Wales then hourly.

It happened about 1515. We've seen control reports that a driver reported his train being struck as well.  Train has made it to Paddington though

The first down train to get caught was 1D43 Oxford, due past Twyford 15:17 but arrived 25 late.
The heaviest rain passed Twyford around 15:00, which fits. That's off the Met Office, which shows very little or no lightning there- but their map feature isn't working right at the moment.
Around Surbiton, both peaked around 14:00. And that's pretty well when the problems started.
The delays on Reading trains appear to be due to something else, starting earlier, around Ashford.

First of all, clearly absolutely no blame attached to FGW, NR etc for the lightning strike, that really is beyond their control (Bob Crow in a bad mood on high perhaps?)

But once again - no communication, no help for customers, no information.......I got to Reading station around 5 and was told to head for platform 13/14, 1714 showing on time (clearly wasn't going to happen but had encouraged all the customers to head in that direction), all the other information boards pretty hopeless......platforms already getting packed, seemingly no attempt at "crowd control".

I consciously looked around for staff - there was a single female on platforms 12/13 who was clearly struggling, seemingly no-one on 14, went back up the escalator to the footbridge and there were a grand total of 2 staff trying to help customers.........no sign of the Ribena brigade or anyone else.

I didn't see anyone being rude or impatient however obviously early days before the rush really got going - pointed out to one of the two aforementioned staff that if there wasn't an effort at crowd control soon then the platforms were going to start getting dangerously overcrowded - his response was "I know mate", I asked him if he was going to get more help and he smiled knowingly and said "They're all in the office", one or two on the gateline but that was about it..............so the choice was a pint or seven and hope for the best or a taxi home to Mrs TaplowGreen...........took the latter choice and am home, ^45 lighter............good luck to all trying to get home tonight.

Judging by the how they're describing the extent of the damage I would imagine disruption will run into tomorrow morning.

I got the "16:12 local from Padd, went started 30 late the driver stated it would go as far as Slough.  5 car which was rammed as far as West Drayton at least it was a 165 so the ventilation was ok while on the move.

As we departed West Drayton the driver announced the train would terminate a Maidenhead which it did an the ran back as stopper to Padd.  Lots of people at Maidenhead wanting to go toward Reading, the station staff were doing a good job given the info they had and were out on the platforms also reasonably regular PA announcements.

The guard on the 17:47 Marlow service was even out on platform 4 & 5 helping with passenger questions right up to the departure time which I think is very commendable of him.

It seemed as though at 17:30 ish at Maidenhead the were talking though HSS between Maidenhead and Twyford a couple of Down HST went through on the Down Relief.

Took about an hour to go through Twyford. Noticed that a couple of HSTs were waved through on the relief line before we could get through.

Hopefully there are decent connections at Plymouth that don't involve waiting for another delayed HST to Penzance..

I arrived at PAD at about 1645 expecting carnage but it was even worse than I expected. Eventually, for the sake of our health and our sanity, myself and two people I knew took a black cab from PAD to TWY which cost ^145 shared between the three of us. The car park at TWY still looked pretty full at about 1945, God knows where everyone was stuck. On the way one of my two friends drafted a resignation email to her boss, this particular straw broke the camel's back for her and she will now look for a more local job. My own job move to Reading doesn't happen until December, I've still got 5 more months of this...

Well, there's been loads of almost empty trains between reading and Waterloo, both ways. Running a few minutes late, though that's got nothing to do with SWT warning of 1-hour delays on all their routes. So, if Paddington trains are going to be an hour late and so full you'd rather not, why are FGW not directing people this way? Is it that most tickets are already valid, so they do not need to agree and announce acceptance on the route?

Whilst the lightning strikes are not the fault of the railway industry, it does seem that vulnerability to lightning is increasing.
I do not recall regular disruption on this scale back in the "good old days" this is the second major lightning induced disruption to Great Western services in only a few days.

Increasingly we seem to have a fair weather only railway, with limited periods of good service in between high winds bringing down trees, flooding washing away infrastructure, leaves causing the usual problems, and snow and ice. Add to that random lightning strikes and electrification works damaging cables and reliability seems to be declining.

Southwest trains have also been badly affected by the lightning strike hence they are not accepting tickets..........interestingly however there is actually a statement on their website apologising for the inconvenience to their customers as well as suggesting alternative means of transport on their routes which contrasts with FGW which just baldly states that services are severely disrupted.....judging by comments on the Twitter feed, Paddington is total chaos and even the BTP are disgusted with the way its being handled.........so glad I stuck my hand in my pocket earlier and got a cab home from Reading, tempted to apply for a refund but I'm pretty sure what response I'd get............sounds like a few cabbies will be ordering Aston Martins tomorrow!!!!!

Major signalling problems between London Paddington and Reading  -   Friday 25 July 2014
From FGW website at 2045......

"Services between London Paddington and Reading,Swindon, Bristol , West of England and South Wales are being severely disrupted due to major signalling problems in the Twyford area (between Reading and Maidenhead) due to an earlier lighting strike.

Customers travelling to and from London Paddington are advised that we are having in introduce a reduced timetable. South West Trains services from London Waterloo are experiencing similar problems to their service and we can only offer our customers ticket acceptance on Chiltern Services between London Marylebone and Banbury.

We are operating a reduced timetable of services , however, severe delays and alterations will continue until the end of today. Ticket easement on all First Great Western routes will remain in place until close of service this evening and ticketed dated today...."

................in other words folks, you're on your own!

It must be quite severe damage to quite a lot of equipment, reading early accounts by a-driver it would seem to be a direct strike.   This will have electrically stressed a lot of components there are only so many spare held by a MDU (Maintenance Delivery Unit) these days, the bean counters take a dim view of idle spares sitting on shelves; so I suspect there is a lot of NR vans flitting up and down motorways brining in spares, the same bean counters have also reduced the staffing levels so if it is a large amount of damage staff will have to be dragged in from other parts of the route in their vans with speed limiters on them, along summer Friday afternoon motorway traffic.

I am sure FGW and NR control and all the staff on the ground are trying their hardest to run some sort of service, but if there are several miles of signalling whipped out there is only so much they can do.

Taplow Green. See what I mean about the ribena brigade running away when the s*** hits the fan!

Also I'm hearing that BTP (as per normal) were actually causing more problems with already stressed out passengers and not using common sense. Telling people (not asking) to move down an already rammed service, and proper rammed  is going to p*** off people. Even threatening to arrest people for not moving is not good.

In the event, only two SWT services from WAT-RDG (14:50 and 15:10) were as much as 30 minutes late, then they were running 5-20 minutes late. Not good, but a lot better than FGW could do. In theory that would have been known within SWT by 17:00, but I can see that no-one may have been actively looking to tell FGW, nor at FGW looking to update the alternatives.

After all, SWT are still (23:10) telling their own passengers that serious problems affect all lines, and that FGW are accepting their tickets. No mention of the fact FGW were/are struggling to run any trains.

Experienced it first hand today, I have only been on the peripheries of any previous serious disruption.

I intended to leave Blackwater at 2pm today, but it got off to a bad start as I noticed the driver on the in cab phone/radio as he approached the station and we sat at Blackwater for 15 mins while he tried to fix the problem, eventually got going and made it to Wokingham where we were all turfed out into torrential rain as the train was taken out of service, as it could not run without the kit working. The train being taken out of service did not bother me so much but the lack of shelter on the platform meant that everyone went running for the footbridge, causing a complete bottleneck and I belive some people taking shelter at the top of the bridge missing the SW train that we were advised to join.

Met a friend for a late lunch but, ended up catching a HST about 16:30 calling additionally at twyford, maidenhead, slough and ealing Broadway, we ended up sitting at the platform at twyford for about 45mins, the gaurd did a reasonable job of walking up and down the platform to keep us updated but nobody really seemed to know what was going on, I got more info from this forum. Eventually arrived at maidenhead about 18:00.

Not a great day in FGW land today.

I was at Paddington last night and it was the worst I'd ever seen.  I saw the mass scrum towards the 18:30 train and decided to get a coffee instead and wait for the 19:30 hoping services would be getting back to normal.  The 19:30 was announced a few minutes late on platform 1, we all rushed there only to find a completely full train with the doors locked!  I'm guessing it was an earlier service which had been "re-branded" as the 19:30, as other posters have commented there was a complete lack of information.  I got the 19:45 to Plymouth instead as most of the Reading bound commuters were still on platform 1 wondering what had happened and I changed trains at Reading to get to Swindon.

There were frequent announcements over the tannoys that customers for Reading were advised to get the train from Waterloo, but seeing the "delays of up to one hour" on SWT website put me and I'm guessing a lot of other commuters off of that option.

Only bright side was that being one of the first onto the 19:45 (as the lights were off and the doors were locked until the last minute) I got a seat - which I promptly gave up to an elderly couple who were heading home from Belgium and had been travelling since 9am!

So what exactly is a lightening strike that affects miles of signalling? Is it a strike on the power supply to the signalling equipment (which presumably has surge protection), or on the lineside cables in the troughing (seems unlikely), or on the rails themselves which carry the track circuits? If the last, does replacing TC's by axle counters help to provide resilience against lightening strikes?  Maybe Electric Train or S&T Engineer can enlighten us.

edit - put "r" in toughing!

The problem is lightening arresters have a voltage limit to what they can safely discharge to earth beyond which they themselves will flashover, there are a lot of circuits therefore a lot of lightening arresters all of which take time to check / replace; some are self resting others are sacrificial although if the lightening was severer enough even the self resetting ones will be toast .   

All sorts of kit can be damaged in the power supply chain, transformers, rectifiers even switchgear, cables particularly joints and terminations can flashover.  Find components that have obvious damage is the easy bit, only to find when systems are powered up something that looked ok fails and may be not straight away.

Lightening can hit the railway direct which is conducted along the rails and cables or it can be a nearby strike the resulting EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) which induces a voltage into the rails and cables which is conduct along the rails and cables in both cases for some considerable distance. 

Don't know to much about axel counters however at the end of the day they are still and electrical / electronic device therefore susceptible to direct strike or EMP.

Regarding the problems on 25th July, it appears that the Cotswold Line was sacrificed with regard to trains to/from London.  Heaven knows what happened to all the intending passengers. According to Realtime trains nothing ran from Paddington through to the Cotswold Line after the 1421 until the 2148:

DOWN SERVICES
 
1552 PAD-WOS ^ CANCELLED (Started from Oxford at 1654 and appears to have been a HST).
 
1622 PAD-OXF ^ CANCELLED.
 
1715 DID- GMV -  started from Oxford at 1758 and terminated at Worcester Foregate Street.
 
1722 PAD-HFD ^ CANCELLED.
 
1749 PAD-WOS ^ CANCELLED.
 
1822 PAD-HFD ^ CANCELLED.
 
1922 PAD-HFD ^ CANCELLED.
 
2022 PAD-GMV ^ CANCELLED (Started from Oxford).
 
2148 PAD-WOS ^ Departed 12 minutes late but was further delayed by signalling problems in the Radley area and arrived at WOS at 0045.  There were people on board who required onward transport from Worcester and the Train Manager came through to obtain details.
 
UP SERVICES.
 
1314 HFD-PAD ^ Probably terminated at Oxford.  Realtime Trains shows it as terminating at Didcot North Junction at 1543.  It then returned at 1643 to form the 1552 ex PAD starting at Oxford.  Perhaps, it went into Didcot Parkway station.
 
1426 GMV-PAD ^ Terminated at Oxford.
 
1553 MIM-PAD ^ Terminated at Oxford.
 
1532 GMV-DID ^ Terminated at Oxford.
 
1514 HFD-PAD ^ Terminated at Oxford.
 
1728 WOF-PAD ^ Terminated at Oxford.
 
1849 WOF-PAD ^ Ran through to Paddington arriving 41 minutes late at 2140.
 
1944 GMV-PAD ^ Started from Worcester F S.
 
2059 WOS-PAD ^ CANCELLED.
 
2151 HFD-PAD ^ Started from Great Malvern.

I have not studied what happened to Paddington to Oxford services, but I saw no evidence of any during the mid evening period when I was caught up in the disruption at Didcot Parkway and Oxford stations.  In fact, the only down FGW trains I saw at Didcot were heading towards Swindon until a Turbo arrived from Reading to form the 2126 to Oxford.  This was to be delayed as well by signalling problems in the Radley area. A few CrossCountry trains went round the curve avoiding Didcot station.   

What they believe happened is lightning struck 1L62 12:28 Swansea to Paddington.  This then fed into the tracks and basically toasted the signalling equipment in the area.

I think that many commuters have experience in jobs/organisations where the level of service offered by NR and FGW would be completely unacceptable but many in the rail industry simply cannot see that the current service level is unacceptable and believe that down-time is just something that will happen on the railways - hence the often polarised views on sites such as this . 

To me the issue on Friday, and many of those previously, was not the trigger event e.g. lightning strike/points failure etc., but that the network has so many single points of failure.  Can you imagine the customer outcry if banking, mobile phone, supermarkets, gas pipelines, airlines, traffic lights etc. had a failure rate the same as the line between Paddington and Reading?  The attitude from FGW was "it was a lightning strike what do you expect us to do about that", to which my answer is "build into your network the fact that equipment will be struck by lightning and have a contingency plan", I can accept the network going dark for a short while but a predictable event causing disruption on the scale and with the duration of Friday night/Saturday morning surely cannot be viewed as acceptable by anyone?

In most industries you plan for key equipment failures and build in resilience, this is a concept that appears to be alien to the rail industry.  I'm sure the "experts" will be along to tell us why this is the case shortly, however, in the industries I have worked and consulted in there has always been those "experts" that have told us that we have to accept that some events are going to happen that will result in failure to provide service.  Almost without exception we have engineered solutions with resilience that ensure that there are no single points of failure.   Yes, you do get down-times but these are usually triggered when multiple trigger events coincide and almost never by a single predictable event.

Moving forward I believe two things need to change:

- The attitude and thinking from those in the rail industry who have "always done it this way" and that service outage is part and parcel of running a railway service
- Benefit analysis of investment cost of building in resilience vs. cost of putting right failure/reputational risk

For everyone who tells me it can't be done I bet we can find a network overseas where it is.....

If you don't mind paying fopr it all, of course it can be done.

But it'd be political suicide....

That's exactly one of the "expert" responses we normally get, usually the first. When we do the analysis we normally we find we are already paying the cost of building in resilience, if not more, when we cost the impact of the down time.

Very different to finding the cost in hard cash (i.e. taxpayers money)

You build a business case case based on investment, pay-back period, and reduced cost in the future. You are right a tough sell politically where anything that pays back beyond the current parliament is normally not viewed as positive. However, it can be done someone ran some numbers for HS2 and managed to build a business case for investment with payback over a much longer period than Reading to Paddington line would require.

I genuinely believe it is about mindsets.  Fifteen years ago I remember my tube journeys having a similar failure rate to what I experience now using FGW.  Management and had the same couldn't care less, like it or lump it, attitude as we currently see with FGW and NR. There has been a real attitude change there. Investment that someone had to build a business case for has happened. The failure rate is now much less than it was (although still higher than I would like).

Hopefully, the type of thinking I am describing was applied to the Crossrail and electrification planning....

Oh, I can clearly see where you are coming from....

BUT, it will take a physical load of ^billions to get to what you describe. And that can only be got in two ways - borrow it (and look where that gets us) or raise taxes. Political suicide either way

By all means do the sums, but building a business case is not just playing with numbers till what you want adds up.  There is either a business case or there isn't.


