Great Western Coffee Shop

From Southampton Airport (https://www.southamptonairport.com/destinations/destination-inspiration/local-escapes/) - advertised on Facebook


I am of ... mixed ... mind.   Southampton Airport is unusually good for local train connections, and really should be from Wiltshire too when the "overdue" linking up of the Romsey Six to the TransWilts is done.  But I wonder if it would not be far better if passengers to the destinations within England (Manchester, Leeds and Newcastle) went all the way by train?

From SOU?

Hmmm - a day trip for business isn't really possible is it?

a) You have business trips and leisure trips
b) You have day tips and you have longer trips

I read the advert as leisure not business.  And I read it as longer not day trips (how could anyone fit in "adventure and relaxation" between two flights in the same day?)

4 hours by train (Manchester or Leeds, from Southampton, City Centre to City Centre) versus perhaps two hours (flight time plus checkin and transfers) makes sense to me. 

It would make even more sense if CrossCountry offered GroupSave ... presumably as part of management contract not a franchise, the DfT is overlord, and could instruct all TOCS to offer and honour them. That would help the "fare simplification" strategy, and I suspect that the number of extra customers just might make it fare receipt neutra.

Southampton to Leeds by train is closer to 5 hours than 4 and typically involves changing at least twice. I wouldn't class that as a particularly leisurely or relaxing experience, and certainly not practical for business, especially in the new world of remote working?

Worth remembering that in 'normal' times, XC offer a service every couple of hours from Southampton to Leeds with just the one change at Sheffield (and also the odd direct one too).  They've not reinstated those as of yet, preferring to operate the Bournemouth to Manchester route with two units instead of one, but I would expect them to return at some point.  Not especially tempting for business users as it's still longer than the drive (unless you get caught up in A34 misery), but a more attractive offer than is currently available for most leisure passengers, which is after all the market the airport were promoting in this threads original post. 

Perhaps XC should get them back up and running sooner rather than later?

Most regrettable in my view that airlines are responding to demand whilst railways remain stuck in "covid mode"

If "the railway" did a bit better, there would be less demand for domestic air travel.

from
https://inews.co.uk/news/uk-holidays-staycations-more-expensive-than-trips-abroad-1041870 (https://inews.co.uk/news/uk-holidays-staycations-more-expensive-than-trips-abroad-1041870)

................if only ! If some of the steps taken by the railways were to actually acknowledge Covid that might encourage people to return to the railways.

My daughter came down from Kent last week, I had already seen that the "through" portion (to Warminster) of the 1220 ex Waterloo had been reduced from 3 to 2 coaches and had warned my daughter. The PA on the train kept saying (wrongly) that the section she was in was for Exeter. Her coach was "acceptable" covid wise at departure from Waterloo At Salisbury there was a huge influx of people, seemingly from the front of the train - when it left for Warminster there were people standing, I could see that both coaches were "rammed".............whose brainwave was this to reduce the length of this (always busy) train with summer and a much reduced lockdown fast approaching ?

She is going to drive down next time...............!! Well done SWR...........I presume that they will now claim to have "freed up" her seat for someone else........

GWR are remaining in covid mode so as to reduce the number of trains needed and to avoid admitting that there is a serious problem with cracked trains. It allows claims of a "near normal service" by defining covid mode as being the "new normal"

That however does not explain covid mode on Cross Country and on South Western trains as reported in this thread.