Great Western Coffee Shop

I came here as a frustrated FGW/GWR passenger and have continued to watch things fail to improve over the years. My posts tend to reflect that so I though I'd post a positive one.

Having been in Scotland for the last week and done a fair bit of travelling on Scotrail I;ve been really impressed. The tickets seems a lot cheaper than the south east, I got a seat on every journey, the trains were clean and the staff seemed happy to stop and chat. Even the stations were a bit more cheerful with flowers and containers.

Perhaps I was lucky but chatting to family and friends they seemed reasonably happy with the service they get especially after i mention the £4k+ a year I pay to stand quite often. It maybe that the Scottish network is 'simpler' - essentially one operator or there's more money about because of the Scottish Governments attitude and whoever pays for what was formally the Strathclyde Passenger Transport Executive.

And the views were great  :)

Only downside is that outside the central belt it's pretty limited.

I was impressed too when I was up in Scotland last week - services running mostly to time, plenty of seats even on the 'fast' 17:45 Edinburgh to Glasgow service which also provides for outgoing commuters to Linlithgow, Polmont and Falkirk. Plenty of ticket inspection staff too; no unchecked journeys made - even a "one stop hop".   

Of course, I don't have enough samples there to give a balanced statistical view - even with an 8% cancellation rate as recently reported on one of our GWR lines (not a TransWilts figure!), chances are I could have been OK.  There probably are peak trains that are squashed like some of ours.   And the Scots edition of the Metro is making a bit thing of trains skipping stops to catch up the timetable.

One of the lines I took had one train along the whole route every two hours when I visited it many years ago. Now it has  two trains every one hour - a massive improvement.  Not unique to Scotland - with the exception of the morning peak, Chippenham has gone similarly over the same period;  perversely, Chippenham's service on its key and largest commuter flow (Bath / Bristol) is only offered hourly at the start of the day, yet half hourly coming back.  I didn't spot any such oddity in Scotland, but there probably are some.

One of the lines I travelled on, and where I stopped at stations, wasn't open when I visited Scotland 40 years ago. And looking at / comparing maps, I note a number of Scots lines re-opened to passengers after a significant number of years of closure.  Lookng ONLY at line with station re-openings, I see (sample stations given):
* Bathgate
* Larkhall
* Alloa
* Tweedbank
* Glasgow Central (Low Level)
* Kirknewton
* Paisley Canal
* Possil Park
Looking for a similar list across the South West (my definition being Wiltshire, Somerset, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Bristol, Devon and Cornwall), I found none at all - a number of new/reopened stations which are fantastic news and a huge success for the most part, one line which had a "parliamentary" service which has moved up to a useable (but very thin) service, with a station re-opened halfway along.

Someone may correct me on re-openings in the South West, and tell me of problems I didn't come across in Scotland; for sure, there are things I could ask "wouldn't it be nice if" and questions I would be asking about specific stations, lines, information and practises if it were my place.  But the overall impression is that we have a lot of good (effective) practise to look at north of the border.

I agree with you, Sixty3Closure - what a positive experience!

Ivybridge.

That's on an existing line, though - like Newcourt, Cranbrook, Templecombe and others.   I started such a list for Scotland ... Edinburgh Park, Edinburgh Gateway, South Gyle, Wallyford, Musselburgh, Kingsknowe, Westerhailes, Curriehill, Livingston South ... and found myself still just in the Edinburgh area.

You can add to that the branch to Whifflet in Strathclyde.  However, I don't believe Kirknewton was on a line reopening, nor even a reopened station (although it was renamed in 1982).

And worth expanding Bathgate as the current line is a result of three separate openings, namely Bathgate to Edinburgh, Airdrie to Drumgelloch, and then finally joining the missing link.

Being slightly pedantic, the Paisley Canal branch was still open 40 years ago.  It closed along with the Kilmacolm branch in c 1983 only to be revived a few years later (though sadly the Kilmacolm branch itself didn't reopen).


 

I've not traveled on Scotrail for about 5 years now, but from my experiences I would agree with everything in the original post. I would love to take a journey on the new Edinburgh to Tweedbank line via Galashiels. I had hoped to find the time this year but it will have to wait now until 2018.