However if this is the case then I would be almost sure that there is no business case.

Unless of course we can innovate so that there is less kit out there to get struck by lightning. Perhaps once we get to in cab signalling it will be possible to reduce the risk.  Do axle counters (as opposed to track circuits) reduce vulnerability? 

Potentially yes. They are insulated from the track which is why they are immune to traction currents.

This (http://www.networkrail.co.uk/timetables-and-travel/delays-explained/lightning-strikes) is what NR say about lightning:

As you can see, they identify track circuits as the big area of vulnerability. I reckon that electrification and the associated resignalling ought to improve that a lot.

Of course how axle counters and other kit is are made and installed could introduce new vulnerabilities.

How many ^billions would it take for FGW to simply improve their level of customer service? If there had been more staff available at PAD on Friday evening to look after passengers and provide as much information as possible it would have gone a long way to improving people's experiences.

And if it's the case that no information was available, how many ^billions would it take to improve that situation? From RTT it looks like the first stopper to TWY on Friday evening eventually left at 2012. If FGW had said at 1730 that there would be no trains to TWY until after 2000 I would have gone away and come back again later instead of despairing and taking a taxi. Surely someone at NR had a reasonable estimate of service resumption which they could have passed on to FGW?

I realise that things do go wrong which are out of the railway's control. Why should it be seemingly out of the railway's control to look after their passengers?

And surges when lightning strikes the overhead wires? (which conduct electricity so well that strikes are likely to be common)

BBM, how do you determine quickly how long a recovery will taker from a lightning damage? NR need to get to site & assess the damage. Only then (and that could take the best part of an hour) might I be willing to agree with your paras above.

How much would it cost to have customer service teams on standby just in case?....be realistic. NR had a large team out at PAD on the night, but Friday nights are notorious for the number of pax travelling.

Its not that people in the railway industry find the current service level acceptable but there's very little FGW can do other than voice there dissatisfaction with the current reliability of the infrastructure and put pressure on Network Rail to sort the situation out.
Network Rail are in a difficult position because the government are constantly slashing there budget or fining them, which serves no benefit to anyone.  Network Rail are basically untouchable.  
In the eyes of the government, privatisation of the industry is considered a success.  The government was well aware that the industry need a significant amount of investment but they were not willing to provide it.  In order to rid them of this problem the industry was privatised and the government effectively washed their hands of it.  No passenger of the railway blames the government, they all blame the private operators. The government has more control of the railway now then when it was British Rail.

The lightning strike on the train was unlucky and something I've never heard of before.  Things like that are rare, there is no point throwing money at something to prevent one days outage in a year or two.  
If the government are serious about rail travel then they need to start showing it and giving Network Rail the funding they require.
I sometimes think passengers assume it is just a piece of rail and a few traffic lights and that's it!

As for a contingency planning.  I can't see how you can viably have a contingency plan for having no signalling through a area whilst maintaining a safe system of working.  
The French recently had two trains collide following a signal failure. Anyone in the UK rail industry would question how they manage to end up with two trains in the same signal section.  Initially, you would suspect there is a failure in their rules and procedures when dealing with this.
There's a reason why our rail system is one of the safest systems in the world and that's because everything is fail safe.  There are rules and procedures covering just about every eventuality which maintains safety of everyone using the network during degraded working.

At the end of the day, service outage will always occur if you want to travel on a safe railway network.  No amount of cash will prevent that.

The lightning strike took place at about 1510. I'm talking about the lack of information at 1730 nearly 2.5 hours later. How long is needed to assess the situation?

And I'm not talking about huge customer service teams, just better use of the existing ones. As said elsewhere the 'Ribena Brigade' disappeared and I've also seen reports of BTP being unimpressed about the lack of available FGW staff. Why not do something with the electronic displays? The 'next fastest train' boards just said 'please enquire' next to each destination. Enquire to whom???

The country needs a big debate on how we spend our (limited) taxpayers funds. The NHS is about to go bust (just wait another year or so) - is that more important than funding infrastructure on the railways, for example.

The NHS is a bottomless bucket and could spend every taxpayer ^ given half a chance. So could bringing up the railways to modern standards, and there are many other demands on the taxpayer ^. Or we could borrow it all & have interest rates back to where they were 40 years ago, with everyone screaming that they can't afford to live!

BBM - OK, clear the boards & say "no services out of Paddington until further notice" and only put up a train once it was known to be crewed & ready? Because that was really the only other option. It just wasn't possible to tell someone when the next train to xxx was gong to leave. People do have to use common sense....

Yes, why not? It's honest and better than the vague lack of information which often happens in times of disruption. So many times in my experience a train has been put on the board when it's not crewed and ready, and later it has to be cancelled.

I know I seem very narked, maybe it's the heat!  :) But also I've not long returned from a trip to Chicago where the commuter 'heavy rail' services are nothing to write home about but they are cheap. A monthly pass over a 35-mile distance into central Chicago is $180, about ^105. I've just checked the price of a monthly pass on the Parisian rail network over a 35-mile distance, it's 114 Euros or about ^90.

A monthly season from TWY to PAD is ^320. Why the hell do we pay so much for rail travel here? What's so different in the way taxpayers' money is spent on railways compared to elsewhere?

When you send a train out you need there's a lot more to consider than just telling a driver and a train manager to jump on the train on platform 1 and take it to Bristol.

You need to keep track of ALL traincrew and ensure you're abiding by hidden regulations.
You need to ensure that crews are booking off in time that it doesn't affect tomorrow service.  Minimum between 12 hours between shifts
Fuel levels need to be considered, there's no point sending out a train that halfway into its journey someone finds out the tanks are empty.
You need to know where the train will finish up so that enough trains are in the right place for next days service.  All maintenance requirements are met.  Maintenance is carried out strictly based on mileages.
We could go on....

Basically control will make the chain of communication as short as possible in order that they can put efforts in to running as many trains as they can.  There's no point spending 20 minutes telling everyone within the company.  
Controller makes decision, resources crew the train, signallers told at Network Rail, input into the system, announcement at station made... bosh!  Simplest chain of command.

I should go & take a look at Standards of Living/wages amongst the railway workers in those countries & compare to ours.

Bob Crow has done a very good job for his members - you & I are increasingly being asked to pay for them....

^320 isn't that expensive.  Work out the costs by car, fuel alone a day has got to be at least ^7 a day + insurance + car tax + parking + servicing + MOT + depreciation + congestion charge = ??

Thanks for all the "experts" for coming along and telling why it couldn't be done as I predicted!

This reminds me of my last assignment, I was part of a team looking into large scale issues in a subsidiary of a large (as it happens state owned) parent.  Those in the business had looked at it and told us on day one that a completely new system and structure would be needed but that the numbers to support doing this didn't add up.  I left a week ago after just over two years, the new system and structure was in place and service levels improved to an acceptable level.  The business case pretty much wrote itself once we had done the analysis.

Sometimes it just needs fresh eyes to come at a problem from a different perspective.  The same people looking to fix the issues they have unsuccessfully been trying to resolve for years will rarely deliver the radical solution that is required.

And it won't while the privatise/nationalise argument continues either.

IF the railways weren't in need of so much investment, I might agree with you more. But there's been decades of underinvestment, while technology has taken off to levels never seen before. It needs serious ^billions of investment, and ultimately there's only one place it can come from - you & I. Either in taxes or fares.

You forgot the NHS. Eating ^billions of taxes that no other country has/does. And about to go bust. Money that other countries pump into their railways

Just to explain "hidden regulations" they are not as the name would indicate a secret set of regulations but actually a set of regulations put forward by Anthony Hidden QC as part of the 1988 Clapham rail crash enquiry report http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/DoT_Hidden001.pdf (http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/DoT_Hidden001.pdf), these regs have now been overtaken by ROGS "Railways and Other Guided Transport Systems (Safety) Regulations 2006"

What I feel was really unfortunate for FGW and NR on Friday (apart from the actual lightening strike) they were not able to recover the situation, the signal failure the other week at Twyford and a couple of suicides recently they were able to recover quite quickly and get things moving.  I am sure there will a lessons learnt to Friday.  The other event which did not help was the lightening strike at Surbiton effecting SW trains there seems to have been a breakdown in communication between routes.

Information out to passengers is of course very important, after all even us railway staff had our journeys home on Friday effected (and no me turning too and helping would not have been any use, no training in customer relations and geographically in the wrong place to do technical stuff)

This subsidiary of a large parent can control or influence many of the factors involved its business.
The railway is fragmented, under funded, a safety critical operation where ultimate control is the hands of a minister who last week was possibly in charge of education, health etc.
There is no comparison between the two.

There goes that mind-set again. That's the one that I am saying need changing before we will see the radical change that we need....

So, change to what, do you suggest?.....

That what we have is completely unacceptable and to identify a solution that a persuasive business case can be built for.

Maybe we need to get the guys in who build/manage the network in Germany where I am pretty sure these issues don't occur, standards of living are higher and prices lower.

Well done, you've just avoided the whole question!

Well done, can I have next weeks lottery numbers please?  No-one on here is claiming to be an "expert".

Just remember Mark Hopwood or Head of NR are not posting on here (I doubt anyway  :P).. It is industry staff who take some of their free time to answer questions and offer debate, not to sit here and take your pot-shots.  We can make suggestions, but whether those at the top level want to listen is another matter.


How many fresh eyes have the DfT had in the past few years?

I refer you to my previous point...


If we try and engineer out every single point of failure using current technology it will indeed cost billions, but we are on the verge of a whole new technology through in-cab signalling.


This is also a good point.  There is only so much that can be justified by a rare failure.

We may not be able to eliminate all single points of failure, but we might be able to reduce the number of such points and the likelihood of those failures.


That does put another layer of lightning vulnerable kit out there.  But is it better able to cope with lightning than signalling systems? And would it indeed provide some protection to the signalling?


Good contingency planning can always help it is bad contingency planning that is a problem. I am sure there are some in place. The emergency timetables I am sure are not thought up from scratch each time! They can help by knowing where spare parts are in a hurry, they could identify the most vulnerable parts of the system to allow some targeted improvements. They could definitely better work out how to keep passengers informed.  


My experience is that DB's reputation for good service is not borne out by the facts on the ground. sure they do some things better. But other things they do worse.

The main issue here about standards of living compared to other countries is the cost of housing (whether rent or purchase).  Until UK plc sort that problem our cost of living and therefore living wages will always be unacceptably high and our costs similarly inflated. Bring housing costs into line with Germany and we would all be better off!

That said I have no easy solution to this.

FGW keep spending lots of money on customer service courses, but if you just dont have the staff on a Friday afternoon you cannot implement the plans.

The major problem with PAD is notwork fail control the boards and the PA systems, badly. As its NR they don't care about the customer as the customer is not theirs directly.
It has happened in the past where the boards get wiped and only confirmed services are shown and then when full they get taken off the screens again.
The ribena brigade will often run away at the first hint of any trouble and hide upstairs, as will senior management. There used to be CAT teams (Customer Action Teams) of local office workers although I have no idea if this was implemented Friday evening.

You wont get the MD publicly criticising Notwork Fail as there is an agreement that no one will throw dirty laundry at each other in public.

A lot of staff are seriously not happy over Friday and if you have staff morale getting even lower, then its going to show in relations with customers. Even internal communications were s***.

We did have a lot of suits in the messroom at Padd on Friday evening, people I've never seen before, I think they become more of a hindrance than a help though.

Internal communications with the two other TOCs I've worked at before have all been equally as bad in fairness.  I don't think that's going to change unless you significantly increase the number of staff working within control.  I think there is a fine line between not enough and too many staff within control

Provision of information at Paddington will only get worse.  You add CrossRail staff and that's another control centre full of staff that need liaising with.  All stations should be managed by the train operating company, surely this would streamline the provision of information?

A lot of the signalling failures have been down to issues with contractors.  We've had contractors offloading pallets of materials and placed them directly onto signalling cables, crushing signalling cables.  We've had signalling relay boxes left open on the lineside, we've even had rats chew through cables, causing a short and the rat goes up in smoke!
A lot of the signal failures aren't down to poor equipment or maintenance procedures.  Its carelessness. 


Believe it or not emergency timetables are pretty much thought up from scratch each time.  Things like Paddington to Bedwyn starting and terminating at Reading are basic amendments.  You have your priority services, these would be your trains to Bristol, Wales and to the South West.  Any other locations can't be reached by using operators, Chiltern, SWT or London Transport.
You can't not plan for every single type of failure that occurs. The plan differs based on the number of trains, crews that you have available.  The location of the failure, the type of failure, the time of the day, the likely length of time to fix etc  These are all unique factors. 



Most peoples perception of European railroads I find are generally based on the European high speed networks, ie TGV, ICE, Bullet and AVE.  Once you get off these it isn't glamorous at all.  But those high speed networks have been will financed and built.  Right now, proper industry experts have voiced concerns over the new IEP trains saying that Hitachi are struggling to make good out of a bad spec given to them by the DfT.  It appears yet again passenger groups and train operating companies have not been listened to.  There's a whole history of the industry trying to do things on the cheap and it always comes back to bite someone on the butt!  The government does not learn.
[/quote]

I've done some travelling around France, and the TGV was fantastic (although even that crashed the other week!).. The local trains though were appalling.  Late, every single window covered in graffiti, the stations smelled disgusting too.  Our London Underground stations were palaces compared to the horrible, dark, dingy and fragrant Paris metro and RER stations.  The promised land of railways does not suddenly begin just because you reach Calais.

I feel that part of the problem is that allegedly rare weather events are occurring a lot more frequently, remember the floods of the winter before last ? "once a century event"  "not worth spending billions on something that may not happen again in our lifetime" etc. Within about 12 months, similar but worse conditions prevailed.

And the lightning strike of a couple of weeks ago was no doubt a very rare event until it happened again within about two weeks!

There is no simple "cure all" but I do feel that more could be done to improve reliability and redundancy at relatively low cost as part of other projects.
More rolling stock would help, not only in reducing overcrowding, but also in recovering from disruption and reducing cancellations caused by rolling stock being out of place.
Just 4 extra trains, one each at or near London, Exeter, Plymouth, and Penzance would help a lot by allowing a few more services to run even if stock is displaced, remembering that train crew can be sent by taxi if needs be, unlike trains.
Considering the recent gross overcrowding on the limited trains available from Paddington, a spare HST or two would have helped a lot. (not by running an extra service as paths were limited by the signal failure, but by combining 2 short DMUs into one full length train, and use of the HST instead of one of the DMUs)
Buying extra rolling stock to keep as spares is most unlikely to be economic, but retaining some old stock SHOULD be affordable.
As an example, when the IEPs arrive, many HSTs will become redundant with a limited number being retained for Cornish services. It would seem sensible to retain perhaps 10 extra HSTs beyond the number needed, as cover for out of course events. The cost of leasing or purchasing something that would otherwise be scrapped SHOULD be minimal.
Maintenance costs should be minimal if the spare sets were rotated onto the Cornish services, 20 sets each running half the mileage should not cost much more to maintain than 10 sets used more intensively.

Not likely to happen though is it ! the IEPs will no doubt be provided in just barely sufficient numbers to run the timetable under perfect conditions. Each suicide, lightning strike, bridge bash, rain storm, cable theft, or snowfall will continue to cause widespread disruption due to trains being in the wrong place.

