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Author Topic: More dangerous overcrowding to the Westcountry  (Read 87463 times)
JayMac
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« Reply #165 on: July 28, 2018, 05:53:51 »

Commercial stupidity?

Virgin West Coast don't see it that way, enforcing pick up/set down only at Watford Junction.

125 mph long distance trains for long distance passengers. 110mph commuter trains for commuters. What is so wrong with that?
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ellendune
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« Reply #166 on: July 28, 2018, 08:23:13 »

Commercial stupidity?

Virgin West Coast don't see it that way, enforcing pick up/set down only at Watford Junction.

125 mph long distance trains for long distance passengers. 110mph commuter trains for commuters. What is so wrong with that?

I think Grahame and you are in agreement.  He was saying that the current situation is commercial stupidity. 

If there is evidence that certain long distance express trains west of Reading (i.e. the vast majority of their route) are empty because people who would have filled those seats were unable to board or were put off by not being able to board, then the current situation is commercial stupidity.

How do West Coast enforce their policy at Watford?
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #167 on: July 28, 2018, 08:53:27 »

Commercial stupidity?

Virgin West Coast don't see it that way, enforcing pick up/set down only at Watford Junction.

125 mph long distance trains for long distance passengers. 110mph commuter trains for commuters. What is so wrong with that?

I think Grahame and you are in agreement.  He was saying that the current situation is commercial stupidity. 

If there is evidence that certain long distance express trains west of Reading (i.e. the vast majority of their route) are empty because people who would have filled those seats were unable to board or were put off by not being able to board, then the current situation is commercial stupidity.

How do West Coast enforce their policy at Watford?

That's a key point - GWR (Great Western Railway) have services which are nominally pick up only at Reading, but choose not to enforce the policy.

Want to ease the situation? Then put pressure on them to enforce it, but be under no illusions about the extra pressure which that will put on already packed local services in the evening peak.

The situation may of course be eased by the "thousands" of extra seats which GWR promised, but are not delivering, due to the dozens of short formations on long distance trains every day.
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Adelante_CCT
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« Reply #168 on: July 28, 2018, 09:07:42 »

We have the same discussions, time and time again regarding the usage of trains by Reading commuters, most pro and cons have already been mentioned in this thread.

It would not be possible to fit all Reading passengers or those connecting at Reading on to a half hourly 8/12 car service that are already full and standing, mostly being used by those heading to Maidenhead and Twyford. Even then the 17:18 is only a turbo. (Watford currently has 7 semi-fast services per hour)

The introduction of 12 car fasts to Reading/Didcot and the possible travel changing habits of those using crossrail should alleviate the problem slightly.

In answer to Grahams question, we just don't know, and even then some may prefer a fast service into Paddington and change onto Crossrail whilst returning on a direct service, or even catching a slow direct train to work whilst trying to get home via the quickest method possible!

I have said it before, yes I do think they should have p/u only at Reading on a handful of the busiest (but not all) fast services. Policing cannot be done at Paddington or Reading but onboard, by a team of inspectors that choose one train at random, and then perhaps go back to London and choose another peak train. No, this would not eradicate the problem immediately but those being caught would think twice about doing it again and by publicising the number of passengers caught/fines involved should deter others over time.

Out of interest, how many choose not to board the 16:30/16:33 departures off Paddington but wait for the 16:36 instead.
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #169 on: July 28, 2018, 09:25:55 »

We have the same discussions, time and time again regarding the usage of trains by Reading commuters, most pro and cons have already been mentioned in this thread.

I have said it before, yes I do think they should have p/u only at Reading on a handful of the busiest (but not all) fast services. Policing cannot be done at Paddington or Reading but onboard, by a team of inspectors that choose one train at random, and then perhaps go back to London and choose another peak train. No, this would not eradicate the problem immediately but those being caught would think twice about doing it again and by publicising the number of passengers caught/fines involved should deter others over time.


Then best be prepared for some seriously unpleasant scenes on board these packed trains. I understand where you're coming from, but in my experience it's far better to stop a situation happening, than allowing it to be created and then trying to deal with it when it's already (forgive the expression!) in train, or spilling onto the platform at Reading?

