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Journey by Journey / London to the Cotswolds / Re: 2024 Delays and Cancellations - North Cotswold Line
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on: Yesterday at 21:42:07
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That four successive trains (five if you include the clearly defective 1W29) should suffer "a problem with the traction equipment (MC)" must be a new record.
But is doesn't say "the traction equipment on this train". A freight train sat down between Reading and Didcot this afternoon - perhaps the traction on that caused its failure and a whole series of knock-ons.
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Briefing on forthcoming changes - from GWR on 14.3.2024
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on: Yesterday at 15:44:24
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Which station, Euston or Waterloo, would make for the best temporary London terminus for GWR▸ IC▸ services when the route into Paddington is closed for HS2▸ related work?
Could they end up using both?
I know which one I’d prefer and it certainly isn’t Euston.
They have been playing their cards close to their chest ... it seems that both options have their pros and cons and I suspect that the balance is quite fine and the decision will be based on how much weight is given to each of things like platform and path availability, extra running time needed, staffing considerations ... and how many trains are going to be diverted, how many stopped back at Reading (or Ealing?). Marylebone is rule is ruled out - max length 5 carriages and hardly any paths available. Both. There isn’t the space to run everything into one.
I don't think they're going to attempt to run everything ...
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All across the Great Western territory / Introductions and chat / Re: More travels ... more looking at how others do it ...
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on: March 17, 2024, 16:09:51
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Avoncliff is, of course, an excellent place to make an intermodal connection from train to cycle or walk along the Kennet and Avon canal, except that... the only access is up a long, steep flight of steps.
And when you have climbed the stairs and want to set off for Bath along the towpath, you have to cross the aqueduct on the east side, loop back on the road that goes under it up to the other side of the canal, and re-cross the aqueduct on the west side.
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All across the Great Western territory / Introductions and chat / Re: More travels ... more looking at how others do it ...
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on: March 17, 2024, 12:25:33
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Observations from a train trip from Melksham to Sicily
So - here we are on day 13 of 14 of our trip from Melksham to Sicily and back by train. I'm starting to write this from my train no. 34 - Munich to Mannheim - out of a probable 38. One rail replacement bus. I took a couple of side trips on Sicily so my numbers are 9 higher than Lisa's. Longest time on a train - Milan to Palermo Central. Shortest - Palermo Central to Palermo Piazza Orleans. Most unwelcoming accommodation - Frankfurt. Most welcoming - a number to choose from; Palermo or Chur perhaps.
Headline / sub-head memories
* Universal timetable sheets It seems from the smallest to the largest, a printed notice listing all train departures over 24 hours, which platform and which days of the week and more information on each. Why don't we have such a notice at Melksham or Trowbridge or Dilton Marsh ...
* Open Stations We travelled out via Belgium, Germany, and Switzerland to Italy. Back via Austria, Germany and (to come) France. None of the stations has had ticket check barriers; there was something though not in operation in Milan and I know there will be in Paris. Instead, tickets are checked on trains; makes huge sense, makes stations more friendly, and I suspect is pretty good at keeping unpaid travel down.
* Reservation and Q at Munich Long distance trains that require reservation are a pain. I don't mind the 5 or even 15 euro fee, but I do find the 40 euro that Eurostar charge to be akin to a hidden supplementary fare. Happy / expect to pay a supplement for a sleeper - which as I recall was good value. Reservations and optional even on long distance trains in Germany, and it's a pleasure. We found seat, no problem, on our 4 trains in the country. But Germany to France today required reservations. The App failed (referred us through 2 more sites ... ended up "Internal Error") so we went to the ticket / reservation office when we arrived in Munich yesterday. Front desk and we were "triaged" - yes, this is the office you need - "here is a ticket and wait" in a room with limited seating, about a dozen positions for staff with perhaps 6 actually staffed, lots of people waiting. The display board told us that our number would be over half an hour, so long indeed that we went across to the hotel, checked in, and I went back to get the reservation. In fact it turned out that our number was issued at 16:36 and reservations at 17:47 ... and I had to remember that the long wait was not the fault of the guy who served me. The fact that he was getting load of "reservation not possible" messages probably WAS his fault because he was looking at same-day reservations and not tomorrow ones, so could only offer me the late train. Once he spotted his error, we got a good train.
