Twyford to Henley branch line - services, timetables, incidents and improvements

[whole diary]

[IndustryInsider]

We've had plenty of discussions about the Regatta in previous years on here.  The timetable has to be altered to deal with the volume of passengers (Saturday's crowds had to be seen to be believed this year - even the 7-car Turbo shuttle was struggling at times!), and to run the 30-minute frequency service that is needed to cope with passenger numbers it is considered that a stop at Wargrave on every train would not be robust enough to allow the trains to keep to time.  I'm slightly sceptical that that's the case, and that perhaps (for the evening peak trains only) Wargrave should continue to be a stop on all trains, but as it is I agree in that particular example of the evening commute home it does adversely affect Wargrave commuters and I do sympathise.

However, the outward commute in the morning is unaffected and 'Regatta Week' is just three weekdays.  The other option from those you've listed is to do an extra 30 minutes at work, or have a pint at Paddington, and catch the 17:36 or 18:47, which still offered a good connections at Twyford for Wargrave.

I do think that perhaps a small gesture of goodwill for Wargrave season ticket holders (^10 voucher maybe?) would be a good thing to do given the disruption to the normal timetable.

[bobm]

Silver, may I welcome you to the forum and thank you for a very interesting first post.

As a former resident of Twyford I know only too well the huge increase in passengers the Regatta brings to the Henley Branch each year.  Like Industry Insider I do have a lot of sympathy for the regular commuters who see their routine disrupted.  It is true the biggest crowds are at the weekend and I am sure some way could be found to accomodate the usual peak hour services on the three weekdays.

It is also interesting that home-going regatta patrons are offered a bus rather than a train.  I am not sure if this is because of the problems there have been on late night services in the past - but it does seem a bit half-hearted offering extra trains to get people there and then finishing the service at the normal time and leave the homeward journey in the hands of Reading Buses.

Finally congratulations to my old school who won their event for the third year running! 

[autotank]

Looks like there are some works taking place on the Henley branch - the past two nights have seen buses used for the last few trips. Doesn't appear on the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website - any idea what they are doing? I've seen quite a few vans at Wargrave recently.

Also this morning (11th Dec) there was quite a lot of late running on the branch during the peak and a few cancellations mid-morning due to 'signalling problems'. I found this hard to fathom as the signalling on the branch is very simple. Why couldn't pilotman working be brought in to maintain a service.

[Southern Stag]

The signalling problems were track circuit problems. The closure if the mid-morning was to allow Network Rail time to fix the problem, and this presumably prevented any train service running on the branch whilst the work was carried out.

[autotank]

Just wondering if we'll ever get an increase in frequency on Saturdays to match the Monday - Friday 45 minute service? Although unpopular with some who prefer clockface operation, I think the 45 minute interval has been a great success with steady growth on the line over the last decade. It's particularly pleaseing to see so many Henley College students use the train - the 0804 Reading - Henley is often full and standing from Twyford.

It would also be nice to see an earlier first train on Saturdays - the first departure isn't until 0724, which feels a bit late and means you can't get most of London until 0930.

Presumably the reason for keeping it hourly is down to staffing - you'd probably need another driver over the course of a day as I think each one only does 3 or 4 trips. No stock implications though!

Sadly an hourly service would have to remain on Sundays as the stoppers at Twyford are only half hourly so a 45 minute service wouldn't connect very well (not that the current connections are that good - lots of seemingly uneccessary waiting around at Twyford).

Looking further ahead, after electrification could a 30 minute service operate throughout the day?

[Chris from Nailsea]

From the Henley Standard:

Rail firms to visit

Commuters from Henley are being offered the chance to comment on rail services.

Henley MP^▸ (Member of Parliament) John Howell has arranged for representatives of First Great Western and Network Rail to meet rail users. He expects issues such as overcrowding, the future of the Henley-London service and communication during the recent floods to be raised.

The meeting will be held at the Christ Church Centre in Reading Road next Friday from 6.30pm.

