Infrastructure problems in Thames Valley causing disruption elsewhere - ongoing, since Oct 2014

[whole diary]

[IndustryInsider]

Aren't Network Rail picking up these delay minutes? Hardly fault of GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)?

Whilst the initial course of the disruption my well-being Network Rail's fault, GWR are responsible for minimising the resulting delays.  This is something they continue to be woeful at doing.  Removing operational staff at Cardiff, Westbury and Oxford recently is an indication of how ridiculous their strategy for improvement is.

They have become much better at dealing with planned disruption, such as engineering blockades, but continue to fall apart when dealing with unplanned disruption.

[grahame]

The air handling system on an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) (Mk3) coach is very similar to the design used on Mk2^▸ (Mark 2 coach) d, e, f.  These air con systems were design for a 50/50% split in each coach being smoking and non smoking, can you remember those day    The air flow is designed for enter at the non smoking end and extracted from the smoking end.  Its quite a big ask for the air handling unit to do this, where as modern trains 387 etc have a much more distributed air handling system.

I never cease to be a-mazed at the depth of knowledge and the things I learn here.

[grahame]

Aren't Network Rail picking up these delay minutes? Hardly fault of GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)?

Whilst the initial course of the disruption my well-being Network Rail's fault, GWR are responsible for minimising the resulting delays.

How do the "financials" stack up?   Is the system set up so that it's in a TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) short term financial interest to minimise NR^» (Network Rail - home page) caused delays?

One can imagine a scenario (surely not the case?) where a delay that a third party such as Network Rail leads to increasing compensation payments to the TOC the more minutes that can be attributed back to it.  If compensation received is more than compensation paid out, this would lead to an accountant's temptation to discourage measures that would get things back on schedule quicker.

[TaplowGreen]

Aren't Network Rail picking up these delay minutes? Hardly fault of GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)?

Whilst the initial course of the disruption my well-being Network Rail's fault, GWR are responsible for minimising the resulting delays.

How do the "financials" stack up?   Is the system set up so that it's in a TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company) short term financial interest to minimise NR^» (Network Rail - home page) caused delays?

One can imagine a scenario (surely not the case?) where a delay that a third party such as Network Rail leads to increasing compensation payments to the TOC the more minutes that can be attributed back to it.  If compensation received is more than compensation paid out, this would lead to an accountant's temptation to discourage measures that would get things back on schedule quicker.

I can recall a number of discussions on this topic, GWR have been asked on several occasions for the figures as to compensation received from NR v compensation paid out to customers for given incidents and whilst they have always refused to disclose it there is little doubt that the former massively outweighs the latter - for one thing, the compensation from NR is contractual and doesn't rely on individuals claiming it (and being prepared to wait for weeks/months for a reply) - so whilst GWR are perversely indirectly incentivised to string out delays  I wouldn't suggest that they do that, good old fashioned incompetence/inefficiency is the main reason, however resting easy in the knowledge that they are going to be compensated by NR certainly takes the commercial heat out of the situation for them (whilst their customers melt in the heat!)

If you hit GWR with a Customer satisfaction KPI on which senior management bonuses/salary increases were dependent, then you would see some more urgency, it tends to concentrate minds wonderfully if the Boss thinks he's going to take a hit to the pocket.

[IndustryInsider]

There's certainly a marked difference in the approach of GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) to an NR^» (Network Rail - home page) caused delay and one they've caused - that's nothing new.  Though as TG says the systems in place are woefully inadequate to deal with either.

[NickB]

This was a quote on the WNXX^▸ (Stored Unserviceable, Mainline Locos HQ All Classes) Forum:

Just to sum up how awful yesterday was:

GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) evening peak PPM^‡(resolve) was just 1.6%
High Speed Services evening peak PPM was 3.8%
London/Thames Valley evening peak PPM was 0%
West evening PPM did better at 12.5%

A shocker of a day with just one train arriving into Paddington making PPM!

But obviously no danger of a Void Day being declared to ensure that all passengers affected receive something approaching adequate compensation??  No, no danger at all. 😒

[charles_uk]

But obviously no danger of a Void Day being declared to ensure that all passengers affected receive something approaching adequate compensation??  No, no danger at all. 😒

"Unlikely" according to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s Twitter team.

[ChrisB]

The magic word is 'day'. If that had happened at start of service, I suspect the Thames Valley & High Speed Train (HST^▸ (High Speed Train)) charter grouos may have got one, but not for less than a full days disruption.

Edit: VickiS - Clarifying Acronym

[ChrisB]

And also morexlikely when the delay minutes are atributable to themselves, rather than some other, like Network Rail in this case, who will fully refund GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) for all costs/compensation for each & every minute atributed

[eightf48544]

And the money goes round and round and the train service doesn't improve.

[Sixty3Closure]

But obviously no danger of a Void Day being declared to ensure that all passengers affected receive something approaching adequate compensation??  No, no danger at all. 😒

"Unlikely" according to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s Twitter team.

Is this the same Twitter team that were too busy to do updates on Monday due to individual queries? I think most of us can accept delays happen but GWR need to talk to their customers.

My train home was on time today except the usual 8 coach (or maybe 7) 125 was replaced by a 2 coach Turbo. On the train I did catch there was an announcement that air con was only working in one or two coaches and passengers should move to one of these coaches. Great advice except there's people standing in the aisle and others running up and down the platform trying to get on. It may have been well intentioned advice but it was met with withering scorn where I was standing.

[TaplowGreen]

Sounds truly horrific....the 1736 is packed at the best of times....suspect the High Speed Train (HST^▸ (High Speed Train)) was nicked to transport the great unwashed to Glastonbury.

Edit: VickiS - Clarifying Acronym

[Adelante_CCT]

17:29 from Swansea
17:45 from Paddington
18:31 from Oxford
18:50 from Paddington

All cancelled and the 17:49 from Paddington is 5 car instead of 8, and 17:36 2 car instead of 8
All the units for the above services have failed apparently, that's quite a large proportion of HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train)

[IndustryInsider]

Surprisingly good performance today from NR^» (Network Rail - home page) and GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway).  A few delays/cancellations/short forms, but overall not too bad given it was the hottest day of the four day heatwave (hottest June days in over 40 years), the disruption of the previous three days (especially Monday) and sets being nicked for Glastonbury.

[bobm]

I've just taken a quick peek at Open Train Times - there are currently 9 trains queued on the UM between Hayes and Burnham but then you have to go back as far as Cholsey to find the next one - so I'd say the rush hour is most definitely not looking good.

A word of warning for those who may be relying on it for information, OTT^▸ (Open Train Times website) appears to be suffering from the heat as well as it seems to be lagging by over 5 minutes on the actual position of trains.

Just for interest there is a detailed explanation of the problems which affected OTT on Monday here - https://blog.opentraintimes.com/2017/06/19/post-incident-review/