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91
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: IETs into passenger service from 16 Oct 2017 and subsequent performance issues
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on: May 22, 2018, 10:45:28
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Lots of these today...…………………..
09:30 London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads due 11:09
Facilities on the 09:30 London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads due 11:09. This is due to more trains than usual needing repairs at the same time. Will be formed of 5 coaches instead of 10.
And broadly similar today, with about 15 short formations consisting of a 5 car instead of 10 car. Also several 8 car instead of 10 car, suggesting an HST▸ instead of an IET▸ . Some, if not all, are enforced by the DfT» to release units for driver training. There’s over 40 drivers who have completed the theory but need practical handling but there’s no units available. In which case why can GWR▸ not just be honest? Because saying it is because of repairs or just "we don't know" (which is the answer I got over the weekend) when they know the actual reason just is not on.
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94
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All across the Great Western territory / Fare's Fair / Re: GWR mobile tickets
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on: May 01, 2018, 11:03:32
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From the National Rail Conditions of Travel: 4.2 Some Tickets are held as an electronic record on a smartcard or electronic device, or may be transmitted to you for you to print out yourself. In such cases you will be advised of (and must comply with) the specific conditions applying to Tickets held in those formats. Provided you are advised of any specific conditions prior to purchase then TOCs▸ can use this clause to add additional conditions, such as a prohibition on break of journey, to the use of e-tickets. Stick to paper tickets folks. What you are getting with GWR▸ e-tickets is a more restricted product for the same price as a paper ticket. Are you advised prior to purchase though? I certainly cannot see anywhere on the information web page / faq / T&Cs that states that GWR mobile tickets prohibit break of journey apart from on the actual ticket screen after you have bought one. Was going to double check on the app / website, but the transactional part of the site seems to be down, yay.
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95
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All across the Great Western territory / Fare's Fair / Re: GWR mobile tickets
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on: May 01, 2018, 10:42:56
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Incidentally I did see that the ticket contained a term disallowing breaks in journey.
I wonder how enforceable that actually is? Since as far as I know you don't actually see that until after you have bought the ticket and I can't see any wording on the GWR▸ website or app to imply that is the case (indeed the site just links to the normal T&C's for the ticket types, which obviously for some of them say BoJ▸ is always allowed).
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96
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Journey by Journey / London to the West / Re: More dangerous overcrowding to the Westcountry
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on: April 30, 2018, 14:59:00
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I would say a trolley is more suitable than a buffet rather than better, though I remain of the opinion they should have a buffet for the WoE routes.
Only if a trolley actually runs through the whole train. I haven't been on that many IET▸ journeys yet, but on more than a couple of them, the trolley was only available in the front 5 coaches.
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97
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All across the Great Western territory / Diary - what's happening when? / Re: FOSBR Quarterly meeting - Friday 20 April 7.15pm, Alma Church Hall BS8 2ES (CFN)
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on: April 23, 2018, 11:31:44
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I'll be honest, based on my experiences of the Severn Beach line over the last 8 months or so (visiting friends who moved out to Shirehampton), I do not blame anyone for taking an adversarial stance with GWR▸ . The service has sometimes been appalling with passengers treated with either utter contempt or simply ignored. On multiple occasions I had have had to get a bus, putting myself out of pocket, and I would be surprised if I was only person in that situation.
For a great example of how it seems like GWR treat passengers - the bustituation that happened at the end of November and beginning of December took the biscuit, with them toing and froing between blaming engineering work or blaming the fact the rolling stock had to be used to provide extra capacity for the Bath Xmas market. Now that may have been genuine miscommunication from GWR. But how do you think that appears to passengers when that happens multiple weekends in a row, with staff telling passengers it won't happen next week, only for it to happen next week!
I get GWR currently have a very difficult job, but with all this going on, I really don't think you can blame anyone who feels a "protest" meeting or whatever is the only way to get themselves heard.
As an aside - I do find it quite interesting to see how different groups attempt to essentially solve the same problem. Coming from my own bubble, where I don't really have the confidence or ability to feel like I can make a difference, I just hope no one is disheartened from trying to make things better, just because different groups have different views!
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99
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All across the Great Western territory / Buses and other ways to travel / Re: mTickets and fairness
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on: April 20, 2018, 13:41:58
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I don't see why the same discount isn't given to those paying by contactless card or by smartcard tbh. If the reasoning for the discount is, as First say, to reduce dwell times (by disincentive cash payment), then surely those two options should also count?
edit - just looked and it appears the cheaper fares are now available with the touch smartcard. Maybe I was mistaken or has that changed since it was launched? Either way, I don't see why contactless should be left out in the cold!
And of course, you have the issue with the mtickets (and the smartcard) that you have to buy groups of tickets if you want a single. So in Bath its a group of 5 for £10, even if you just want to buy the one single.
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100
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All across the Great Western territory / Fare's Fair / Re: GWR mobile tickets
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on: April 20, 2018, 10:10:09
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So it looks like actually the mobile tickets are only available if the origin or destination is a GWR▸ gated station.
After a bit of a Twitter dialogue, it sounds like this is because they want the ticket to be scanned at a gateline at some point in the journey. Which sounds sensible. Until you realise that, unless these tickets bar break of journey (which I don't believe is the case), you can board late / finish early on your journey, potentially doing a journey that is between two ungated stations. I can see GWR's thinking here, but in reality it doesn't make much sense. I assume they are just banking on people just not doing that.
I can't help feel it is a bit of a kick in the teeth, as at least for me, the very reason I think these are useful is for those of us at ungated stations that have less ticketing facilities anyway!
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101
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All across the Great Western territory / Fare's Fair / Re: Mobile ticketing and PlusBus
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on: April 19, 2018, 11:53:00
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To answer your question, at least for now, GWR▸ 's new mobile tickets do allow you to buy a plusbus ticket, but when you do so you get told you will have to pick this up from the station! So good if you starting your journey on rail and using the bus at the end (and travelling via or to a station that has a ticket machine), but not good if you want to start off using the bus before getting to the station!
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102
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Journey by Journey / Bristol (WECA) Commuters / Re: MetroBus
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on: April 18, 2018, 12:29:48
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Has anyone else noticed that the Bristol Post seems to have turned into BristolLive?
As have all the local papers run by the same company. The Bath Chronicle is now part of SomersetLive.
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