Some good news for a change.

From the Beeb:

A producer of hit film The King's Speech has thanked rail staff after they found his Oscar on a train.

Gareth Ellis-Unwin was in a "mad panic" after he got off at Didcot Parkway, Oxfordshire, without the briefcase containing his Best Picture award.

The Metro reported he phoned GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) who sent a team on to the train at Oxford to retrieve the statuette.

Mr Ellis-Unwin tweeted: "Got to say a massive thank you to all the staff @GWRHelp awesome customer service".

Link here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-43574138

A massive infrastructure investment for Oxfordshire was announced today. The focus for the first year is transport related. According to the Oxford Mail:

"There will be £3.25m for a Botley Road corridor project - to give buses priority and improve cycle provision and the road condition - and £500,000 will be put towards a study to widen Botley Road rail bridge to facilitate the Oxford Station development and create more rail lines."

When I worked for FGW^▸ (First Great Western), I once helped to organise a schools day trip from Combe to Worcester. Yes, I know, not possible, unless you arrange for special stop orders, which I did!

About 30 kids got on with a handful of adults. None of them had tickets. Much confusion about the cheapest way to travel. A call to the ticket office supervisor at Oxford elicited the suggestion of using Group 4, and charging some of the kids as though they were adults! No reason to stop you doing this, and, overall, it produced the cheapest price. So, once we had shown the TM^‡(resolve) how to do a groupsave on Avantix^▸ (Ticket Issuing System used on board trains), the tickets were issued and everyone was happy.

Particularly when the driver remembered to stop at Combe on the way back!

I decided to check them out yesterday and went Padd to Hayes and return. I thought they were very impressive trains. The ambience is superb and the layout, with so many tables, is much better than many suburban trains. I had forgotten how quiet electric trains are and how quickly they accelerate. Compared with other electric trains they may not be a huge step change but, compared with turbos, they certainly are, and are certain to impress. They only down side I could find was the hardness of the seat, which came as something of a surprise as I first sat down! But I can't say I noticed it after a short while and the ample leg room certainly compensated.

Yes, there were a lot of announcements, but almost all were about station stops. And between Padd and Hayes there are four station stops, some only a few minutes apart. No sooner had we departed Acton Mainline than we were approaching Ealing Broadway! I liked the announcements about which coaches would not be platformed, followed by an announcement telling you which coach you are in. Very reassuring for occasional travellers, I would think.

As DMUs^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) go, the Turbos are pretty good and will certainly bring an improvement to West Country services. It did strike me, however, that at last Paddington suburban commuters were getting the type of service that every other commuter into a mainline station in London had enjoyed for many years, and it is indeed a huge step change!

I would think Reading to Exeter.

The Union Inn, Saltash.

It seems there are quite a few light sleepers in Oxford:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-38259667

I was on a Scotrail train today and heard the customer host who was operating the trolley tell a customer that he would carry a hot drink to the customers seat because they were not allowed to let a customer do it in case the customer spilt the drink and injured themselves. It is clearly dangerous for customers to carry hot drinks through a moving train.

Which made me think that, clearly, the RMT^▸ (National Union of Rail, Maritime & Transport Workers), in its pursuit of safety, would now demand the replacement of inherently dangerous buffets by trolleys.

And then again, maybe not!

Would have been difficult to see the cricket doing that!





Edit note: Minor typo corrected, for clarity. CfN. 

Worth noting though that it is only the main lines that are complete. There are still sections of the contact wire missing on the relief lines, for example, at Goring and Cholsey.

The new footbridge opened this afternoon. The lifts have power to them, but are out of use at the moment.

I don't know if it is still the case, but when I joined FGW^▸ (First Great Western) back in the early noughties all staff were trained in train evacuation as part of their induction course. This involved a trip to SPM^▸ (St Philip's Marsh (Bristol depot)) where they had a carriage that could be filled with smoke to simulate a fire. We were trained in lateral evacuation (moving customers down the train away from the smoke), how to deal with customers in such a situation, the location of the emergency alarms and equipment, and how to safely evacuate passengers to the track side if needed. This was given to all staff, so I would expect any member of staff on board to have some idea what to do in this situation. Many staff were also trained to make emergency telephone calls - all station staff received an annual brief on this.

Train Managers/guards are safety critical staff and have two additional qualifications.

Firstly they are trained in PTS^▸ (Personal Track Safety) - Personal Track Safety. This sounds as if it ought to be mainly about how to keep yourself safe when on or about the track, and it certainly includes that. The main element though is about train protection in an emergency - knowing where and how to place detonators and track circuit clips to protect a stricken train. If a train derailed, the first duty of the driver and the guard is to inform the signaller and then protect the train, by walking down the line and placing detonators. Only then should they turn to helping customers. Incidentally, there are quite a lot of staff who have PTS certification to assist with their job. It was a two day course when I did it with a biannual competency test.

Secondly, they are of course trained in the safety critical aspects of train operation, the most obvious being train dispatch. They also must have route knowledge and traction safety training (eg, how to do a brake test on an HST^▸ (High Speed Train)). Competence managers will regularly audit their performance and they have a biannual competency exam.

I retired a few years ago, so things may have changed. But my own feelings are that it is highly desirable to have a second person on board a long distance service, primarily for customer service. However I see no need for them to be safety critical on trains that can be operated DOO^▸ (Driver-Only Operation (that is, trains which operate without carrying a guard)). Safety training, including PTS, should be provided to all on board staff, so that they can assist in an emergency. But it should not be a requirement to have such a person on every train, all of the time.

Its time the RMT^▸ (National Union of Rail, Maritime & Transport Workers) joined the real world.

9 St Pancras

I have been told that wiring of Reading station is excluded from the September deadline.

Two points:

- Bi modes simplify the problem - could stop and change mode at Tilehurst if they did not want to do this on the move, but I would have thought this will be a key part of the testing anyway.
- it may be the intention to wire the western entrance into the depot or, alternatively, the passenger loop, which would allow reversal.

Planned/possible new services are:


- Virgin KX - Edinburgh half hourly
- TPE^▸ (Trans Pennine Express) hourly extension Newcastle to Edinburgh
- Open access applications for express KX -Edinburgh
- Transport Scotland has aspirations for regular local services with new intermediate stations.

With an hourly freight path as well, it sounds as though it could soon be like similar to the Swindon of old.