During rush hour on a good evening, you'll be lucky if there is one spare HST at London.  Same for the Turbo's.  If you have the spare rolling stock you could employ and have more spare drivers to drive these spare trains in the event of disruption or late running.

Glastonbury is a prime example of what you're saying.  To provide enough capacity, you have to cancel was it the Swansea's or Cardiffs.  Ridiculous situation for a transport company to be put in

I had a look for what NR have to say about resilience. The answer is - depressingly little of substance.

There a rather vacuous mission statement called "Delivering a better railway for a better Britain: our plans for 2014-2019" (http://www.networkrail.co.uk/publications/Delivering-a-better-railway-for-a-better-Britain.pdf), which is a summary for the public of the CP5 plans. It talks about reliability, but mostly in the context of wear-and-tear failures and how to do maintenance better. It talks about availability, but that's to do with reducing the impact of engineering possessions  - "7-day railway" in the jargon.

Then there is a bit about resilience, but that's all about climate change:


I think that misses the point. So far any change in the climate is only a small shift in the relative probabilities of different levels of weather (when turned into numbers). No weather that has happened in the last 30 years is inconsistent with the pattern of weather over the previous 100 years (or more, though we lack good data going further back). The warming itself is only  just on the verge of being identifiable from measurements, which is why predictions have to be based on modelling.

That section also suggests looking at the problem - starting now! Since the main problem is that the railways can't cope with the weather we already have, I would hope that resilience was a long-standing area of work. That would involve providing some resilience in the service using the existing infrastructure (mainly by managerial action), and improving that infrastructure both by small changes and major renewals. So there does seem to be a lack of concern and concerted action.

I would contest your statement:


As I do not think it is yet possible to calculate the relative probabilities to any statistically significant level.


This is true but I think you miss the point.  Our weather is so variable that we have to base our view of climate on the occurrence over many years. 30 years is indeed the usual period taken, but others argue that due to various effects a longer period should be used.

So we have had a larger number of warmer summers, a larger number of more intense storms, in recent years. We and other parts of the world are getting more extreme weather but the question is whether this record is long enough to demonstrate a pattern that is a change in climate.

By the time we can demonstrate any change in climate it could already be well past the time we should have done something about it (either to stop it happening or to make out lives more resilient to it).

So although I think the NR statement you quote goes too far in saying the pattern has definitely changed, we cannot say it what we have been experiencing is in the last 10 years is normal by the experience of the past. So they would be right to say something less definite, but we cannot ignore our recent experience and say it is just down to our poor collective memory because there is something real, but we cannot prove it is not just a passing phase. However the models continue to suggest it is likely to be real. 

As a personal observation, without any facts to back it up - we seem to have had more lightening over the last two or three years than I remember in the past. I am not sure how far back good lighting records go so I have no idea whether this can be demonstrated as a change in climate. It is however consistent with climate change predictions.

That's what I said, isn't it? Any change is too small to be demonstrated with reasonable confidence.


Again, I think that last point is the case. The record is not long enough. So to say we have had enough warm summers, or big storms, tp be more than just chance or normal fluctuations is unwarranted.


Sure, the best evidence is that there will be such effects. Hardly a surprise, if the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere doubles. My point is that, before worrying about what that might do after 30 years from now, we should look realistically at the next 30 years assuming no change. "Normal"? Consider this winter's rainfall, and say it has a 1% chance of happening in any one year. In 100 years (roughly your own lifetime of your children's) there is a 63% chance of that much rain or more. In 30 years, there is a 26% chance. So I reckon that is normal, and should be planned for. "Climate change" (as usually understood) might move that number up or down a little, but I don't think it would alter the conclusions for infrastructure planners.


If you look at the record, it's clear we do have a poor memory (collectively, at least) of these things. When watching interviews during the Thames floods, with a book of Berkshire weather history, more than once I heard someone say it had never happened in their lifetime and I knew they were wrong.

Flooding is an area where there are certainly events in history that we cannot cope with now. And where once in a lifetime is more than enough to suffer, thank you very much.  After the 1947 flood, the flow capacity of the Thames was significantly increased. That involved dredging, but I wonder how the current depth of the river compares with what it was then, and whether that flow rate would submerge Lower Caversham again. Certainly a repeat of 1894's water flow rates would.

And on lightning - I remember coming back from Ipswich to London in around 1960, during a massive lightning storm - flashes coming of the OHLE and even the rails, and later on the local paper reported 3000 lighting flashes over Harrow. More spectacular than anything since, I think, though I've never found a record of it (or its exact year).

In my view, they have probably had too many sets of fresh eyes at minister / junior minister level. Alistair Darling, Douglas Alexander, Geoff Hoon, Ruth Kelly, Andrew Adonis, Phillip Hammond, Justine Greening and Patrick McLouchlin - that's 8 in the 9 years I've been taking an interest, and I'm not sure that a year is long enough to deliver anything at this level.   Junior ministers ... again a lot of names. Derek Twigg, Tom Harris ... and some at both senior and junior level actually rather good, but then moved to other things just as they learned in.  I keep my fingers crossed that one or two of the current ones last longer than average, and I've got to the stage I would probably wish for that even if I thought they were only mediocre.

For those who like pretty pictures with a high scientific content, the Met Office now has quite a lot of stuff about last winter (http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/news/2014/uk-storms-and-floods), including report called The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK (http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/1/2/Recent_Storms_Briefing_Final_SLR_20140211.pdf). This says quite clearly that none of the storms, nor general amount of rain, was exceptional; it was the persistence of the weather type wot did it. And when addressing the question of whether this is an aspect of climate change, the answer is that "there is now some emerging evidence".

What is true irrespective of that "climate change" label is that warm air holds more moisture, and there has been a short-term warming locally (1^C in the last 30 years). That increase in humidity is quite rapid - 6-7% per ^C.  That provides more rain, but also more latent heat of evaporation of water, which powers the steam engine that drives storms. So we expect a bit more rain and storminess, but that comes on top of something very variable.

As I suggested before (on another thread I think), if Directors/management pay and bonuses were linked to Customer Satisfaction ratings you would be amazed how quickly additional resources would become available and things would change for the better - believe me I have seen it in other large organisations - it concentrates the mind somewhat if there's a chance of senior individuals being hit in the pocket!

The way that customers were abandoned on Friday (and not just at Paddington) was nothing short of disgraceful.....I will be writing to Hopwood today and asking him i) How many Customer Service staff are employed at Paddington/Reading (and elsewhere) ii) How many of these were on duty on Friday throughout the chaos that was caused by the lightning strike and where were the Ribena brigade? iii) what is the contingency plan to ensure that customers are looked after/enabled to get home in these circumstances iv) what have you learned and what will be done differently in future - I will report back when/if I get a response (when he's finished "signalling" at NR)

I see it's Newbury's turn this morning, all lines blocked, chaos.........I am beginning to wonder if we're reaching meltdown?

Bit late to the party here, but my trip home Friday wasn't as bad as I anticipated. There was a couple of massive flashes in the office around 15:00 on Friday, so as soon as my meeting finished I took a look at the trains and saw the strike at Twyford. I set off to the station usual time, but didn't rush.

About 16:35, the 16:07 to Oxford arrived. CIS said it didn't stop (I think it was expecting the freight train that comes through at that time!), but it did and several hopped off. I jumped on, finding it surprisingly empty. The driver came on to say sorry for all the confusion, and confirmed she would be all stops to Oxford, and explained the issue at Twyford, that she was waiting for Swindon to wave her through the signals and that when we left Maidenhead we would be making two more signal stops before Twyford, and would be running slow.

Not sure what time we left, guess it was maybe 16:40. Sure enough we stopped as detailed, and all the time she was constantly updating us on what was happening, apologising for the temperature in the carriages and even telling us when we reached the damage signal that NR were working on!

As we arrived at Reading she announced we would be terminating, but the service on platform 12 was now the stopper to Oxford.

I thanked her as we got off, for all the updates and she again apologised for the temperature - which wasn't that bad to be fair - but I joked it could have been worse, it could have been one of the services with "air conditioning", to which she found amusing.

Arrived at platform 12 and hopped on the train and we pulled out around 17:30 - and was smooth sailing from there.

So all in all, for me, wasn't too bad this time.

Gotta say, all the updates from the driver did make a huge difference, and the fact she seemed quite chirpy probably helped. I mean she was apologising about the weather at one point, saying there really was a storm, not that you'd know it looking outside now!

Strictly, they aren't required to have one to get pax home after an Act of God.

If the damage was such that no trains were able to run, you'd have to get yourself home. Or stay over at your expense. Just something to bear in mind.

Fair point, but it will be interesting to know if they have a plan, or whether it's simply a case of "sorry folks, you're on your own" as it seemed to be on Friday - at the VERY least IMHO it should consist of having sufficient staff available to signpost alternative means of transport and direct customers to it, organising transport for vulnerable customers, arranging taxi shares etc............this doesn't need to be specifically customer service staff, others should be able to help, you don't/shouldn't need specific "customer relations" training to be able to help out in a crisis although I'm sure that some will wave this flag......no reason why managers and other office staff can't be included in this......when it's all hands to the pumps.

The key is communication and information - FGW are woeful at both of these at the moment.

TG ask Hopwood these questions, he (or his lackeys) wont know the answers.

1)How many of the ribena brigade were on duty and how many were actually on the concourse and had not run away from being asked slightly hard questions.
2)How many suits were hiding in the drivers messroom who could be customer facing. (Hint its double figures).
3)What ever happened to the CATs team.
4)Why does FGW continue to allow Notwork Fail to constantly disrupt customers and what is he actually doing about it.
5)Why does FGW continue to allow Notwork Fail at PAD to be utterly useless.

Remember 'customer service' staff will include the Gateline staff, ATEs, TEs, Booking office staff, Reservation labellers (who also were hiding) so is quite a broad area. I will hazard a guess you had around 16 Gateline Staff, 6 ribenas, 4 helpdesk staff, full booking office, 1 dsm on duty.

Just out of interest, Virgin Trains threatened to take legal action against Network Rail for its infrastructure related problems on the West Coast route a few years, does anyone know the outcome of it?  Was it just a PR stunt by Virgin or were they effectively silenced and that's why we have the agreement that no TOC can't publicly slate Network Rail?  Either way it seemed to go quiet.

Can't remember why, but I do remember a press piece saying that Virgin had cancelled the legal action

Answering the earlier post by CLPGMS about 'how intending passengers got home' in my case it was taxi. I was travelling from Richmond to Great Malvern on Friday evening. My SW train from Richmond was around 15 minutes late arriving into Reading just before 7pm. Then I took the 1910 Cross Country to Oxford; that left around 10 minutes late, but due to Track Circuit issues at Radley,took around 45 minutes to Oxford. I was hoping that the 1922 ex Pad might have started at Oxford, but at around 8.20pm, it was announced that this service would be a road replacement service, and pax for the Cotswold Line should make their way to the front of the station. There were 30 or so pax milling around and we were all directed into taxis to various destinations. So I shared a taxi with 2 others to Worcester, but there were others wanting to go as far as Hereford. If the Cross Country train had been on time, I would have been tempted to take it to New Street and then connect with London Midland to Malvern. However Cross Country were NOT accepting FGW tickets which was a bit depressing under the circumstances. (London Midland were, so full marks to them).

A friend in the control centre has sent me this, this is all the CSL2 messages that were sent internally from end to start(sorry its upside down>>read from bottom up to male sense)

It should also be noted that all the info shown, was also displayed on Journeycheck and was publicaly available, only internal text is under the internal info heading on each message.




 UPDATED   21    CORE MSG 19 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   26/07/14
01:48   
 
Following lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough all lines have now reopened.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations are returning to normal but some services may still be revised at short notice. Disruption is expected until 13:30 26/07.

Customer Advice:
Owing to the major disruption during Friday afternoon / evening, following the damage sustained by signalling equipment due to a lightning strike, many of our trains are not in the correct position for us to be able to operate a full service on Saturday morning. Individual train service alterations will be advised in due course.

Any customers holding tickets dated for Friday 25th July who were unable to make their intended journey may use tickets dated for Friday on Saturday 26th July 2014 instead.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 5 hours.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 13:30   


 
 UPDATED   20    CORE MSG 18 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
22:58   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled, delayed by up to 30 mins or revised at short notice. Disruption is expected until 03:30 26/07.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Today's tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. Servere disruption to be expected on all routes until close of service.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 03:30   


       UPDATED   19    CORE MSG 17 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
21:56   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arrangements previously made with First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley to convey passengers have now been withdrawn.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales and Virgin Trains services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Today's tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 21:56: Temporary block working withdrawn

Update at 20:11: Trains are running normally on down main and down relief. Temporary block working on up relief. Talking past TR77 on up main.

Update at 19:52: A line block of 15 minutes will be taken so techs can investigate.
Todays tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   18    CORE MSG 16 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
21:08   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales and Virgin Trains services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Today's tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 20:11: Trains are running normally on down main and down relief. Temporary block working on up relief. Talking past TR77 on up main.

Update at 19:52: A line block of 15 minutes will be taken so techs can investigate.
Todays tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   17    CORE MSG 15 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
20:13   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales and Virgin Trains services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Today's tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 20:11: Trains are running normally on down main and down relief. Temporary block working on up relief. Talking past TR77 on up main.

Update at 19:52: A line block of 15 minutes will be taken so techs can investigate.
Todays tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   16    CORE MSG 14 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
19:54   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales and Virgin Trains services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Today's tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 19:52: A line block of 15 minutes will be taken so techs can investigate.
Todays tickets will be valid for travel on Saturday 26th July.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   15    CORE MSG 13 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
19:20   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Arriva Trains Wales and Virgin Trains services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   14    CORE MSG 12 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
18:30   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 18:30: Signaller running normally on the down main except talking passed TR6 Ruscombe.
TBW in place on the up relief at 18:20

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   13    CORE MSG 11 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
18:09   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 18:08: 4 buses ordered for Reading so far none available
6 buses ordered for Twyford/Maidenhead so far only 2 abvailable.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   12    CORE MSG 10 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equip...   25/07/14
17:48   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 17:48: Temporary block working to be in place at 18:00.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   11    CORE MSG 9 (CSL2 ACTIVATED STEADY STATE)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipm...   25/07/14
17:04   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Further Information:

An update will follow within the next 1 hour.

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   10    CORE MSG 8 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
16:51   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   9    CORE MSG 7 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
16:36   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   8    CORE MSG 6 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
16:20   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Bristol Temple Meads and Plymouth in both directions until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   7    CORE MSG 5 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
16:05   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough fewer trains are able to run on all lines.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 16:05: Temporary block working in place in 1 hour.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   6    CORE MSG 4 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
16:00   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough all lines are affected.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   5    CORE MSG 3 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
15:54   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough all lines are affected.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
First Berkshire Buses 1B & 2 Slough (Bus Station) - Burnham, First Berkshire Bus 75 Maidenhead - Taplow - Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley and First Berkshire Bus 76 Burnham - Slough (Bus Station) - Langley services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   4    CORE MSG 2 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
15:50   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough all lines are affected.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Customer Advice:
Chiltern Railways services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.
Cross Country services are conveying passengers between Oxford and Banbury in both directions until further notice.
Underground services are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
   Show full message Show full message Hide messageHide message       UPDATED   3    CORE MSG 1 (CSL2 ACTIVATED)-RED: Lightning having damaged equipment Reading -...   25/07/14
15:45   
 
Owing to lightning having damaged equipment between Reading and Slough all lines are affected.

