Great Western Coffee Shop

Would welcome views / comments on this scenario, as reported to me by a person who had cycled from Melksham to another Wiltshire town and wanted to get the train back from there.

a) Person goes to station and asks at booking office if she can take her cycle on the train at xx:xx (next train) to Trowbridge.   Told, yes, she can.

b) Buys ticket

c) Is then denied boarding

Travels on next train to Trowbridge, missing Melksham connection.

My understanding is that the person was also very concerned because the delay meant that their car parking ticket over-ran - luckily for them however the parking authorities weren't on the ball that day, so the fine was avoided. It would be interesting to see if the fine could have been claimed back in full or in part though (doubt it somehow)

Cycle space is always subject to availability. That should be communicated to a passenger making such a query though.

... agreed.   But it was NOT communicated - they were given the clear indication that they would be able to take their cycles on the train at XX:XX, without any caveats, and on that basis entered into a contract to travel y purchasing a ticket.

Very interesting ... in that I have been talking about cycles on trains with a member of the TOC team this afternoon, and cycles is such an emotive subject with them that I would suggest that it's one of the more difficult areas for interested parties to discuss positively and dispassionately!

Sorry but the train was apparently full.

(https://scontent-b-lhr.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-xap1/v/t1.0-9/10513418_10152347841248300_6192935694563201131_n.jpg?oh=ee97fce338f14d2612ef38d0b0711874&oe=547FF527)

What you can't see in SDS's pic is that the designated cycle space is just out of shot and is full up with suitcases...

You should see what happens when someone boards a Class 150/2 with a 4th Bike. Then 2 stops up the line, someone with a Wheelchair wants to board. But a bike is now in the Wheelchair space... ::)

It put the conductor in a very difficult position and I think she had to make the decision of who she was going to annoy the least!

Easy

The Equality Act protects the Mobility Impaired customer. It Doesn't protect the Cyclist. So off goes the Cyclist. It all reality the 4th bike shouldn't have been allowed on in the first place 'just in case' their is a wheelchair.

Hardly equality then is it!  ;)

As an avid cyclist, full size cycles on trains p*ss me right off. They should either add space, or just ban the lot. Personally I would have converted the 1st classes on the Turbos to cycle areas, and anyone with a bike (inc folding) made to stand in there with the bikes - that would have freed up even more seats!

Even when the rules state no bikes, none of the staff stop people with them. There was a poster up at Maidenhead for months saying no bikes on Turbos that arrive at Paddington before 9:30 (I think it was), but I only ever once saw someone being stopped (and physically dragged off) - but that was when the 180 was replaced with a (2 car if I recall) turbo.

There is some guy that gets off at Maidenhead who hoiks up his full size bike onto his shoulder in the vestibule before getting off - he almost hit me so many times I moved to another area on the train just to avoid the idiot.

So what happens if there's, for example, no bikes but several wheelchairs? What happens if the Lower Moulding on the Scroat Wheelchair Users' Club decides to have an outing by train one day, and all 12 of them turn up at once? Are they all protected, and the TOC required to start removing seats to make space for them?

The point is that a bike is luggage and therefore discretionary. And if not a folding bike very large luggage. The bike user can travel without his/her bike. A wheelchair is essential for the user to travel. There is no contest.

I think the "Reasonable Adjustments" under domestic law would come into play on this one. But even then under European Law FGW would have to find alternative transport for them.
Cyclists should be completely and utterly banned, no exceptions. I dont care if you got a ^27.47bn brompton bike or a 99p folding bike from halfords or a ^9.99 full man-sized bike. Trains are for humans (term used loosely in accordance with the great unwashed of Reading and Glastonbury festivals) and not for stupid bikes.

