Great Western Coffee Shop

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/evcf1.jpg)

I'm delighted that the people of Ebbw Vale have their service at last - here it is, this evening, waiting at platform 0 at Cardiff Central just before half past five.  It's a 4 car train - 2 x 150.  Early days for the service but it appeared to have a healthy sprinkling of customers on board - a few dozen, perhaps.  Does anyone know what the traffic forecast levels are?   Part of me is delighted at this generous provision, part of me feeling just a little that concerned that there may be overprovision here that's leading to underprovision elsewhere.  I know that for an appropriate service returned to the TransWilts we would expect to start with something shorter.

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/evcf2.jpg)

Let's see ... a single 150 would cope with the traffic I saw this evening (and 2 and 3 times that traffic) in comfort.  The released 150 could strength the Bristol to West Wiltshire service in the evening peak that's strengthened with a 153 at the moment (good news for groups who are unhappy with overcrowding that's still going on - and the 17:30 Cardiff to Portmouth certainly left Bristol, 2 car, pretty packed tonight). And then you have a 153 which could form a 17:45 Swindon to Salisbury service.

Now I'm totally aware that the mechanisms of franchises, rolling stock leases and the like mean that solutions like this can't be implemented as easily as might have been possible in the days of nationalisation (and, good heavens, we used to complain about the railways then too!).  And I'm completely aware that I do NOT have and forecasts or figures for the 4 car Ebbw Vale service, and may be asking the question based on an observation that may be unrepresentative. Does anyone have the figures / forecasts?

Again and again over travels in the past few weeks - I've been struck by the major station facilities lieing underustilised - 2 and 3 coach trains standing at platforms that can take 8 to 10 coaches, and those trains ranging from busy (in Nottingham) to packed (from Liverpool, and local services around Cardiff) to overcrowded (Bristol to / from the Midlands, Cardiff to Bristol and on towards West Wiltshire)

I have some info that is very close to what you require, from our friends at Jacobs (links below.)
http://www.sewta.gov.uk/PDF/Final_Report.pdf

http://www.sewta.gov.uk/PDF/SewtaPIP.pdf

Thanks, Lee ... some agressive growth forecasts there, and our experience on the TransWilts when we had a reasonable servive level would tend to provide supporting evidence.  Same algorithms as used in Wales should be applied to West Wilts, especially considering to that it's marked for such enormous growth under RSS.

Slighly frustrating, the Ebbw Vale service seems to fall between two stools in some of the tables of those reports - there are no current traffic figures from which to project (in many tables) and there are no "we should do this, and here's why" sections in the proposal section because the line was more than a proposal - it was actually happening.   

Graham I was saying the exact same thing to somebody else!

That 17.30 is a killer. Booked 2 car!

Maybe it's the extra units that we're getting in May, probably expecting a large influx on the Ebbw vale line for the first couple of weeks until the novelty wears off (in terms of trainspotters "scratching the route").

There was an item in The Times today that passengers were being turned away from Ebbw Vale services yesterday(?) because there was no room. ATW put it down to good weather bringing passengers out, with the inevitable "wrong type of sunshine headline". But it's half term week, and the citizens of the Ebbw Valley have a new railway service, so maybe it's not surprising that many of them have taken the opportunity to take their children out on a day trip to Cardiff or wherever.

Nice problem to have 1 week into a new service. So I can understand why ATW are erring on the cautious side, as you only need one "bad experience" to put people off using the service again. Also good that they are using 150s (which presumably is what WAG have paid for) to give new passengers a decent train for their new service.