The BBC» City Thameslink in London has been named the worst of Britain's busiest railway stations for cancellations in the year to August.
About one in 13 of almost 150,000 scheduled stops there were cancelled during that time, according to Office of Rail and Road (ORR» ) figures analysed by BBC.
Those cancellations were among about three million cancelled stops in Britain of a scheduled 89 million.
At my local station (Melksham, Wiltshire), one in 9 of scheduled stops has been cancelled in the last time period (twelve weeks) - that would represent ten million rather than three million. Worlds apart ... how I wish our record was even as good as the worst reported by the BBC.
I am being very careful here to make a statistically meaningful comparison. Of course, numerically more trains will be cancelled at a place like City Thameslink where 150,000 stops were scheduled in a year as against Melksham where just 6,000 stops are scheduled. But if one goes missing from the 150,000, another will be along in a few minutes - half an hour at the worst. Southbound at Melksham - the 06:32 fails to turn up, and there's nothing to 09:09, or the 15:40 fails to turn up and there's nothing to 18:00.
The BBC story goes on ...
The issue of trains being cancelled late at night can be particularly difficult for passengers in rural areas.
Sheila O'Donnell, 73, lives in Arnside in Cumbria. She said her train was often cancelled when getting home from work or out seeing friends in nearby cities.
Our data shows one in 17 planned stops from the station ended up being cancelled in the past year.
"It happens so often, I'm resigned to it," she said. "The worst one I've had, I was on the train to Liverpool to celebrate somebody's big birthday, I got back to Lancaster at 21:10 to find the next train had been cancelled."
A friend dropped her at the bus station but the nearest stop was still a walk of 4.5 miles (7.24 km) from her home.
"I couldn't get a taxi," she said. "From 22:30 to midnight, I had to walk home along the dark country lane. Hardly any lights and I needed the torch on my phone."
One in 17 - that's a 6% cancellation rate is only half that at Melksham. And Arnside has a population of just under 2,500 - that's a tenth the size of Melksham, which is not rural - but it is separated from other towns around and I can confirm stories of friends not being able to get alternative transport and walking from Trowbridge along a busy road in the otherwise pitch black countryside.
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