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35746
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All across the Great Western territory / Who's who on Western railways / Re: Andrew Griffiths Talk (09/10/2007)
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on: September 27, 2007, 06:44:59
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Grahame, your forever an optimist, I say that with tongue in cheek, see my post on the Tranz Wiltz line "Dreaming".
A year ago, I gave us a 5% chance. I now give us something ike a 35% to 40% chance - and I know that the case has been looked at rather more than trivially. I am assured it is being looked at again even more seriously at the moment, for December 2008, and I would be even more optimistic if we hadn't been, frankly, had so many letdowns in the past. Why am I so optimistic: because the more you look forward at the case, the stronger it is. And the more you look back at the evidence gathered prior to the premeditated slaughter of the service last December, the more the old evidence backs up the future. |
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35747
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Journey by Journey / TransWilts line / Re: Southampton - Westbury Shuttle Service Cancellations (26/09/2007)
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on: September 26, 2007, 22:05:51
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ok, so have we got an official winter timetable for the transwilts yet? if the tt are available 12 weeks before a change (as NRES▸ looks like having that info), we should have at least the first two weeks of the dec 2007 online now!
Not "Official" ... but we know knoe that the service is hardly changed during the week - at 07:00 and 19:35 from Westbury and 06:19 and 18:42 from Swindon, give or take a couple of minutes. The three EXTRA trains that were being worked on - from Salisbury at 07:40 (Swindon 08:50), Salisbury 11:31 (Swindon 12:40) and Salisbury 14:31 (Swindon 15:40) were pulled from the draft timetable in late May, and the class 153 unit that was going to provide them is running extra Salisbury - Romsey - Southampton services all leaving within 12 minutes of one of the new South West Trains runsSaturday - sorry - don't know but I think very little change. Although there are times up on the NRES system, we are "bustituted" again in December on Saturdays. As the buses are running at about the times the trains run at the moment ... Sunday - it looks like we have an improvement although once again I've just seen bustitution for part of the way; on the first Sunday we (at Melksham) have a train at about 17:21 to Chippenham, a train at 18:51 arriving from Chippenham, and a final tran up to Chippenham at 19:50. Doing that from memory - I may be a few minutes either way. We are very, very disappointed that an opportunity has been lost - a decent peak service into Swindon on Monday to Friday would have given a good boost to the latish 18:42 back as people's days would have been a sensible length, and the daytime runs would have done great things for Salisbury - Chippenham and Salisbury - Swindon, both of which are oft overlooked; indeed, I have a copy of an FGW▸ paper that ONLY looked at traffic for Melksham with the new proposal and still it got somewhere. At the same time, I am delighted with the Sunday evening Southbound train. On one hand it's just one train a week, and easily provided as the first Northboound used to return empty anyway. BUT it's a signal - it's FGW providing a service on the line over and about the SLC▸ specification - i.e. on a commercial basis. One swallow doesn't make a summer, but the longest journey starts with just a single step. |
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35748
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All across the Great Western territory / Who's who on Western railways / Re: Andrew Griffiths Talk (09/10/2007)
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on: September 26, 2007, 19:58:13
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The way things have been on West services these past few days may not make for a pleasant meeting for him.
I certainly wouldn't want Andrew's job at the moment (or for the past 18 months, come to think of it!) Yet meetings can be held and pulled around; I'm suspecting that Westbury on 9th October wouldn't be selected to announce something major (like trains from Westbury to Swindon at 08:10, 11:00 and 14:00), but that certainly would help turn the meeting around once we we re-assured it was real and not just a "holding proposal"  |
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35749
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Journey by Journey / Bristol (WECA) Commuters / Re: O dear!
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on: September 26, 2007, 19:48:07
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NOTE the 18.27 Soton-Chelt is shown as cancelled throughout, so no Melksham!
