Great Western Coffee Shop

It's good to see significant numbers of people using "early" Sunday morning trains - here are the first trains into Westbury this morning from Warminster (08:47) and from Melksham (09:46)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/wmn_20180708.jpg)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/mkm_20180708.jpg)

23 people joined the 08:47 at Warminster as it started its journey - not bad for a train which in theory only started earlier this year ... as a bus for the first couple of months ... and has (shall we say) had its teething problems and not run even when supposed to be a train.   But then with a 2 hour gap to the next train, it has a wide time catchment.

19 people joined the 09:46 at Melksham and there were a good number on board from Swindon and Chippenham too - in fact it looked distinctly busier that the nearest weekday equivalent at 09:18.   Again, there have been reliably issues - let's be generous and call them "teething" since this has only been an all-year service for the one winter so far.

Early (first) Sunday services on other lines / all year have been progressively introduced elsewhere - how are they doing (in terms of loading and of reliability) on other lines?

The problems with the Warminster seem to have been train crew (but starting from Westbury) or overrunnig Engineering Work

Indeed ... last Sunday there were crew but the line was not handed back until "too late" because one of Network Rail's Tampers has sat down at  Bradford-on-Avon during the night.   Yes, I know that's the other way from Warminster and I'm totally scratching my head about why an incident at B-o-A should prevent a Westbury to Warminster shuttle for which the stock, driver and conductor are already waiting to go!