The request for additional "soft launch" measures which saw this service being taken out on some weekdays prior to the start of Church Fenton works was made about four months before the start of the timetable.
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December 2025 Timetable Change - Confirmed changes only
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I can say with certainty it was made in 2024.
99009
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1R50 05:21 Nottingham - Liverpool Lime St via Beighton Jn + 1L08 08:51 Liverpool Lime St - Nottingham now seem to be booked for a pair of 170's instead of a pair of 158's. It's possible that there are other workings too that EMR have changed from 158 to 170 or vice versa, but I haven't seen it stated anywhere if there are. Before this timetable change, only EMR 158's were booked via Beighton Jn with 170's only occasionally appearing, so the booked variety Chesterfield - Sheffield via Beighton Jn has now increased.
There are quite a few very minor timetable changes - by no more than a minute or two between Bedford and West Hampstead on Thameslink. My morning train now departs a minute later at Leagrave, and my evening train arrives a minute later.
That would have been very useful on Monday when the 1715 to Plymouth was a little (70 ish mins!) late.
I believe staff were refusing to allow any more people to board the 1709 to Nottingham it was so packed.
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XC promised a more reliable service on the Birmingham to Cardiff service from the start of the December timetable.
Well they delivered on the reliable bit in that you can now rely on there being no trains on that route on Sundays!
Halved the frequency and managed to run only the 1730 from Birmingham to Cardiff all day, yup that’s one train on what used to be an hourly service.
XC delivering nothing to their customers once again!
Come to think of it, they didn’t have a great day on the rest of their routes with the cancellation of the first train north from Bristol and a couple of Manchesters cancelled later along with early terminations at Birmingham on a couple of others. At this rate they may as well remove all their services from the timetable on Sundays from December 2026
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The new timetable allows for Wixams station to be slotted in without further timetable changes. The additional stop would have led to too short a turnround time at Bedford, so (almost) all turnrounds at Bedford have "stepped down" a train. This has the effect that, in general, a 9R forms a 9R and a 9T forms a 9T, instead of the previous situation where they interworked at Bedford.
As a result, I expect that all of the 8-car diagrams on the Brighton and Midland Main Lines will have changed completely. (They are needed in order to cycle the 8-car units back to Three Bridges without incurring additional mileage or crew resource - I believe there are about five such diagrams.)
Then it seems to me you're thinking of something else. Network Rail would hardly have offered the LTP with those trains in if there had been an agreement on phased launch in 2024 would they? They have been STP cancelled instead, as a result of late notice changes.
Had a similar situation when I arrived on a packed platform for the 1709 after the 1611 XC was so badly delayed it was supposed to skip Leeds and divert via Dearne Valley with the 1711 delayed around an hour too, only to hear an unexpected platform announcement for the XC arriving.
They apparently changed their mind and ran it in the path of the 1711 instead, and it left practically empty in the rear unit!
TT-ONR-NRN
Veteran Member
I used to go home from Cardiff Uni to Farnham via Fratton (got a lift from Fratton) a lot of the time as it was less hassle than via Reading, and the Cardiff Portsmouths always skipped Cosham in the late evenings. First time I’ve heard of it in the morning and afternoon though. Mind you, I don’t think there’s a huge need to stop there really.
Absolutely Network Rail would (and did) include the phased launch trains in the LTP, as - clearly - they are expected to be coming back at some point during the timetable.
And they would have been bid and offered without period A in them if the ESG had agreed a phase in 14 months in advance. They didn't so they weren't.
Seems to now be about a 50/50 split between 170 and 158 now with the former as 5/6 car west of Nottingham and mostly 3 east.
Hopefully just for the winter but Skegness has gone from 3 car to 2 car 170's.
Skegness is 2 car 158s with the odd exception with the plan to be 4 car 158s in summer as appropriate.
Liverpool Norwich is indeed a 50/50 split more or less.
Peregrine 4903
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And you know this for certain?
weeklycommuter
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I have written to GWR stating that I am not happy with this change and I want all GWR trains on the Portsmouth Harbour to/from Cardiff Central before 20:00 each day to continue to call at Cosham. They reply that my request to reinstate those stops will be fully considered.
As well as being inconvenient for people in North Portsmouth, not just for local journeys but also for longer journeys to/from Bristol and Cardiff, removing these three stops each way Monday to Friday may cause confusion as every other train on this service before 20:00 each day calls at Cosham. Everyone knows the trains on this service do not call at Cosham after 20:00 which has long been the case and is late evening anyway so continuing with that practice is not a problem.
I do not know why GWR decided to remove these stops. They are in the middle of the day Monday to Friday which is not the busiest time for people travelling and any issues with there not being enough seats should be resolved when the GWR Class 175 rollout is complete as the Portsmouth-Cardiff trains will all be 4-car Class 158 or better.
