Great Western Coffee Shop

For the usual Easter crush, it appears on Friday 7th April the 17:06 to Westbury terminates at Newbury as in the past, which will then form an additional 19:33 from Paddington to Penzance.

As for the Thursday 13th April, an additional 14:34 from Paddington to Plymouth, an additional 19:12 from Paddington to Swansea NOT calling at Reading or Newport, and as above, an additional 19:33 to Penzance with the 17:06 terminating short.

Every little helps...

I'll be interested to see what happens next year, when IET's are available for use and there might be more scope for even more additional trains.

That's good news - I believe Maundy Thursday is the busiest day of the year, even more so than the Christmas period?

Extra trains are of course welcome, but how does the planned provision for this Easter compare with the actual provision last Easter, is it in fact any more ?

Are lots of discounted advance tickets available so as to worsen overcrowding, or have lessons been learnt regarding limiting availability so as to hopefully reduce overcrowding.

Won't be able to answer that - "commercial confidentiality" - and pax may simply pay extra for Super Off-Peak tickets which are alwats valid over holiday periods

With Easter rapidly approaching, I wonder if it will be better organised than last year.
I expect the usual overcrowding and resultant chaos.

No doubt loads of cheap advance tickets have been sold so as to encourage even more passengers to use overcrowded services.

"we can not buy/lease extra rolling stock just for Easter, Christmas, bank holidays, school holidays, rugby internationals, cup finals, Glastonbury, rush hours, weekends, and other exceptional events."

Proof please?

Proof of what ?

Proof that loads of discounted tickets have been sold, unlikely to be available but I am aware of two intending passengers who paid very low fares for London to Plymouth on the 18-03 for Maundy Thursday.

Or proof that severe overcrowding will occur, we don't know until it happens, but previous experience suggests that it is probable.

Or proof that the railway industry considers provision for peak demands to be unreasonable.

The former, thanks.

Woah, freaky circular arguments going on here - was it not broadgage who originally asked if large numbers of cheap tickets had been sold and is now being asked for proof of this? ??? ::) :o

Indeed, because he stopped asking and stated it as fact

Decided I didn't fancy the hell that is Maundy Thursday so I'm getting the 18:03 on Wednesday!

Things were pretty crowded last night on the expected services from twitter and it looks like things aren't any better this morning.

Advice from GWR: "Trains towards Devon and Cornwall are busy today, if you have not made a seat reservation please speak to staff or travel later if possible."

Major issues averted by the looks of things though.

Couple of pals who travelled back to Plymouth yesterday said it was bad but better than last year.....good to see GWR have learned a few lessons.....unless of course more people have given up on the train & gone by road instead?

The same on most long distance services, Virgin East Coast, Virgin West Coast, Grand Central, East Midlands Trains all reporting heavily overcrowded services on Twitter.... it just goes to show how the government wants the railways to be run, on a shoestring with barely enough capacity to cope on a normal day.

Plenty this morning who seem to be surprised that there are a lot of people travelling on Good Friday.

Comments on 'overbooking' - if a train went off with only those with reservations there would be a lot left behind ... to the casual traveller though maybe the fact that they selected particular service in the online booking should be enough to secure a seat on it. That is how coaches and airlines work after all.

Last night at Paddington they were advising people queuing to pick up their pre-booked tickets that they could just get on the train without picking up their tickets (as the queues were so long) and that they just needed to have their booking confirmation with them instead.

From the numbers milling around that I saw on my travels yesterday (admittedly not on GWR routes) that was definitely not the case!

Astonishing isn't it?  After all, hardly anyone uses the train on Boxing Day ...  ;)

Not really a surprise there - that seems to be how they want to run everything!

It will also help that Easter is later this year, and the school holidays have coincided differently depending on where in the country you are.  The West schools go back Easter Tuesday, but London/East have another week off to go. 
Next week is where I think we may see extra overcrowding as the two - regular school day commuters and returning holiday makers - clash.

When I was reading GWR Tweets earlier today, there seemed to be a common theme, post after post.  Long distance trains packed to the rafters, people unable to get through to toilets and if they did succeed, passengers were standing inside them for want of space.   Buffet visits out of the question and clambering over luggage to move at all.

It has been pretty similar on all the longer distance operators.

Only seen reports from Virgin customers of them not being allowed on the train at the terminus though.

..............but as GWR will tell you, there's no need to worry because severe overcrowding does not in the least compromise safety  ::)

As a comparator I see that the M4 was completely closed for a period this afternoon between Bath and Chippenham and is still only partially open. Congestion on various stretches of the M5 and A303 as well.

But on the plus side we don't take the United Airlines approach when we need passengers to leave the train! 

The M4 was closed due to an emergency - a tanker in flames - I'm not sure how that comparison is particularly valid in the context of Easter being a somewhat more foreseeable event for the railways to plan for?