Why not run these trains from Platform 1 at Paddington and have the inspectors, in numbers, front and centre inspecting tickets before boarding, preceded by loud, repeated announcements and prominent signage regarding the trains in question? A couple of BTP (British Transport Police) standing nearby would also be useful.

I reckon a few days of that highly visible policy would help and put off all but the most determined.

I get that there's no silver bullet, other than providing sufficient capacity of course.
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sikejsudjek3
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« Reply #170 on: July 28, 2018, 09:46:17 »

Why not just run some trains that don't stop at Reading? I agree Reading commuters should not be on all long distance services. The rest of the country subsidises London commuters by a ratio of 7x per head. Plus they will have crossrail, another massive investment bestowed on them.
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #171 on: July 28, 2018, 10:01:00 »

Why not just run some trains that don't stop at Reading? I agree Reading commuters should not be on all long distance services. The rest of the country subsidises London commuters by a ratio of 7x per head. Plus they will have crossrail, another massive investment bestowed on them.

Not a bad shout, but then you have the issue of Reading being a major junction, at which many people change for onward travel to the Westcountry/Wales etc, what happens to them?
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eightonedee
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« Reply #172 on: July 28, 2018, 10:22:13 »

Quote from BNM-

"You don't have to cram into a train that takes half an hour longer to get to/from Reading. You can take one that takes 31-37 minutes. 8 carriages long, around 450 seats and better standing provision."

We might almost be saying the same thing! The problem is currently that there are very few such trains running to these times (I think just 2 an hour max), and these are either HSTs (High Speed Train) ot Turbos doing the Oxford line runs - which I would class as Inter City services. If GWR (Great Western Railway) did provide a lot of 31-37 minute trains non stop or limited stop to Reading using Electrostars at peak times, then they would, I am sure, relieve pressure on Inter City services. There are already some services that do not stop at Reading

Perhaps it is symptomatic of the problem that you cannot now get a separate faster trains Reading-Paddington timetable to check the trains!
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sikejsudjek3
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« Reply #173 on: July 28, 2018, 12:34:01 »

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Not a bad shout, but then you have the issue of Reading being a major junction, at which many people change for onward travel to the Westcountry/Wales etc, what happens to them?

I was thinking of one or two of the south Wales services missing out Reading and Didcot - was this done in the 70's ? At peak times of the day there are probably enough people travelling to try this and increase journey times to south Wales.
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4064ReadingAbbey
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« Reply #174 on: July 28, 2018, 14:05:44 »

As Adelante_CCT posted above, we keep repeating this discussion. Which raises the question - why does this topic exercise so many people? Including me...!

Firstly - some contradictions I have noticed.

One of the things people seem to want to keep is the concept of the ‘walk up railway’ - that is, it is not necessary to book a ticket for a specific train.

The corollary of this is that historically there is no access control to individual trains (with some minor exceptions, traditional Pullmans for example), even if there is access control to the platforms. This means that if lots of people willingly want to squash themselves onto a train - why stop them? That's what 'walk-up' means.

There are two ways to limit access to trains - one is procedural and the other physical. Procedural implies labelling the trains as ‘pick-up’ or ‘set-down’ only for certain intermediate stations. Any regular traveller will know after a day that a particular train which is nominally non-stop does in fact stop at Reading - and board anyway. Revenue control staff have at the most 20 minutes to work through a crowded train - whether they catch more than two or three chancers in that time is questionable. While the, judging by impressions given here, dozens of other chancers on every train will get off scot-free.
Procedural methods also increase the risk of friction between railway staff trying to enforce the rules and someone who knows that the train stops, has paid over £5000 for his ticket and really doesn’t understand the reason he should not get on this train. He is already tired from his day’s work, hot and sticky from the tube and now there’s this jobsworth trying to stop him getting home.

It really will not be an effective deterrent.

If physical access control to individual trains is required then, apart from using an extended Platform 1 at Paddington, holding lounges as used at airports are the obvious solution. I can just see the Secretary of State for Transport signing off a large sum of money to rebuild the required stations to permit such a solution for a couple of dozen longer distance trains a day... And Platform 1 is a non-starter: even if the track layout permitted it, allowing time for turnaround a maximum of 2.5 trains per hour could use it. That will make a big difference.

Lounges? Or more electrification?