Yes. Ask yourself why for example only the Leeds - Sheffield, GTR stops at Cambridge South plus some other minor tweaks, and one and a bit LNER diagrams are what's been taken out? The answer is because it was too late to do anything more invasive. The Leeds - Sheffield diagrams are an easy target as they don't do much else. It's a largely arbitrary choice to hold them back.
I suspect what happened was that Bald Rick or someone in Network Rail lobbied for "soft launch" (which is a misleading name for it) measures in 2024 and nobody else at the table agreed. The idea was then filed, only to be resurrected recently.
It's been referred to as a 'firebreak' move, in an interview with Paul Rutter (Network Rail EC Route Director) that was published on the latest Green Signals podcast, timestamped below:
It still makes absolutely no sense. How is introducing it later going to help with reliability? Either it works or it doesn't. Is the idea to withdraw these services if performance is impacted too heavily?
If so the industry should be honest with the public about what's going on rather than giving smokescreen excuses. I'm sure there would be a backlash 'up north' as their local services pay the price for the new timetable, so perhaps that explains why that approach wasn't taken...
It still makes absolutely no sense. How is introducing it later going to help with reliability? Either it works or it doesn't. Is the idea to withdraw these services if performance is impacted too heavily?
If so the industry should be honest with the public about what's going on rather than giving smokescreen excuses. I'm sure there would be a backlash 'up north' as their local services pay the price for the new timetable, so perhaps that explains why that approach wasn't taken...
I think reading between the lines that some people at Network Rail would quite like that to be the way it turns out, absolutely.
However, the rights holders, unsurprisingly, clearly do not see it that way. Either the rights are available for use or they aren't, and if they aren't, then one follows due process for them to be amended.
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The hours make it sound like they've done that for performance reasons. They've removed stops to make it ever so slightly more likely that those services will start right time at Portsmouth Harbour / arrive right time at Fareham.
As someone with a lifetime experience in ops, it makes absolute sense to me if major changes are involved.
New timetables rarely work well immediately no matter how well briefed. There will always be trains with an unexpected and disproportionate impact on the plan, needing new strategies for their management.
Having some temporary firebreaks is a good way to help everyone get to grips with the new service, then learn a bit more as the white space is eventually filled.
The problem is that if your "firebreak" is a single express train per hour, which interacts with about 14 miles of route on a branch from the mainline, it absolutely raises questions around just how much of a "firebreak" this is. For instance, I think the now circa 60 min turnaround at Leeds, or the circa 80 min turnaround at BDQ, acts as a far more meaningful opportunity to recover time on the express runs to London. Certainly more meaningful than a few minutes gained by leaving a gap on the graph for a very small number of route miles.
I think its totally a fair to be very sceptical about the motivations here - if it truly is a firebreak, its not a very substantial or meaningful one, and certainly, if I was the operator and truly in a position to deliver this service, I'd be questioning why I'm losing revenue to act as another operators recovery time.
Agreed, a few schedules being left out on all routes in a controlled phase-in as a pre-planned exercise would actually have been achievable and brought some of the benefits you describe here. This could have been managed as part of the LTP offer. Alternatively some discrete buckets of schedules with simplified diagrams could have been created in the initial drafting so that the STP cancellation exercise were simple to achieve.
However, withdrawing one service group when you didn't do the above and realise too late, so it's the only suitable target left, especially one which is in fact essential to a piece of TRU work, and around which the TRU Church Fenton work was long planned, isn't the way to achieve that.
Nitpicking but I assume when he said the Northern service is starting in January he actually meant from 27th December as is the currently advertised plan.
Correct. Thankfully Northern won the argument to have it start no later than that, otherwise there would be a startling reduction in capacity for Leeds - Sheffield for about four weeks. They may also run tomorrow and Sunday.
Peterthegreat
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Nor will they run the first week of February. In fact there will be NO trains from Leeds to Sheffield as the line is blocked at the north end of Sheffield due to engineering work.
Kite159
Veteran Member
4 coach 158s on Skegness line, trains which have rubbish luggage space being used on services where passengers will likely be carrying luggage (including the kitchen sink).
(And I bet some guards are not looking forward to working potentially overcrowded Skeggy services when formed of a 158 if they have got used to a 170 with the cab doors)
Since I have discretion over when I go in the office this basically means I'll be absent entirely for four out of the first five weeks of the year, plus today when XC couldn't find a driver to start before Leeds. I feel for the people who either don't know or don't have any choice other than to go in whilst capacity is down more than a third in the peaks, assuming Northern run perfectly.
Edit: actually I think the new services don't run into Leeds platform 17 so might at least be 3 or more cars? But that'll require units being found so I'm not hopeful
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It'll be character building
Newbies haven't lived until they've tried working a 153 on it's own on the 0955 in summer!
1D53
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This is correct.
weeklycommuter
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Nothing will be stopping at Cambridge South in the December 2025 timetable period as the opening date for this new station has been delayed to June 2026.
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