Heatwave 22-27 June - effect on the UK Railway

[Russel]

There really needs to be an inquiry into the way in which the rail industry falls to pieces so easily and so frequently, and why it takes days to recover.

Agreed, we've known about climate change for a long time now, yet we still seem totally unprepared for it, not just the rail network, the country in general.

On the subject of XC though, they didn't do themselves any favours yesterday, the 16:00 and 18:00 Edinburgh - Bristols were cancelled leaving only the 17:00 which ran as a double 220 until Derby which was obviously full and standing in typical XC fashion, at Derby, they still detached the rear portion and crammed two full trains into one, think Jubilee Line at rush hour, wouldn't it have made more sense to run it as a double to New Street and then send the rear unit back to Central Rivers from there?

 

[david l]

Bizarrely the Hadfield Line is back to full service, but the Rose Hill Marple services are not

But all services on the east side are running as normal, yet on the west side not. Bizarre as the forecast temperatures between Leeds and Manchester are similar.
Of course the west side will suffer its usual Sunday service tomorrow, expected gaps of 2,3,4 hours (take your pick)
All the 769's were stopped on Monday evening. presume they are expected to start perfectly on Monday after a 6 day shutdown on depots that are for overnight stabling........doubt if anyone's had a look at them........

 

[jumble]

Sorry but I’m not having that. Literally everyone I know in railway management and staff involved in service provison has been working their socks off this week. Given the constraints we have on the GB railway, and the intensity of which it is used, it has been extremely hard going.

I was out on the patch yesterday, and every single member of staff I spoke to was doing their very best to keep people moving and providing information where they could.

The service has not been great these last few days, of course, and we can do better. But “attitude“ is not an issue.

Real World experience on the ground 1M15 GLS to EUS EXGLS 14.24
On boarding staff were helping a vulnerable person to find an unreserved seat as it was chaos owing to late arrival
Train delayed at Carstairs for what felt like an hour
Doors opened by TM and passengers invited to walk on platform
Water supplied
Aircon and toilets still working
I certainly did not come across anyone whose attitude was anything other than "we are in an uncomfortable mess but I am doing everything I can possibly do to mitigate"

 

[Peter0124]

Real World experience on the ground 1M15 GLS to EUS EXGLS 14.24
On boarding staff were helping a vulnerable person to find an unreserved seat as it was chaos owing to late arrival
Train delayed at Carstairs for what felt like an hour
Doors opened by TM and passengers invited to walk on platform
Water supplied
Aircon and toilets still working
I certainly did not come across anyone whose attitude was anything other than "we are in an uncomfortable mess but I am doing everything I can possibly do to mitigate"

Yes I got talking to a few people on the platform at Carstairs, there were a lot travelling home from the Metallica show the night before.

 

[dk1]

So much going on with concerts this week/weekend. Liverpool Street trains were leaving Norwich extremely well loaded yesterday with some services full and standing from Ipswich with queues at the buffet counter before departure. Even the platform staff were laughing about the do not travel messages that had been sent out.

 

[brad465]

I suspect many ticket gatelines will be extra busy from those who have rearranged travel plans needing to show their ticket to staff, as the tickets obviously won't be accepted in the machine if travel on a later date has been undertaken.

 

[Peterthegreat]

But all services on the east side are running as normal, yet on the west side not. Bizarre as the forecast temperatures between Leeds and Manchester are similar.
Of course the west side will suffer its usual Sunday service tomorrow, expected gaps of 2,3,4 hours (take your pick)
All the 769's were stopped on Monday evening. presume they are expected to start perfectly on Monday after a 6 day shutdown on depots that are for overnight stabling........doubt if anyone's had a look at them........

Services on the eastern side are NOT running as normal.
The Sheffield to Leeds fast service has been withdrawn as has the Leeds to Halufax service.
Yesterday the last trains from Sheffield to Leeds, Leeds to Sheffield, Doncaster to Leeds and Doncaster to Goole were sll cancelled with no bus replacement offered

 

[Krokodil]

34 cancellations already on Crosscountry today, including all services between Cardiff and Birmingham

Nothing unusual there...

