Is it one of the ways that "the railway" is increasing its income from the same number of passengers while "not raising [regulated] fares"?

Advance fares were introduced to help fill seats on quieter trains, as I recall.  With trains getting so much busier and (we hear) services on Sundays being reduced, there are now and progressively will be fewer - far fewer - spare seats to offload.

I have some disquiet over service reductions though in certain instances they can make sense.   

At Melksham, we lost two round trips on Saturdays "so that the others can be more reliable".  The services lost were the ones that had been running pre-2013 and we were left with just the Westbury - Swindon shuttle with extended gaps in the middle of the day where those previous skeleton services had run.   In some ways a logical cut, as the trains cut had been run at times the stock wasn't really needed on other lines either - quietest time of day.  However, I spite of us being told they were being cut to help reliability, the reliability of the remaining service got worse.    This broke the promised message we had been sold - "fewer trains but more reliable" though of course we don't know if it would have been even less reliable had they remained.   As a result of this failure to deliver what we were sold on, we find it harder to trust GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) these days.

GWR services on the South Coast to the east of Portsmouth - to Brighton - were also lost.  Two round trips a day.  There was sadness rather than retention campaigning as they were lost.  Again, comment / promised that it will "let us do better / be more reliable with the other services" which has had a hollow ring, and I'm not sure that the promises - or implicit promise of the marketing hype - has been delivered.

In December, GWR cut a peak train from Warminster to Westbury in the interest of "the reliability / time keeping of other busier trains".  Problem is that as a result, they then offered no route home for students and working people from Salisbury from 16:42 to 19:13 - for sure, there are fewer passengers on the train culled than on the one it held up, but should they really be prioritising saving a couple of minutes delay over getting people home at all?   With an extra call on the train that was got in the way of sometimes,  the issues could have been compensated.  But, no, in spite of their being three minutes of extra allowances in that train, they won't add the call and seem to be intent on performance stats one serving their existing customer base.   And - we were presented with a "fait accompli" on this one - no notice at all of the significant change prior to it happening and the train just disappearing from the timetable.

So - whilst we appreciate the need to update timetables, and to provide a reasonable level of service overall that may be a lessening for some, we treat planned cuts with extreme unease and we don't trust (sorry) GWR to deliver the benefits to us that they promise.

Pictures and text suggest this was a great success - and that I was wise not to go for the sake of my wallet.  Did any Coffee Shop members go?

Best ticket advise sought - 2 adults, day return on 20th June 2026, Southampton to Twickenham to attend a major event (a rugby match between TBA and TBA according to Google) that starts at 3 p.m.  No age related railcards

Looks to me like "super off peak" only allows travel too late in the day.     

Not sure how direct or indirect will be acceptable - I would suspect that Southern fares via Gatwick are out.

69 lots, 12th to 17th March 2026.

https://www.wilsonsauctions.com/auctions/tfl-museum-depot-auction-3223

I am not seeing any *I MUST have that* items ... but others just might.

A Google search (already!) comes up with this thread as its top hit  ...

Your other overnight question asks about long-standing members, and we use aliases here so it could well be that David is a member, and / or retains his interest in other ways. 

I would ask anyone who knows / reads this to be aware of GDPR, as we at the Coffee Shop are, and if they have current details not to publish them in the open forum without permission.  The most appropriate way would be to get in touch with David and ask him if either his details can be shared, or he can get in touch with infoman if he wishes.

15th May 2019.   See https://www.passenger.chat/r20407.html



We (Coffee Shop) have 69 members who registered over 15 years ago and have been logged in within the last year.

From the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page)

I'll post my notes in "Frequest Posters" in a few minutes ... once I have taken out the grossest of spelling mistakes. 

Summary of the day from our chair, Nick Buckland

1. Delighted to see the heat / strength of discussions and energy - even after lunch

2. Okehampton is an interesting lesson in "live in interestning times", "reach important people" and "get what you wish for".  Although the rail link has been a huge success, the loss of the 6th form college in the town is noted, as is the degraded links from Bude - a less frequent bus service and a need to change with concern at need to change between bus and train on the way, and the breaking of connections - not so much at Okehampton itself but to and from ongoing buses into Cornwall at Bude

3. Customer Interest Groups - changing. TWSW^» (TravelWatch SouthWest - website)?  *Their* 50 focus group, sample too small.  Risk of national decisions on small local group. So - energy never more required. Apparently a  "Passenger Council" to be appointed by the bill in Lords.  How get people in - no-one seems to know ...

