I thought about that before I posted, and decided that "day" means daytime - from around 8 in the morning til 6 at night.   It means that people working during the day can use the train, including (now, just) people working in retail in Swindon on a Sunday.

There should be a later train that 18:32 from Westbury on a Saturday ... and later that the 19:35 (ish) the rest of the week.   A further cycle of the same unit?   Understand another crew would be needed and (commenting here in a slightly private area) we have been quoted what looks like the price of a complete shift for driver and conductor, with a need for two of each to run 7 days.  4 staff at £how-much each, plus operating cost of train and track access charges and you'll see it's an awful lot of money.  Need to find something else to do with the crew / train, or have it more sensibly integrated at another timetabling point.

Congratulations on their completion.   Although this thread went quiet, I carried on watching from time to time to Wick.

A set of pictures to represent the whole journey at RailStaff web site

From The Herald

Fascinating discussions on this topic earlier today with someone who lives down there and came along to evaluate the Melksham Rail User Group's Railfuture entry.  The arithmetic that the professional and informed see from their heads on these things is not what the majority of railway customers feel in their hearts, and whilst the heart is often a good indicator, that's not always the case.

You talk of Stone and of Upwey.  There are others (of us) who look at through London service options, but in the end conclude that the balance of a good regional service, uncoupled from the mainline by having good connections into frequent long distance expresses that are passing, is a pretty good solution.   It means that there's an appropriate and economic shorter train running on the regional line - lower top speed, but better acceleration.  And it means that if there are main line delays (mind you, with perfect infrastructure in the Thame Valley, delays are rare   ) the regional stations don't have to wait for their particular train to be clear of the logjam.

First pass at Autumn timetable.    Part of me is p*ssed that the timetable changed unexpectedly on 10th September (such short notice that the GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) timetable change posted got the change wrong!) ... the other part of me is delighted that we now have a year round service all day every day.   What a big marketing boost with the addition of the early Sunday service through to Chippenham - indeed to Swindon from 10th December!

The Adventure starts here:  http://atrebatia.info/tt_autumn_2017.pdf

The operational team that's trying to schedule the rotas is only too aware there's a problem.   It's recognised as a problem as you get further from the operation team, but the problem becomes muted as you move steps away from the actual team trying to squeeze five cups of tea out of 4 teabags.    Because crew training is a convenient reason (and probably with much more than a grain of truth in it) and next year's training program is 33% down on this year's, the strategists away from the front line may be tempted to see it as a temporary problem, especially when they look at new crew being trained to add to the rotas next year.

 

Do bear in mind that people want to make journeys from Dilton Marsh to other places too.  Currently, a 2 stop ride to the little village  of Salisbury is possible at around 07:03 (arrival 07:36), then there's a service gap to 10:10, change at Warminster and get to Salisbury at 11:32, followed by the 11:13 that reaches Salisbury at 11:42.  And Dilton March is no longer a halt set in the midst of open fields ... its' between the housing of Westbury Leigh and of Dilton Marsh, ... extra services at 07:35 and 09:42, reaching Salisbury at 08:01 and 10:12 can make a massive difference.  Huge shame the 17:58 back from Salisbury doesn't call, but I suspect we could make a good point of asking for that; together with the 18:59 from Salisbury (which does call), you have a viable commuter service, and with a 13:52 back as well for people who want to pop into Salisbury for the morning.

To some extent, how all the MDs come across relates very much to the times and thus their mandates.   I sometimes wonder if Alison Forster followed by Andrew Haines was a deliberate "bad guy, good guy" plan.   With stage one seeing how far costs could be cut on lines that were unlikely to reach First's desired profit margins, and stage two to pull back depending on the strength of public protest.   

We're now into another act, and one in which an infrastructure and fleet change outside the immediate control of the First Group. Personally and on TransWilts, we have found Mark Hopwood and his fellow longstanding directors helpful within the constraints on them and in the circumstances. It does credit to them that I can still write that when last Sunday 12 out of 13 trains were cancelled last Sunday, and my trip to Dublin earlier this week both started and finished with a taxi ride to / from Chippenham, when it really should have started / finished on a train.   How much of the circumstance the GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) team could have realistically been more effective in managing the effects of is open for discussion, though ... but it's a far different world to 2006, when the victor seemed intent on subjugating the vanquished as franchises merged.

May split this into a separate thread later - gone off RyanAir topic!

Higher tensions and pressures for faster running ... need for stuff that lasts longer and needs less maintenance because we're headed for the 24 x 7 railway.  Also quicker maintenance by replacing components rather than tailoring each piece.  But the folks today are on the maintenance training rather than design side; 100 Over-Head Line Equipment (OHLE) and associated engineers to be trained. Not only Great Western Railway (GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)) mainline, but Crossrail too - which is the bigger one for maintenance because of the huge number of extra pantograph passes over the wire.

Edit: VickiS - Clarifying Acronyms

Thank you for that - a fascinating afternoon.  I learned an enormous amount about electrification ... and will never look at that catenary or pantograph in quite the same way again.


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Ironically, when Irish Ferries let me down this week with cancelling the 14:30 and offering me the 08:05 or the 20:55 yesterday, I ... got a seat on Ryan Air.  Refund from Irish ferries;  flight cost about the same as my SailRail though I had extra costs from airport home.  Funny world, isn't it?

No easy answer - our moderator and admin team struggle with the best place for some threads.    The subject line is "Infrastructure problems in Thames Valley  ...." and I personally read that to mean that we're talking about infrastructure problems, and they're in the Thames Valley   

From UK^▸ (United Kingdom) Parliament

for 16th October 2017


Witness - 16:45 - Chris Grayling

ACoRP^▸ (Association of Community Rail Partnerships) awards in Derby ... good luck to anyone who's group is shortlisted (and may it be a well contested battle in the Outstanding Individual Volunteer section where TransWilts are represented by Peter Blackburn, without whom I doubt we'd have a train or station here in Melksham at all)

Thank you East Midlands Trains for laying on a Community Rail networking event during the day. It's fantastically useful to meet CRPs^▸ (Community Rail Partnership) from around the nation and borrow their ideas - make the trip doubly worthwhile

From Get Surrey