I don’t see there is even a problem if people willingly want to stand in a train if it reduces their journey time home - the 10 minute faster train journey might make a half an hour difference to the arrival time at their front door depending on how connections to buses or other trains work. They may stand for 25 minutes to Reading, but they’ve probably already been squashed into a tube train for the 20 minutes previously, so there’s no big difference. The vestibule of the grown-up train is, on balance, probably more comfortable…

Other posters have raised the issue of the effect this standing has on people travelling further. It certainly makes for a less comfortable journey - but only during the peak periods. The key concept to remember is the railways supply public, not individual, transport. Part of the deal is you rub shoulders with the other punters.

The real issue is that of numbers.

Taking all the travel modes into account, rail, car and bus, more people travel to Reading to work than travel from Reading to work elsewhere. This has been the case for some years, the Reading Borough Council's Sites and Detailed Policies Document, dated 2008, states:
Quote
6.1.3 Reading is a dense urban Borough, containing a broad variety of uses. It has a thriving economy and is a net importer of labour.

There is clearly some imbalance in flows, especially to and from Paddington, but taking all the flows into account (five rail routes meet at Reading, six if one considers the Oxford and Swindon flows separately) the number of inbound and outbound passengers in each of the morning and evening peak periods is roughly balanced. Stand on Station Approach and just watch...

Some 17 million people start and finish their journeys in Reading every year to which must be added the 4 million who change trains. This must be seen against the 3.5 million who use Didcot, the 6.5 million using Oxford and the 3.5 million using Swindon. Comparisons are sometimes made with the situation at Watford Junction and Milton Keynes where ‘pick up only’ and ‘set down only’ is used to try to segregate the long and shorter distance flows. The situations are very different, both in the number of long distance trains stopping and the size of the traffic flows. Watford Junction has 8 million entries and exits and 600,000 interchanges each year. Milton Keynes has 6.8 million entries and exits (one third of the number at Reading) and 462,000 interchanges (a factor 10 lower). Procedural methods to separate the flows have more chance of success with these lower numbers.

The demands on the services are significantly different.

The counterpeak flows west along the Thames Valley to Reading are significant - one only has to stand on the platform in the morning watching the number of people disembarking to realise this - but the to-London flows in the morning (and the reverse in the evening) are, of course, larger. The oft repeated image of the stereotype Reading commuter uniquely insisting on fast trains to London is untrue - any commuter from anywhere would like a fast train to London, it's just that there are a lot of them using Reading.

To serve all these disparate flows is difficult and the timetable is a compromise. The additional capacity offered by the IETs (Intercity Express Train), the 387s and, closer in to London, Crossrail will be welcome, but it will be impossible to give everyone what they would like. But they might get what they are prepared to pay for...
« Last Edit: July 28, 2018, 14:49:48 by 4064ReadingAbbey » Logged
4064ReadingAbbey
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« Reply #175 on: July 28, 2018, 14:46:29 »

Why not just run some trains that don't stop at Reading? I agree Reading commuters should not be on all long distance services. The rest of the country subsidises London commuters by a ratio of 7x per head. Plus they will have crossrail, another massive investment bestowed on them.

How do you arrive at the 7X figure? And 7X what?

Some three quarters of the capital cost of Crossrail has been, or is being, raised by from businesses in the area affected by Crossrail within the GLA area by a mixture of infrastructure levies and increases in rates and future farepayers. From a  https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/4863/letter.pdf  Freedom of Information request:

Quote
2. Crossrail has a £14.8 billion funding package, which is split in three roughly equal parts between national taxpayers (through Government funding), businesses, and future Crossrail fare payers.

The national taxpayers’ contribution, will be provided in the form of a grant from the DfT» (Department for Transport - about) of £4.7 billion.

The major part of the contribution from businesses will be provided through the Business Rate Supplement, a 2p in the pound levy raised by the Mayor on business properties in the Greater London Authority with a rateable value of over £55,000. This revenue stream (which is expected to continue for some 28 years) will support £3.5bn of debt to be taken out by the Greater London Authority to provide funding for the construction of Crossrail, as well as providing £600 million in direct cash contributions.

The Mayor is also raising £300 million from businesses through Section 106 developer contributions, by seeking contributions from developers in a central zone and also within a radius of other Crossrail stations within the GLA boundary. The Mayor also intends to raise £300 million through the Community Infrastructure Levy.

