Is that really relevant, though?
But for example you can’t replace an hourly Cardiff train that has 2 coaches with one train every 3 hours that has 6 coaches and claim you’re providing the same service, that’s clearly nonsense
And anyhow,from what I've seen, the emergency timetable on the Cardiff to Nottingham route (every two hours at certain times instead of hourly) does not seem to necessarily compensate with extra capacity. If running half the services meant they would double up the remaining ones they wouldn't be running 3 coach trains after a two hour gap, it would be at least 2+2.
There has certainly been no increase in double Voyager operation on he Bournemouth to Manchester services despite the cancellation of most of the York/Newcastle services plus one Manchester and two Bournemouth services.
Indeed, my train manager on Wednesday repeatedly apologised for the crowding, blaming it on Transport for Wales cancellations as far as Cheltenham, then blaming it on the emergency timetable beyond. Coming back from Birmingham my service was cancelled due to animals on the line so I had to endure an absolutely rammed four car Voyager to Cheltenham, followed by the joys of a TfW 153. Ah, train travel.
Surely not a single 153 on that route? I’ve passed a few of their new 197s? recently which were 3 coaches I think.
Looking at Realtime Trains, there was a pair of 153s on one of TfW's Cheltenham - Maesteg diagrams that day.
A pair of 153s fortunately but they are still awful things. The next day there was indeed a one-car 153 doing Maesteg - Cheltenham.
Lovely! Welcome back to 1987!
Yeah I suppose so, sounds like they’re both incredibly unreliable to me. It’s just worse from my point of view when XC promised they would increase capacity of trains whilst their “emergency” timetable was in operation. They mostly haven’t!
That may be fine if each train was twice as long. But they are nowhere near.
One of the few remaining Newcastle to Reading services was cancelled today due to set shortage!
Especially given that some of the trains that do run are still two cars, e.g. the 1645 from Cardiff to Nottingham.
The three units released from Newcastle - Reading services are being used to strengthen services: Two on Edinburgh - Plymouth, one on Manchester - Bournemouth/Bristol.
Two Voyagers were separately involved in fatalities on Monday, which has probably impacted fleet availability.
OK, fair enough, but what about the 170 routes, particularly Nottingham to Cardiff, which has been badly affected by the emergency timetable? I haven't noticed any strengthening there, but maybe I'm looking at the wrong services.
Must admit I'm less familiar with the 170 services, travelling on them less often, so I'm not sure if there's been any change to train lengths there.
If I'm not mistaken there looks to be a second 4 car 170 diagramed which is the one that does includes the 1207 Nottingham to Cardiff. In the normal timetable I think there is just 1 4 car.
XC on a Sunday on the Nottingham to Cardiff route seems even more of a disaster than the rest of the week. Last time I was planning to use it, the 0955 ran (that service is typically overcrowded, it's timed far too late for the first train to Birmingham and should be a double), then the 1116 and 1216 were cancelled. So nothing from Nottingham for 3 hours 21 minutes unless you tried to cram onto whatever Voyager turned up after getting to Derby on the sparse Sunday EMR service.
Given that there are a few partial cancellations at reading this evening on Bournemouth services because of a shortage of train drivers I'm not so sure.
The regional service was very heavily disrupted due to lack of traincrew last weekend, and there are still a number of cancellations on most days due to a lack of traincrew. This does not give me confidence that they will be able to return to the full timetable, particularly as there is an ongoing drain of resources through retirements. The whole industry is facing a wave of traincrew retirements, but the age profile is particularly serious at XC.