Impact:
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled or delayed at short notice. An estimate for the resumption of normal services will be provided as soon as the problem has been fully assessed.

Hide More Information

Internal Information:

Lightning strike at Ruscombe. All trains at a stand in the area.

Update at 15:44: A reduced service will be in place.

Update at 15:39: Reading MOM en route.



 Posted By:3070   No.:1313085358   Expiry Time:26/07/14 02:00   


 
 

Did anyone see the BBC programme "Cloud Lab"?  One of their "discoveries", was that the world's effort to reduce CO2 and pollution levels is causing higher ocean temperatures as clouds are cleaner and more sun gets through.  This then feeds stronger hurricanes and storms.  (Granted they were looking at Florida/New Orleans and across the US, but was quite fascinating and questioned the standard climate change beliefs too..)  I believe it's still available on iPlayer for a couple more days.

Not CO2 - that's "clean" pollution - the effect is caused by dust, smoke, etc. The observation is not new of course; there are all those severe global cold spells in history due to volcanic dust. This is just new measurements showing an effect from the much smaller man-made sources. People have even suggested generating huge clouds of such smoke as a way of reducing global warming, though the idea is not exactly popular.

I've been playing around with reformatting the Realtime Trains data for last Friday so as to show clearly what ran and what didn't. Below is (I hope) a full list of trains due or actually arriving at Reading from Paddington, during the period when trains were being affected. It shows the two Oxford trains that were cancelled at Reading (2N46 and 2N48), and also the trains started at Reading (as "Cancel to RDG") though without times. From midnight trains ran pretty much to timetable.

It is striking how few trains got got through the "dead" area at Ruscombe. I can't help thinking that even with the current procedures it should be possible to do better than that.


ID       Destination                      Plan      Act Arr         
1D43     Oxford                           15:22     15:48           
2N44     Oxford                           15:21     15:20           
1C19     Bristol Temple Meads             15:25     16:05           
1C86     Penzance                         15:31     16:20           
2R45     Terminates here                  15:43     16:39           
1B48     Cardiff Central                  15:41     17:05           
1K68     Bedwyn                           15:47     16:38           
2N46     Terminates here (cancelled)      15:50     16:56           
1D45     Oxford                           15:51     17:19           
1C20     Bristol Temple Meads             15:55     17:45           
1G47     Cheltenham Spa                   16:00     Cancel         
1B51     Swansea                          16:10     Cancel         
2R47     Terminates here                  16:15     Cancel         
1W47     Worcester Shrub Hill             16:17     Cancel         
2N48     Terminates here (cancelled)      16:23     17:21           
1C21     Bristol Temple Meads             16:25     Cancel         
1C87     Penzance                         16:31     Cancel         
1B55     Swansea                          16:42     Cancel         
2R49     Terminates here                  16:46     Cancel         
1K74     Bedwyn                                     Cancel to RDG   
2M50     Banbury                          16:51     Cancel         
1D49     Oxford                           16:52     Cancel         
1C22     Taunton                          16:55     18:26           
1C88     Plymouth                         17:00     18:08           
1B59     Swansea                          17:10     17:48           
2R51     Terminates here                  17:18     Cancel         
1D51     Oxford                           17:19     Cancel         
2N52     Oxford                           17:21     Cancel         
1C23     Bristol Temple Meads                       Cancel to RDG   
1C89     Penzance                         17:28     Cancel         
1C90     Bristol Temple Meads             17:37     Cancel         
1B63     Carmarthen                       17:40     Cancel         
2R53     Terminates here                  17:46     Cancel         
1W07     Hereford                         17:49     Cancel         
1D53     Oxford                           17:54     Cancel         
1C24     Taunton                          17:54     Cancel         
2R54     Terminates here                  18:00     Cancel         
1C91     Newton Abbot                     17:57     18:25           
1G60     Cheltenham Spa                   Pass           Cancel         
1B69     Swansea                          18:10     Cancel         
1D57     Oxford                           18:14     Cancel         
1W59     Worcester Shrub Hill             18:20     Cancel         
1C25     Bristol Temple Meads             18:24     Cancel         
2M56     Banbury                          18:26     Cancel         
1C92     Penzance                         18:28     18:48           
1J93     Frome                            18:35     Cancel         
2R59     Terminates here                  18:44     Cancel         
1B76     Swansea                          18:39     Cancel         
1W08     Hereford                         18:49     Cancel         
1C26     Weston-super-Mare                18:53     19:06           
1D61     Oxford                           18:56     Cancel         
2R61     Terminates here                  19:00     Cancel         
1C94     Plymouth                                   Cancel to RDG   
1B79     Swansea                          19:10     19:24           
2N62     Oxford                           19:13     Cancel         
1G70     Cheltenham Spa                   19:18     Cancel         
1D67     Oxford                           19:21     Cancel         
2N64     Oxford                           19:26     Cancel         
1C27     Bristol Temple Meads             19:24     Cancel         
1C95     Penzance                         19:28     19:38           
1D68     Oxford                           19:41     Cancel         
2R69     Terminates here                  19:45     Cancel         
1B81     Swansea                          19:46     Cancel         
1W09     Hereford                         19:51     Cancel         
1D69     Oxford                           19:56     Cancel         
1C28     Weston-super-Mare                19:55     20:13           
2R71     Terminates here                  20:00     Cancel         
2R73     Terminates here                  20:13     Cancel         
1C96     Plymouth                         20:09     20:26           
1G88     Worcester Shrub Hill             20:18     Cancel         
1M73     Banbury                          20:21     Cancel         
2N74     Oxford                           20:25     Cancel         
1C29     Bath Spa                         20:24     20:36           
1B88     Swansea                          20:40     20:51           
2R77     Terminates here                  20:45     Cancel         
2N78     Oxford                                     Cancel to RDG   
1W75     Great Malvern                    20:52     Cancel         
1R10     Terminates here                  21:00     Cancel         
1C98     Exeter St Davids                 20:59     21:23           
2R79     Terminates here                  21:13     21:22           
1C31     Bristol Temple Meads             21:11     21:12           
1D77     Oxford                           21:20     Cancel         
2N80     Oxford                                     Cancel to RDG   
2R81     Terminates here                  21:43     21:53           
1B91     Swansea                          21:39     22:03           
1D79     Oxford                           21:50     Cancel         
2N82     Oxford                                     Cancel to RDG   
2R83     Terminates here                  22:14     22:20           
1C32     Exeter St Davids                 22:09     22:13           
1W81     Worcester Shrub Hill             22:23     22:32           
2N84     Oxford                           22:30     Cancel         
1C33     Bristol Temple Meads             22:39     22:38           
2R85     Terminates here                  22:45     22:53           
1P85     London Paddington                          Cancel to RDG   
1D83     Oxford                                     Cancel to RDG   
2N86     Oxford                                     Cancel to RDG   
1B94     Swansea                          23:09     23:12           
1D85     Oxford                           23:27     00:26           
2N90     Oxford                           23:40     Cancel         
2R91     Terminates here                  23:59     Cancel         
1D87     Oxford                           00:04     Cancel         
1C36     Cardiff Central                  00:07     00:06           
         
      

   

From the FGW website

So what are the odds on this being a Void Day?

Personally I think it counts, but history tells me that I have a lower threshold for these things than FGW...

Thanks very much for that, it seems to prove that no class 2 trains (i.e. stoppers) from PAD made it through to RDG between 17.21 and 21.22 which tallies with my own research on RTT in looking at Down departures from MAI and TWY. So dear FGW, how the blinkin' hell was I meant to get to TWY without using a taxi???


Last February we did get a week's refund on our season tickets because of the flooding even though it was an 'act of God'. Any hope of that sort of thing happening again this time I wonder?

I'd always been led to believe that, in the Great Western universe, Isambard Kingdom was God.

Have I been misinformed?

In terms  of  a taxi I suspect you'll get the usual catch-all of "we're not responsible for consequential loss" and any question about how you were supposed to get home in the absence of trains/alternative arrangements will be greeted with cut and pasted rhetoric, I was in the same position trying to get from Reading-Taplow.

I thought I'd add my thoughts to the debate, as despite not being directly involved in the disruption of the lightning strike, I've seen the same sort of thing happen many times before, though rarely on this scale.

Firstly, regarding comments about the number of staff at Paddington.  I too have noticed staff disappearing when things really are bad, but in some ways having loads of staff out and on the ground doesn't really help that much in terms of actually giving people information, though I absolutely take TaplowGreen's point about managers being able to assist with taxi sharing and direction to passengers, there is still a limited number of FGW staff and managers actually based at Paddington, and I'm afraid the information systems simply aren't set up correctly.  The best way to communicate information to passengers is not to have loads of staff that haven't got a clue what's going on - would the 'Ribena' brigade even know what Temporary Block Working is and how it is likely to impact on the service?  The best way to communicate accurate, non-conflicting information is to use the information/departure screens which can be seen by potentially thousands at once and (backed up by announcements) be operated by a mimimal number of staff.  It seems that the whole set-up at Paddington in this regard is wholly inadequate.  Even in this case though it is incredibly difficult to keep the thousands of people informed and happy when the messages coming from NR/FGW control are inaccurate.

Having the station swamped with staff giving inaccurate information is arguably worse than having no information at all, and that is where another of the next problem lies.  Paddington is so busy on a Friday evening, that if all the staff had been saying at 16:05 that NR planned to have Temporary Block Working in place at 17:00 and all the passengers had taken that in good faith and waited then come 17:00 the station becomes dangerously overcrowded.  Then it looks as if it was at least a further hour before TBW did actually commence during which time more passengers arrive.

For me there should be a NR/FGW task force set up RIGHT NOW to look into information which has representatives from Control, Duty Managers, Ops. Managers, Station staff, Drivers/Guards and everyone who has to deal with these incidents.  With the increasing number of passengers on the network set to continue, especially the surge we're likely to see on the GWML with the sparks effect of electrification and the opening of the Crossrail network, dealing with these incidents will only get harder and harder.

Turning to the alternatives, the usual advice of 'go via Waterloo' wasn't available because of their own issues, which leaves the unappetising option of totally overwhelming Marylebone, so no wonder many people were reluctant to leave the station.  Buses really aren't much of an option as there are not enough of them available to make even the slightest dent in the numbers of people waiting when a section of the GWML closes completely.  Come 2016, there will be a much more useful service from Marylebone in the form of the 30-minute frequency service to Oxford, but in an instance like this those trains (and Marylebone station) will be put under extreme strain, so I would suggest that FGW/Chiltern and NR seriously look at providing proper arrangements for having a diversionary route from Oxford via Bicester into Paddington as per the diversions we've seen during the Reading closures.  Bit too difficult to do at the moment on an ad-hoc basis with the reversal at Banbury leading to long journey times, but when Oxford is within reach of London via Bicester in an hour or so, then divert two of the services per hour (on Bristol and one Swandea) to that route.  Preferably 10-Car Bi-Mode IEPs.

It will lead to problems with pathing, and it will lead to problems with resourcing crew for route knowledge.  The first could largely be solved by having an agreement with Chiltern to thin out a couple of their peak hour trains, so that the diverted services can run at a reasonable pace, this might actually be to their benefit as it will stop Marylebone getting so swamped with other TOC's passengers.  The crew knowledge would be a bit more difficult, but could be largely resolved by having a couple of late night/early morning services running that route to keep a pool of Oxford or Paddington drivers/TM's conversant with the route.

That would certainly be the best option for the passengers, but it will cost more, and need several organisations to agree to compromise, so I doubt it will ever happen and we will continue to have a catastrophic service meltdown every couple of months.

And for those who think that these things are handled better sur le continent...

Last month, our daughter was travelling on DB's sleeper from Amsterdam to Zurich on Jun 16/17, aiming to reach Como in north Italy on the afternoon of the Tuesday 17th in time for a boat up the lake to Menaggio.

Alas, North-West Germany was hit by severe weather that night and all of the trains ground to a halt. Apparently the electricity supply north of Cologne had failed.

First thing that daughter knows of this is when she wakes up, to find that the train is stationary at Emmerich (first station over the border between the Netherlands and Germany). Evidently it has been sitting there for most of the night.

DB are faced with three particular problems with this train.

First is that they'd like to taxi everyone to Cologne (100-120km south) to continue their journeys. But (unlike a recent post describing FGW at Exeter in the middle of the night) they haven't woken up the local taxi operators so all of this takes an incredible amount of time.

Second problem is that everyone would like something to drink (and preferably something to eat as well). Normally breakfast gets loaded on somewhere like Mannheim, far to the south, so the train crew haven't anything to offer ^ not even bottles of water. I can^t help but feel that FGW would have some supplies somewhere.

And thirdly, since this is an international train, it usually has automated multi-lingual announcements. Alas, not everyone understands the manual ones that are only being made in German.

Daughter eventually sets off in a taxi with a family group, including a 3-year-old. Alas, the severe weather has also affected the autobahn. The lightning has been so bad that many road users have sheltered in the tunnels and underpasses. The subsequent rain has flooded the tunnels and underpasses, which are now blocked by abandoned vehicles.

So they're inching along, listening to traffic reports on the radio. Daughter has limited German, but she does understand 'stau' (a traffic jam) and can understand a lot of numbers. Though she didn't believe the funf-und-zwanzig-kilometre stau (15 miles) and had to query it with the taxi driver and the family. At one stage they managed 4km in one hour.

The 3-year-old is intermittently fractious, probably because, like everybody else, they'd really like something to eat or drink.  North of Dusseldorf there^s an exit to the Airport, and the family decide that that makes sense for them. Daughter agrees ^ the S-Bahn might be a likelier bet.  There are two S-Bahn possibilities at Dusseldorf Airport. She gets sent from one to the other, but eventually ends up at Dusseldorf Hauptbahnhof.

It^s now late afternoon. There^s nothing on the displays (and I agree with the previous post that this is by far the best way of spreading good information). All the announcements are incomprehensible. The queue for the information desk takes an hour.  They tell her that nothing will move today and that DB have filled all the available hotels in Dusseldorf.  She^s recommended to go to Wuppertal on the S-Bahn and to get to Cologne in the morning.

Which she does. She arrives at Cologne and there^s a train saying ^Zurich^ in the next platform. It turns out to be running 75 minutes late, but it^s going in the right direction, although it does eventually decide to turn short at Basel. But it^s routed via the Rhine Gorge instead of the high-speed line beside the autobahn, so that^s a plus. And by Basel there^s another one close behind, and that one is going to go through to Zurich.

She arrives in Como late on the Wednesday evening, roughly 30 (three-zero) hours late. Though she had to give up on the boat up the lake.

Her views on DB and their ability to do customer care are (as they say in the Magistrates^ Courts) written on a piece of paper in front of Your Worships.

Now I occasionally moan at FGW for screwing up my journeys. But next time I promise to take a deep breath and give thanks that I^m not stuck at Emmerich on a sleeper that^s not going anywhere on account of a total lack of electricity ^ and that I^m not dependent on DB to get me to my destination.

Indeed things are not as rosy elsewhere as some of us might think. I haven't been to France for a while but on my last trip there in 2005, 50% of the trains I took were more than 30 minutes late. One such delay was caused at N^mes when a tamping machine was sent out ahead of the TGV I was on and we had to crawl at about 20-30 mph until the start of the high speed line was reached. Maybe I'm wrong but I can't imagine NR sending out a tamper right in front of a Turbo let alone anything faster!  :)

I would question that. The public statements from the SWT/NR alliance said that their whole network had serious problems, with delays of 60 minutes. They appear to have told FGW and NR Western Route the same. But a blockage at Surbiton affects the SWML, not the line to Reading, and even leaves routes to Weybridge and Guildford via Epsom still open.