Direct contributions have been agreed in principle with some of the project’s key business beneficiaries along the route: Canary Wharf Group, City of London Corporation and BAA PLC. The detail of these third party agreements is covered by confidentiality agreements to protect their commercial interests.

Future revenues from farepayers on Crossrail services will fund up to £4.7 billion of the capital costs of building Crossrail. These revenues will remunerate Network Rail for the costs it will incur in upgrading its existing network to facilitate Crossrail services, and will service debt to be taken out by Transport for London to provide cash funding for construction of the central tunnel section of the route.

The balance of the funding package will come from income generated by the project itself – for example from the sale of development rights above stations and from interest earned on cash balances during construction.
« Last Edit: July 28, 2018, 14:53:00 by 4064ReadingAbbey » Logged
PhilWakely
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« Reply #176 on: July 28, 2018, 22:31:30 »

We have the same discussions, time and time again regarding the usage of trains by Reading commuters, most pro and cons have already been mentioned in this thread.

<snip>

I have said it before, yes I do think they should have p/u only at Reading on a handful of the busiest (but not all) fast services. Policing cannot be done at Paddington or Reading but onboard, by a team of inspectors that choose one train at random, and then perhaps go back to London and choose another peak train. No, this would not eradicate the problem immediately but those being caught would think twice about doing it again and by publicising the number of passengers caught/fines involved should deter others over time.

A far simpler solution would be to run non-stop through Reading and then stop at Reading West/Tilehurst. RPIs (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context)) would be posted at both of these stations and penalty fare all those who alight.

As for pax waiting at Reading to board, an announcement would be made for pax to join the next available service for Reading West/Tilehurst so that they can then join their chosen service.
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4064ReadingAbbey
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« Reply #177 on: July 29, 2018, 11:44:31 »

We have the same discussions, time and time again regarding the usage of trains by Reading commuters, most pro and cons have already been mentioned in this thread.

<snip>

I have said it before, yes I do think they should have p/u only at Reading on a handful of the busiest (but not all) fast services. Policing cannot be done at Paddington or Reading but onboard, by a team of inspectors that choose one train at random, and then perhaps go back to London and choose another peak train. No, this would not eradicate the problem immediately but those being caught would think twice about doing it again and by publicising the number of passengers caught/fines involved should deter others over time.

A far simpler solution would be to run non-stop through Reading and then stop at Reading West/Tilehurst. RPIs (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context)) would be posted at both of these stations and penalty fare all those who alight.

As for pax waiting at Reading to board, an announcement would be made for pax to join the next available service for Reading West/Tilehurst so that they can then join their chosen service.
How would that work?

Some £850 million have been spent on supplying Reading with three parallel platforms fed from the Down Main to permit closer headways to be used on the Down Main (DM). Stopping expresses on the single Down Main at Tilehurst will simply return the position to the status quo ante, delays will be programmed in. Admittedly the West of England trains will have left the DM at Reading but Cross-Country trains which have reversed or started from Reading frequently (not always) use the DM as far as Didcot East so the reduction in the number of trains is not as great as one would think.

Stopping expresses at Reading West is also a bad idea, as the half-hourly Basingstoke and the Newbury stoppers also call here - if there are clashes then the times of one or both of these services may have to be changed as well as those of the southbound Cross-Country trains. Quite apart from potential delays to the, approximately hourly, southbound container trains.

And why make the journeys for those people who board at Reading more difficult? Why try to solve a perceived problem by adding a change and a lengthening a journey for people who have have nothing to do with it?

How to win friends and influence people...?
« Last Edit: July 29, 2018, 11:55:28 by 4064ReadingAbbey » Logged
bobm
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« Reply #178 on: July 29, 2018, 12:11:32 »

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09:47 Penzance to London Paddington due 15:43 has been delayed at Penzance and is now 39 minutes late.

This is due to train crew being delayed.

Service full and standing. First class is declassified.
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #179 on: July 29, 2018, 12:26:50 »

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09:47 Penzance to London Paddington due 15:43 has been delayed at Penzance and is now 39 minutes late.

This is due to train crew being delayed.

Service full and standing. First class is declassified.

That's going to be a bloody awful journey for hundreds of people.
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