All cross country services suspended 23/08/26

Elecman · Sunday at 14:32

Why don’t XC just use Lamp Block ?

RailUK Forums

em81 · Sunday at 14:33

Qwerty133 said:
The social media team (who i believe are also based our of the control room unless things have changed in the past couple of years) are responding as normal. It says a lot that theyve put more thought into being able to respond on X in the event of failure than in being able to run a train service.

One or two people, who are likely on a little than minimum wage, will be able to reply to hundreds of queries each hour. They might even work from home, or could have been asked to work from home for today. Having a single spare driver on standby would cost more.

class 9 · Sunday at 14:35

Elecman said:
Why don’t XC just use Lamp Block ?

They were last night, not sure about today though.

Snow1964 · Sunday at 14:39

class 9 said:
There are back up phone numbers, but control don't have access to any of the IT systems required to run a service.

Why would anyone with even an ounce of common sense, put back up phone numbers, and expect to use same system as back up is supposed to cover when that system is down.

Thats not a contingency plan, thats just idiotic.

GoneSouth · Sunday at 14:40

class 9 said:
I can't see anything in my original reply to an earlier post defending anything.

Sorry, I didn’t intend to suggest you were defending it, I intended to say XC would defend it but I quickly posted on the hoof so didn’t really read what I’d said. Apologies

EYFanatic · Sunday at 14:40

Elecman said:
Why don’t XC just use Lamp Block ?

For the benefit of those who dont know what that is, could one prevail upon you to explain?

Iron_Duke · Sunday at 14:46

EYFanatic said:
For the benefit of those who dont know what that is, could one prevail upon you to explain?

Traincrew depot and offices at New Street.

Elecman · Sunday at 14:46

EYFanatic said:
For the benefit of those who dont know what that is, could one prevail upon you to explain?

Lamp Block is the XC office at the side of New Street Station

GoneSouth · Sunday at 14:50

I use XC a lot, fortunately not today, but I was wondering what I’d do in such an event to travel from Leeds or Manchester to Bristol. Down the east side there really is no alternative between Derby and Birmingham so would I be allowed to go via London?

A little better down the west side, where I assume via Newport would be allowed?

Either way I think we’re talking some seriously long journeys and definite 100% delay repay.

Do people know if other operators are set up with redundancy to keep going in these situations?

ox_chap · Sunday at 14:57

I’m at Oxford station. XC are not shown on the screens at all (no word “cancelled”.). Lots of very confused people. Surely as a minimum the train should be shown as not running. Once folk talk to the station then all is explained - and the staff here are fantastic as always. Nevertheless…

paulmch · Sunday at 14:58

EYFanatic said:
Ironically, Kevin is the fastest member of XC staff today

Edit:

I have to say I am surprised that XC haven't used the coloured rubber process that some smaller airlines use when their systems go down

For those who dont know, thats when they get coloured rubbers and call them Crew 1, Crew 2 and so on and move them around as and when they are supposed to be at the other end of a route thereby getting things moving and knowing where people are

That system only really works if a crew stays together for the whole journey. A train from Plymouth to Edinburgh could well have 5 or 6 crew changes enroute, and also some overlapping sections where (for example) a driver works from Plymouth to Bristol and is then relieved, but the Train Manager continues to Birmingham and the caterer to Derby. Keeping track of all those movements across an entire network of trains without a computer would be exceptionally difficult.

Dr Day · Sunday at 14:58

Journey planners are indicating a full normal service tomorrow. Given the nature of what might have happened (which feels like may be a bit more than meets the eye) would the industry insiders consider this is likely (other than a few issues first thing if trains are out of position)?

45Fox · Sunday at 15:01

GoneSouth said:
I use XC a lot, fortunately not today, but I was wondering what I’d do in such an event to travel from Leeds or Manchester to Bristol. Down the east side there really is no alternative between Derby and Birmingham so would I be allowed to go via London?

A little better down the west side, where I assume via Newport would be allowed?

To be fair, the XC social media team have been answering enquiries like this all day.

They're stating that all routes, such as in your examples via London and Newport, are ok.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Sunday at 15:06 ==

Dr Day said:
Journey planners are indicating a full normal service tomorrow. Given the nature of what might have happened (which feels like may be a bit more than meets the eye) would the industry insiders consider this is likely (other than a few issues first thing if trains are out of position)?

XC website was showing a good service on all routes today, a couple of hours back!
By all accounts this was due to being unable to access the website internally to change the status.

The service prospects for tomorrow?
I can't help thinking that currently we're in 'how long is a piece of string?' territory.

Bantamzen · Sunday at 15:19

mrcheek said:
many people complaining about the lack of contingency plans here.

I assume XC has such plans. But presumably they are contained in or on a file that is somewhere in this building which they cant get in to...

Alternatively, it may be that their official contingency plan for a Sunday is "Bin all services, and let the other TOCs deal with it"

Still, at least if theyre running some of the Anglia area services, it means theres a better Sunday service than on GWR........