Another problem with bikes is short platforms.  For example, due to the positioning of a signal at the end of the UP platform, HSTs calling at Evesham station have coach A (in which the cycle space is provided) 3 or 4 coaches beyond the end of it.  Train Managers usually allow bikes to be stored in the vestibules of the front 4 coaches and, if someone boards at Evesham with a bike, I have seen the train delayed at the next suitable station so that the bike can be moved to the correct place.  In Evesham's case, the next station is Honeybourne.  Here, there can be a problem with bikes stored in the rear portion of a Class 180 on trains heading towards Worcester.  The DOWN platform is only 3 coaches long. On occasions, the Train Manager has had to request the driver to draw forward to allow a bike to be removed from the train.  This results in delays.

The last time I took a bike on a train, some 45 years ago, it was a piece of cake, simply paid for a ticket for the bike, train arrived at Preston Park, put bike in guard's van, got on train,  got off East Croydon, sorted. I think the bike ticket cost as much as my child's fare, but I can't really remember.  Stupid idea to get rid of guard's compartments, and fares for bikes.

Thank goodness for that!

If your gonna quote, quote the whole bit of my sig and not just convenient bits to attempt to mislead other readers.

Some preventable delays are caused by cyclists. Cyclists who think they are above everyone else and decide to break the rules. Lets take my giant bike on a peak service and then complain and have a tantrum when told to take it off. Lets dump my bike on the tgs of an hst when its fully reserved knowing full well you dont have a bike reservation and thus prevent another person who has correctly reserved a space.
Lets also try and take my bike into the vestibule of an hst when its not allowed and never has been, again having a tantrum when a member of staff asks you to take the bike off and causing more delays.

Did you actually know that reservations are mandatory on peak hst services and banned on peak turbos? Did you also know that the policy is to allow only 2 bikes on each turbo set (All turbos) and 6 on 180s and hst? But that rule is flouted by cyclists knowing full well that if they moan and have a tantrum the train will be potentially delayed and thus blackmail fgw.

The sooner a cyclist is prosecuted for a by-law offence the better. I'm thinking 12(2) would cover that.

Administrator note:

In response to a member reporting this post to the admin team here, I'm taking the opportunity to quote SDS's signature in full.  From which I take it that the statement contained in the first quote above is not the official policy of any Train Operating Company including First Great Western.

Chris from Nailsea.

I have certainly seen cyclists cause delays and have tantrums, but I've also met some absolutely delightful cyclists.  Let's face it, they are just passengers like everyone else and so come in good and bad varieties.  Your argument about cycle reservations could just as easily be applied to passengers with seat reservations as well - though perhaps we should ban those as well the amount of hassle they cause?!  As a member of staff I have cause to take my bike on the train on occasions and always try to be the model passenger with a bike, and am lucky enough to usually use a route where there is very unlikely to be any lack of availability.

It is perhaps not always the passengers fault for flouting the rules when they can easily get away with it (or not even know they are breaking the rules) due to FGW's rather lax enforcement of their own rules.  It's rather difficult to enforce rules on Turbo services into Paddington for example which are driver only, and there's no way the driver can enforce it, so it's down to the platform staff who usually have more pressing things to deal with (or just want to avoid confrontation).

The policy itself is also a little bit open to interpretation, with the cycle leaflet listing that a maximum of two cycles can be carried by Turbo service, but I've seen posters up on stations explaining that it's two per vestibule, so in other words a maximum of 8 on a 2-car Turbo, rising to potentially up to 24 on a 6-car Turbo.  The ban on peak Turbos is only listed if you're travelling to London Paddington in the morning peak and from London Paddington in the evening peak, which means that on the busiest stretch of most Turbo services (Southall to Ealing Broadway) they are allowed on board according to the policy.

HSTs (in exceptional circumstances) can also carry three bikes in each power car giving a total of 12 designated spaces per train, without any bikes being carried in the passenger saloons.  If circumstances dictate, I believe TM's have the authority to allow bikes in vestibules on HSTs and 180s for short journeys and if the train is quiet.

