Cross Country - provisional timetable for 2022

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Cross Country - 2022 - from Railwaydata - "Please note: This timetable is a very early edition and should be treated as such. Some trains for this period are missing and there will be changes before the timetable goes live. Next update expected on 26/09/2021."

I would summarise the service as

A core hourly route, Newcastle to Plymouth via Leeds. At the north end, about half of the trains start back at Edinburgh and one starts back at Glasgow and one at Aberdeen. At the south end, one extends to Penzance. No servives to Paignton, Bath Spa or Cardiff via Bristol, and none calling at Weston-super-mare any longer. At least one short run only as far south as Bristol. Only one of these services calls at Gloucester.

A second core hourly route, Manchester to Reading, about alternate trains extended to Southampton. No extensions to Bournemouth of Guildford at all.

Hourly Nottingham to Cardiff, with a second train Nottingham to Birmingham

Two trains a day from Newcastle to Birmingham via Doncaster, one extended to Banbury.

[Bob_Blakey]

One of the more obvious omissions appears to be, according to RT (Realtime Trains), the continuation of the hourly BHM<>SSD service.

[grahame]

One of the more obvious omissions appears to be, according to RT (Realtime Trains), the continuation of the hourly BHM<>SSD service.

The RailwayData website (link above) DOES show two trains an hour (XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise))) from Birmingham to Leicester, one of which continues all the way via Peterborough, Ely and Cambridge to Stansted Airport (SSD); I missed those off my earlier post, for which I had only looked at the table that covered their services onwards to or through GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) land.

[eightonedee]

I note with a little concern that the useful Reading-Newcastles are not on this draft.

Hopefully that is because they are not yet there.

[trainbuff]

Cross Country - 2022 - from Railwaydata - "Please note: This timetable is a very early edition and should be treated as such. Some trains for this period are missing and there will be changes before the timetable goes live. Next update expected on 26/09/2021."

I would summarise the service as

A core hourly route, Newcastle to Plymouth via Leeds. At the north end, about half of the trains start back at Edinburgh and one starts back at Glasgow and one at Aberdeen. At the south end, one extends to Penzance. No servives to Paignton, Bath Spa or Cardiff via Bristol, and none calling at Weston-super-mare any longer. At least one short run only as far south as Bristol. Only one of these services calls at Gloucester.

Being pedantic, there is not a core hourly service between Newcastle and Plymouth. There are 4 trains missing from such a pattern. Indeed the 07.25 is a double set, 11.27 is a double set (from Plymouth) but I believe the 09.25 is a single set. No 08.27 or 10.27. The 09.25 is always busy, especially from Exeter. A bijou service perhaps

There appears to be the same gaps as now from Plymouth. No trains at  08.27, 10.27, 13.27, 17.27

A second core hourly route, Manchester to Reading, about alternate trains extended to Southampton. No extensions to Bournemouth of Guildford at all.

Hourly Nottingham to Cardiff, with a second train Nottingham to Birmingham

Two trains a day from Newcastle to Birmingham via Doncaster, one extended to Banbury.

[CyclingSid]

I don't know if they will change this for the summer, because quite often the XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) Reading to Bournemouth would be packed on a summer Saturday. If not will make the SWR^» (South Western Railway - about) services covering Southampton - Bournemouth even more unpleasant.

[rogerw]

It seems to me that this is a very negative approach by XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) with no restoration of services from Bournemouth, limited services from Southampton and no Bristol to Manchester services. They may claim that the demand is not there but this is not backed up by experience elsewhere. I suspect that demand is being suppressed by the lack of  services that people require. Many people prefer through journeys and do not like changing trains (especially at Birmingham)

[paul7575]

Real time trains (RTT^» (Real Time Trains - website)) shows the current 2 hourly Manchester Picc to Bournemouth service continues until May 2022.

Paul

[REVUpminster]

The cross country 1014 and 2020 are still running from Paignton in the December timetable on railway data. Still only going to Bristol and Birmingham respectively.

http://www.railwaydata.co.uk/timetables/Dec21/timetable.php?table=266%20-%20Exeter%20:%20Newton%20Abbot%20-%20Torquay%20-%20Paignton

[Zoe]

A core hourly route, Newcastle to Plymouth via Leeds.

It's only fully hourly as far as Bristol, there are some two hours gaps west of there.