 

[Coleridge]

Real World experience on the ground 1M15 GLS to EUS EXGLS 14.24
On boarding staff were helping a vulnerable person to find an unreserved seat as it was chaos owing to late arrival
Train delayed at Carstairs for what felt like an hour
Doors opened by TM and passengers invited to walk on platform
Water supplied
Aircon and toilets still working
I certainly did not come across anyone whose attitude was anything other than "we are in an uncomfortable mess but I am doing everything I can possibly do to mitigate"

The fact that frontline staff are doing their very best in very difficult circumstances - circumstances that, in many cases, are largely or entirely the fault of the rail companies - does not contradict the idea that the rail industry is disorganised and passionately anti-passenger.

Is "Aircon and toilets still working" a sign of excellent service these days?

 

[800002]

wouldn't it have made more sense to run it as a double to New Street and then send the rear unit back to Central Rivers from there?

I'm afriad, as repeated events have been raised before in other XC threads.
If there is not the required team members available, with time in their day / duty to take the train further, than it cannot operate with passengers in the 2nd unit.

If there wasn't the staff available at Derby to relieve, than that's the only option.

 

[Snow1964]

I suspect many ticket gatelines will be extra busy from those who have rearranged travel plans needing to show their ticket to staff, as the tickets obviously won't be accepted in the machine if travel on a later date has been undertaken.

And the obvious question is why not.

If announce ticket can be used for later days, then surely the gates should also be set to allow them to be used (or at very least not set to reject on date, if all else is ok)

Unless it's another half thought out idea, have acceptance, but not make it easy for customers, because gate programming is put in the too difficult pile.

 

[Russel]

I'm afriad, as repeated events have been raised before in other XC threads.
If there is not the required team members available, with time in their day / duty to take the train further, than it cannot operate with passengers in the 2nd unit.

If there wasn't the staff available at Derby to relieve, than that's the only option.

Which is a complete nonsense situation created by XC themselves that could be easily resolved!

 

[800002]

Which is a complete nonsense situation created by XC themselves that could be easily resolved!

You've got to work with what you've got.
Repeated failings over many many years don't just resolve themselves overnight (on the railway, anyway) because it's 'the sensible thing to do'
I don't make the rules, we're just all playing the game established by our forebearers.
No one wants to stomach the fight.

 

[Snow1964]

Except the simple answer is it still isn’t really ‘normal’ ranges where those points are. It’s expected to get up to around 31-32C in the Slough area.

Depending on which weather station you pick near Slough, eg Heathrow Airport, Kew Gardens etc then it appears typically get
6-18 days per year where temperatures reach 30c
3-6 days per year where temperatures reach 31c

So I would suggest 31c is within normal range, even if it is only 1-2% of days per year. And having a railway specified not to cope with 3-18 days per year, suggests to me spec is wrong. Remember we are talking about a busy 4 track mainline to London, not some cash starved minor route where spec might be lower.

 

[brad465]

And the obvious question is why not.

If announce ticket can be used for later days, then surely the gates should also be set to allow them to be used (or at very least not set to reject on date, if all else is ok)

Unless it's another half thought out idea, have acceptance, but not make it easy for customers, because gate programming is put in the too difficult pile.

Whether or not resetting the gates in this way is possible, a strong perception will exist that they can't, so many passengers will automatically go to the staffed gates.

 

[800002]

And the obvious question is why not.

If announce ticket can be used for later days, then surely the gates should also be set to allow them to be used (or at very least not set to reject on date, if all else is ok)

Unless it's another half thought out idea, have acceptance, but not make it easy for customers, because gate programming is put in the too difficult pile.

There are obvious disadvantages here.
A new thread is required, likely, to allow a full drawn out debate.
I don't know enough about the system(s) involved and their capabilities, but tickets can be rejected for a vast number of reasons and I then wonder if it's possible to introduce an accept feature for what would technically be expired tickets, but valid by arrangement, which have not been previously used.

 

[londonmidland]

Bad news. Weather forums and forecasts are expecting us to go back into the furnace after this brief cooldown.

 

[Chriso]

Seconded.

100% agree the one positive in all this for me is excellent staff on the ground working in extremely difficult positions

 

[johncrossley]

However the other side of this coin is that people are free to make their own choices, and should be able to do so, and if they do end up in an unpleasant situation then it’s largely their own making, albeit they are also increasing the chances of an unpleasant situation arising. I saw a disproportionate number of broken-down cars on the motorway yesterday, and in pretty much every case there was a whole family standing next to the car - which does suggest irregular road users deciding to go on a jolly quite probably in a poorly maintained or prepared car.

