Great Western Coffee Shop

Yesterday I had the misfortune to be delayed by two incidents on the same journey - first, a points failure at Pilning, and then by a broken-down freight train on the diversionary route between Lydney and Chepstow.  And when we finally pulled in at Newport, the connecting service I had hoped I might catch was just leaving. 

Since I was already very late, and it would be a long wait until the next train, I asked the TfW staff at Newport whether they could request a taxi for me.  They called GWR, who duly authorised a taxi, but the local taxi company refused - saying GWR no longer have an account with them!  It's fair enough that a ToC can make the call when it is appropriate to use taxis to get customers to their end destinations, but on occasions it *will* be necessary - and surely they *must* have contingency arrangements with taxi companies for such eventualities?

The staff member I spoke to at Newport was very keen I followed this up with GWR, as I wasn't the first, and wouldn't be the last person asking him for help to get home after a problematic journey.

Newport must be getting used to doing these things now...! I and a friend had a taxi provided by Crosscountry (arranged through TFW) from Newport to Pilning a few months ago after a missed connection... I was expecting to have to argue for it, but the TFW chap was extremely helpful and it couldn't have gone smoother! From past experiences, Newport is one of those stations to me where 'customer service' hasn't been great in the past.

Sounds like Newport may be getting its act together, even if holes in the GWR contracts are being identified. Must be confusing for the cabbies - presumably the blame attribution is done by the station person and then the look for a cab on a GWR, TfW or XC contract?   Nightmare!

Cabbies ted to like "cash in hand" jobs and don't like piling, waiting, collecting ... so there has been a problem with finding a cab that will take a rail replacement job.   Some TOCs have got a reputation for taking far too long to pay (but then any period will be "too long" for some) and that makes it hard to find cabs.

At lead Newport is / was staffed.    Try it at Trowbridge after the staff have gone off ... or at Melksham at any time.

I was surprised that the incidents hadn't been published elsewhere on Coffeeshop. Whatever the failure at Pilning, up trains were able to avoid it by using the loop. The Portsmouth-Cardiff trains terminated at Bristol while some of the Paddington-South Wales trains were diverted via Stroud (I think one via Parkway and Yate but I'm not sure).

I believe the problem at Lydney wasn't a freight, but an ECS 5G64. This seems to have been a Maesteg-Cheltenham service that must have been terminated at Lydney and then failed completely.

By the time a rescue train came from Cardiff, there were six trains queued up behind it including three Paddington-South Wales services, 1B21, 1B24 and 1B25.

The first two of these made it to Newport shortlybefore 1B28 (Carmarthen), which was the first service via Pilning following remedy of the problem there.

In my case, I informed TFW of the missed connection, told them there were no further trains today. He went into the office and phoned Crosscountry control, who asked for my name and mobile number, was told to wait for a text and wait in the short stay car park outside the station building. 5 minutes later I received a confirmation text from the taxi firm involved, the taxi arrived 15 minutes later, no questions asked and took us both to Pilning, we did have to guide him a little bit :P https://imgur.com/a/Mf9SJvo (https://imgur.com/a/Mf9SJvo)

Thanks for that report.   I was surprised no-one posted too.  From what I heard, at least one train put all its passengers out at Pilning and they were taken forward in rail replacement coaches; that was a side-mention in something with a different main topic, so not sure if it's true.

It was described as a points failure.  Eastbound, trains were getting through but were apparently going via the up freight loop at Pilning.  So, maybe not a fault involving a single set of points.  I think the incident lasted about 4 hours.