Mr Howell said: ^I get a steady postbag of complaints about the service that First Great Western provides, so it seemed the obvious thing to arrange for FGW^▸ (First Great Western) to come to Henley and tell commuters what it is doing. There are a number of issues which it needs to address. It will also be good to hear from Network Rail on the work they did during the flooding.^

[bobm]

I have always had a soft spot for the Henley Branch.

As chance would have it I was on one of the through trains from London Paddington this evening.



I also hadn't noticed until today that there is a pedestrian exit at Shiplake near the Twyford end of the platform across the old trackbed of the double line.  Goes to show how you can travel a line many times and still miss things!

[eightf48544]

Just a thought with electrification has any one suggested redoubling or a dynamic loop on the branch to allow an increased service.

[bobm]

I looked at the geography at Shiplake last night to see if a loop could be put there.  I think it would be possible if trains were stopped nearer the Twyford end of the platform.  Both faces are still there.  However it would mean sacrificing car-parking space and sorting out the footpath pictured above.  You could then end the loop before the level crossing to avoid the need to remodel that part.

[autotank]

I went along to the meeting last night which was quite well attended (around 50 people). There were 4 FGW^▸ (First Great Western) managers including Mark Hopwood and a chap from Network Rail along with Henley MP^▸ (Member of Parliament) John Howell who organised it. I didn^t stay until the end (had a train to catch and beer to drink!), but here (from memory) is a brief summary of the main points discussed:

Mark started by saying how important the branches are to FGW, even though he realised that sometimes passengers might not feel that way! He grew up in Marlow and early in his railway career spent time in the Henley ticket office, so he appreciates and understands the issues and desires that branch users have.

An explanation of the signalling problems between Maidenhead and Twyford ^ there are still temporary measures in place on the relief lines using axel counters instead of the normal track circuits with extended signal sections. The crossover at Ruscombe is still out of action as well. Network Rail hope to restore the normal signalling system in the next 2-3 weeks. The meeting was understanding of the flooding disruption, but critical of the communication. Mark recognised this and said it was something they are working on at a senior level.

The reliability of the 1805 Paddington ^ Twyford HST^▸ (High Speed Train) was one of the main talking points. This train is frequently delayed and often misses the tight connection with the Henley train at 1831. Mark said this train was of concern and near the top of his reliability watch list. The service will benefit from one extra standard class carriage (converted from First) in the near future which will help somewhat ^ but it will always be a very popular busy service.

A discussion was had about the usefulness of the 1712 and 1812 through trains which are quite slow compared to the 1706 and 1805 HST services which connect with branch shuttles. A straw poll showed the vast majority of people prefer an HST and connection rather than a slower through train (which I was slightly surprised by and didn^t agree with!). At the next major timetable change in May 2015 the possibility of a branch shuttle connecting with the 1847 HST from Paddington (what this would mean for the only through down ^fast^ service at 1905 wasn^t discussed).

The meeting seemed to agree that the up service and connections to London worked well in the morning, but that the down service in the evening wasn^t as good with connections often missed and overcrowding a frequent issue. It^s unlikely that more carriages can be found for the popular 1905 through service.

The Network Rail man confirmed the branch will be electrified and expects it to be a relatively straight forward task, with perhaps a few weekend closures. It will be wired after the mainline is completed so the branch will have to rely on diesel units for slightly longer than elsewhere. A couple of people expressed a desire for the line to be doubled in the future (!) and urged NR^» (Network Rail - home page) to make sure that works to wire the line wouldn^t rule this out.

Mark noted that there wasn^t a dedicated user group for the Henley line although the Marlow - Maidenhead Passengers^ Association has a watching brief. He suggested that if a group was formed for the Henley line that FGW would provide some money to help start it up. The meeting agreed this was a good idea ^ sadly I didn^t stay around until the end of the meeting so I^m not sure if anything was actioned. This is certainly something I^d welcome and like to be involved with.


The questions and observations I made seemed to be quite well received:

A half hourly frequency throughout the day is currently not possible because it isn^t very robust. With the better acceleration and a possible line speed increase to 60mph on the branch would a 30 minute frequency be possible throughout the day? Mark tentatively said that this was an aspiration.

The 45 minute off-peak frequency during the week works well ^ why can^t we have this on Saturdays when there are 4 trains an hour from Twyford?