Yup, thanks for highlighing it Jim ... funnily enough I've just been following up a post elsewhere that shows this is the best train of the day - 15 minutes quicker than any other and uniquely no changes - from Salisbury to Chippenham. |
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35750
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Journey by Journey / TransWilts line / Re: How to get a two-hourly train right through with just ONE unit
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on: September 26, 2007, 08:04:25
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Wonder if SWT▸ are allowed to run services on the transwilts?
My understanding is that under Open Access arrangements, anyone can ask to run a train service anywhere. The limitations are in proving that you're suitable to run the service, and it terms of system capacity to carry the extra service. There are a LOT of loops to be jumped through in terms of setting up a company to do it, as you see with the current Wrexham and Sunderland to London proposals. On the other hand, Hull trains already run a Humberside to London service which in the most part competes with GNER▸ ... but Hull trains isn't an independent company - it's actually a part of the First group so they didn't have the same loops to jump through - they were already there. System capacity is the other issue, and an open source operator who wanted to pass through Reading would probably not get accepted. There are other less obvious / less clear cut points like this too. An Open Access operator into a station run by a franchised company (or indeed a franchise service run by a different operator) is not always welcomed / marketed properly. Indeed, at the time that Wessex Trains ran the TransWilts they very much "camped" in this way, and on more than one occasion I was advised to catch alternative services operated by First (a train to Bath then a bus to Melksham, for example) when there was a perfectly good train sitting there in the bay for those who knew about it I can understand this "enemy within" attitude from the main player; after all, they are paying the government 1.1 billion to run all the services on top of track access costs and normal taxes, etc ... but Wessex trains was subsidised, and an Open Source operator would not have a premium to pay. Sorry - did you want a short answer ;-) Link to even more: http://www.savethetrain.org.uk/forum/index.php?topic=359.0 |
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35753
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Journey by Journey / Portsmouth to Cardiff / Re: Is there a case for a flagship service / a premium route?
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on: September 25, 2007, 17:12:55
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I'm very happy to learn that there are empty workings, though; for this means that the trains are allowed through that way - unlike the Thames Turbos. A high quality service - Portsmouth to Swansea with fast, modern trains - does look more and more sensible to me. And (note to cash-hungry operator  ) people would be prepared to pay for a first class service, and would fill your seats. What about it? |
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35755
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Timetable - Printing costs and future
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on: September 25, 2007, 17:02:42
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The online jounrey planner is no substitute for the printed timetable. If printing costs really are prohibative then we could atleast have teh alterations book available for downloading from their website.
A bit off (original) topic. I know we have the last PRINTED edition of the timetable now - there's one just two foot from me - but it is alos downloadable. If it's the printing costs that are prohibitive, then does that mean that there WILL be a fully downloadable national timetable form December? Does anyone know? |
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35756
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All across the Great Western territory / Buses and other ways to travel / Other operators using some of the same tracks?
