Elizabeth line "fasts"

[announcements]

Does anyone have definitive information about how the fasts work on the Elizabeth line? Is there a set pattern/frequency?

I have heard platform announcers reference "semi fast" so I assume these exist too? It so, what is the difference?

Is there any reason why they chose not to include this level of detail on the in-car line diagrams? Are they concerned it may complicate matters? I would have thought the pros of including it outweigh the cons.

 

[cactustwirly]

Does anyone have definitive information about how the fasts work on the Elizabeth line? Is there a set pattern/frequency?

I have heard platform announcers reference "semi fast" so I assume these exist too? It so, what is the difference?

Is there any reason why they chose not to include this level of detail on the in-car line diagrams? Are they concerned it may complicate matters? I would have thought the pros of including it outweigh the cons.

Maidenhead/Reading services skip Acton, West Ealing and Hanwell.

Some peak services are Fast Ealing to West Drayton

 

[Bigbru]

In the peak there are a few Abbey Wood to Reading services that also skip Southall, Hayes & Harlington, Iver, Langley and Taplow. But they are on top of the normal 4tph that go West to Maidenhead/Reading

 

[MaidaVale]

During the morning and evening peaks there are an extra 2tph to/from Reading that only call at Twyford, Maidenhead, Burnham, Slough, West Drayton and Ealing before resuming stopping all stations east of Paddington, totalling 6tph in the peak hours. All other Reading services also skip Hanwell, West Ealing and Acton Main Line (and sometimes Iver). They're peak only and aren't usually widely advertised as expresses.

Most Heathrow to Shenfield services also skip some stops, only calling at Hayes & Harlington, West Ealing and Ealing Broadway for most of the day. A handful of Heathrow-Shenfield services do call at Southall, Hanwell and Acton Main Line during the peak hours, but the majority pass straight through.

I don't believe it happens at all out east, as all trains I've checked stop everywhere. I suppose you could count the few Liverpool Street - Gidea Park short trips that depart from the mainline platforms as skipping Whitechapel although as it's a physically different route I wouldn't count it.

 

[announcements]

Thanks for your responses. It seems there is quite a lot happening and therefore could be difficult to depict on the in-car diagrams.

 

[Watershed]

Thanks for your responses. It seems there is quite a lot happening and therefore could be difficult to depict on the in-car diagrams.

It wouldn't be too difficult to mark the stations that are sometimes skipped in a different way. I'm not sure why that's not been done.

 

[VT 390]

Thanks for your responses. It seems there is quite a lot happening and therefore could be difficult to depict on the in-car diagrams.

I think it would be easy to have show the general pattern on the in carriage line diagrams.

They could just have 3 lines on the diagram, Line 1 Shenfield to Heathrow Terminal 5, Line 2 Abbey Wood to Heathrow Termninal 4, Line 3 Abbey Wood to Reading.
Line 1 would clearly identify the Paddington - Ealing Broadway - West Ealing - Hayes & Harlington skip stop pattern.
Line 2 would clearly identify the all stations services.
Line 3 would clearly identify the Paddington - Ealing Broadway - Southall - Hayes & Harlington skip stop pattern. They could then add a peak only fast dashed line (like on the Metropolitan line diagrams) between Ealing Broadway and West Drayton to show the peak limited stop services.
2 and 3 could also be shown as a single line Abbey Wood to Paddington and then split.
Limited service station calls could be added to each of the lines where required.
The only thing this would not show is that Iver and Taplow are only served by every other service off-peak and the unusual services such as Heathrow Terminal 4 to Shenfield (but this does not really matter in the same way the limited service Circle line to Baking is not shown).

 

[Taunton]

The additional Reading super-fasts are only a few per day, I think just 5 with-peak evening outward services. Doing separate lines on a diagram would have to explain all this. There are further variants, like stopping a few morning peak inward Reading services at Acton, a change to deal with passengers unable to board full trains there. All this gets away from Underground-style simplistic "all trains the same" line diagrams. However it does reflect passenger demand, and the wish to minimise passengers on longer journeys having to lose time stopping at lesser-used stations. Contrary to some armchair timetablers' beliefs, passenger demand does rise significantly twice a day, and fall away at other times, the complete opposite of a standard interval service all day.

I agree that the way this is presented could be improved. The format of the stop lists is such that at Woolwich the stops flash past in a huge long, comma-separated scrolling list, where you just have to spot momentarily, and be fully aware of the sequence as it all whizzes past, whether it stops for you at Iver or not.