On Sundays can the connections be tightened up at Twyford ^ often you have to wait quite a while for a connecting train which makes journey times unattractive. The 2 stopping services an hour on Sundays need to always be 5 cars minimum ^ I^ve often seen 3 or even sometimes 2 which struggles to cope east of Slough. There are plenty of spare sets at Reading on a Sunday sat doing nothing. A lady sat near me raised the good point that 10am was quite a late start for the branch service ^ Marlow now has a 9am service.


The majority of answers came from Mark Hopwood who I was impressed with. His answers were honest and realistic (needed to rein some of the more ^out there^ suggestions and complaints in). I see from his twitter that a follow up meeting is to be held in 3 months time which I'll make an effort to attend.

[bobm]

Thank you autotank for an excellent summary of what seems to have been an interesting meeting.  Let us hope it bears fruit.

I admit I hadn't realised the crossovers at Ruscombe were out of use but that would explain some of the delays to services reaching Reading in the evening peak.

As for the tight connection on the 18:05 part of the problem with overcrowding is because those wanting the Henley train tend to head for the middle coaches of standard to afford themselves the best chance of making the connection by being closer to the stairs.  It is noticeable after Twyford how empty these coaches are compared to the rest of the train.

[autotank]

I looked at the geography at Shiplake last night to see if a loop could be put there.  I think it would be possible if trains were stopped nearer the Twyford end of the platform.  Both faces are still there.  However it would mean sacrificing car-parking space and sorting out the footpath pictured above.  You could then end the loop before the level crossing to avoid the need to remodel that part.

As a regular user of the branch I've often daydreamed of how to improve the service. A half hourly service is just about possible at the moment as things stand, but wouldn't leave any wriggle room as there would be only a 3 minute turn around at each end. With electrification and a line speed increase to 60mph the end to end time could conceivably be reduced to 11 or even 10 minutes which would make a half hourly service a more realistic prospect. This is something that Mark Hopwood sort of hinted at as a longer term aspiration at the meeting last night.

If you wanted to further increase capacity I don^t think a loop at Shiplake would work as the impact on the car park and platform length would be considerable. Instead I^d go for a dynamic loop between Twyford and Wargrave which would allow a 20 minute frequency 2 train service post electrification something like this:

Twyford   xx00   xx20   xx40
Henley      xx11   xx31   xx51

Henley      xx15   xx35   xx55
Twyford   xx26   xx46   xx06

This seems reasonably robust to me and allows a decent amount of recovery time at Twyford.

All pie in the sky of course, as a 20 minute frequency wouldn^t really fit in with the mainline 15 minute service.

[ellendune]

Was he branch ever double track? Or would a dynamic loop require additional land take?

[bobm]

It has an interesting history.  It was originally a single track broad gauge line but then converted into a double track standard gauge one.  It reverted to a single track in the early 60s although there was still a loop at Shiplake until the end of the 60s.

The station at Henley had three platforms but now it only has the one.

An unusual fact is that when the line is closed for engineering work the replacement buses have to start at Shiplake then to Henley, Wargrave and Twyford as the only way to cross the river between Wargrave and Shiplake is the railway bridge.

[John R]

Given the costs involved in a dynamic loop, I would have thought electrification + slightly higher line speeds is the only realistic chance of bringing end to end journey times down enough to give a resilient 30 minute service.

Actually,it might be possible to have a half hourly service now if one of the two services ran non-stop from end to end, particularly off peak.  Given passenger numbers at both intermediate stations are relatively low (both have under 100,000 entries and exits compared with Henley's 700,000), this could be the optimal use of existing resources, although would could be controversial.

If services were increased to half hourly with one unit then connectional delays become an issue. If you hold a train for a late connection then there is very little chance of catching up, and could mean the inward service to Twyford would miss its connection.   There's also the problem that it becomes very difficult to time connections both ways (ie both Reading and London). As an example, if you want the Henley bound train to leave 3 minutes after arrival of a service from London then by definition the previous train from Henley into Twyford can't arrive in time for passengers wanting to connect with the Reading bound service. At least not with any degree of resilience.