Passengers may have been directed to these alternatives at Waterloo, or may have found them undirected, but I don't believe any trains were diverted via Virginia Water. However, most trains on the main line did run, arriving late, rather than being cancelled. So there would have been capacity to Reading, certainly later on when there were still crowds at Paddington but those at Waterloo were mostly gone.

Generally you would say that diverting from PAD to WAT makes sense before you set out for PAD, but less so once you have got there. I noted this in a previous post (of Paddington, around 19:00):
Now that is just the opposite. By then it should have been apparent that the capacity available via WAT would still be useful even to those already at PAD, but even more useful to those still lurking in the pub.

Below is the record of trains arriving at RDG from WAT (none was cancelled). On this basis, the public statements about the performance of the network were not correct. Note that the strike at Surbiton happened at about 14:00.

ID       Plan      Act Arr          Late
2C31   13:10     13:15               5
2C33   13:40     13:54              14
2C35   14:10     14:19               9
2C37   14:40     14:50              10
2C39   15:10     15:25              15
2C41   15:40     15:51              11
2C43   16:10     16:45              35
2C45   16:40     17:12              32
2C47   17:10     17:18               8
2C89   17:27     17:28               1
2C49   17:42     17:40              -2
2C91   17:58     18:15              17
2C51   18:12     18:25              13
2C53   18:42     18:59              17
2C93   18:57     19:07              10
2C55   19:12     19:26              14
2C57   19:42     19:44               2
2C95   19:57     19:55              -2
2C59   20:12     20:27              15
2C97   20:25     20:33               8
2C61   20:40     20:42               2
2C63   21:10     21:10               0
2C65   21:40     21:45               5
2C67   22:10     22:10               0
2C69   22:40     22:41               1
2C71   23:10     23:30              20
2C73   23:40     23:41               1
2C75   00:10     00:09              -1
2C77   00:45     00:45               0

There remains the question of ticket acceptance. Most tickets to London via PAD are valid via WAT anyway. What are the exceptions? Advance maybe, but I don't know about seasons.

That's very interesting to know, and totally unacceptable if a quite reasonable service out to Reading was running from Waterloo.  Not only the public statements about the performance of the network as: 'Please note: passengers can not travel via London Waterloo due to major signalling problems.' which was being distributed internally is very specifically telling people not to go to Waterloo.  Did anyone on here end up going to Waterloo to report back on the conditions there?

From Reading there are separate 'Any Permitted' and 'via Staines' fares. The vast majority of folk will have had, as you rightly say, an 'Any Permitted' ticket. Only those who had Advance Purchase tickets from further afield would have been denied travel to/from Waterloo after SWT refused ticket acceptance. Season holders with a ticket valid from or through Reading would also have been 'Any Permitted'.

Staff at Paddington and online information should perhaps have communicated the fact that anyone with an 'Any Permitted' ticket valid to or via Reading could have gone to Waterloo if they so wished. Telling them trains were running from there, despite what SWT were saying, but also making passengers aware of the potential issues affecting the Waterloo-Reading route. SWT, refusing other operators tickets, could only have refused travel to folk holding FGW Advance tickets.

SWT were overly cautious I think. Perhaps worried that their network could fall over at any moment, and not wanting to share the opprobrium FGW were facing.

This is of course, "Britain's Train Companies Working Together" as ATOC, through their National Rail brand, are wont to tell us.  ::)

Two occasions in recents year have made me reluctant to go to Waterloo when there's been disruption on the GWML.

On the first one, I duly went to Waterloo, got a train to Reading and then had to wait 45 minutes there for a train to Twyford. That turned out to be the return working of the first Turbo stopper off PAD after services had resumed, so if I'd waited there instead of going to Waterloo I'd have been home at least 20 minutes earlier.

On the second one, the announcer at PAD said that due to the 'nature' of the fatality which had then closed the line services would not resume for at least another hour and everyone should go via Waterloo. I was 50-50 on doing that or staying put and getting a burger. I decided on the latter. Just as I took the first bite the station announcer at PAD suddenly annouced imminent departures of high speed services and a stopper. If I'd jumped straight on the Bakerloo Line I doubt I'd have got as far as Oxford Circus by that time!

Added to that is the tedious stopping pattern of the SWT service. Some 20 years ago (yes this sort of disruption did also happen in BR days!) I arrived at Waterloo to find an additional 8-car EMU ready to depart non-stop for RDG, a journey I remember timing at 57 minutes thanks to a scheduled service being held at Ascot for us to pass. The SWT line could be very good if it could just be speeded up a little.

But, with 20-20 hindsight, if I'd gone to Waterloo last Friday and taken a train to Wokingham I would have had a much cheaper taxi journey from there to Twyford!

Perhaps I was especially (un)lucky to have experienced both Paddington and Waterloo on Friday.

It struck me as odd (or naive) that FGW staff were announcing at Paddington that passengers should take SWT from Waterloo given a) I knew that SWT were screwed due to signal failure; and b) there is no Bakerloo line at Paddington to convey passengers there.  This was at approx 6pm.

I had to go to Waterloo anyway to meet friends so took the H&C + Jubilee line route south.  At Waterloo all direct entrances from tube to mainline were closed due to 'overcrowding' (that is generous - I would describe it as crushing).  Nothing was moving in and out and SWT were certainly not able to support diverted PAX from Paddington.

Friday was the worst passenger chaos at Paddington that I've experienced.  Staff absence was immediately conspicuous.  The worst problem was crushing on the Platform1-8 gantry and route to the H&C line where all gates were open but there were no staff at all.  None.  It wouldn't have taken much for a child or vulnerable person to have been pushed to the floor, or for a dangerous crush to have occured and without ANY staff there who would have taken any action?  To my mind all PAX should be cleared off of the gantry and made to wait on the concourse.  In such circumstances H&C should be exit only via Platform 12 and entrance only via the gantry.

That probably explains why nobody was being advised to go to Waterloo then.


All of which takes more and more staff to effectively police.  I'm taking your point (and others) about staff disappearing, but where are all these staff coming from to do this level of crowd control, whilst still having plenty of staff visibility in the concourse, as well as fully staffed help desks and extra staff to deal with directing customers to the taxi ranks and so on? 

For example, it's very hard to clear large numbers of people who are waiting on the gantry, most of whom know it's the best place to wait for a quick entry onto a train when it is advertised and don't want to move, and then at the same time keeping that gantry open for those wishing to gain access to the H&C line (and of course the increasing number of people arriving through the Northern entrance by it).  The best way to clear the gantry, and I agree that would probably have been desirable for many reasons, would be to have better/more detailed information on the disruption on the information screens in the main concourse - but it sounds like very little was on display anywhere.

OK, as I said, I wasn't involved in it - but that contradicts the advice from Control that 'insider' posted which Paddington Control staff would have seen.  Perhaps they panicked from the sheer number of passengers that were building up?

Regarding crowd control, again I don't think BTP would have officers in any where near enough quantities, bearing in mind they would also have had numerous issues at Waterloo to deal with as well as all their normal duties.  Perhaps some back-up from the Met could have been called in, but who pays for that - and of course police officers with no idea how the station and railway operate might be more of a hindrance than a help?

It has been suggested to me by a manager who was in Swindon control for deveral hours on Friday during the chaos that they will consider claims for taxi fares incurred in getting home if pax were sensible enough to obtain receipts.

It is acknowledged that Fridays service was inadequately provided and an inquest is under way

