Station dwell times - an HST in the Kennet Valley

[whole diary]

[grahame]

In "my youth", I lived in the London 'burbs - the old "Southern Electric" land with 4 car EPB trains - quick acceleration, slam door stock without interlocaking and up to 10 doors on each side of each coach, and a regular clientelle who knew to close the door behind them (and who could hear if the door only half closed and fix the problem).  The trains were aloud 30 minutes for 10 stops - that's the running between ststions PLUS station dwell - for which 20 seconds was allowed, I understand - in 180 seconds.

On Friday, I caught the 18:06 from Paddington to Frome, via the Berks and Hants, and logged station dwells.

Twyford 122 seconds *
Reading 129 seconds **
Theale 90 seconds *
Thatcham 105 seconds *
Newbury 187 seconds **
Kintbury 63 seconds *
Hungerford 184 seconds *
Bedwyn 91 seconds *
Pewsey 71 seconds *
Westbury - I detrained.

Those stations marked "*" - the Train Manager had people moving forward, telling them not only how many carriages would be platformed, but giving the carriage letters too.  Those marked "**" took the whole train. Train manager was also asking peole to ensure they closed the doors behind them - I guess that's necessary when the majority of the services to many of these stations are Turbos with automatic doors.

Total dwell time - 17 minutes (as opposed to the 3 it would have been on Southern Electric for the same number of stations.  BUT please note - the train arrived in Westbury virtually right on time, and I suspect that the longer wait at Hunderford was more for the timetable to catch up than for the station activities.

I'm posting these figures as there's been much discussion of selective door opening, stating dwell times, etc, and there was an opportunity for me to come up with an example.

[devon_metro]

Obviously an EPB isn't the best example as there was a door for every set of seats, but interesting reading all the same.

[Btline]

V interesting, although there are less doors per passenger with HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train).

[John R]

That would concur with my observations of dwell times at Nailsea, which of course have been worsened since SDO^▸ (Selective Door Opening) since only 4 coaches are platformed, so more passengers need to get on at each door.

It's particularly a problem for joining passengers in the morning, since passengers block the vestibule even though there are seats available. Also the tendency of the first passengers joining to take the first available seat in the coach, which then causes a delay of a couple of seconds whilst they settle themselves, or ask someone to move, blocking the aisle as they do so. Before you know it, you've got a 2 minute dwell time. 

[Hafren]

If you're interested, you can check the official minimum dwell times used for timetable planning in the Rules of the Plan, which can be found easily by Googling. The dwell times recorded above actually do (Newbury is an exception) match the official allowances reasonably well! At most of those stations, for HST^▸ (High Speed Train) it's 1 1/2 minutes off-peak, 2 minutes peak; at Reading and Westbury it's 2 minutes all day.

[swlines]

Et voila - 2009 timetable (December 2008 - December 2009) for GW^▸ (Great Western) region: http://www.networkrail.co.uk/browse%20documents/Rules%20Of%20The%20Route/Outrotp9/gw09p.pdf

[grahame]

Hello, Hafren, and welcome to the forum.

I put "station dwell times" into Google and did a UK^▸ (United Kingdom) search .... and came back to this thread! - I'll have to try a more innovative search term - unless you have a link you can post?  But I agree with you that they're about right, timetable wise - the train was on time and the Newbury and Hungerford extensions were quite possible awaiting the timetable.

There have been various discussions here (perhaps you have seen them before you took the plunge and posted?) as to how SDO^▸ (Selective Door Opening) was working, whether 125s are suited for these services, whether there's too much slack in certain timetables. I took the opportunity on Friday night to gather some figures so that a further discussion could take place with some actual figures - although I would need many more samples for there to be any degree of certainty to the conclusions.

And what have I concluded so far - that the timetable is about right for the type of train being used, and (from your comments) that the train was stopped and under way in roughly the proportions that the timetable planners expect.  Which is good news.   I think it also shows that SDO didn't (on Friday night) cause disproportionately long stops at stations where the whole train didn't fit and my feeling is that a lot of that is due to the diligent work of the passenger facing staff on the train.

I'm going to have anothe "Google" for the dwell times for Turbos!

Edit - thanks, swlines!