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on: September 25, 2007, 16:59:05
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Here's an interesting letter I have received via email, and which I reproduce here with permission. Open Access is something that we have investigated in some depth with regards to the TransWilts service, decimated last December in spite of growth in the years prior, and amazing future prospects. For where else do you six major town and cities along a 40 mile corridor, each of which is to grow around 50% in the next 20 years, and the connection from end to end between them being a bus that takes 120 minutes, and roads that are already overloaded? But this case, put by the UpStart Coop reaches far wider. Dear Mr Ellis, I've just been reading your excellent website, relating to the poor service currently experienced on the Melksham line. I am a social enterprise development worker, and I have recently been working on a study on the use of co-operatives and community businesses to provide additional rail services. I'm interested in cases where track exists, but none of the private rail operators wish to run full services on it. One of the less well known features of rail privatisation is the potential for independent businesses to offer new services through an 'open access' contract. So far, these have been used by subsidiaries of rail operating companies to provide additional services to London (for example from Hull, Sunderland and Wrexham). However, there is no reason why co-operative or community owned businesses couldn't provide local services. New rulings by the Financial Services Authority have made it much easier for these types of business to raise the finance necessary. Obviously, it would be easiest for everyone if First Great Western were willing to simply improve the service on their franchise. However, if they aren't, there is always the possibility that an open access service could do it instead. Such a service wouldn't be burdened with the cost of the franchise, might be willing to forego short term profits in exchange for better public service, and could raise investment directly from the people who would most benefit from the service. Yours is not the only poor quality service in the West country. I have also been looking at services from Yeovil Pen Mill, Okehampton, Minehead, and towns such as Wellington, Somerton and Chard that have lines but no stations. I suspect that there may be scope for a cross country service linking Exeter and Milton Keynes (or at least Oxford, as not all of the track between Bicester and Milton Keynes is intact) - as well as providing services to the communities on the way, I believe that the connections between main routes will allow many travellers the opportunity to find faster journeys to a wide range of destinations. The stretch of line that runs through Melksham would be a handy short cut for this route. I'd be interested in your views on this. My next step is to secure funding for a feasibility study, and if you would like me to keep me informed on the progress of this, do let me know. You can see some more information by going to the new page of our website ( www.upstart.coop) and looking for 'Rail' in the news stories. Yours, Alex Lawrie Here's the scheme Alex is talking about ... there's a larger version downloadable from here I note that we do already have other operators on the tracks here abouts - notably the Cross Country franchise, and also South West Trains extending to Bristol and Plymouth. |
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35758
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All across the Great Western territory / Introductions and chat / Re: Bristol to Taunton/Exeter services
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on: September 24, 2007, 19:48:46
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Hi, Wiveytraveller, and welcome to the forum. Incredibly, we have seen elements of movement / softening / potential improvements over the past 18 months, though there are some people who will suggest that "the plan" was always to take 12 steps towards a trimmed down system within the current frachise, then give a few steps back if they had to. Those suggestions have gone on to say that they've actually had to backtrack rather more than they anticipated.
But, sure, the bid that was chosen was the one that payed the highest premium. And the bidder would, I believe, have still been awarded the contract with a bid that was several hundred million pounds lower. Which could, very nicely, have been shared between improvements and shareholders.
To some extent such comments are now historic - but actually there IS good news in that we've seen a number of areas where pressure has lead to a change in services - Severn Tunnel Junction, Ivybridge, Saltash, Bedwyn, Oxford and others to mention just a few. The campaign I'm helping with - the TransWilts hasn't got any tangible improvements in operation as yet, but from having a case that everyone, frankly, laughed at without even reading the fine print we've now moved to a position where some folks HAVE read the find print and found it to be good.
So ... by letting folks know what you think, by presenting well reasoned cases, things can be changed for the future. Frustratingly slow at time, but I for one am not giving up on what could be an excellent service for everyone.
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35759
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Journey by Journey / Portsmouth to Cardiff / Re: Is there a case for a flagship service / a premium route?
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on: September 24, 2007, 19:34:42
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They would know that they could be used hence asking such a high price.
I'm not only looking at this specific case .... I can't help feeling sad that commercial negotiotions / gambling with the pricing of things has worked to the detriment of the rail travel and the economy as a whole within the current way the whole system operates. However - I am empahtically NOT feeling like taking on the whole system; much much better to look to understand the system and help work with and within it. Not sure where that takes us except to sadlu conclude "Great dream. Sensible answer. Chance would be a fine thing under the current set of rules ..." |
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35760
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All across the Great Western territory / Across the West / Re: Andrew Haines interview - reliabiity and cascading trains
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on: September 24, 2007, 10:33:31
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What are Northen doing to get all this stock?  They must be paying the Dft a hefty premium for the franchise. Hopefully this means will have to keep the adelantes though.  My understanding is that the Northern franchise involves a payment by the government to the train operating company, and not a premium payment back by the Train operating Company to the Government. Can anyone confirm this / give figures, or am I barking up the wrong tree? |
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