You would think / hope that contingency plans would include "what would happen if we lost power to HQ / servers". But then this is the railways we are talking about here, contingency planning isn't one of it's strong points.

AdamWW · Sunday at 15:21

Bantamzen said:
You would think / hope that contingency plans would include "what would happen if we lost power to HQ / servers". But then this is the railways we are talking about here, contingency planning isn't one of it's strong points.

I suspect that we notice it more when it fails than when it works.

KNN · Sunday at 15:22

Does anyone know why exactly this has happened? It has to be more than a simple power outage.

Starmill · Sunday at 15:23

ox_chap said:
Nightmare if you want to travel north from Oxford. No East West rail available, changing at Worcester Parkway won”t work. Walk across Bicester it is…

You'd be allowed to go down to Haddenham & Thame Parkway etc if you didn't want to walk. Unfortunately, that wouldn't necessarily guarantee you'd get a better connection.

AdamWW · Sunday at 15:28

KNN said:
Does anyone know why exactly this has happened? It has to be more than a simple power outage.

I think it's fairly clear that at present nobody posting on this thread is able or willing to say what's happened though some are happy to speculate or make assumptions.

Megafuss · Sunday at 15:40

Nearly 4pm and not a peep from the Transport Secretary

GoneSouth · Sunday at 15:42

paulmch said:
That system only really works if a crew stays together for the whole journey. A train from Plymouth to Edinburgh could well have 5 or 6 crew changes enroute, and also some overlapping sections where (for example) a driver works from Plymouth to Bristol and is then relieved, but the Train Manager continues to Birmingham and the caterer to Derby. Keeping track of all those movements across an entire network of trains without a computer would be exceptionally difficult.

Wow, that’s bonkers. surely that can be simplified. Or are unions involved?

317 forever · Sunday at 15:43

This seems like the power failure at Manchester from the other week writ large.

Iskra · Sunday at 15:45

Megafuss said:
Nearly 4pm and not a peep from the Transport Secretary

She’s been quoted on the BBC article, which has been there hours.

GoneSouth · Sunday at 15:54

Given XC are saying tickets for today will be valid for a further 3 days until Wednesday, does that imply they are expecting chaos or no services tomorrow as well?

172007 · Sunday at 15:54

GoneSouth said:
Wow, that’s bonkers. surely that can be simplified. Or are unions involved?

Drivers have maximum hours in the seat in anyone sitting as they are constantly concentratjng . A Train managers workload is not constant concentration as there are concentration rest periods between dispatching and selling / checking tickets. A retail services manager is selling drinks etc so concentrates least. Each job therefore has different levels of fatugue. Each job therefore has longer stints between breaks and the breaks aee often less. Therefore you send up with overlaps in train crew along the journey. If all had the same parameters as a diver you would need moe staff and greater costs.

GoneSouth · Sunday at 15:56

Megafuss said:
Nearly 4pm and not a peep from the Transport Secretary

Quoted by BBC and others as saying she’s very concerned and asked nationalised operators to step in where possible and provide extra services / accept tickets.

Deepgreen · Sunday at 15:57

ox_chap said:
I’m at Oxford station. XC are not shown on the screens at all (no word “cancelled”.). Lots of very confused people. Surely as a minimum the train should be shown as not running. Once folk talk to the station then all is explained - and the staff here are fantastic as always. Nevertheless…

That is pathetic, but nothing about the abysmal information system on our railways today surprises me anymore.

em81 · Sunday at 16:00

ox_chap said:
I’m at Oxford station. XC are not shown on the screens at all (no word “cancelled”.). Lots of very confused people. Surely as a minimum the train should be shown as not running. Once folk talk to the station then all is explained - and the staff here are fantastic as always. Nevertheless…

I noticed on RTT the Manchester ones were showing cancelled in one direction, while they've been deleted in the other direction. I wonder if they're trying to use the "short notice change to the timetable" excuse.

On Friday I heard an announcement regarding a 4 car XC service towards Manchester being 20 minutes late due to overcrowding.

dvboy · Sunday at 16:15

XC apparently running buses between Birmingham and Leicester now

CrossCountry Trains (@CrossCountryUK) on X

@kamthpm Hello Kam. Yes, get the planned replacement Bus to Leicester. From there, we have Buses that are running from Leicester to Birmingham. Station staff can help you when you get to Leicester ^CW

x.com

I assume the Peterborough to Stansted Airport section can run because it’s not connected to the rest of the network because of the engineering work and therefore easier for a controller who might be working from home to keep an eye on.

SuspectUsual · Sunday at 16:25

GoneSouth said:
Quoted by BBC and others as saying she’s very concerned and asked nationalised operators to step in where possible and provide extra services / accept tickets.

Awful phrasing, but no doubt deliberate use of the word nationalised rather than other to imply nationalisation is better

em81 · Sunday at 16:31

SuspectUsual said:
Awful phrasing, but no doubt deliberate use of the word nationalised rather than other to imply nationalisation is better

Chiltern are claiming they've added in extra services.

All cross country services suspended 23/08/26

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