Is there a 14:04 from Durham on Sunday?

[Egg Centric]

(Mods: this might be supposed to be in the LNER timetable thread but that seems focussed on generalities, pls move if it's wrong place)

I'm supposed to be on the 14:04 from Durham to Kings Cross on Sunday.

What I am not sure about is if it's running and what the authoratative source is. On the one hand I've not been emailed by tickets.railforums.co.uk which as a good boy I've bought the ticket from, and the service is still there on RTT. On the other hand the LNER site has a theoretical timetable in the form of a PDF and that service isn't on it... but y'know, PDFs.

Do we think it's running or not? If it's not running, I assume that the most sensible thing for me to do given there's a 2-hour gap at Durham is to get dropped off at Darlington, right? And take any LNER service from there (of which there are still plenty on the strike timetable)?

 

[Benjwri]

On the one hand I've not been emailed by tickets.railforums.co.uk which as a good boy I've bought the ticket from, and the service is still there on RTT.

LNER says Sundays timetable will be uploaded to journey planners tomorrow, so RTT and TrainSplit will not show the correct timetable until then. If it isn’t on the PDF timetable unfortunately that means the service won’t run.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 15 Dec 2022 ==

If it's not running, I assume that the most sensible thing for me to do given there's a 2-hour gap at Durham is to get dropped off at Darlington, right?

Depending on your ticket and time constrains probably yes. Obviously there is the train at 13:45 from Durham, but if you can’t make that’s Darlington is probably your best option. Obviously this assumes your ticket is flexible and allows break of journey, otherwise you will have to refund it.

In this case refunding may also be best anyways, as you train has been cancelled so you would be eligible for a fee free refund anyways, and assuming your ticket was flexible, the equivalent from Darlington will be cheaper if you do travel from there.

 

[Wallsendmag]

(Mods: this might be supposed to be in the LNER timetable thread but that seems focussed on generalities, pls move if it's wrong place)

I'm supposed to be on the 14:04 from Durham to Kings Cross on Sunday.

What I am not sure about is if it's running and what the authoratative source is. On the one hand I've not been emailed by tickets.railforums.co.uk which as a good boy I've bought the ticket from, and the service is still there on RTT. On the other hand the LNER site has a theoretical timetable in the form of a PDF and that service isn't on it... but y'know, PDFs.

Do we think it's running or not? If it's not running, I assume that the most sensible thing for me to do given there's a 2-hour gap at Durham is to get dropped off at Darlington, right? And take any LNER service from there (of which there are still plenty on the strike timetable)?

Did you book with LNER? If so and if the train isn't running simply log into your account, click change train time and you'll be offered a free changed to whichever service you decide on.

 

[Egg Centric]

Thanks all. Most likely I will arrange things so I can claim 1 hour delay repay for a seasonal brucie bonus

What's very confusing on RTT is at the moment it seems to have both the emergency timetable and the standard timetable there, so a whole load of trains are duplicated. It has been like that since this morning. Not sure if that's RTT only or everywhere.

 

[Watershed]

Thanks all. Most likely I will arrange things so I can claim 1 hour delay repay for a seasonal brucie bonus

What's very confusing on RTT is at the moment it seems to have both the emergency timetable and the standard timetable there, so a whole load of trains are duplicated. It has been like that since this morning. Not sure if that's RTT only or everywhere.

That will be a result of the cancellations not yet having gone downstream.

 

[Haywain]

Thanks all. Most likely I will arrange things so I can claim 1 hour delay repay for a seasonal brucie bonus

What's very confusing on RTT is at the moment it seems to have both the emergency timetable and the standard timetable there, so a whole load of trains are duplicated. It has been like that since this morning. Not sure if that's RTT only or everywhere.

RTT is not an official source of information.

 

[Adam Williams]

RTT is not an official source of information.

RTT is not official, but in this particular case it is the case that the official timetable data is junk.

Journey planners are going to show both services:



E.g. in this case we have both https://timetables.trainsplit.com/times.aspx?uid=N52114&date=20221218 and https://timetables.trainsplit.com/times.aspx?uid=C03945&date=20221218

I've complained to folks on the forums about stuff like this before, but this is not how you should put a temporary or amended timetable in place. There's absolutely no reason for these two services to exist - C03945 was fine, none of the timings have changed. Why did we need to replace it with something completely identical in the way of N52114? And why have neither of them been cancelled?

I hope LNER/NR have made damn sure that a) the timetable comparator service will detect this substitution as a straight replacement so that retailers don't spend spurious cancellation notices out to customers and b) that RARS2 isn't going to trash all of the reservations from the original timetabled service when these cancellations eventually filter through into S3.

 

[Egg Centric]

@Adam Williams (and anyone else wot knows stuff) - as well as that potential issue of double reservations, does this affect the advance ticket quotas or is that seperate - i.e. are there potentially some very cheap advances available atm?

 

[Adam Williams]

The retail service IDs are the same: in theory you'd expect this to be fine and for the advance quotas to be scoped to the retail service (i.e. unchanged by the mess in the timetable) - but I have no visibility over any of the TOC's side of the new reservation system nor sight of any documentation on how RARS2 deals with timetable changes, so shrug

We've definitely had cases of seat double bookings with Avanti in the past before due to poor handling of a temporary timetable, so I think it's a realistic risk.

