Recent content by JamesM

Apologies if this is a highly simple, silly question - I sort of have this vague recollection of if you bought a single ticket you could upgrade it to a return by paying an excess. So my friend is going from Bloxwich to Stafford as a day trip; and has bought a single fare for £9.50 digitally -...

Sunday Times reporting... Virgin Trains have applied to be an open access operator on the West Coast Mainline. 10 car trains. If I am reading the article correctly, 1tph to Preston via Manchester, Liverpool and Brum. Glasgow to London once every two hours. Always interested in thoughts on...

I remember living in the area and the train would stop at stations like Ruabon and Chirk. This was great on the occasions that friends would visit and preferred not changing and just working on the train, but in reality meant a pretty sluggish journey time. The obvious lack of a huge...

Ah took a while- but I've found one - thanks for the help. I think maybe I typed in the wrong Glasgow station or something.

There's a great fare advertised on the Rail Sale website of Glasgow to Sheffield with TPE for £10 something. I've spent ages on different ticketing engines trying to track that fare down - any idea how I encourage the computer to show it to me. I've tried things like 'via' and can't find a...

Hello all, Just to stress, I've read Yorkie's excellent thread on this from a few months ago and I've done a few searches on the forum to try and understand how GC handle things. So, say I am getting the first GC train from KC to York on Saturday and the last GC train from York to KC on...

So, the journey is Maidstone East to Bristol Temple Meads on an advance ticket. In the olden days, from memory, with these sort of long distance advance tickets (and I am thinking on Virgin Trains for instance) you were allowed to get any service for the unreserved 'connecting' bit, in this...

Thanks everyone - yes, it had a 'advance' style element on the way down, so you had to specify it as a specific train on the outward bit, but you could take any train back. It was great for £40 ish.

Hi, Many years ago (maybe 2012) I used a great ticket from Chester and maybe Crewe called the Saturday Off Peak Travelcard on Virgin Trains. Basically, you booked an advance ticket on a Saturday morning and could get any train back on the Saturday night, plus you got a travelcard. Great for a...

Thank you guys - very useful. Will keep an eye on SaveECRewards too.

Hello, I'm going from London to Inverness, then Aberdeen to London in a couple of weeks. I wonder what to expect from a food point of view, during this eight hour epic journey - just checking that surely I'll be offered two meals during the journey and won't need to stock up in advance at Kings...

Friends, Is there a up to date "sample" or "projected" service frequency timetable around anywhere? I saw a paper written a few years back discussing potential service patterns, but was trying to get my head around how places like Crewe and Stockport would be affected once the whole project...

Hi there, He was queuing for at least 25 minutes, I wasn't in the queue so couldn't say for definite, but he'll write in - my guess is c.25-30 mins. I understand the delay repay rules, but to suggest that passengers arrive c. 35 mins before departure time in order to purchase a ticket, a...

Yes, he's taken photos - I think key is the long line of Southern ticket machines that are out of order at Victoria station. I have encouraged him to write in, as it just seems very unfair. Many thanks for your time.

Hi there, Hopefully this is in the right forum. So a friend of mine has just been made an hour late by ticket queues at Victoria. He claims (I suspect a slight exaggeration) there are queues of about 100 people for the ticket machines and counters at the station. He has been unable to buy a...