Great Western Coffee Shop

A train journey from Bristol Temple Meads was in the top 10 most overcrowded commuter services going in or out of London, according to figures from the Department for Transport.

A First Great Western 6.30am service from Bristol Temple Meads to London Paddington travelled with 574 passengers, 179 more than its maximum capacity of 395.

The figures were revealed in a Freedom of Information request to the DfT on overcrowding.

The top 10 relates to figures for over-capacity trains on commuter services arriving or departing from London in the morning and evening rush hours during the autumn of last year. They were taken from one-off measurements of the passengers on each train on a particular weekday, so do not represent average overcrowding on a particular service.

In responding to the FOI request the DfT noted that according to more recent figures, the number of people travelling on the FGW 6.30am service has been reduced.

The Bristol journey came ninth in the top 10 most overcrowded journeys. The number one spot was taken by a Capital Connect service to King's Lynn in Norfolk, which had 352 passengers more than its capacity of 494.

First Great Western spokesman Dan Panes said: "We constantly monitor the use of all our services to ensure the safety and comfort of our customers. The published passenger figures for our 6.30am Bristol/Paddington service dates back to last year. Since then we have taken positive steps to tackle overcrowding through timetable changes to create additional capacity and by encouraging customers to use less busy trains wherever possible. For example, in December last year we changed the timings of our Greenford/Paddington services so customers can now catch two trains to get them into London between 8am and 8.45am, rather than one. This has helped reduce overcrowding by more than 70 per cent. We are also offering incentives, such as promotional fares, to encourage customers who usually travel on our 6.30am Bristol Temple Meads/Paddington service to use less busy trains, like the 6.40am service. While the 6.30am service is still a busy service, we have been able to reduce overcrowding on this service by around 45 per cent."

Back in the day I caught that 0630 a few times (as did a friend who commuted on it every day for a couple of months) and it was always absolutely fine as far as Didcot, busy as you would expect but everyone had a seat. I would hazard a guess that those statistics must only apply to the RDG-PAD section of its journey.

I agree. I doubt whether 574 board at Temple Meads on that service. And what promotional fares are/were available on the 0640? If there was a promotion, FGW kept it very quiet. Did the spokesman mean greater AP availability?

I never understand why passengers don't get the 0640, it follows the 0630 into Paddington and has been known to overtake it!

Coach A = 76. Coach B = 84. Coach C = 70. Coach D = 84. Coach E = 84. Coach F= 17. Coach G = 48 Coach H = 48....dont think some one can add up