Remember that SWT's problems started much earlier. Two different problems at WAT, leading to cancellations on specific routes, then their lightning at 14:00. After then, they cancelled more trains due to the WAT problems than the SUR one. I can do a list of WAT departures, though it is rather long - but here goes (starting an hour before lightning time, to show the pattern of service leading up to then:
ID       Destination                      Plan      Act Dep   Late
1P37     Portsmouth Harbour               13:00     Cancel       
2O33     London Waterloo                  13:03     13:09        6
2G33     Guildford                        13:03     Cancel       
1W67     Weymouth                         13:05     13:05        0
2J33     Hampton Court                    13:06     Cancel       
2V33     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:07     13:07        0
1T37     Portsmouth Harbour               13:09     13:19       10
2D33     Guildford                        13:09     13:45       36
2H33     Shepperton                       13:12     13:24       12
2L37     Woking                           13:12     13:50       38
2P37     Haslemere                        13:15     13:15        0
2R33     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:15     13:14       -1
2M33     Chessington South                13:16     13:27       11
2C37     Reading                          13:20     13:20        0
1L37     Exeter St Davids                 13:20     Cancel       
2F33     Woking                           13:20     13:33       13
2S37     Weybridge                        13:22     13:22        0
1A37     Alton                            13:23     13:23        0
1D33     Dorking                          13:24     Cancel       
2U37     Windsor & Eton Riverside         13:28     13:27       -1
2K33     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:28                  
1P39     Portsmouth Harbour               13:30     13:30        0
2G35     New Malden                       13:33     13:41        8
2O35     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:33     13:41        8
1W27     Weymouth                         13:35     13:37        2
2J35     Hampton Court                    13:36     Cancel       
2V35     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:37     13:37        0
2B39     Poole                            13:39     13:45        6
2D35     Guildford                        13:39     Cancel       
2H35     Clapham Junction                 13:42     14:11       29
2L39     Basingstoke                      13:42     13:54       12
2P39     Portsmouth & Southsea            13:45     13:47        2
2R35     London Waterloo (At platform)    13:45     13:45        0
2M35     Chessington South                13:46     14:02       16
2C39     Reading                          13:50     13:49       -1
1L39     Gillingham (Dorset)              13:50     13:56        6
2F35     Woking                           13:50     14:05       15
2S39     Weybridge                        13:52     13:52        0
1A39     Alton                            13:53     14:08       15
1D35     Dorking                          13:54     Cancel       
2K35     London Waterloo                  13:57     Cancel       
2U39     Windsor & Eton Riverside         13:58     14:02        4
1P41     Fratton                          14:00     14:05        5
2G37     Guildford                        14:03     14:14       11
2O37     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:03     14:07        4
1W69     Poole                            14:05     14:09        4
2J37     Hampton Court                    14:06     Cancel       
2V37     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:07     14:11        4
2D37     Guildford                        14:09     14:18        9
1T41     Fareham                          14:09     14:11        2
2L41     Basingstoke                      14:12     14:23       11
2H37     Teddington                       14:12     14:28       16
2R37     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:15     14:25       10
2P41     Haslemere                        14:15     14:27       12
2M37     Chessington South                14:16     14:31       15
1L41     Salisbury                        14:20     14:20        0
2F37     Woking                           14:20     Cancel       
2C41     Reading                          14:20     14:22        2
2S41     Weybridge                        14:22     14:21       -1
1A41     Alton                            14:23     14:42       19
1D37     Dorking                          14:24     Cancel       
2K37     London Waterloo                  14:27     Cancel       
2U41     Windsor & Eton Riverside         14:28     14:44       16
1P43     Fratton                          14:30     14:49       19
2O39     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:33     15:00       27
2G39     Guildford                        14:33     14:42        9
1W29     Dorchester South                 14:35     14:43        8
2J39     Hampton Court                    14:36     Cancel       
2V39     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:37     14:52       15
2D39     Guildford                        14:39     Cancel       
2B43     Brockenhurst                     14:39     14:40        1
2L43     Basingstoke                      14:42     14:47        5
2H39     Shepperton                       14:42     14:50        8
2P43     Portsmouth Harbour               14:45     Cancel       
2R39     London Waterloo (At platform)    14:45     14:45        0
2M39     Chessington South                14:46     Cancel       
2F39     Woking                           14:50     15:30       40
1L43     Salisbury                        14:50     Cancel       
2C43     Reading                          14:50     14:58        8
2S43     Virginia Water                   14:52     15:09       17
1A43     Alton                            14:53     14:53        0
1D39     Dorking                          14:54     Cancel       
2K39     London Waterloo                  14:57     15:27       30
2U43     Windsor & Eton Riverside         14:58     15:04        6
1P45     Portsmouth Harbour               15:00     15:10       10
2G41     Guildford                        15:03     15:20       17
2O41     London Waterloo                  15:03     Cancel       
1W71     Weymouth                         15:05     15:05        0
2J41     Hampton Court                    15:06     Cancel       
2V41     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:07     15:07        0
2D41     Guildford                        15:09     15:15        6
1T45     Portsmouth Harbour               15:09     15:26       17
2L45     Basingstoke                      15:12     15:35       23
2H41     Shepperton                       15:12     15:24       12
2R41     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:15     15:20        5
2P45     Portsmouth Harbour               15:15     15:27       12
2M41     Chessington South                15:16     15:33       17
2F41     Woking                           15:20     15:35       15
2C45     Reading                          15:20     15:44       24
1L45     Exeter St Davids                 15:20     15:19       -1
2S45     Weybridge                        15:22     15:34       12
1D41     Dorking                          15:24     Cancel       
1A45     Alton                            15:23     15:40       17
2K41     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:27     15:40       13
2U45     Windsor & Eton Riverside         15:28     15:31        3
1P47     Portsmouth Harbour               15:30     15:43       13
2G43     Guildford                        15:33     15:46       13
2O43     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:33     15:36        3
1W31     Weymouth & Poole                 15:35     15:37        2
2J43     Hampton Court                    15:36     Cancel       
2V43     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:37     15:38        1
2D43     Guildford                        15:39     15:42        3
2B47     Brockenhurst                     15:39     16:23       44
2L47     Basingstoke                      15:42     15:47        5
2H43     Shepperton                       15:42     15:48        6
2P47     Portsmouth & Southsea            15:45     15:57       12
2R43     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:45     15:52        7
2M43     Chessington South                15:46     16:02       16
2F43     Woking                           15:50     Cancel       
2C47     Reading                          15:50     15:50        0
1L47     Gillingham (Dorset)              15:50     Cancel       
2S47     Weybridge                        15:52     15:58        6
1A47     Alton                            15:53     16:01        8
1D43     Dorking                          15:54     Cancel       
2K43     London Waterloo (At platform)    15:57     16:06        9
2U47     Windsor & Eton Riverside         15:58     16:14       16
1P49     Portsmouth Harbour               16:00     16:12       12
2O45     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:01     16:04        3
2G45     Guildford                        16:03     Cancel       
2C89     Reading                          16:05     16:05        0
1W73     Wareham                          16:05     16:08        3
2J45     Hampton Court                    16:06     Cancel       
2V45     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:07     16:12        5
1T49     Portsmouth Harbour               16:09     16:42       33
2D45     Guildford                        16:09     16:11        2
2L49     Basingstoke                      16:12     16:33       21
2H45     Shepperton                       16:12     16:15        3
2P49     Portsmouth Harbour               16:15     16:37       22
2R45     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:15     16:24        9
2M45     Chessington South                16:16     16:30       14
1L49     Exeter St Davids                 16:20     16:33       13
2F45     Woking                           16:20     Cancel       
2C49     Reading                          16:20     16:19       -1
2S49     Weybridge                        16:22     16:22        0
1D45     Dorking                          16:24     Cancel       
1A49     Alton                            16:25     16:40       15
2K45     Clapham Junction (At platform)   16:27     16:27        0
2U49     Windsor & Eton Riverside         16:28     16:28        0
1P51     Portsmouth Harbour               16:30     16:43       13
2O47     London Waterloo                  16:31     Cancel       
2G47     Guildford                        16:33     16:33        0
1W33     Weymouth & Bournemouth           16:35     16:39        4
2C91     Reading                          16:35     16:48       13
2J47     Hampton Court                    16:36     Cancel       
2V47     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:37     16:45        8
2D47     Guildford                        16:39     16:43        4
1T51     Portsmouth Harbour               16:39     16:55       16
2H47     Shepperton                       16:42     16:57       15
2L51     Basingstoke                      16:42     16:48        6
2P51     Portsmouth Harbour               16:45     16:51        6
2R47     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:45     16:45        0
2M47     Chessington South                16:46     16:54        8
2F47     Woking                           16:50     16:51        1
1L51     Yeovil Junction                  16:50     Cancel       
2C51     Reading                          16:50     16:51        1
2S51     Weybridge                        16:52     17:04       12
1D47     Dorking                          16:54     Cancel       
1A51     Alton                            16:55     Cancel       
2K47     London Waterloo (At platform)    16:57     17:00        3
2U51     Windsor & Eton Riverside         16:58     17:08       10
1P53     Portsmouth Harbour               17:00     17:03        3
2O49     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:01     17:05        4
2F91     Guildford                        17:02     Cancel       
2G49     Guildford                        17:02     17:22       20
1W75     Weymouth & Bournemouth           17:05     17:05        0
1N93     Aldershot                        17:05     17:15       10
2J49     Hampton Court                    17:06     Cancel       
2V49     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:07     17:16        9
1T53     Portsmouth Harbour               17:09     17:27       18
2D49     Effingham Junction               17:09     17:19       10
2H49     Shepperton                       17:12     Cancel       
2L53     Basingstoke                      17:12     17:56       44
2O96     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:13     17:13        0
2P53     Fratton                          17:15     17:15        0
2R49     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:15     17:19        4
2M49     Chessington South                17:16     Cancel       
1L53     Exeter St Davids                 17:20     Cancel       
2C53     Reading                          17:20     17:30       10
2F49     Woking                           17:20     17:25        5
2S53     Weybridge                        17:22     17:28        6
2L91     Basingstoke                      17:23     17:24        1
1D49     Dorking                          17:24     Cancel       
1A53     Alton                            17:25     17:53       28
2K49     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:27     17:47       20
2U53     Windsor & Eton Riverside         17:28     17:33        5
1P55     Portsmouth Harbour               17:30     17:38        8
2D91     Epsom                            17:30     17:49       19
2O51     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:31     17:36        5
2G51     Guildford                        17:32     18:13       41
2F93     Guildford                        17:32     17:34        2
2C93     Reading                          17:35     17:46       11
1W35     Weymouth & Poole                 17:35     17:40        5
2J51     Hampton Court                    17:36     Cancel       
2V51     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:37     17:39        2
1T55     Portsmouth Harbour               17:39     17:41        2
2D51     Effingham Junction               17:39     17:52       13
2L55     Basingstoke                      17:41     18:13       32
2H51     Shepperton                       17:42     17:56       14
2H93     Shepperton                       17:43     17:43        0
2R51     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:45     17:45        0
1G55     Havant                           17:45     17:46        1
2M51     Chessington South                17:46     17:58       12
1B93     Southampton Central              17:48     17:49        1
2C55     Reading                          17:50     18:01       11
2F51     Woking                           17:50     18:00       10
1L55     Yeovil Junction                  17:50     Cancel       
2S55     Weybridge                        17:52     17:53        1
2L93     Basingstoke                      17:53     18:03       10
1D51     Dorking                          17:54     Cancel       
1A55     Alton                            17:55     18:01        6
2K51     London Waterloo (At platform)    17:57     18:05        8
2U55     Windsor & Eton Riverside         17:58     17:58        0
2D93     Epsom                            18:00     18:07        7
1P57     Portsmouth Harbour               18:00     18:06        6
2O53     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:01     18:04        3
2G53     Guildford                        18:02     18:10        8
2F95     Woking                           18:02     18:08        6
1N95     Aldershot                        18:05     18:05        0
1W77     Weymouth                         18:05     18:18       13
2J53     Hampton Court                    18:06     Cancel       
2V53     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:07     18:14        7
2D53     Guildford                        18:09     18:20       11
1T57     Portsmouth Harbour               18:09     18:54       45
2L57     Basingstoke                      18:12     18:31       19
2H53     Shepperton                       18:12     18:17        5
2H95     Shepperton                       18:13     18:16        3
2R53     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:15     18:19        4
1G57     Portsmouth & Southsea            18:15     18:14       -1
2M53     Chessington South                18:16     18:26       10
2P91     Guildford                        18:18     18:23        5
2C57     Reading                          18:20     18:20        0
2F53     Woking                           18:20     18:40       20
1L57     Exeter St Davids                 18:20     Cancel       
2S57     Weybridge                        18:22     18:34       12
2L95     Basingstoke                      18:23     18:25        2
1D53     Dorking                          18:24     Cancel       
1A57     Alton                            18:25     18:28        3
2K53     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:27     18:28        1
2U57     Windsor & Eton Riverside         18:28     18:32        4
1P59     Portsmouth Harbour               18:30     18:41       11
2D95     Epsom                            18:30     18:31        1
2O55     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:31     18:39        8
2L97     Basingstoke                      18:32     18:34        2
2G55     Guildford                        18:32     18:50       18
1W37     Weymouth & Poole                 18:35     18:36        1
2C95     Reading                          18:35     18:37        2
2J55     Hampton Court                    18:36     18:44        8
2V55     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:37     18:49       12
1B59     Poole                            18:39     18:39        0
2D55     Guildford                        18:39     18:53       14
2L59     Basingstoke                      18:41     Cancel       
2H55     Shepperton                       18:42     18:55       13
2H97     Shepperton                       18:43     18:42       -1
2R55     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:45     18:47        2
2P59     Portsmouth Harbour               18:45     19:12       27
2M55     Chessington South                18:46     18:46        0
2G91     Guildford                        18:48     19:00       12
2C59     Reading                          18:50     18:52        2
2F55     Woking                           18:50     18:58        8
1L59     Salisbury                        18:50     Cancel       
2S59     Weybridge                        18:52     19:00        8
1D55     Dorking                          18:54     Cancel       
1A59     Alton                            18:55     19:04        9
2K55     London Waterloo (At platform)    18:57     19:02        5
2U59     Windsor & Eton Riverside         18:58     19:01        3
2D97     Epsom                            19:00     19:12       12
1P61     Portsmouth Harbour               19:00     19:32       32
2O57     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:01     19:10        9
2F97     Woking                           19:02     19:02        0
2G57     Guildford                        19:02     19:14       12
2C97     Reading                          19:05     19:15       10
1W79     Weymouth                         19:05     19:07        2
2J57     Hampton Court                    19:06     19:06        0
2V57     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:07     19:11        4
1T61     Portsmouth Harbour               19:09     19:40       31
2D57     Guildford                        19:09     Cancel       
2L61     Basingstoke                      19:12     Cancel       
2H57     Shepperton                       19:12     19:16        4
2Y61     Woking                           19:15     19:45       30
2R57     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:15     19:15        0
2M57     Chessington South                19:16     19:19        3
1L61     Exeter St Davids & Bristol       19:20     Cancel       
2F57     Woking                           19:20     19:27        7
2C61     Reading                          19:20     19:21        1
2S61     Weybridge                        19:22     19:22        0
1J91     Surbiton                         19:23     19:23        0
1D57     Dorking                          19:24     Cancel       
1A61     Alton                            19:25     19:45       20
2K57     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:27     19:30        3
2U61     Windsor & Eton Riverside         19:28     19:28        0
1P63     Portsmouth Harbour               19:30     19:43       13
2O59     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:33     19:33        0
2G59     Guildford                        19:33     19:39        6
1W81     Weymouth                         19:35     19:39        4
2J59     Hampton Court                    19:36     Cancel       
2V59     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:37     19:38        1
2B63     Southampton Central              19:39     19:57       18
2D59     Guildford                        19:39     19:41        2
2H59     Shepperton                       19:42     19:43        1
2L63     Basingstoke                      19:42     20:03       21
2P63     Portsmouth & Southsea            19:45     Cancel       
2R59     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:45     20:05       20
2M59     Chessington South                19:46     19:46        0
1L63     Salisbury                        19:50     Cancel       
2C63     Reading                          19:50     19:49       -1
2F59     Woking                           19:50     Cancel       
2S63     Weybridge                        19:52     19:57        5
1A63     Alton                            19:53     20:47       54
2D61     Epsom                            19:54     19:53       -1
2K59     London Waterloo (At platform)    19:57     19:56       -1
2U63     Windsor & Eton Riverside         19:58     19:58        0
1P65     Portsmouth Harbour               20:00     20:00        0
2G61     Guildford                        20:03     20:12        9
2O61     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:03     20:02       -1
1B65     Bournemouth                      20:05     20:13        8
2J61     Hampton Court                    20:06     Cancel       
2V61     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:07     20:08        1
1T65     Portsmouth Harbour               20:09     20:24       15
1D61     Dorking                          20:09     Cancel       
2H61     Shepperton                       20:12     20:14        2
2L65     Basingstoke                      20:12     20:13        1
2P65     Haslemere                        20:15     20:22        7
2R61     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:15     20:19        4
2M61     Chessington South                20:16     20:27       11
1L65     Exeter St Davids                 20:20     20:20        0
2C65     Reading                          20:20     20:20        0
2F61     Woking                           20:20     20:31       11
2S65     Weybridge                        20:22     20:22        0
1A65     Alton                            20:23     20:44       21
2D63     Epsom                            20:24     20:34       10
2K61     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:27     20:34        7
2U65     Windsor & Eton Riverside         20:28     20:28        0
1P67     Portsmouth Harbour               20:30     Cancel       
2G63     Guildford                        20:33     20:48       15
2O63     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:33     20:34        1
1W83     Weymouth                         20:35     Cancel       
2J63     Hampton Court                    20:36     Cancel       
2V63     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:37     20:37        0
2D65     Guildford                        20:39     20:42        3
2B67     Eastleigh                        20:39     21:19       40
2H63     Shepperton                       20:42     20:46        4
2L67     Basingstoke                      20:42     20:42        0
2R63     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:45     20:45        0
2P67     Portsmouth & Southsea            20:45     Cancel       
2M63     Chessington South                20:46     Cancel       
2F63     Woking                           20:50     21:06       16
2C67     Reading                          20:50     20:50        0
2S67     Weybridge                        20:52     20:52        0
1A67     Alton                            20:53     21:16       23
2D67     Epsom                            20:54     21:03        9
2K63     London Waterloo (At platform)    20:57     20:56       -1
2U67     Windsor & Eton Riverside         20:58     20:58        0
1P69     Portsmouth Harbour               21:00     21:26       26
2O65     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:03     21:02       -1
2G65     Guildford                        21:03     21:33       30
1B69     Poole                            21:05     21:15       10
2V65     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:07     21:07        0
1D65     Dorking                          21:09     Cancel       
2H65     Shepperton                       21:12     21:13        1
2L69     Basingstoke                      21:12     21:35       23
2R65     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:15     21:15        0
2F65     Woking                           21:20     21:29        9
2C69     Reading                          21:20     21:20        0
1L69     Yeovil Junction                  21:20     21:22        2
2S69     Weybridge                        21:22     21:27        5
1A69     Alton                            21:23     21:41       18
2D69     Epsom                            21:24     21:25        1
2K65     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:27     21:31        4
2U69     Windsor & Eton Riverside         21:28     21:30        2
1P71     Portsmouth Harbour               21:30     21:37        7
2G67     Guildford                        21:33     21:36        3
2O67     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:33     21:35        2
1W85     Weymouth                         21:35     21:46       11
2J67     Hampton Court                    21:36     Cancel       
2V67     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:37     21:37        0
2D71     Guildford                        21:39     21:52       13
2B71     Southampton Central              21:39     21:48        9
2H67     Shepperton                       21:42     21:41       -1
2T71     Portsmouth Harbour               21:42     21:51        9
2R67     Twickenham                       21:45     21:45        0
2P71     Portsmouth & Southsea            21:45     21:56       11
2M67     Chessington South                21:46     21:46        0
2C71     Reading                          21:50     22:00       10
2F67     Guildford                        21:50     21:55        5
2S71     Weybridge                        21:52     21:52        0
1A71     Alton                            21:53     21:53        0
2D73     Epsom                            21:54     Cancel       
2K67     London Waterloo (At platform)    21:57     21:58        1
2U71     Windsor & Eton Riverside         21:58     21:57       -1
1P73     Portsmouth Harbour               22:00     22:00        0
2O69     London Waterloo (At platform)    22:03     22:02       -1
2G69     Guildford                        22:03     22:25       22
1B73     Poole                            22:05     22:05        0
1D69     Dorking                          22:09     22:10        1
2L73     Basingstoke                      22:12     22:11       -1
2H69     Shepperton                       22:12     22:12        0
1L73     Salisbury                        22:20     22:20        0
2C73     Reading                          22:20     22:19       -1
2F69     Woking                           22:20     22:21        1
2S73     Weybridge                        22:22     22:23        1
1A73     Alton                            22:23     22:22       -1
2K69     London Waterloo (At platform)    22:27     22:28        1
2U73     Windsor & Eton Riverside         22:28     22:28        0
1P75     Portsmouth Harbour               22:30     22:30        0
2G71     Guildford                        22:33     Cancel       
2O71     London Waterloo (At platform)    22:33     22:33        0
1B75     Poole                            22:35     22:35        0
2J71     Hampton Court                    22:36     22:36        0
2B75     Southampton Central              22:39     23:09       30
2D75     Guildford                        22:39     22:44        5
2L75     Basingstoke                      22:42     22:42        0
2H71     Shepperton                       22:42     22:41       -1
2P75     Portsmouth & Southsea            22:45     23:13       28
2F71     Woking                           22:50     23:10       20
2C75     Reading                          22:50     22:50        0
1S75     Woking                           22:52     22:52        0
1A75     Alton                            22:53     23:05       12
2K71     London Waterloo (At platform)    22:57     22:56       -1
2U75     Windsor & Eton Riverside         22:58     23:01        3

Bloody hell, what do you do as a party piece?!!

Under these (rather unusual) circumstances, would the best strategy be to use the Underground to Richmond?

Looking at how many trains did run, and ignoring the loss of the Dorking service (backed up via Victoria), why was the station so jammed with people? Did it reach the critical point (the equivalent of gridlock, whatever that's called) where trains set of half full and leaving passengers behind who couldn't reach them? In that case the crowd doesn't get reduced by running trains, and you might be better off going to Clapham, Wimbledon, Richmond etc. Usually this is not viable, as trains are full on arrival. And if too many people (which is not a huge number) do it crowding becomes a problem there.

Going back to Silver's comments earlier on, if you run one of these big stations (and that means NR, of course, not FGW or SWT) you need plans to cope with any level of service or none, and however many waiting passengers that leads to.

SWT had agreement from FGW to take their passengers for (I imagine) RDG, BSK, and points west. They continued to advertise this alternative all evening, with no mention of the lack of FGW trains. And they said their services were severely disrupted (without exceptions), not that WAT was too full of people. That may have seemed like an "equivalent lie", often done in the past, but I don't think it is advisable now. We can now check on what trains are running, so giving advice that is clearly based on wrong information will only lead to people ignoring the advice.