[Hafren]

I usually Google for 'Rules of the Plan' when I want to refer to them. Quite a big, dry document - the dwell times are  in Section 5.3.5 (under the Bookmarks tab on the left in Acrobat Reader). Route GW103 covers PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains)-RDG^‡(resolve); GW500 covers the Berks & Hants. For Turbos the 'standard value' is 30s (1m for non-DOO^▸ (Driver-Only Operation (that is, trains which operate without carrying a guard)) routes like the Cotswolds) - so for a HST^▸ (High Speed Train) to be faster with a few stops, there has to more sustained 100+mph running. Interestingly, it's only in recent releases of the rules that it's been 30s - it used to be 45s, which in practice means alternating between 30s and 1m. Incidentally, minimum timing allowances are also shown (sec 5.5) - on a Paddington-Bristol/Cardiff run it's more or less a minute's slack per stop - similarly, it's easy to see how a non-stop run on the B&H^▸ (Berks and Hants - railway line from Reading to Taunton via Westbury) can arrive at Reading 5 minutes early.

Most of the stations affected by the new HST stops had loco-hauled trains on similar peak semi-fasts before the Turbos came - I wonder what dwell times were like then. Hopefully passengers will become better-trained in time. I say 'hopefully'...

[grahame]

Tom (swline's) link has it ... and a fascinating document. I've learnt all sorts of things in the last quarter of an hour ... and can see myself coming back to it quite often.  Interesting to note that a service from Bedwyn can turn around and form an ougoing train from Paddington in 10 minutes, but one from Westbury requires 20 minutes. 

Cutting dwells from the HST^▸ (High Speed Train) allowance to 30 seconds for the Turbos (is Bedwyn Driver Only [DOO^▸ (Driver-Only Operation (that is, trains which operate without carrying a guard))]?) and also considering faster acceleration of the turbos, even if the top speed is not as high, means that ironically the train that can run faster gives the slower transit time. I know you "railway types" are very much aware of this, but it comes as an element of surprise to some of us customers.

[swlines]

Tom (swline's) link has it ... and a fascinating document. I've learnt all sorts of things in the last quarter of an hour ... and can see myself coming back to it quite often.  Interesting to note that a service from Bedwyn can turn around and form an ougoing train from Paddington in 10 minutes, but one from Westbury requires 20 minutes.

That's because it is assumed that Bedwyn services are Turbos (they can't not be, put it that way), while Westbury turners would be 180s or HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train).

Cutting dwells from the HST allowance to 30 seconds for the Turbos (is Bedwyn Driver Only [DOO^▸ (Driver-Only Operation (that is, trains which operate without carrying a guard))]?) and also considering faster acceleration of the turbos, even if the top speed is not as high, means that ironically the train that can run faster gives the slower transit time. I know you "railway types" are very much aware of this, but it comes as an element of surprise to some of us customers.

Bear in mind that the Berks and Hants doesn't really go faster than 100mph.

[devon_metro]

A section is 110

[swlines]

I don't think that section is much longer than 5 or 6 miles long though - it doesn't really take much of an effect in timings as its lost in slack time!

[eightf48544]

To me what this thread and the others on this topic show  is just what a magnificent train the HST^▸ (High Speed Train) was when it first was produced as an Intercity Train in the mid 70s.

The fact that they just about copes with a tototally unexpected use as a  commuter train only re-enforces what a superb design it really is.

However, the fact that it just about copes doesn't mean it should be used as a commuter train. It's an Intercity high speed limited stop train,  so shouldn't have to be used on commuter trains it's only beacuse  "they" didn't order enough units in the 90s.

It's a bit like asking a Duchess to work an unfitted freight, when you saw that you knew it was the end of steam. Is this end of the HSTs are they going to wear themselves out working totally unsuitable services? That would be a very sad end.

[Btline]

Anyone else surprised about some of the dwellls in that document (which was v interesting)?

A 170 has 2 mins, but an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) has 1.5 mins.....

Doesn't calculate!

[swlines]

Some issues relating to platform clearances and despatch are included in the dwell times listed at stations - for instance on HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) there may be higher ease of view than for instance a 2 coach class 170.