A poorly maintained car is a problem regardless of the weather. The key question here is which is more resilient in hot weather. What is the increased risk of driving in 35 degrees compared to 20 degrees, compared to travelling by train? If driving is still within acceptable risk but train travel isn't, then that's not really ideal, as clearly the main reason of public transport is to cut road traffic in order to reduce the negative impact of driving on society and to reduce the social exclusion of people without cars.

 

[London Trains]

Despite being (slightly) cooler than it was during the week, Southern appear to have cancelled a lot more services than they did during the week (where, to their credit, they didn't cancel masses of services), including the cancellation of all London Bridge to Epsom services and all Victoria to Eastbourne services.

 

[The exile]

It’s off my area but I was told by a colleague who deals with the Eastern side that cancellations due to faults, often air-con have been perhaps the worst they’ve been today.

Unsurprising really. Like humans, you can overwork equipment for a while, but not for ever.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Despite being (slightly) cooler than it was during the week, Southern appear to have cancelled a lot more services than they did during the week (where, to their credit, they didn't cancel masses of services), including the cancellation of all London Bridge to Epsom services and all Victoria to Eastbourne services.

I think the London Bridge to Epsom might be for engineering reasons rather than the weather; they weren't showing in RTT two weeks ago when we were planning the route for my son's return from university this week.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Despite being (slightly) cooler than it was during the week, Southern appear to have cancelled a lot more services than they did during the week (where, to their credit, they didn't cancel masses of services), including the cancellation of all London Bridge to Epsom services and all Victoria to Eastbourne services.

Surely London Victoria/East Croydon to Ore services (running via Eastbourne) are, to the most part, just about still operating today?

 

[Islineclear3_1]

Surely London Victoria/East Croydon to Ore services (running via Eastbourne) are, to the most part, just about still operating today?

I think its the Eastbourne terminators that have been canned. The Victoria-Eastbourne-Ore services are still running

I'm not sure whether this is why GBR 387.172 is stabled at Victoria(?) RTT shows it as running an early morning service from Eastbourne but no return journey

 

[CyrusWuff]

And the obvious question is why not.

If announce ticket can be used for later days, then surely the gates should also be set to allow them to be used (or at very least not set to reject on date, if all else is ok)

Unless it's another half thought out idea, have acceptance, but not make it easy for customers, because gate programming is put in the too difficult pile.

There is no way to set (Cubic) gates to accept tickets before the start date or after the expiry date without disabling most of the ticket checking logic. Even then, that only works for magnetic tickets.

Barcode acceptance can only be altered by Cubic themselves and they're not going to do that for every gateline in the country due to a few days of disruption just to change it back again a few days later.

 

[david l]

Services on the eastern side are NOT running as normal.
The Sheffield to Leeds fast service has been withdrawn as has the Leeds to Halufax service.
Yesterday the last trains from Sheffield to Leeds, Leeds to Sheffield, Doncaster to Leeds and Doncaster to Goole were sll cancelled with no bus replacement offered

I'm talking about today (not previous days) where the west side has 300+ services cancelled, yet all other operators in the area have single figures cancelled

 

[trainophile]

Bad news. Weather forums and forecasts are expecting us to go back into the furnace after this brief cooldown.

Where did you hear this? Don't think I can take much more of days like these. It doesn't feel much cooler where I am even today, already had two showers and contemplating a third!

 

[1D54]

Where did you hear this? Don't think I can take much more of days like these. It doesn't feel much cooler where I am even today, already had two showers and contemplating a third!

100 flight cancellations and 300 delays at Heathrow due to thunderstorms and still the temperature is 29.

 

[Taplowgreen]

According to the Met Office we're looking at temperatures up in the 30s again early next month........better get that air-conditioning installed!

 

[dk1]

100 flight cancellations and 300 delays at Heathrow due to thunderstorms and still the temperature is 29.

Do you know after all the usual digs at rail in the current heatwave it was quite refreshing to read that between Gatwick & Heathrow airports almost 800 flights had been affected too.