You can formulate the best plan in the world but, as every operator will tell you, no one has the rolling stock available to cope with the demand. The DfT ensures that each operator has barely enough stock to cope with a normal weekday. This is why the picture is the same across the country. Look at Virgin West Coast.  Recently upgraded but when it comes to rolling stock, there's still no spare capacity.

If that's the situation, it's not ideal but the TOC's have to manage it and the number of tickets they sell.

I do not see GWR complaining about the huge amounts of additional revenue they are happy to trouser by selling virtually unlimited numbers of tickets for trains which they know damn well will be obscenely overcrowded - in fact it makes perfect sense for them to do that rather than providing additional trains - why should they run two trains which are merely full to capacity when they can cram all those people onto one train in cattle truck conditions? - never mind the people who can't reach the toilets (being used as standing space today judging by reports), have panic attacks, stand for hours on end etc etc.

Ultimately, GWR are accountable for the service, they bid for the franchise, they have to manage it. If that means limiting ticket numbers in order that people can travel in something approaching humane conditions, then they need to grow a pair and do so...................although as I said they won't, because there is a perverse financial incentive for them not to do so.

Perhaps one of the experts can advise exactly how much additional capacity will be provided by the new long distance trains and how will it mitigate this annual farce?

What a difference a day makes...
As I write this (on Good Friday, for those reading later without ready access to a calendar) I'm on the 1801 from Derby to St Pancras.  Not QUITE empty, but not far off.  One of the first class coaches has just one passenger in it.
Maybe bank holidays should be staggered?  Surnames A-F take Tues to Fri off; H-N take Thurs to Sun; O-U have the 'normal' 4 days from Fri to Mon, and V-Z and numericals can take Mon-Thurs of the next week off.

There may well be additional capacity, but as Northcote Parkinson would probably tell you....... "Traffic expands to fill the space available"  ::)

Once the train company sells all the seats on a train they are not permitted to stop selling tickets.  There is nothing they can do other than advise which trains are likely to be extremely busy.
There is no additional capacity out of London Paddington and there are no additional HST sets available.  After planned maintenance they is, I think, 49 sets available for traffic, 49 are booked to be used.  The DfT doesn't want spare trains sitting around, they don't earn revenue.


GWR are not ultimately accountable for the service.  The DfT are.  The DfT outlines want it wants the franchisee to do, the DfT micromanages each franchise.  You could make a franchise bid that drastically increases capacity but if that's not what the DfT wants you won't be awarded the franchise.  It all comes down to the balance sheet, not the needs of the passenger.  This is why it doesn't matter who runs a franchise.  If First wasn't running the franchise the DfT would find another company who would run it in the same way. 



In my opinion, the additional capacity on the long distance services will barely be noticeable.  There certainly isn't any room for growth - look at CrossCountry and Virgin West Coast.  It's fleet replacement was managed in the same way. 
The IET is not an improvement on the HST, it's a cattle train built as cheaply as possible with the main aim of cramming in as many passengers as possible and its been forced on the train operators by the DfT.  There failings will become even more apparent come the height of Summer.

There currently is no extra stock, for Easter or any other time.

There asditional capacities are discussed in the IEP thread, but its like the roads I suspect - add capacity & it quickly creates the demand to fill it.

Can you imagine the howls of protest - probably from you too - if GWR were to throttle demand as you suggest by using the only tool in their cupboard - remove all Advance fares, and if that doesn't work, off-peak fares too. How else do you suggest they do it? (Serious question)

The only way would be to pay higher fares/taxes all year round in order for TOCs to have them either running around empty or stored doing nothing.

Just that people on the road were having a hard time too. Nothing more profound than that I'm afraid.

If there's no extra stock for Easter or "any other time" (your phrase), how are entire "spare" trains found for PR exercises like services from Okehampton to Paddington?

In answer to your question about "throttling demand" it's quite simple - you limit the number of ticket sales &  people boarding a train to a sensible and safe limit, on H & S grounds if necessary, and before you refer me to the oft quoted guff about overcrowding not being dangerous, that refers solely to the structural integrity of the train, not the other obvious dangers & discomforts which anyone with half a brain cell can identify.

 I would be interested in knowing if Hopwood or any of his cronies have been banging on the DfTs door demanding to be allowed to source extra capacity? No? What a surprise.

If it's true that the DfT are responsible for everything and that GWR are merely the poor, oppressed franchisee doing their bidding with no influence , it makes their "Building a Greater West" campaign even more dishonest.

Whilst it is true that GWR or other TOC can not stop selling tickets when it is known or suspected that the train will be full, what they CAN do  is restrict or even eliminate sales of discounted advance tickets.

