Great Western Coffee Shop

A rather odd tweet from GWR Help this morning about the 0546 from Exeter St Davids being delayed at Taunton due to passengers causing a disturbance on a train.

The 0546 from Exeter St Davids subsequently departed Taunton 46 minutes late and then missed the scheduled stops at Castle Cary, Westbury, Pewsey, Hungerford and Newbury.

Does anyone know anything further about this?

GWR internal information states 'civil police attending a fare evader'.

OK, I thought it might be something like that.

There were a lot of very annoyed passengers at Pewsey this morning who had to wait an hour for the next train!

with no compensation due either....

I can imagine ...

The train that was due at 07:19 passed through non-stop at 07:49; next train due at 08:09.  Had the delayed train made all its calls, it would have been later still and getting in the way of that next train - some GWR were between a rock and a hard place on this one once the train was held up at Taunton.

I expect the 07:04 Westbury to Cheltenham Spa via Swindon was even busier than usual, with the 07:01 Paddington effectively cancelled.   That goodness that's a 158 not a 153!

Does anyone else think there must be more to it that simple fare evasion?  I assume that the person in question must have done more than avoid paying a fare in order for the powers that be to deem it necessary and proportionate to delay a whole train to deal with it. 

Probably refused to pay and also refused to alight

Civil police??!  ???

Yes, where are the nearest BTP to TAU?......and how much longer would it take them to get there? :-)

(I know they're civil too!)

I can add that apparently is was a drunken fare evader, so you could possibly infer from that there might have been threatening behaviour?

I believe "territorial police" would be more correct to describe the general, Home Office controlled, local police forces, as opposed to BTP and the other specialist police forces. 

Unless the passengers sue the alleged offender  ;)

I should imagine those territorial police are as defensive of their territory as the civil police are ever so nice about things!  ;D

But the cause of the incident - p!ssed & objectionable at that time on a Tuesday morning - a sad state of affairs for that person.

Talking to the people involved, others on this thread have correctly guessed the sequence of events.

Unless they were just really very, very polite police, perhaps?

An oxymoron, surely?  :P

I've never experienced a policeman anything but polite in the thankfully few interactions I've had with them. But then again, I probably haven't rubbed them up the wrong way.  I'm extremely grateful for the job that the police do in protecting us, and as was seen last week at Westminster, their job is not without danger.

I think you can imagine that this incident has gone down like a cup of cold sick with the management!

19:45 London Paddington to Plymouth due 23:25


19:45 London Paddington to Plymouth due 23:25 has been cancelled.
This is due to passengers causing a disturbance on this train.

Sounds interesting! Any idea what happened?

Doesn't look like it even left Paddington

People getting upset at severe overcrowding perhaps?

So the 2035 down will have twice the number of passengers on it.  Would hate to be travelling on that one.....

Noted on Open Train Times Maps that the 1945 is running down to Plymouth as empty stock.

So the 2035 down will have twice the number of passengers on it.  Would hate to be travelling on that one.....

Noted on Open Train Times Maps that the 1945 is running down to Plymouth as empty stock.
[/quote]

Surely if running empty stock it could run in service to relieve the overcrowding; or even run as a limited stop to Plymouth?

Not having been present I know not what happened, but I have a suspicion that a member of the crew might have been assaulted, or felt in fear of assault, or felt that the train was overcrowded to a dangerous degree.

Members may recall an incident last Easter when the 18-03 terminated at Reading after an alleged assault.

Surely there is a BTP presence at Paddington, or were they on a donut break? If a member of staff "felt threatened", the culprit should have been removed by the BTP allowing the train to proceed?

As for overcrowding, GWRs default position is that it however bad it is, overcrowding doesn't represent a safety risk so can't imagine that would be the reason?

If memory serves the incident last Easter you referred to turned out to be a red herring?

Obviously I acknowledge that I/we are all speculating............although Broadgage's suggestions sound plausible........

GWR certainly have a default position that overcrowding is not a hazard, however individual drivers or guards may take a different view and they have considerable discretion.

I agree that disruptive or threatening passengers should have been removed by the BTP.

The incident last Easter was originally reported as an assault, but this was indeed found to be a red herring. Nonetheless the train still ran empty, and from a passengers point of view was cancelled.

All this is speculation, hopefully we might get a report from someone who knows what happened ?

Some time has now passed, does anyone KNOW what happened, either by personal observation, reliable secondhand accounts, or information made public.