That argument can only be used when sufficient affordable station car parking is provided to meet the demand. In this case it is not. And as for the families with 2 or 3 cars - surely THAT is something that should in no way be condoned or facilitated by the Council. Especially when they live near stations! What should be happening under the heading of "changing travel behaviours" is encouraging as many people as possible to use public transport by complete deregulation of all parking in the vicinity of stations and radial bus routes (apart from where it genuinely does cause congestion or safety hazard, or prevent people parking near their homes or local shops, of course - the bar for proving those conditions should be set high) and making things hard for people with more than 2 vehicles in their household.

My point about the restrictions on Oak Tree Road was referring to the totally ridiculous nature of them - either the road is safe to park on or it is not, period. It cannot possibly be unsafe to park there between 11-12am on one side of the road and between 12-1pm on the other side, but perfectly safe at all other times! Double yellow lines on the whole of one side, and unrestricted parking on the other with a few sections of double-yellows stuck in at sufficient intervals to provide safe passing places, or a blanket "30 mins only - no return within 1 Hour" restriction that did not specifically discriminate against commuters would not have aroused so much ire!

And yes Carlisle and Elesley Roads were exactly the places I meant - I really can't think of any rational reason at all why you are not allowed to park there, except for mindless adherence to some weird dogma mandating that "we have to stop people parking in roads near stations" without ever questioning why.

The problem is not just restricted to Tilehurst BTW^▸ (by the way) - the whole country has perfectly parkable-in roads within 500 yards of stations left empty all day due to double yellow lines or CPZ's that simply cannot be justified on the grounds of safety or preventing obstruction, but purely because the locals say they "don't want commuters parking here" (even if they have their own garages or driveways and don't actually want to be able to park there themselves).

Oak Tree Road is ridiculous! They have just a 1-hour period in the day where you can't park - which inexplicably is a different hour on each side of the road - which is obviously intended as pure pettiness and spite against us poor commuters who can't afford and/or can't get a space in the ridiculously small and overpriced station car park, because there is absolutely no other rational explanation for such an arbitrary restriction. The result is that (depending on when people arrive) some people park one side of the road and some on the other - and many ignore the restrictions altogether and park there anyway.

And now here they go again - they should be ENCOURAGING people to park in roads surrounding the station and use the train, not keep trying to stop it.

Fortunately you can still (for the moment anyway) park for free on Kentwood Hill and some of the surrounding roads if you are prepared to endure the occasional poison pen note on your windscreen from the NIMBYS.

And yes I find it totally incomprehensible why anyone would ever even consider paying the extortionate car park charges to park at Reading Station - if everyone boycotted that car park and used suburban stations or came in by bus they would have to reduce the charges. While there are still enough mugs/millionaires prepared to pay them there is absolutely no incentive for them to do so!

OK Reading Local Stopping service then

Yes, saw that too. However since the semi-fasts also stop at Twyford, don't really think it isan improvement TBH^▸ (to be honest). What is wrong with "Reading - all stations"?

Since the introduction of the new timetable there has been a massive deterioration in the timely anouncement of platforms at Paddington, especially for the Pad-Mai-Twy-Read-stopping service to Didcot semi-fasts that I have to catch. Previously it was common for the platform to be announced 15 minutes or more before departure, enabling me to routinely arrive in plenty of time and bag myself a decent seat before the train filled up. Now it is generally 5 minutes or even less before departure that a platform is announced, leading to a regular stampede for the gates (and the gatelines having to be opened in order not to delay departure). You can't even rely on it being the "usual" platform either - the other night they had to make an announcement telling passengers that the train would NOT be leaving from Platform 10 after everyone had congregated at the gateline and many had already passed through the gates in anticipation. The train eventually left from Platform 3 leading to an even worse stampede than usual.

I am assuming that the reason is the tighter turnaround times at Paddington so there are no free platforms for the carriages to sit in - but it is one more thing to hate about the new timetable!