I am not the only one to have suggested this. I thought that the purpose of train specific discounted tickets was to fill up under utilised trains and not to make overcrowded trains even worse.

Tosh, I'm sorry.

Would you contract for more stock knowing there's little use (no pointvin running empty trains) aound most of the time? Bear in mind there are no additional peak time slots where more money might be made. No, so you can understand their reluctance.

And occasionally, yes they have banged on the DfTs door when stick has become available. Where did they get the SWT stock they've borrowed, for example? That would have needed DfT approval.

That PR example was on a Sunday when they can find extra sets - but if you ran these in Easter Sunday, what extra demand do you think there might be? They weren't available on Thursday. Were any extras run this morning?

Before anyone gets too hysterical, any extras that GWR might have wanted to run this morning (had crew and stock been available) would have been stymied by the engineering block from Hayes to Paddington over this Easter.  Only two tracks being available, whilst, amongst other things, platform extension works are taking place.

The Okehampton to Paddington would have been catered for through less HST Diagrams in service on a Saturday

Who is Tosh, and why are you apologising to him?  :D

Okehampton - Paddington was a Saturday, not a Sunday, and I was under the impression from your earlier assertion that there was "no stock for Easter or any other time" - when you emphasised "any other time" I assumed that was what you meant.

You state that there is no sense in FGW contracting for more stock as they would be running around empty, and yet a few minutes before you were talking about demand expanding quickly to fill capacity.

It seems that you largely agree with me that FGW/GWR not working particularly hard to obtain more long distance stock is driven as much by the financial incentive and margin that running massively overcrowded trains provides them with than anything else - after all, why run two merely "full" trains, when you can cram them all on one and collect the same amount of money?

Happy Easter all, hope your eggs didn't get crushed!  ;D

"no extra trains"....don't misquote me.

Which means that GWR are unable to contract for stock which doesn't exist. Therefore they would be contracting for new build. With the length of franchise they currently have, any new stock wouldn't/couldn't be delivered before the end of franchise.

So, yes, absolute Tosh, TG.

That is a problem, a TOC (ATW) locked into a 15 year contract since 2003 has seen a passenger growth of 75%.  Franchises prevent TOCs being able to adapt to changing circumstances.

Couldn't agree more.

Chiltern's 20 year franchise allowed them to invest, but the plan was there from day 1. A new Welsh franchise from next year of that length could possibly include new stock.

Be interesting to see how First Group copes with scrapping a lot of SWT stock and buying new.

Will they end up with more actual trains (i.e. units), coaches (longer trains)  or just more capacity (pack em in e.g. 345 style instead of 387 style).

Is there a measure of seats per hour available on a particular route or at a particular station.

Seat miles per hour at a particular station would be an interesting measure as for some trains in the peak it could be Zero i.e arrives already full.

They could contract to keep some of the HSTs which will start to go off lease. Not all have new homes to go to. Indeed they appear to be doing just that with the blessing of the DfT. It's that latter point which is key, the govt effectively has a veto over any such plans.

The surplus Class 185s also need a home after rumours that the recently awarded franchise might have them proved unfounded.

I'm not convinced that's always true.

Getting the 180s back wasn't in FGW's franchise agreement at the time. Ordering a bunch of 170s wasn't in Central Trains' franchise agreement. And so on.

Shortages of available rolling stock are one thing, but when stock is available - and it sometimes is, as per Chiltern nabbing the 170s from TPE - franchises can and do take on extras, as long as (AIUI) the franchise-holder can convince the DfT that there will be no impact on the subsidy profile.

Potentially YES to all 3.   The problem is people are only making reasonable assumptions at the moment.  What they have said in their PR stuff is 90 trains totalling 750 carriages, AND the separately listed 18 x 5 car 442s.   

But the new trains will almost certainly include a high majority of 10 car units, so one new train could replace 2 x 458/5s - or 2 x 455s and a 456.

The ITT asked for a solution to dwell times at busy stations such as Clapham Junction.   That definitely implies units that are more like 378s then 387s, for sure.

Paul

See what I mean about making sense of trains, coaches and seats.

 90 trains totalling 750 carriages, = 8.3 coaches per train.

Anecdotal I'll agree but I know someone who travelled on the 19:30 from London Paddington on Good Friday towards Plymouth, paid for the Weekend First upgrade and had the whole of the first class buffet coach to themselves between Newbury and Exeter St David's.

It became pretty quiet after the mad rush to get away and to their destinations for lunch/dinner.  Not quite Xmas eve quiet, but quiet nonetheless.

Slight reduction in staff today

Always a problem with London based drivers more than any other depot. Very few live in the London area and they would normally rely on train services to get them in which obviously don't start early on Sunday.

1027 also cancelled, same reason.........possibly a bit of a radical concept for the railways, but if that's "obviously" the case and it was known to be a problem perhaps some initiative could have been used and other arrangements put in place to ensure that they got to work on time? 

