Great Western Coffee Shop

Engineer / rail replacement bus report - Melksham, Saturday 5th September 2020

Observations

I took the opportunity to walk via the station at around 14:30 and review passenger information

* The WEBtis screen is showing a reboot message (no indication as to whether or not the help and emergency buttons would work or not).

* The new information display on the platform says "No services from this platform" which is correct, but as it's the only platform suggests that the station is not being served.   This differs from the WEBtis display when it's working, which has the word BUS clearly against tail replacement bus services

* Walking into the pick up and drop off area, the "TV" display is faded at the top / hard to read in the sunlight, but it IS indicating the next bus, at 14:48 to Chippenham.  Much clearer see - not faded and at first glance appearing to be the next service is the 16:48 bus to Chippenham.

* The GWR timetable notice board at the station show the December 2019 to May 2020 timetable in one direction only; that's the service that was replaced by an emergency timetable in late March

* The A to Z at the top of Station Approach also shows December 2019 to May 2020 data, superseded in late March 2020.

As I walked down Station Approach, a car drove down and picked up a couple of young people - guessing it was 'Dad's Taxi' judging by the cheerful waves - not sure if they had arrived off the bus 20 minutes earlier, or had found themselves at the station without the trains/buses they anticipated being clearly available to them.

One lady waiting at the station. She had arrived for the 14:12 bus (Trowbridge and Westbury) but had waited seated at the station believing that the bus left from the car park area just outside the station gate.  She had only spotted the bus, which had called at the stop on Station Approach, as it left. Luckily, the next bus was due in the opposite direction at 14:48, and her final destination (east of Reading) could be equally reached via Westbury or via Swindon.  She was concerned as to whether her ticket would be accepted by the alternative route.

Come 14:48, and the bus (showing as "On Time" online) hadn't even arrived, let alone exchanged passengers ... and she worried as to whether it was going to turn up. I reassured her (from at least 3 metres away!) that "On time" on online applications is an assumption when it comes to rail replacement buses, and indeed the bus rolled up a couple of minutes later.   Four off, she got on, and it departed Melksham at 14:55 - late enough to be flagged as "significant delay" in official ppm calculations.

Suggestions to GWR

1. Fix the easy issues. Repair the WEBtis, repair the TV, change the platform display so that it includes buses. Replace timetables that haven't operated since March with current ones.  Remove the automatic "On Time" status from rail replacement buses.

2. Use your station adoption group (MRUG) more than you have been doing.

This latter topic to be much expanded ... there is so much that could and perhaps should be done ... with an immense frustration at present due to the rules imposed on volunteer activities by station adoption groups due to Coronavirus (see page 5 of the latest MRUG news letter (http://www.mrug.org.uk/mrugnews_202009.pdf)) .  Elements of this are absolutely correct ... but some very clearly do not apply to other group types - "xxxx has been contacted by an organisation called Volunteering Matters who are looking for volunteers for a scheme called Journey Makers" from my mailbox concerning recruitment of volunteers for Exeter Central and Newton Abbot."

Having expressed that frustration, separate proposal to be written to suggest how we - the station group for Melksham - can help ensure that services and knowledge thereof works well both at the station and before people travel so that everyone is properly informed.   Much is happening on that front already, much as happened in the past but is outside current rule, and much more can be done for the next 15 months where we expect significant Sunday issues.

Supervisng replacement buses on Sundays at Sutton in the 60s was nice little earner.