* Much more on time Some trains do get held up, but there is much more of a feeling of "routinely on time" here. I've come to the conclusion that's because schedules have much more generous recovery times in them - it's not uncommon to sit at a station for a few minutes to await a right-time departure.
* Extra carriage at Innsbruck I know they used to strengthen trains in the UK▸ - still happens over here. They shunted an extra carriage onto the rear of the Verona to Munich train we joined at Innsbruck yesterday, and the seats were gratefully grabbed by joining passengers even before the connection process was completed.
* High Speed tunnels High speed lines are excellent and getting you from "A" to "E" quickly - but so much of them is in tunnels, or on lines with high noise-reduction barriers that they can be mighty boring and with little to see. Getting very used to coming out of a tunnel, brief flash of countryside from perhaps high on a bridge over a valley, and diving into the dark again. Sure, these lines are not intended to be pretty journeys. When time allows, give me the older lines.
* Variable hotels Headline says it. We have been booking a few days ahead via booking.com with extreme closeness to the railway station being a major factor, to which we have added flat / lift/ just a few steps access during the trip. There is a whole series of posts possible on this - we have gone from the old to the ultra-modern, from the quirky to the boring, and from old buildings to recent builds. All have free guest wifi these days, all provided an ability to recharge devices. Some had hospitality trays, some not. All (our choice) were en-suite. A commonality was a feeling that rooms were designed to look good and not to be practical to use. You may have seen Lisa's picture of my head in the way of the TV a few days ago, and last night's was so low you had to sit up high in bed to see it. Mirrors tend to be too high to do your hair and makeup, and loo roll holders too far from the loo to reach. Last night's shower and loo was a glass enclosure which - shall we say, made the room decidedly revealing and would certainly help a new couple get to learn a great deal about each other very quickly.
* English almost everywhere Lisa speaks some German, I speak some French - so we went to Italy! Gestured, similar words, and many people speaking enough English, together with gestures were a huge help. Some menus included English translations, others we could work them out, and there we a couple of "guess the dish" incidents. The translate App on our phones - which we have got very used to making the best of with Ukrainian and Russian translation - was an occasional fallback for more complex issues. Train announcements - even on local trains - seems to be in one or two local languages and followed up in English; only TV sometimes in the hotels had very limit channels in English if any.
* Integrated Transport It feels ... routine ... for trains to have displays telling you about ongoing train and bus connections, and where they leave from and if they are on time. And it seems routine for the busses, trolley buses and trams to all come together even at the smaller of wayside stations too. I suspect that there are lessons to be learned for Warminster, Dilton Marsh, Westbury, Trowbridge, Bradford-on-Avon and Melksham in West Wilts. I'll make an exception for Avoncliff where connection provision would be - err - extraordinary.
* Step free access issues and climbing onto trains What an incredible variety on the trains - from climbs up from low platforms or even no platforms to absolutely level access where the train extends a shelf - step free - out to the platforms and I swear that a spirit level would show it as flat. Station lifts are prevalent though not universal and in places are out of service - much more being "radically modernised" that just bust. In hotels and accommodation, that picture is slightly less rosy - three flight of stairs in Catania were a real issue, and you have to wonder at a few places where there were steps at the entrance ... up to the lift which then took you to upper floors.
* Local traffic is dominant Catania, Palermo, Innsbruck, Milan, Konstanz, Bolzano ... all have thriving local networks with the local traffic far outweighing the longer distance traffic. No great surprise though I've not previously thought of Sicily as being a particularly big place with such relatively local networks around its two biggest cities and just a handful of daily trains between them. International services are even sparser; I "guess" there is no great integration of the population across many national borders, even within the Schengen area.
Continuing ... on train 35 - the 11:40 Mannheim to Paris (Est), Sunday 17th March 2024.