And another

Agree with TG, surely they know which drivers can or cant get in on time, and therefore roster accordingly, also don't they use taxis for when drivers can't reach where they need to be via the use of train services?

Or is this just a case of a sunny Easter Sunday, and a handful of drivers are 'throwing a sickie'?

Looks like the latter, all Paddington to Cheltenham trains have now just been cancelled for the day

Edit: And to combat this slightly

.......could this be a new policy by GWR to address severe overcrowding?......don't run any trains at all to a given destination? (..........which at the same time frees up trains elsewhere!) - can't see it catching on somehow  ;)

It might not necessarily be a driver shortage, could be a train manager, ultimately though, isn't it the responsibility of the employee to ensure they get to work on time?  Sunday's aren't part of our working week, a condition that was inherited from the days of BR and long may that continue to be the case. 
Rostering doesn't work like that, rosters are fixed months in advance and because they are fixed well in advance it reduces the risk of human error and a job being left uncovered and ensures the most productive use of train crew.  We have to have 12 hours rest between turns so what you can work on a Sunday is determined by what you work Saturday and Monday.
We can make ourselves unavailable for a Sunday upto 5 days in advance which gives rosters enough time to find cover for a job or to quite literally beg with incentives.  For me personally, the offer of a taxi in wouldn't be enough to tempt me.  I've had to take a taxi before and I spent the entire journey in fear of my life... and the taxi driver had only done a 13 hour shift.  There are horror stories of taxi journeys and unfortunately, loss of life.  I'm not prepared to risk that for a few extra pounds.
For me, Sunday is guaranteed time I can spend with my kids and family so I'd rather not work them.

Cheltenham trains get cancelled because there's alternative ways of getting there so rosters will redeploy a member of train crew onto a Penzance perhaps. 

So what you are suggssting is that GWR would have known if this shortage at least 5 days before? And thus could have have given pax that notice too? Might have been helpful....

Not necessarily 5 days since they were presumably trying within those 5 days to persuade others to take those rosters. 

Possibly yes, but there was far more jobs than that not covered so at what point do you cancel them and disrupt a significant amount of journeys?  Getting work covered can be down to the last minute and relies on the goodwill of those drivers and train managers who work their Sunday's.

Last minute changes will happen even in the best planned circumstances; I got a phone call at 05:15 this morning to let me know that one of our team due to start work an hour later had woken sick.  Not a problem as we have a safety net in place; probably easier for us as we don't have such a lot of specialism in each team member but rather cross-train.

Which is exactly why Sundays should be part of the working week. Train crew provide a public service that is required 7 days a week, just like NHS workers, emergency services etc, and so being required to work any day is a not unreasonable requirement of staff in this day and age.   

Nail hit squarely on the head.

That might be true but no one is going to like having their terms and conditions of employment especially when it is a detrimental change.
The biggest issue is money, hugely expensive to make Sunday's part of the working week as there will be a need to significantly increase drivers numbers. In fairness, with the recruitment taken place for to enable drivers to train on the traction we are getting close. You've only got to look at how much it would cost to have GP surgeries open 7 days a week. Admittedly we are not on the same scale but that cost has to be met somehow and I would imagine the DfT would have to be involved as the increased cost would mean the franchise isn't profitable.

I'm not sure I understand why the cost would be significant, as the drivers have to be paid (and incentivised) to work those days one way or another. (Unlike GP surgeries, which don't, although arguably there is then more demand for their service during the week.)  And the uncertainty that it brings to the TOC probably results in a degree of inefficiency as well. 

I agree it would be a detrimental change, and one option would be to offer two sets of terms to existing drivers, with an enhancement for those willing to agree to the change (and no reverting subsequently). For new drivers it would be mandated. That way existing drivers would be protected, and would probably be a pragmatic solution.

With no incentive for new drivers (unless mandated by all TOCs together), applications would dry up....

To cover Sunday's at the moment you are paid for that one day as overtime. To include Sunday's in a 35 hour working week you would need to recruit additional drivers to cover the workload which works out far more expensive plus the £2000+ Sunday's are worth a year would need to be added to the basic salary.

Would they?  Surely the salary and terms would still be attractive enough for people?  Didn't Virgin have 15,000 applications recently? I bet some of those would still go ahead and apply if they were told that Sunday would be part of their normal 35 hour week.

Sunday's are already part of their working week reflected in their basic salary. I believe they basically sold all their conditions for it.

35 hour week? Blimey I might go for it myself! 😃

If you can't beat them, join them!  That's what I did, 7 years as a commuter was enough!

GWR Twitter on Easter Monday seemed to have a theme running right through it.     Overcrowded trains and passengers unable to board on West Country routes