Regular readers will remember that the free faith school transport funded by Cheshire East Council was discontinued from September 2012. This led to even more scholars using the Mid Cheshire line to get to the 4 schools and The Mid Cheshire College sites adjacent to Greenbank station, the main train being the 0717 from Piccadilly arriving at Knutsford at 0800 and Greenbank at 0818. The following train, an hour later is too late for most of these.
Meanwhile, Barclays at Radbroke Hall has increased the number of training courses run there for their employees, not just those from the UK, but also many from Bangalore who come to train here before returning to staff the helplines run from Bangalore.
Also, the number of scholars from South Trafford using the line to attend Knutsford Academy continues at well over 100 a day.
Our passenger counts have shown patronage continuing to grow fast.
During school term time, the 0717 from Piccadilly loads to around 270 into Knutsford. Around 30 join it at Stockport, another 30 at Navigation Road, over 100 at Altrincham, more than 30 at Hale, some at Ashley and 5-10 at Mobberley. At Knutsford around 200 leave the train, whilst a further 60 join it, most of these going to Greenbank, some to Northwich. A further 5-10 join at Plumley, 30-40 at Lostock Gralam and 40-50 at Northwich, with around 150 leaving at Greenbank.
The 1602 and 1702 from Chester also suffer from very heavy loadings with the return flows. The 1502 copes well, being a 4-car train. The afternoon trains benefit from the scholar flows in the main being earlier than the flows of those returning from work.
Many of you will be aware that the station dwell times were increased by 3 minutes last May to cope with our larger passenger loads. However, the extra dwell time added to most trains is not proving to give enough time to get everybody on and off our (mainly) 2-car trains.
The 0717 is diagrammed for a 2-car class 150 unit this having 20 metre long coaches. These mainly have between 130 and 140 seats, depending upon where they were inherited from, but cope with over 300 including standees before people are left behind at stations; next train 1 hour. Some days, a class 156 unit is provided; these have 23 metre coaches. These have around 150 seats and can cope with around 300 including standees and although having 4 doors, these being single-leaf doors means that it takes much longer to get passengers on and off trains than with the 4 double leaf doors on the class 150s.
Its not unusual for the service to be formed of a 2-car class 142 unit. These have 16 metre long coaches, three double leaf doors a side and between 108 and around 130 seats, again depending upon their heritage. We used to think from experience of Chester Race Days that the most number of passengers it was possible to get on a class 142 was around 230 people. Now we know that around 270 can be accomodated, though it does take a long time to get everyone on and off and does rely upon passengers getting on top of the luggage racks by the doors and also sitting under those luggage racks. This is where many of the smaller children end up sitting on other childrens laps.
Some days when formed of a class 142 everyone cant get on. We know that on 9 October the service was operated by 142060. 11 passengers were left behind at Hale, 2 at Ashley and 7 at Mobberley. With the next train being an hour later, this means scholars are arriving late for lessons and Barclays Bank workers and others late for work.
A year ago around 60 were using our services to get to Radbroke Hall, now its over 100.
Barclays have recently upgraded the transport used to transfer staff to Radbroke Hall from Knutsford from smaller coaches to 53-seaters or bigger, though even these are not proving to have enough capacity some days.
All this crowding (as DfT tweely puts it) also means that the trains run late. Last week the 0717 arrived in Chester 5 or more minutes late on 4 occasions (offically late) and this is after the extra 3 minutes added to the timetable last May. The previous week it was late on all 5 days 6, 7, 13, 15 and 10 minutes late respectively.
In early November, there was a spate of class 142 operation on 7, 8, 13 and 14. We complained. As far as we know, no-one was left behind on 7, 8 and 13 November, but on 14 November the service was operated by 142087, one of the low capacity 142s with 2+2 seating inherited from Arriva Trains Northern. Passengers were left behind including all 7 at Mobberley.
Northern are aware of these problems from remonstrations made by MCRUA, the passengers and others.
None of this is good for any of us, Northern, the passengers, those left behind or for the economy of Knutsford. Weve even suggested that as a short-term fix since Northern and/or DfT seem unable to find more trains, that they hire buses and run these between Altrincham, Hale and direct to Knutsford Academy and/or Radbroke Hall to create space for others on the trains.
In our view this train should be 4 carriages or else a further 2 carriage train should be run half an hour later. Northern are aware of this view, as are TfGM, Cheshire East, CWaC and others. Meanwhile, this crowding is inhibiting further growth and increasing the already bad road congestion in Knutsford in the mornings, as people who have the option of being able to drive find they have to, as they dont want to risk being unable to board the train.
How long has this been going on? Are they PACE trained?
I can only assume the relevant post was unintentionally brusque.