Just wondering if anyone knows what the construction works are at the concourse end of Platforms 11 & 12 at Paddington? For a few weeks now I had noticed that the trains on Platfom 12 no longer passed the gateline (meaning that the likelihood of almost being guaranteed a seat at that end of the train even shortly before departure had now gone  ). Over the last few days the tracks have been barricaded off and they seem to be building something. Are they just extending the concourse or are they going to do something more ambiitous such as opening a more convenient gateline or building an entrance to a subway for Crossrail?

The rear doors opened on the 7:54 from Tilehurst this morning. No-one was standing in that spot though so obviously the message hasn't got out yet! I will try standing there tomorrow and see what happens....

You forgot the refreshment truck!

The main problem at Tilehurst is the absence of lifts! I remember signing a petition for them about a year or so ago wich apparently was rejected on "safety" grounds. The safety of, for example, a lone woman at a quiet time of day trying to transport a pram or pushchair plus child(ren) up and down long flights of stairs obviously doesn't count for anything....

It just makes me so mad when far less busy stations such as Taplow and Iver have lifts, but a really busy (at least in the peaks) station like Tilehurst cannot have them.

What annoys me is when the train is actually standing in the platform but the screen is showing as "delayed" and then it just leaves without updating a departure time first. This seems to happen regularly at Reading for example - so if you are on the concourse or the footbridge and the train you want is showing "delayed" you would not exactly be breaking into a sweat to make it to the platform, when in fact the train is about to depart imminently and the doors close just as you are coming down the stairs/escalator.

I have been caught out by this more than once and have seen penty of other people just miss trains in this way too. Surely there must be some way to address this e.g. an announcement saying that "The delayed XX:XX to YYYY is almost ready to depart - please can any passengers wishing to board this train make their way to the platform now" or something?

"I don't know what time Janes finishes but this train calls at Ealing Broadway at 1634"

That would be an incredibly early finish for me - I tend to leave the office between 17:00 and 18:30 depending on the day of the week - and it's then a 10-15 minute walk to EB station (I can get so much more work done in that last hour or so once everyone else has gone home! ) However to look on the marginally brighter side, it is still half an hour later than the last stopping service now, so may find myself using it on the odd occasion.

Still doesn't explain what has happened to the semifasts though...

And to bring the topic back to the actual thread (mods, I think some of these posts actually belong on the new timetable thread - but I was just replying to one that was there already, your honour!) - the situation is likely to result in the fast Twy-Mai-Pad trains being even more full of those of us from the local stations between Didcot and Reading who are turning back at Paddington to EB than they are now, because we are losing our two stopping options that we have now in the mornings which a lot of us use.

No it's not, it's a complete disaster! (for me anyway, as I commute from Tilehurst to Ealing Broadway) - NO local stopping services at all whatsoever in either the morning or evening peak apart from Crossrail trains (and to make it even worse that what I had expected, I can't even see their promised semifasts only calling at Reading/Twyford/Maidenhead/Slough/WD/EB/Pad, they all look like slower stoppers!)

So basically I'll either have to change at Reading or Maidenhead and endure a long, uncomfortable journey in a rattling cattle truck with no toilets or tables, or have go via Paddington in both the morning AND the evening, which is even worse than now, when I just have to do it in the evening. That option also will be much worse when the new Crossrail platforms come in as it will make changing at Paddington a lot more complicated on top of everything else.

Just don't understand why they are doing something that will unnecessarily INCREASE the number of people who need to change at Paddington, when the whole point of Crossrail was to do the opposite.... Grrrrr!!!

This kind of incident is exactly why many of the more savvy passengers have started using the signalling diagram screens on the platforms rather than the CIS^▸ (Customer Information System) screens - especially later in the evening, when very-last-minute platform changes appear to be the norm.

That way, by seeing the white route line appear, you find out before even the platform staff (unless they are standing next to you looking at it!) and can get a head start on the crowd.

Can be amusing sometimes trying to predict what they will do when the advertised platform is very clearly already occupied.... (One night I was very amused to see the obviously broken-down train blocking the platform designated as "BUST" instead of by its normal code number!)