There's a post on http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=103950 (http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=103950) that says that the signalling equipment on HS1 is well-defended against lightning strikes. Is this right?

It is ETCS - in cab signalling, which uses a NRFD track mounted balise (or transponder) GPS and speed measurement to know where the it self is this is fed back to a control centre computer via GSMR (railway cell phone network) this then tells the train the max permitted speed.

If all this fails there fixed block markers which the drive can be talked through.

It is possible that lightening could take out signalling power supplies and junctions but HS1 doesn't have many of those, also the OLE could be struck taking out a substation but HS1 has a complex alternative feed system which providing the lightening hasn't taken out the SCADA that is  ;D

Since people build and operate and operate railways and other infrastructure in places where big lightning bolts are commoner than here, it must be possible to build these to survive. I have come across several reasons why that would be so:

Keeping out lightning surges, like keeping out interference, is mostly in the details of earthing and the like. If it's wrong from the start, you can't add it in later. But despite the inherent susceptibility of modern electronics - small devices on chips can be destroyed by a tiny amount of energy - they can be protected. A lot of chips have some protection built in, then you can add more at board and module level, and most importantly at the cabinet entry point. Power supplies can now cross insulation breaks too, along with signals - a lot of domestic kit contains standard DC-DC converters that can withstand several kV.

Axle counters and balises are fixed to the track, but insulated from it, so have a big advantage over track circuits (all of which will go). The Thales AzLM (NR's main favourite axle counter) can take a 6 kV surge on any interface, and they offer an extra protector for the cabinet entry.

The OHLE is electrically not so different from pole-mounted MV (11 kV and 33 kV) supplies, and they mostly survive lightning using standard methods. The lightning will still enter the ground down one or more stanchions, producing a big voltage difference between nearby earths - hence the importance of insulating cables from earth, using fibre, etc..

So new railways, and newly electrified and resignalled ones like most of the Western Route, ought to do be better than what we have now. But there are limits - most lightning round here has peak currents in the range 5-10 kA. If you get a really big one, like the 100-200 kA  seen in tall buildings and Alps, it may still fry things.

District Line was bust too.
Not kidding.

............and that sums it up in a nutshell - "you need plans" - even if in extremis that means closing the station until such time it is safe and practicable to operate a service which allows the numbers leaving the station to reduce the numbers waiting, even if in extremis it means calling in the Met Police to help with crowd control if FGW/NR/BTP are not capable of doing so (as they patently were not last week), even if in extremis it means being honest enough to tell people that there is no point waiting as there will be no trains for the foreseeable future, even if in extremis advising customers to seek their own alternatives which will be refunded.......................basically it means exercising a duty of care to customers/the public.

Is that an issue in itself?

If Network Rail manages the station, but most of the staff who work there work for a TOC (or for BTP) which is not a subcontractor to NR, whose responsibility is safety and crowd control? If it's been written into contracts, that usually has good points (ensures the subject has been thought about and responsibility allocated somewhere) and bad (if it wasn't thought about, or incompletely, everyone may duck it; management is made far more complex, and cooperation with a third party can't realistically be required in a contract).

I think it is.

IT doesn't sound as if any agreement other than standard station working has been entered into by Network Rail and the TOCs using their major stations - so when it comes to Meltdown, the TYOCs are trying to organise their crews & stock, while NR alone are left to man their station. And fail, because they need a connect (and probably a better, more detailed one that under standard conditions) with the TOC.

This latter connect to me is mainly missing....

I went through Reading station this morning at about 0745 and bearing in mind the woeful level of staffing in evidence on Friday during the meltdown I thought I would have a quick scout around to see what was in evidence this morning.

On each of the main London bound platforms there were 3 train dispatch staff in hi vis, there were at least one or two on all the other operational platforms, together with a load of Ribena in the gateline/concourse areas as well as the gateline staff, additionally there were one or two on the footbridge.

My question therefore would be.............why was it in the height of Friday's chaos that there only appeared to be a handful of staff anywhere attempting to help customers (and believe me I looked for them) - few if any on platforms, no Ribena, and only 2 on the footbridge who by the looks of it would have earned a VC by close of play.

Were they hiding in crew rooms? Or is there another explanation?

Leaving aside the Customer Service implications...........what about Health and Safety? Station evacuation with the area much busier than usual? How would that be manafged? How would disabled customers be assisted?

At Maidenhead on Friday it amused me greatly that the only two staff present on the platforms had located themselves on Platform 1, which for anyone unfamiliar with Maidenhead is the only platform that passengers weren't on as it is only used for about two trains per day.

Hiding out of the way on a quiet platform, or was a HST due soon for despatch, or were they doing one of these security checks that happens at the larger stations?

They were on Platform 1 for the best part of an hour whilst I was on Platform 2/3 with a couple of hundred other passengers.
HST's were coming in to Platform 1 and being held at signal in the platform for about 10mins a time before going onwards towards Twyford.  The doors remained locked throughout and there was no chance of a disembark on Platform 1.

One of the friends with whom I shared the taxi on Friday says that one of her colleagues is adamant that a train picked her up at Maidenhead "sometime after 17.30" and she was able to alight at Twyford. According to RTT there appears to have been no Down stoppers from MAI between 1644 and 2106. Did by any chance one of those HSTs open its doors there and at TWY I wonder?

Well I was on platform 2 staring at platform 1 from 16.00 until 17.30.  I'm not going to call anyone a liar, but to the best of my knowledge no one got on or off those HST's.  The unlock/lock would have been audible to me.

Apparently it was sometime after 17.30. I don't know how reliable the information is, it's very much second-hand from my friend's colleague. However I'm intrigued to know if any Down trains did actually stop at MAI and TWY during the main (4-hour) part of the disruption even though there's nothing on RTT to suggest they did.

..........bet they both got an amazing sun tan!  :D

They were probably on platform 1 ensuring passengers don't leave or attempt to board the train...... I know the doors remain locked but passengers can attempt to open the doors which causes problems with the train arrives its next booked stop with the door handle not in the horizontal position and, believe it or not, passengers have been known to board or alight through the droplight window even when the train is on the move!   
Trains with slam doors are still dispatched by the TM regardless of whether the doors are released or not at unscheduled station stops.

As for Reading station, there is always at least one member of staff on each through platform, more for the platforms served by the HSTs.  They have no other messroom facilities at Reading other than an open office on the platform where they have access to train signalling maps and train running information.
Each tickets barrier has to be manned by two members of staff (when in use) and the Ribena brigade will generally just reiterate what has been announced over the station tannoy or what is advertised on the departure boards.... that is why you generally find them near a departure board!

I don't blame anyone for hiding, if that is what they do. I wouldn't stand there taking a torrent of abuse from passengers for hours on end.  Its not so bad if you have accurate information but when there's nothing from Network Rail telling a passenger "we honestly don't know what time the line will reopen" doesn't generally go down well and more often than not, passengers generally don't believe it.

All you need is a massive screen or two where someone, whether it be working on the station or sat in control, can type the exact state of play and what is being done.  A system which allows "freehand input" rather than one where you are limited to what information can be displayed.  Can't be that difficult to setup.

One of the wonderful things that ATOC dictate during disruption (PIDD) is that the disruption messages have to be consistent and have the same meaning wherever you are in UK.
Hence why you rarley would get free text messages

Privatisation is wonderful, when you want to apply common sense to a situation.... bosh!  someone is there to put a stop to it!

You're making loads of "generally" based assumptions here, abuse, via torrents or otherwise is inexcusable (from either side) but in my experience rarely seen - however if you've chosen to work in a public service environment where the service concerned frequently falls over you should be willing and capable of dealing with frustrated (not abusive) customers....if you're the sort of person who would hide away and leave your colleagues to deal with it and/or leave customers without assistance, perhaps you need to reassess your career choice?

Secondly, people appreciate honesty, they are far more likely to complain because they are being told nothing, rather than being given bad news - people understand that the guy on the platform is not responsible for signal failures or whatever, but they do (quite rightly) hold him responsible for keeping them informed........if it's most likely going to be hours, say so, and advise customers of alternatives where available.......don't just disappear leaving people to get more and more frustrated with no information and (in the case of Paddington on Friday) the station to get more and more overcrowded and dangerous.

It's a shame you have such a blinkered view of life.  These comments are based on 35 years in the industry, they happen on a daily basis just because you don't see them don't mean they don't happen. 
I've seen platform staff floored, in the last two or three months there have been 2 incidents alone in this area where staff have been hospitalised.
I've seen passengers last week chase, yes chase, after platform staff up a platform at Paddington shouting abuse at them because they were politely informed the train had been cancelled due to no driver.  The member of staff walked away when things started to turn and they were chased.
I've known a incident where a passenger who hasn't got there own way accused a train manager of sexual assault leading to the train manager being arrested and off work whilst it was investigated, luckily CCTV cleared him, all because they were reminded they were in a quiet coach.  This allegation was made by teacher!
 
I wouldn't leave colleagues out on the platform to face a torrent of abuse and possible assault, but we don't come to work every day to be on the receiving end of it.  I can happily deal with frustrated customers, that doesn't bother me.  Unfortunately, frustrated passengers can and will turn when they are told something they don't want to hear or they think they know better.
Passengers may understand the guys or girls on the platform are not responsible but you wouldn't think so by the way some of them behave.

As for leaving customers without assistance, rubbish.  There were operational screens and announcements made at Paddington.  You tell a passenger one thing, the plan changes and suddenly you have someone pointing a finger in your face calling you a liar and there you are, another conflict point. "You've just told me........"
Passengers expect to be told exactly when the train will leave, from what platform and exactly how long the delay will be.  None of us know exactly how long a fault will take to fix yet passengers will still tell us we are lying!

I should say its a minority but it's that small minority day in day out that pummels morale, and once morale is down its down
No incentives or cash will be enough to lift that morale from rock bottom. The only thing that will help is considerably more staff on the ground..... and I think from what I read this morning that could be happening.

Moderator note: I've taken the liberty of renaming this topic from 'Twyford signalling problems - big delays - 14 July 2014' to what you see now. Better reflects the more than one issue on one day and the wider area affected.

From what I saw on 25th July, station staff were being left to face the public with no access to information about when the next train was likely to arrive.  The screens were only showing trains which "were known to be running".  While I spent an hour at Didcot Parkway waiting for a train to Oxford, the staff were trying to contact Control to see whether anything could be done to divert an Oxford-bound train into the station to pick up passengers.  As it turned out, no such trains were running, other than ones operated by CrossCountry.    We were being told that the next train to Oxford was not expected for over an hour.  Then, to the surprise of the staff, one appeared on the screen and, after a few minutes, the staff cheerfully announced that it had just left Reading.

Similarly, later at Oxford, at least one member of staff was making himself available to passengers waiting on the platform, handing out bottles of water and passing on what information he had.  A cheer went up when he announced that the 2253 to Worcester Shrub Hill was approaching the station (about 35 minutes late).

I think that the main problem on 25th July was train staff being in the wrong places.  Trying to work out what stock and staff was available must have been a nightmare and probably explains why information was not being made available to station staff.   

If I may I'd like to look at the aspect of customer care during disruptions from a slightly different angle.

In 2009 I was the sole carer of my elderly mother who had terminal cancer. For a period of about 4 months until she needed more intensive palliative care, it was agreed between me and Social Services that they would look after her at home until 17.00 every weekday. Then they would leave her on her own until I took over once I arrived home from the 17.06 to TWY which would be at about 17.45.

I was concerned about what would happen if I was delayed. Social Services didn't seem very interested by my concern. For a time sunset was at about 18.00-18.30 and I was worried about my Mum being left in the dark. Things got off to a bad start when the 17.06 one day failed to stop at TWY and I had to return from RDG. But after then, during the whole of the 4 month period, I was never home more than 5 minutes late. Never ever. Not even once.

But imagine how I'd felt at PAD last Friday evening if I had to get home to look after someone with no certain prospect of anyone being able to step in at short notice to provide care? This was brought home to me the previous day when the 17.06 was shown as 'Delayed' with no news or announcements, and one of my fellow commuters was going frantic because she needed to pick up her children and the carer she was speaking to on the phone was getting angry because yet again she would be late.

Now, I'm not suggesting that it should be the responsibility alone of customer service staff to deal with these sort of issues. But surely SOMEBODY should be taking care of this sort of thing? Or do people simply accept that it's a risk one takes by being a commuter?

The latter unfortunately. Your arrangement would be seen as cutting things very fine these days.

Unfortunately, the relative is yours. Therefore you have to ensure that your arrangements suit every possible delay.

Without wishing to trivialise in any way the examples you provide, if morale is so low and this minority causes such immense distress amongst the general workforce, could you tell me/us why are people apparently not leaving the rail industry in their droves?

They are.  Within the next 2 months they plan to recruit more drivers despite recently going through a major recruit program.  We are seriously short of drivers this weekend.  We have a huge staff turnover, especially on the LTV routes and on gateline and dispatch roles with many actively looking at jobs with other train operators which is a shame, because aside from the fact Network Rail can't provide a reliable infrastructure and the DfT won't allocate us enough rolling stock, FGW is probably the best of the 3 TOCs I've worked for since privatisation.

Fair enough! I would also add I wasn't intending to be antagonistic, just genuinely curious as when I used to make use of FGW services (I have had enough and now drive) i'd see the same faces all the time, but that was mainly Swansea based crews so the employment market there is probably a little less conducive to easily moving on.

So are people being poached or otherwise leaving to join other TOCs or are they exiting the industry entirely?

Apologies for thread drift...

Quite a few drivers are going from our LTV depots to join the HSS side but equally we've had a lot leave for CrossCountry, Virgin Trains, SouthEastern, London Midland, First Capital Connect, East Midlands Trains, DBS, Freightliner and a couple have moved abroad, but all staying within the railway industry as far as I'm aware.
On the other hand we seem to take a lot of qualified drivers from SWT, LOROL and Greater Anglia

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/union-boss-warns-rail-staff-could-strike-in-32-hour-week-bid.24811512

Would you leave with a 32 hour working week on the horizon? Where do I sign up?  ;)

Right here:
https://uk.firstgroupcareers.com/company/firstgreatwestern/home/

If you can't beat us, join us   ;D

I could certainly live with the dreadful trauma of a customer shouting at me now and again for those terms and conditions, no wonder the fares are so high!!! I like the irony of the bike to work scheme though.........handy for all those days when the trains fall over!!!  :D

lol.  Come and find and why then (and get your discounted bike!).  I think you maybe in for a surprise, if not a shock.  Any help with the application form just give us a shout

All the information is here......
http://www.traindriver.org
http://www.how2become.com/train-driver-course/

Well of course, couldn't possibly be staff cycling from where they live to their local station, or cycling to the depot/station before trains are even in passenger service :)

I appreciate this is all a bit of tongue-in-cheek, but I think you really believe what you say...

Have you considered how good the terms and conditions would be as you kill another human being with your train, perhaps a child?  What about being punched or spat at..?  Fear for your safety when football "fans" or others have had too much to drink and being aggressive and violent when you are the only one in a metal tube with a responsibility for safety?  Being threatened with a knife?.... and that's before you are called all the names under the sun for trying to enforce even basic revenue rules.