Indeed.   Bryony called me a little later and I understand that David was conscious and in Musgrove Park.  I will keep members posted as I hear and can post.

This is in answer to a request from a fellow campaigner for pointers to data on loadings and journeys of trains to and from Torbay (TLCs^▸ (three letter code, or tender loving care, depending on context ) PGN TQY and TRR, to help provide data and inform him and his colleagues of when and where people are going. 

Source 1: https://www.railwaydata.co.uk/loadings/gbr/?TLC=PGN - covering an "average weekday during the summer of 2024" and show numbers of arrivals, departures and through passengers on each timetabled service. Change PGN to TQY and TRR to see the figures for Torquay and Torre to cover the the intermediate stations between Newton Abbott and Paignton. These come from a "no longer maintained" site, so I have member's mirror at
https://www.firstgreatwestern.info/mirror/PGN_2024.pdf https://www.firstgreatwestern.info/mirror/TQY_2024.pdf and  https://www.firstgreatwestern.info/mirror/TRR_2024.pdf . Note that were "no source" is shown on the trains, I suspect it's Exeter St David's - a station in which the apostrophy often causes problems.

Source 2: Our own forum using https://raildata.org.uk - Rail Data Marketplace data.  This shows destinations - using URLs such as https://www.passenger.chat/PGN.html (and change to TQY and TRR, and thre is a link on each page to give you the top 50.

Neither source answers the complete question of "where are people going on which train?" but it sounded to me like these two sources together are a little more information that the Torbay team had looked at so far. Split tickets, ticketless travel, ranger and rover tickets, etc, will clearly skew the figures.

Source 1:







Sample from source 2 (full links above)

I have provided a new (graphic) data / news feed for TravelWatch SouthWest to display as a "what's going on" feed on their web site - here's what it gives me just as I write this:



The image includes the title of the most recent public posts, and is further limited to exclude boards that do not cover the TWSW^» (TravelWatch SouthWest - website) area - such as the North Downs Line, Thames Valley Branches, and The wider picture overseas.  It does not include "lighter side" either to help ensure that the feed is serious transport stuff.

At the moment, clicking onto the image on the TWSW site will take you to the Coffee Shop's most recent public posts, including those public but excluded from the graphic topics.

From yesterday - at Westbury at 19:00



and I'm a bit shocked by this:



Of an evening, why are the "popular" top level tickets the anytime ones for London (and yet off peak for Weymouth?)

Other walk up return adult no-railcard no-split fares to Paddington from Westbury - are available at £53.20, £71.20, £71.70, £77.40, £78.00, £84.00, £94.00, £94.90, £104.70, £110.40, and £226.80.  As from April 1st, if someone accidentally click on the "Popular" front fare (popular with whom?) and buys that ticket, there's no "oops - bought the wrong one" option as I read it, even if they walk across to the (open?) ticket office and admit their error.

You are correct - "topic drift" and perhaps answering a different question to the one I was asked.

I, and Lisa and I, have travelled to the USA for holiday reasons in the past, and also on trips which are primarily holiday but have included meeting up with family and friends.  Most recent (and purely a holiday) in April 2023. As with any trips / holidays, consideration given to the personal circumstances of the travellers and that include personal safety, visas, passports, etc..  And my vote which is "not in the foreseeable future" - and that perhaps means "never again" - holds valid.   I would like to do Amtrak across the continent, I would like to visit Cass again, I would like to see Silvertown and Durango and have another ride on the White Pass, but none of these is sufficiently high up my list top actually do it, especially with all the rigmarole involved.

Time has - resolved and healed - the family situation, thank you. We still have the scars from 30 years ago, but they are carried with a knowledge of how things can go wrong, the protagonist passed away a few years ago, and we are now proud and unencumbered - if physically distant - grandparents.

20:06 off Westbury this evening ... left a minute late to maintain a connection with the 18:36 from Paddington; sensible decision.   At Melksham, 10 off and 12 on which is very much more than I might have guessed; I did not walk through the train and have no idea of what the through count was.   Our trains seem to be getting busier.