 

[Egg Centric]

Thanks - I did have a quick search after posting my question (maybe I should have looked before ) and there isn't anything super cheap (it's not much more expensive either mind). So my current plan of travel on the ticket on either the later train or something midly earlier from Darlington such that I am slightly over an hour delayed looks the best plan.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Dec 2022 ==

But this must be an absolute mess for you guys!

 

[Watershed]

There's absolutely no reason for these two services to exist - C03945 was fine, none of the timings have changed. Why did we need to replace it with something completely identical in the way of N52114?

The Network Rail policy for strike days is that operators should bid to cancel all trains (including deleting any STP additionals or overlays that have already been created for the relevant days), and then bid new STP additional trains to reflect what's intended to run.

In theory, this avoids any chance of spurious services (which there's no intention to run) remaining in the timetable data - and to be fair, it normally works reasonably well. But clearly it hasn't on this occasion!

And why have neither of them been cancelled?

I'm almost certain that the old one, C03945, has been cancelled - but that this cancellation wasn't published before the new service was published. Result: confusion, as seen here!

 

[Adam Williams]

The Network Rail policy for strike days is that operators should bid to cancel all trains (including deleting any STP additionals or overlays that have already been created for the relevant days), and then bid new STP additional trains to reflect what's intended to run.

I think you'd struggle to find a software engineer who likes or approves of this policy

When we make changes to code, we use a version control system that is designed to capture the minimum amount of information required to formulate the change in terms of a set of patches. That's the most efficient way to communicate what has changed, make it clear to everyone else what has actually happened and keep the required storage space and data required to be transmitted to a minimum.

What's happening here is almost as if we delete every file in the codebase and then re-add 90% of them with the same contents but with different filenames. The change would be unnecessarily massive.

In theory, this avoids any chance of spurious services (which there's no intention to run) remaining in the timetable data

Would a better answer not be to build/set-up processes and tooling that would allow for quick comparisons with the intended service pattern to flag up anomalous services that shouldn't exist or need further amendment to fit with the strike day service?

Then we'd cancel the ones that are actually going to get cancelled. It also eliminates the possibility of the timetable being published whilst the services are in an inconsistent state.

 

[Egg Centric]

Would a better answer not be to build/set-up processes and tooling that would allow for quick comparisons with the intended service pattern to flag up anomalous services that shouldn't exist or need further amendment to fit with the strike day service?

Then we'd cancel the ones that are actually going to get cancelled. It also eliminates the possibility of the timetable being published whilst the services are in an inconsistent state.

The strangest thing is that you would think this is the most "intuitive" form of the data as they have it - presumably, they didn't timetable the 10:58 and 11:33 in the screenshot from scratch - they just carried them over. It'd be crazy otherwise. Keeping track of the deltas shouldn't really be any more of a burden than keeping track of everything.

(Very nerdy point about most popular vcs git and filenames not inserted)

 

[Benjwri]

claim 1 hour delay repay for a seasonal brucie bonus

Delay repay is done off the timetable of the day, which is that at 22:00 the day before unfortunately, so you won’t get delay repay unless a train in the actual strike timetable is running late.

 

[Wallsendmag]

The strangest thing is that you would think this is the most "intuitive" form of the data as they have it - presumably, they didn't timetable the 10:58 and 11:33 in the screenshot from scratch - they just carried them over. It'd be crazy otherwise. Keeping track of the deltas shouldn't really be any more of a burden than keeping track of everything.

(Very nerdy point about most popular vcs git and filenames not inserted)

As far as I know all the reservation data is done from scratch for each strike day, our reservation team has been slightly busy this year.

 

[Egg Centric]

Delay repay is done off the timetable of the day, which is that at 22:00 the day before unfortunately, so you won’t get delay repay unless a train in the actual strike timetable is running late.

I'm not entitled to it but previous experience suggests I'll get it anyway (whilst I *am* entitled to rerouting on other providers which previous experience suggests I won't get!)

 

[Watershed]

I think you'd struggle to find a software engineer who likes or approves of this policy

When we make changes to code, we use a version control system that is designed to capture the minimum amount of information required to formulate the change in terms of a set of patches. That's the most efficient way to communicate what has changed, make it clear to everyone else what has actually happened and keep the required storage space and data required to be transmitted to a minimum.

What's happening here is almost as if we delete every file in the codebase and then re-add 90% of them with the same contents but with different filenames. The change would be unnecessarily massive.

Agreed - unfortunately there are many things that leave room to be desired (to put it mildly) in the planning processes, and I can't see this changing anytime soon.

Would a better answer not be to build/set-up processes and tooling that would allow for quick comparisons with the intended service pattern to flag up anomalous services that shouldn't exist or need further amendment to fit with the strike day service?

Then we'd cancel the ones that are actually going to get cancelled. It also eliminates the possibility of the timetable being published whilst the services are in an inconsistent state.

That would be an eminently sensible option, hence you can just about guarantee - this is the railway we're talking about, after all! More to the point, the software that most of the relevant players use simply doesn't lend itself to this sort of process, and there's simply not going to be authorisation to spend millions on developing or licensing software that does.

Delay repay is done off the timetable of the day, which is that at 22:00 the day before unfortunately, so you won’t get delay repay unless a train in the actual strike timetable is running late.

Delay Repay is - for some TOCs - handled this way in practice. But not all operators try to make use of the dubious PToD "exemption", and even for those that do, you always have the alternative of relying on your PRO rights (or, in theory, the enforceability of the PToD concept).