0200 wake-up alarms for earlies, 0200 bed-time for lates, 0800 bed-time for nights, trying to sleep with the summer heat, feeling fatigued, not able to plan a day/night out with "normal" (ie. non-railway) friends/family until a few days before because you're not sure you can get your annual leave granted.  Spare turns where you can be moved up to 3 hours each way from your original start-time that can screw any plans for your days up, or ruin your body clock that little bit more.  0600 finish off nights and then it's your day off.. what time are you sleeping so you don't waste your day off completely?

We accept it and we get on with the job, because the vast majority of staff are loyal and committed to offering the best possible service, despite mass failures in our network.  Please do not think for one minute though, that life is as simple and rosey as you portray in your blinkered view of our world.

We get abuse, serious abuse, physical abuse, threats and malicious accusations. We get managers who cba and automatically believe the 'paying' customer. Example being the TM who was accused of sexual abuse and was on suspension for a period while BTP 'investigated' it. That's also while the company investigated them internally (and the law of innocent till proven guilty doesn't apply in FG land.). And think of how a simple malicious accusation can cause you to loose commission, Sunday pay, allowances, rest day work and overtime?
I personally have had 2 knifes pulled on me. 1 of which BTP wasn't the slightest bit interested in, till an off-duty civi police got involved. I have been spat at, gobbed at (even worst then spittle), had needles thrown at me, punched, scratched.

Kiss goodbye to even a simple family life. Earlies? Go to bed at 17:00 and wake up at 02:00. Lates finally get home gone 02:00. Nights get home at gone 08:00 just when everyone else has woken up.

So yeah a really rosy place to work, the railway industry isn't it!!! :-p Must keep thinking the benefits outweigh the negatives. Pay is okay, 35 hour week coolish, travel perks including Europe and Eurostar great, 40:60 shared cost Final Salary Pension (if I survive that long), Private Health Insurance, a great Union, almost guaranteed payrise every year (well inflation rise anyway), to name but a few.

I have worked for several TOCs, including FGW. FGW have slipped nosedived in the support/back up of their staff. Its all "customer first" and "kiss the backside of the customer" and "Sod the employee they are but a number". I noticed that changing in the past few years and got out and moved to another TOC who are worse but support the employee so much better. When you get the FGW MD saying in the weekly corporate spin Email Newsletter '......you said to us you got no support and no information on Friday.... which is not acceptable.....' there is clearly a problem.

I'm feeling somewhat perplexed by the railway employees here who keep telling us all how utterly dreadful it is working on the railway (which I accept it probably isn't always great on several levels) yet for some reason you stay put...?!? I just don't get why anyone would keep at it if it's really that dreadful...apart from if certain incentives are far superior to those potentially gained elsewhere?

- think that answers your question, these are terms and conditions that most of us can only dream of...........as for working shifts, millions of people do that and get nowhere near as many rest days - if you don't like it, there's always the option of getting a 9-5.

People who work in the public sector/quasi public sector jobs are almost always the worst when it comes to moaning about how hard they have it (teachers being a good example) but generally forget about these terms and conditions.

Yes this was/is tongue in cheek, a bit of light hearted banter, but I think it's time some people cooled their jets, especially if they're going to start throwing comments around about killing children with trains

To reiterate - no-one is suggesting abuse of either staff or customers is acceptable in any way, believe me I have worked in far more emotive situations than the "railway industry" and  have heard/been threatened with everything from weapons to bodily fluids - it's not right but it goes with the turf and is more about what society is prepared to tolerate these days.

Talk to guys who've held the line in Northern Ireland/Iraq/Afghan and then tell us what a hard life it is on the railways.

There endeth my sermon -have a good, safe day everyone.

I feel that we customers are treated badly by FGW so goodness knows what it must feel like to be one of their employees. My own perception of FGW is along the lines of "kiss the backside of the once-yearly Glastonbury traveller and sod everyone else including annual season ticket holders, particularly the poor Cardiff/Newport people who see their train service cut by 50% while the Festival is on".

Thank You to all FGW staff who have posted here and yes I'm guilty of sometimes letting off steam especially to the operators of the @FGW Twitter account but I'm always polite and I thank them. I'd be very interested to know what response staff get from the MD regarding last Friday's problems because I'm not aware of any word to customers regarding last week's events.

The simple point is it's not all fab t's & c's when there is a downside to it at times.  The only downside you seem to think is you might occasionally be moaned at by a customer or two.  You might not like reading comments about kids being killed, but does it happen?  Of course it does, and no amount of pay, t's and c's is going to remove that sort of trauma.


I repeat my original quote:

We accept it and we get on with the job, because the vast majority of staff are loyal and committed to offering the best possible service, despite mass failures in our network.

Add to that, many of us have an interest in transport and railways.  I personally couldn't work a 9-5 job in an office anymore.  I love the views of the GW network, meeting staff and customers from Penzance to London (TaplowGreen i'd even buy you a pint - Reading prices though :o ), I have some wonderful friends all over the network, enough so that it feels like a massive family.

It hurts a lot of us to see us fail to provide the service that you pay for, and that's why so many of us contribute on here.

However i'm merely trying to get across that yes terms and conditions are great, pay is good comparable to other industries and most days are great, but not everything in our world at times is as rosey as the public might choose to believe.

Thanks - I'll have a Doom Bar please! (Plymouth prices probably more competitive!)  ;D

Not when you add a Taplow-Plymouth fare surely...  ;)

Thank you - I think that puts it in a much better context for me - this is an emotive issue and my interpretation of some of the posts in this thread give me the impression the occasional foul mouthed shouter (or worse) is a much more significant issue than you suggest in your last post.

I think every member of this forum, and the vast majority of the travelling public would condemn any kind of abusive behaviour and also appreciate the good work that most FGW staff do in sometimes chaotic circumstances on behalf of a less than perfect employer.

However, I would reiterate some comments on here that it is a sad but inevitable consequence of customer facing roles that some of your 'customers' from time to time aren't very nice to you, I guess you just develop coping mechanisms for the 'minor' stuff. This isn't a new thing at all - my dad started work in the late 60's dealing with the lovely public (night pharmacy in Central London...), it just used to be easier to 'deal' with oiks in the appropriate manner back then... ;D

FGW have their faults... as operational staff I may not always agree with the way things are done, decisions made, things said etc and this can be disillusioning.

I however do think FGW do a decent job with the cards they are given. I really don't think much would change if we were run by DB, Stagecoach etc.

I really have no issues with them from an employee POV. Pay is great, my local management are decent, holiday is good.

SDS' view is not representative of the majority of the FGW workforce.

I totally agree with you.  Are line managers are superb and approachable which is something I'm not use to!  The other TOC's I've worked for managers would never be seen in the messroom, it was always a case of them vs us. 

I think FGW do a decent job with very limited resources in terms of rolling stock, and despite nearing the end of the franchise they've still gone out and secured extra trains when they could have sat back and spent nothing.

Even if First lose the franchise, I doubt very much whether you would notice anything different apart from a change of colour on the trains and a new uniform, in fact I would put money on there being a deterioration in some aspects of the service.

My employer is just like any other employer these days ......... no worse not better. 

I am really enjoying my current job more than any other in my 40 years, I am "Building A Better Railway" getting rid of old and obsolescent equipment improving reliability and even building new lines and stations; we will get there, it will just take us a bit of time.  There is only so much time we can have access to the train set to do stuff and only so much money to do it with.

Railway staff often look back at the days of BR and think they were great days, well I took my rose tinted specs' off years ago, pay was poor, hours were long.

Agreed, and to add the Henley/Wargrave/Shiplake season ticket holders are equally ignored during Henley Regatta. 

You may think that FGW were improvising during these two major disruptions. But if you look on their Customer Charter page it says this:

The link is to the First Great Western Passenger Information Delivery Plan (https://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/~/media/PDF/AboutUs/CustomerServices/PassengerCharter/FGW-PIDD-Delivery-Plan.ashx).

This is not really written as a public document, and is stuffed full on unexplained abbreviations, starting with PIDD (passenger information during disruption).  It refers to a number of other documents, mostly internal ones, and to the ATOC code of practice on PIDD (http://www.atoc.org/clientfiles/files/ACOP015v3%20-%20PIDD%20(2).pdf).

The FGW plan is very much a management procedure, which serves mainly to show how many actors are involved and how much management time has been spent on it. But it's not exactly rich in practical detail. The ATOC code is a long list of things that should happen, a lot of them rather obvious. Was the actual PIDD delivered any better as a result of these documents than it would have been if they were all improvising? I suspect some of you may doubt it.

Hmm ...  ::)

There are some shocking typos in that document - starting on the first page, where it is claimed it's been approved by "Patrick Holgate, NR Route Managing Director - Western".

So much for "our commitment to delivery good quality information to customers".  :o

Having a plan is one thing and serves to ensure that a box is ticked, but it means nothing unless it actually happens.

All train operating companies struggle with severe disruption.  Beginning of this month it was Virgin Trains with passengers stranded on trains with complaining of no information, no refreshments and no air con for over 5 hours.
https://twitter.com/mjcole/status/495632665211854848
https://twitter.com/frankieboyle/status/495599990476382210

Tonight it is Abelio Greater Anglia with complete signalling failure in the rush hour
https://twitter.com/jellyfire1/status/497437565524668416
https://twitter.com/craigthemac/status/497467708750188544
https://twitter.com/SamWeArePrimal/status/497464849681887232
https://twitter.com/HarryGriff89/status/497459527802159104

FGW is the only operator to have delays caused by infrastructure faults.  The best laid plans aren't going to get around a total line closure.  Train companies can not and will never be able to get enough replacement coaches to transport passengers around a line closure at he drop of a hat.  When it comes to a total line closure it will always be a case of waiting until they can get it reopened.
Given the amount of infrastructure faults that occur on the UK rail network daily all groups/organisations need to sit down and rethink it's current guidelines and procedures regarding the provision of information because at the moment that is clearly not working for any TOC.  I still think each TOC needs more freedom with the way it is allowed to provide information on screens at stations.

It isn't just about having information on screens in these circumstances or even fleets of replacement coaches, it's more about having enough people on the ground who are capable of dealing with difficult situations and often high volumes of frustrated customers to offer help,ensure a safe environment and provide advice on alternative means of travel - FGW failed dismally in both respects on the 25th July, however it was encouraging to hear that they were more proactive after the suicide at Ealing last Friday.......let's hope we don't get three in a row.

I would certainly be interested in reading FGW's review of events on the 25th, what lessons they learned and how they will do things differently going forward to provide a decent level of customer service when things go wrong...........after the amount of problems we've had recently they've certainly had plenty of opportunity to practice.

The fact that "all TOCs struggle with severe disruption" is more an indictment of them than a mitigating factor - it certainly isn't a reason for FGW not to improve.

Everyone knows that occasionally everything will fall over - that's not an excuse to shrug shoulders and say "tough luck" - it's how and if FGW (and others) rise to the challenge and respond to these occasional crises and do their best for their customers that marks them out.

And Greater Anglia again this morning (Mon Aug 11), this time with overrunning engineering works blocking the line at Ipswich, with "limited" buses running from Stowmarket to Manningtree. http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/today.aspx (http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/today.aspx)

Oh dear...

"A signalling problem at Ealing Broadway is causing delays of up to 25 minutes between London Paddington and Slough. There is no firm estimate yet of how long disruption will last but it is likely to continue until at least 17:00"

Update at 16:48 - S&T are at the Transmitter end and have reported no Voltage present. Techs are making their way to the location to check the power supplies. All services are now going on the Up Relief line while techs investigate.

Update at 16:10 - Trains are now being talked past SN222 signal only.

Update at 15:55 - Techs on site.

Network Rail report Track Circuit PMJ has failed showing occupied whilst clear and PML has blipped twice on the Up Main line approaching Ealing Broadway Trains are being Talked past SN222 and SN212 signals or diverting onto the Up Relief line where possible. 1A83 10:00 Paddington to Penzance examined from affected line, nothing seen.

Second item on BBC Look East tonight was a lengthy apology from Greater Anglia regarding the punctuality problems they have had. They blame, in no particular order, signalling and track problems, an increase in the number of people struck by trains and rolling stock issues.

On the 11th August, bored with Points West's obsession with, and lead story about, the non-news of a Commonwealth Games competitor (3 weeks after the event), I idly flicked through the other local BBC programmes in search of something interesting.  And behold!  A feisty roasting of a senior NR man on Look East about the over-running of engineering work that morning in the East of England.  Now that's a story and great spectator sport!

Track Circuit Failure between Swindon and Didcot Parkway tonight. Seems just a small section in the Up direction affected. Now picking up speed having been doing stop start stop start for a while.

Also our HST to Paddington seems to have only 1 or 2 working toilets in First AND Standard Class put together.

Train in question is 1A35 with Power Car 43088 on the front :)

Slight delays for me this morning due to "signalling problems at Maidenhead" is this still ongoing trouble in that area or just unfortunate coincidence?

Seems the track circuit failure between Twyford and Maidenhead didn't cause that many delays going into Paddington this morning, the three biggest delayed arrivals I can see (and I only have a quick glance!) were:

05:27 Swansea - Paddington arrived 6 minutes late (caused by fault on 0706 Didcot - Padd
05:29 Bristol - Paddington arrived 4 minutes late (caused by late running empty coaching stock to Westbury)
06:20 Westom-super-mare to Paddington arrived 4 minutes (caused by fault on 0706 Didcot - Padd)

Interesting - I was going the other way, 06.30 out of Paddington to Bristol which I picked up at Chippenham. Only 18mins late in the end. Mention of Maidenhead immediately reminded me of this thread though!

.......think people are starting to realise that this is becoming a several times a week event now!

I imagine the track circuit failure may have only affected the one line, quite often the track circuit fails after the passage of say 'train A' through the area, 'train B' comes along, goes through the area at slow speed to check the line finds nothing wrong and the track circuit rights itself after 'train B' leaves the area. 

and that procedure will become even commoner once we have axle counters everywhere. It's part of the standard reset after any fault or loss of power.

A lot are already in place, you can see the 'detection heads' along most of the route between Padd and Reading.
I think we were running both track circuits and axle counters in tandem for a while, I don't know wether that is still the case.

It's the yellow mushrooms that are really obvious. The makers call them "electronic junction boxes", presumably because earlier models just had a junction box there but now they have some electronics too. The bit that bolts to the rail is called a "rail contact", which is a bit odd as it's a non-contact magnetic wheel detector containing only coils.

......just as a postscript, and somewhat amazingly, I did apply for a refund and have today (after a month) received a letter enclosing ^50 in rail vouchers  in respect of the "difficulties you experienced" following this incident........the usual line about not meeting claims for consequential losses is trotted out however this is apparently intended as a "more tangible apology"..........which coincidentally matches my cab fare and the receipt I enclosed!  :)

A satisfactory result, then, TaplowGreen!  :D

Indeed - to tell you the truth I'd forgotten all about it after a month but I guess they have been v busy with all the problems they've been having......just goes to show though that it's always worth asking!

My philosophy too. Don't ask, don't get.

I recently enquired about charter compensation when delayed by 59 minutes according to official timings, but just over the hour by my own reckoning.

I asked FGW and was told that a claim would be accepted. Waiting for RTVs to arrive...

FGW are currently advertising internally for volunteers to form new CATs. Don't know the exact ins and outs of the position but I believe in the event of disruption off-duty staff can be called in to assist.

https://uk.internal.firstgroupcareers.com/vacancy/1252/description/

I have split off posts concerning the delays this morning (6th October) into a separate thread as it now looks like it's going to be a bit thing today - see http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=14689.0