E.U. wasting money.

[markskoda]

Czech Railways have updated the line between the border town of Cheb (Eger in German) and Plzen (Pilsen). They've done a beautiful job with good looking stations all along the line. The little Spa Town of Lazne Kynzvart is typical. Long platforms and ramps so long that the incline is very slight. New toilets and heated waiting rooms. On completion of the work the two hourly express service to Prague was discontinued with the exception of the 4.30 a.m. service out and the 23.30 service back and passengers for the capital have to take a local train five miles down the line to Marianske Lazne (Marienbad) where they have a wait of up to 90 minutes. Hardly a connecting service. The E.U. investment has been massive and the contractor Skanska has been at work for about three years.
The full time station mistress tells me that passenger numbers are down to an average of around one per train joining and alighting from around four or five previously. Eight express trains a day to Prague and eight from Prague have been deleted. In addition there is now one Pendolino service in each direction but this does not stop in Lazne Kynzvart. It looks as if all the track work was to accommodate the new Pendolino service. Surely this is economic madness.

 

[tbtc]

Who decided to amend the timetables though? Presumably not the EU?

 

[MCR247]

And why is this in the UK Railway Discussion forum?

 

[swj99]

And why is this in the UK Railway Discussion forum?

And why not, considering that the people of the UK contribute towards the money the EU wastes.

 

[tbtc]

And why not, considering that the people of the UK contribute towards the money the EU wastes.

But what have the EU done wrong here? Are they the ones who specify the timetables and services?

Or is this just another "lets blame the EU" story (when the reality is that train services are the responsibility of someone else)?

If your council puts a new bus stop at the end of your road and then the bus company withdraws the commercial route that served it, do you blame the council?

 

[Wath Yard]

If your council puts a new bus stop at the end of your road and then the bus company withdraws the commercial route that served it, do you blame the council?

Yes. Just like I'll blame the UK Government when the "electric spine" is completed and FOCs continue to use diesel traction. If they're using public money they should get assurances that the money won't be wasted.

 

[yorkie]

And why is this in the UK Railway Discussion forum?

Please can people simply use the report button instead, to alert the moderators when threads are in the wrong forum? Or if there is any other concern with any post/thread.

As stated in our Forum Rules, "please alert us to it, by reporting (

) it."

The report button is at the bottom left of each post.

We do rely on the use of the report button as we cannot possibly read all posts, we can only read a small proportion of them as we get a 4-figure number of posts each day. Thanks!

(This thread has since been moved to the correct forum)

 

[NSEFAN]

The EU investment was presumably a funding scheme similar to that which improved the Maritime line in 2009? In the case of this line, the number of trains has doubled and hence the number of passengers has increased because the service is better.

It seems however in the case the OP mentions, the service has been made worse following the improvements? Perhaps the money spent didn't have the desired effect of improving passenger numbers, in which case the line has been rationalised as a result?

 

[Oscar]

Czech Railways have updated the line between the border town of Cheb (Eger in German) and Plzen (Pilsen).

I wonder why they have done so little to Cheb Station though - the passenger information (apart from a few posters in the departure hall) and signage is still quite limited and old-fashioned and it is a station used by a lot of foreigners. Has Marktredwitz to Cheb been updated? This line was much more heavily disrupted that the line to Mariánské Lázně when I visited recently on a snowy day primarily due to trees falling on the line.

 

[CarltonA]

Damned EU lumberjacks!

 

[gordonthemoron]

ask http://www.cd.cz rather than us