Railway bosses are poised to relaunch the once threatened Penzance to London sleeper train thanks to "people power".

Charles Howeson, chairman of First Great Western, has revealed to the WMN plans to unveil the refurbished service under the new name of the Night Riviera Express on June 23.

See http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?nodeId=141507&command=displayContent&sourceNode=257390&home=yes&more_nodeId1=257393&contentPK=20728306

Well, since around 8000 of us - including a lot of contributors to the forum - got together to try and save the service, it seems to have gone from strength to strength! I have to give FGW credit for the way they've handled the sleeper in recent times - they've done a lot of research to find what passengers want, and they're starting to respond with the likes of a proper breakfast onboard and so on.

What's really good news is that they've added a fifth sleeper coach on busy nights, and I'm told that if loadings carry on rising, they may have to look into generating a business case within the next 12-18 months for a sixth! I think that's a real tribute to the quality of the service, and the excellent staff who look after snoozing passengers. For once, it's good news on GW - let's hope it continues and that we don't have to fight to save the train in another few years!

Andy Roden

Video from BBC Spotlight SouthWest about the relaunch:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7470329.stm

(What you don't see is the presenter introducing the video and getting in the "MPs thought FGW was the worst operator on the planet" comment  )

Favourite quote from the video: "They've apparently done 'something' to the breaks to make it a smoother journey"... quality reporting 

Perhaps they could get jobs with the BBC then   

I think its mainly a case of that "bad news" will always sell papers, and "good news" (although featured more than people realise) will not always get the level of coverage that perhaps it merits.

From my perspective, one of the things that has greatly improved is that, if I raise an issue of importance to the Coffee Shop or CANBER, Andrew Haines will always ensure that I get a speedy and detailed response, either from him personally or the person responsible for the matter. Frankly, this is in stark contrast to how things were before he came along.

There have also been welcome moves towards improvements on several lines/services (TransWilts being a notable exception.)

However, FGW remain gaffe-prone, and when things do go wrong, they tend to go wrong in spectacular fashion, the debacles over the Exeter ticket promotion and the Free Severn Beach Line service cancellations being good examples. Errors like this could be avoided, and FGW still (in my opinion) have work to do on this front.

Here is a view from the I Hate FGW blog author, in which she notes (with caution) that things have improved (link below.)
http://www.canber.co.uk/?q=node/29