* Sunday trains and clock-face Sunday trains here abouts run to broadly the same timetable as the rest of the week, and it was notable how busy Munchen and Mannheim Stations both were this morning, even though the city of Munich seemed to be just waking up. I can't help feeling that our (UK) public transport should by now be pretty similar on Sundays to other day; I am aware what a big issue it was to gain our Sunday morning train at Melksham, then to have it run all year, then to have it continue to run after Covid. But that said, there things were very different last Sunday in Sicily where the Sunday trains are very different to (and even thinner than) the rest of the week. So many trains here are "clock-face" and I know that's the case in the UK too. But seeing it in practise on new lines makes it very clear just what a huge difference it makes if the trains are always at "xx minute after the hour" or there abouts. Be it the local Catania to Paormina train, or the Brenner to Innsbruck one
* Freight Noting the volume of freight ... though far less on Sicily, still some
* Police checks In Italy especially, even in internal trains, police checks including checking of passengers ID from time to time. Also at some of the borders, even between Schengen countries.
* Cross Platform An addition today - a plaudit for the connectivity between trains at Mannheim which shows what can be done. A pair of northbound platforms and a pair of Southbound platforms. The slower train pulls in first, the faster one pulls across the platform, drops off, picks up, continues and then the slower one also continues. Fascinating to watch and so much appreciated when compared to our experiences at some other places. Today we arrived on the Munich to Dortmund train and left on the Frankfurt to Paris from which I am writing.
* Industrial Action It seems an age ago that we had to change our plans and "skip" Germany a day early because of upcoming industrial action - an expensive change because the upmarket hotel we had booked for two nights in Frankfurt would not reduce our booking to one night (this was the hotel at which it seemed that even a smile from staff was a chargeable extra!). Every cloud has a silver lining and the diversion we took changed our route, introduced to so a Swiss hotel where the staff and service were perhaps the best on the trip. Then there was a warning of Italian industrial action causing delays and cancellations, but we were not effected. A reminder that staff / management issues at the expense of the customers are not unique to the UK.
All in all, a very interesting two weeks - lots to learn and thoughts of how things are done the same, and different, across Europe. This post is a rail forum one, so has a "bent" towards the rail passenger experience.
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Sideshoots - associated subjects / News, Help and Assistance / GWR - website forbidden (to me in Munich)
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on: March 17, 2024, 06:08:29
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OK - awoke to this: I'm not sure if GWR▸ are making site changes overnight, or if they have my location / IP at present as a problem. Could have done with a better message, folks, like who the website owner is to contacts
Added - in the interest of constructive criticism, here is "our" forbidden page ... ... and I am happy with it. Where a remote IP address causes a problem, automation adds it to a block list. But dynamic use of IP addresses (people move around just like they do in street addresses, but much more often) means that on occasions a bona fide user finds themselves blocked. I have chosen that our error page tells you who to contact, and gives the information I need to fix the problem for individuals within a couple of minutes. If the site or forum is down as a whole, I can put a general message out in place rather the a "403" or "404".
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Briefing on forthcoming changes - from GWR on 14.3.2024
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on: March 17, 2024, 05:55:14
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Thanks for providing an objective, informed and reasonable answer to my question, Graham. Though I think you meant 18 days and not 18 years!
Still waiting any more insight as to whether the 19:04 is being badly crowded with Reading passengers on a Friday?
Corrected now in my original post. Several reports of that slip, which at least confirms that people still read my stuff and furthermore that some are happy and have the time to let me know when I make a goof like that - I appreciate the reporting, thank you. I am not going to speculate on the 19:04 dropping off people at Reading on a Friday these days - I do not have the knowledge to inform; I am not a politician so I can say "I don't know"
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Briefing on forthcoming changes - from GWR on 14.3.2024
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on: March 16, 2024, 20:29:31
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The relief train to Plymouth and the resulant superfast run of the regular Penzance train are for the summer only. The extra train has other things to do come the autumn. The path IS being kept so that it can be run again when appropriate amd there's a train to do it. So not really a long term thing for Plymouth.