Not only do TMs have ultimate authority as to where a bike can go, but FGW's own "Cycling by Train" policy lists all the stations with short platforms where it might not be possible to stow a bicycle in the correct area. This applies to many services operated by HSTs where the only option for a cyclist is to stow their bike in a vestibule. It is therefore quite incorrect to state that it is not allowed, and never has been, to take a bike into a HST vestibule.

https://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/~/media/PDF/AboutUs/CyclingPolicy/Cycle-by-train-May-2013-for-Web.ashx


I've seen this happen on HST services in Somerset and Cornwall on more than one occasion.

Then tell FGW staff to enforce the policy - especially on Turbos - or ban bikes completely in the peaks..........in almost 20 years of commuting I have NEVER seen anyone prevented from boarding with a bike, never mind told to remove one......and I speak as a cyclist but one whom (I hope) has enough consideration for other passengers not to flout the rules inconsiderately for my own benefit........sometimes it's part of the job to have difficult conversations - there are more than enough dispatch staff at Reading at least in the mornings to enforce it.

There probably are, but the problem with Turbos, in my experience, isn't really at Reading as the trains are usually pretty empty from there and passengers on stoppers aren't generally going beyond Slough.  The problem is at places like Hayes, West Drayton, Langley, Burnham and Taplow where you might, if you're lucky, have one member of platform staff or just someone in the ticket office, so virtually impossible to enforce.

......so to all intents and purposes then, even setting this rule is totally meaningless, as it relies on customers regulating it themselves, which clearly isn't happening, and simply achieves the potential for friction between customers with the Company taking no responsibility for resolving it.

Yes, as I thought I made pretty clear in my original post?

I have just returned from a week in the Netherlands.  I observed massive well used cycle parking facilities at stations (there must have been 5000 bikes at Delft station).  However I saw very few bikes on trains and there was only the UK amount of facilities.  This evening I saw two bikes get on a train at Rotterdam. One appeared to have an argument with the train manager which delayed the train. He eventually was allowed on the train with his bike. 

This led me to question how much bike travel on trains is really necessary if there is so much more bike usage in the Netherlands and apparently no more bikes on trains.

I witnessed the usual bun fight over cycle space on one of the evening peak departures from Bristol TM to Severn Beach.

Guy gets on with a bike and asked an elderly chap if he wouldn't mind moving from the tip up seats. Guy with bike then alights at Lawrence Hill.

Rightly the elderly chaps moans loudly at him for taking his bike on the train for such a short journey. I was in complete agreement. Bristol TM to Lawrence Hill can be cycled mostly via a flat segregated route.

Whilst in the Netherlands a few weeks ago I was told that a lot of people have two bikes. So probably one for each end of the journey.

I suspected that might be the case. That would account for the large number of bikes parked at all times of day. Is provision of enough storage for this a way of reducing the problem of less cycle capacity on trains?

Quite a few people do have two bikes who use the train - witness how full the cycle racks at Paddington are overnight, of which a new large facility (well over 100 bikes) has just opened on Platforms 9 and 10.  A small but growing percentage use 'Boris bikes' as well - for example, a friend who commutes daily from Reading, jogs from Paddington to his office in the morning and cycles back using a 'Boris bike' in the evening.

So, provision of more storage (or more hire bike schemes) probably is the only way of controlling the increasing number of people who (quite sensibly) wish to get to and from work using a bike.

I do believe that the bikes on Platform 9/10 are for season ticket holders (month or longer) and have to have a special yellow tag on the bikes obtainable by Network Rail.

When I was living and working in M^nchen a few years ago I knew several people who had two, or in a couple of cases more than two, old bikes which they kept at convenient S- and U-Bahn stations around the city.

Having lived in the Netherlands for several years, I can indeed confirm that many people have 2 or sometimes several more bikes strategically positioned in various bike parks at each end of their commute and often one or two dotted about at convenient places in their home town or city. In 3.5 years there, I don't recall ever seeing a full size bike on a commuter train, just an rare foldable from time to time.

Over there, the attitude towards bikes is that they are solely a means of getting from A to B and people generally don't use expensive carbon fibre & titanium species for general transport, so are much less prissy about their machines.

To put some scale to this, Utrecht Centraal has a covered bike park of some 4200 spaces...