As Sixty3Closure said, when you spend most of your traveling time having to stand in overcrowded trains, or waiting for trains that are then cancelled, travelling in many other areas outside of GWR territory is an eye opener of what could be.

I hadn't really thought about the new stations even though I used Camelon to go visit the Falkirk Wheel. Grahame's list does make it look like there's quite a different approach to rail travel.

The new Border's railway is also on my 'to do' list but I think I'll wait for spring or summer.

The Scottish Goverment pumos funds into their rail system, ciurtesy of the Barnett formula, so yours & my taxes folks

If you plough through Grayling's session with the MPs on Monday, you'll find this exchange:


So it seems the SG used to get about £600M more than the Barnett formula would have given, but from now on they won't.

Excellent use of my (and the Scots) taxes. The Barnett formula is based on public spending in England or England & Wales. So if England or England & Wales gets a certain amount of funds for a particular public service, then Scotland gets an equivalent amount based based on their population proportion versus England or England & Wales.

And remember, this money comes from Scottish taxpayer contributions to the UK treasury too.

That is why Scottish MP's must be able to vote on expenditure in E&W. 

I'm not sure 'equivalent' is the right word though. Per population, the Barnett formula provides more funding per person than an E/Wales project provides for their populations.

Which is how the SC can splash the cash per person more than they do in England

That's true of the division of funding, which gives more per head in Scotland; but that's not due to Barnett, whose formula does reflect the populations. His formula is only applied to increases in funding, on top of last year's money which continues unchanged. When this system was adopted (temporarily, of course) in 1979, spending levels were already higher in Scotland (and in Wales and Northern Ireland too), for a variety of reasons. Over time the spending levels "tend to" converge on the population ratio, but only slowly.

For railways, I've not seen the announcement, but I presume the existing rail funding from the Treasury to each part of the UK will be added to the overall baselines for last year, the totals adjusted for inflation, and then the Barnett formula applied to the increase in the relevant total. Would that give £600 less in a year? No, nothing like. I wonder, what does that figure mean?

From Rail Technology Magazine (http://www.railtechnologymagazine.com/Rail-News/alloa-line-reopens-after-electrification-works) - a further step forward in Scotland


28 days of rail replacement buses, and the reward is trains running there under electric power from next year.  GWR and NR have the interesting case to talk to at Pewsey of 50 days of rail replacement buses this year, and the trains will still be running from there under diesel power ...

Hopefully they will have solved the 385 windscreen problem.

Great Western Coffee Shop > All across the Great Western territory > The Wider Picture in the United Kingdom > Problems with new Class 385 Trains in Scotland

Apparently Hitachi are replacing them https://www.railmagazine.com/news/network/scotrail-s-385s-face-further-delay-as-new-windscreens-to-be-fitted

Heading up to Scotland next week. Haven't been to Alloa for about 30 years but tempting just to see how much its changed and maybe try out the new line (well new to me). Never quite saw Alloa as a tourist destination but willing to be surprised :)

I read that the ORR has signed off the Polmont - Greenhill Junction wiring along with that on the Cumbernauld route.

Dunblane, Alloa and Perth? next.

OTC

via Shotts is probably next to turn on, and via Maryhill would be logical pretty soon. Your via Stirling lowland services also good candidates. I'm not so 'up' on Scots electrification - I think only the first of these is underway / planned, or is there a logical rolling program?

Logical, that I wouldn't like to say, but there is project SC008 "Rolling Programme of Electrification (Scotland)". That includes the latest new bit through Grahamston to Alloa and Dunblane, plus Shotts. What comes after is in another box labelled "CP6".

NR's announcement (https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/first-section-of-stirling-dunblane-alloa-electrification-delivered#) explains more of the linkages.

Shotts completed on time - from Infrastructure Intelligence (http://www.infrastructure-intelligence.com/article/apr-2019/£160m-rail-electrification-between-glasgow-and-edinburgh-completed-time)

Clearly they gave it their best shot...……...I'll get my coat.

Have you got the number of their contractor - I've a job or two for them!