There is what I read as widespread early concern amongst the informed and interested in the community, and indeed in GWR▸ , at the effect the closures for six years over the Christmas period - ranging from 2 days some years to 18 years days in other years - is going to upset passengers, as will extra stops if they are to be aded thereafter at Old Oak. There is a feeling that the new station will bring very few benefits / new travel opportunities to GWR passengers who are having to "pay" for it with extra disruption and slower journeys. But I suspect at the end of the day people will just put up with the disruption and slowing, with the wider community getting a bit upset nearer the time it actually happens, but then learning to live with the changes that are permanent.
How much MPs▸ are briefed, by who, whether they choose to take these briefings / inputs further and what they look to achieve by doing so will vary between them. It was very interesting to see the different ways our local MPs in Wiltshire and BaNES reacted to the news that well used through services to and from London were to be withdrawn, and the murky and dirty way that had been decided. Some made very strong and public inputs in support of the services (not that it saved the services), other talked of going in to see the minister and raising it with him - but the way this was reported left it very unclear as to whether the MP in question had made a strong input on our behalf, or had assured the minister that if he stuck to his guns it would blow over.
Edit to correct closure from "18 years" to "18 days"
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Journey by Journey / Wales local journeys / Re: Global Centre of Rail Excellence
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on: March 16, 2024, 14:11:46
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More on this project at Wales Online[b'The railway lines and station in the middle of nowhere no real passengers will probably ever travel on[/b]
A £400m Global Centre of Rail Excellence facility is being built on an old opencast site, and it's pretty unique
On the mountains of Neath Port Talbot there's a unique and large-scale development starting to take shape that could have a massive impact on the area.
It will eventually feature miles of railway tracks and station platforms, but no real passengers will likely ever travel on it, or stand at the station platforms waiting for a train.
Located on 700 hectares of land near the village of Onllwyn, 17 miles north of Neath, and straddling the neighbouring borough of Powys, a new £400 million rail testing centre named The Global Centre of Rail Excellence, is currently being developed.
Edit to correct quoting
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All across the Great Western territory / Media about railways, and other means of transport / Europeran Rail Timetable
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on: March 16, 2024, 08:17:18
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In March 1873, the First Thomas Cook European Rail Timetable was publish and now over 150 years later their is still a European Rail Timetable. Thomas Cook closed their publications section a decade ago and it is now run by a separate company, with 4 printed issues a year and a digital version too. See (here). I carry the printed version with me on current tour and also have access to the digital data. The printed tome is becoming less used, but it is far from redundant and even in my very light packing, it retains and will retain its place. and here are some of the trains covered in that timetable: Edit to add links
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Journey by Journey / Portsmouth to Cardiff / Re: Westbury - engineering works from 24th December 2024 for 30 days
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on: March 16, 2024, 08:03:53
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The first week of that month is Christmas so hardly anyone would be travelling anyway, and as we are always being told that time of year presents unique opportunities for large scale work.
What impact is this closure likely to have on long distance London - Devon/Cornwall services?
Yep, you could characterise that as 10 days over the holiday season and then 20 days when the people and daily flows are back. I was unclear at the meeting as to whether the main line via the Westbury Avoider will be closed or not, and that would make a huge difference. I suspect the people at the meeting are just learning into this too; the question WAS asked in passing but I don't think there was an answer. If I was GWR▸ , I would characterise the comments on Westbury as an early information piece to help prepare friends in the community and to pick up what were going to be the element GWR have to "sell" rather than any detail as yet. The big thing they have to sell (in my mind) is that they are not taking the opportunity to do any "platform 4" work - even passive provision. That's sad because when they do that work it will be another significant possession and further penalty payments / compensation paid within the industry; it make no sense to me NOT to be thinking about the 4th platform.
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Briefing on forthcoming changes - from GWR on 14.3.2024
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on: March 16, 2024, 07:03:45
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It is an effective policy in that it lessens the number of people for Reading quite significantly on what there would be otherwise.
The 2h 51m journey time to Plymouth is nice to see for those calling for faster trains.
Indeed. And there are plenty of other trains from London to Reading, and there's the relief a couple of minutes behind to Exeter. The only flows lost / changed by more than a few minutes are Reading, Taunton, Exeter, Newton Abbott and Totnes to stations beyond Plymouth. Plenty of other direct journeys for these - just not that particular hour.
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