Some supplementary announcements were added that trains "will not stop at Acton AND Hanwell", which is grammatically incorrect. 'And' is for an inclusive list. A list of exclusions should be "... Acton NOR Hanwell".

 

[announcements]

Are they referred to casually by platform announcers as "fasts" or "semi fasts" and if so would the difference be obvious to passengers, given the level of detail that has been outlined above?

I agree, there needs to be a judgement call about about diagram clutter. However, try telling that to whoever rolled out the current ones - with all the zones, exceptions and special termination points at Paddington and Liverpool Street, it all seems rather overbaked for what is meant to be a "new line" in the eyes of an average Londoner.

 

[VT 390]

Are they referred to casually by platform announcers as "fasts" or "semi fasts" and if so would the difference be obvious to passengers, given the level of detail that has been outlined above?

Whenever I have been at Paddington or other zone 1 stations travelling west I have heard them announce "All Stations" for Heathrow Terminal 4 services but never "semi-fast" or "fast" instead they have announced it as "Calling at...listing all stations served by that service".

Although it would be a good idea to use fast and semi-fast in platform announcements as this would allow regular users to quickly identify if the service calls at their station or not. It would not even be new to TfL as they already do this on the London Underground Metropolitan line.

 

[Purple Train]

Some supplementary announcements were added that trains "will not stop at Acton AND Hanwell", which is grammatically incorrect. 'And' is for an inclusive list. A list of exclusions should be "... Acton NOR Hanwell".

I would say Acton or Hanwell. "Nor" is only really used to join alternatives after "neither" in Standard British English (which obviously shouldn't necessarily be mandated, but if you're going to mandate anything, standard usage is probably what you ought to go for). I have never heard that construction where "nor" is used without a premodifier, and would find it quite confusing (how many negatives are there in that sentence?): maybe I'm an exception, but I really don't think the majority of passengers would understand that.

Interestingly, my online dictionary says that your usage is standard in America.

(Linguistics mode disengaged.)

I've never heard an Elizabeth Line service announced as "fast", but I occasionally hear "semi-fast" used for the ones which go Ealing Broadway-West Drayton-Slough. A quirk of the timetabling is that the morning peak semi-fasts call at Acton Main Line in the up direction. They're certainly very useful services and exceptionally well-patronised. There used to be some GWR peak extras in the evening which would go fast to Slough and then call at Burnham and Maidenhead. I don't recall them being quite so popular!

 

[announcements]

I would say Acton or Hanwell. "Nor" is only really used to join alternatives after "neither" in Standard British English (which obviously shouldn't necessarily be mandated, but if you're going to mandate anything, standard usage is probably what you ought to go for). I have never heard that construction where "nor" is used without a premodifier, and would find it quite confusing (how many negatives are there in that sentence?): maybe I'm an exception, but I really don't think the majority of passengers would understand that.

A better translation for the phrase you are commenting on would be "trains will stop at neither Acton nor Hanwell"? However, this wouldn't be plain English enough to meet TfL Comms standards.

 

[Taunton]

The Reading trains did not initially serve Acton, but the morning inward stops were introduced to avoid overcrowding, which shows the difficulties with specific line diagrams when services are flexible. It's even more so on the DLR where there is commonly adjustment, particularly at weekends but other times too. It was initially suggested that the Liz core be shown as two lines, one Shenfield to Paddington and the other Abbey Wood to Reading/Heathrow. That would have all had to be redone when the additional service from Shenfield to Heathrow started. The railway is a flexible medium, and few services stay set in aspic over the long term. It remains to be seen what patterns the extra 10 trains now arriving will run.

 

[Chiltern 165]

Thanks for your responses. It seems there is quite a lot happening and therefore could be difficult to depict on the in-car diagrams.

They managed it for the Metropolitan line

 

[RJ]

"Fast", "semi-fast". These are not passenger friendly terms, these are technical terms that only make sense to people that already have a high degree of understanding of that network and its service patterns, of which this forum will have a disproportionate representation. If you're a tourist going to the airport or an infrequent traveller, these terms are likely to mean absolutely nothing. The idea is to try and make information accessible to as many people as possible.

Given there's no overtaking trains on the Elizabeth Line network it matters even less to market trains as fast.

They should really avoid using these terms and overcluttering maps with excessive service pattern information and just advertise the calling patterns as normal.

 

[mickey]

The problem with changing the line diagrams is that they’re inconsistent anyway - and often change at the drop of a hat. For example, in normal service, Reading services call at Taplow but not Iver, while Maidenhead terminators/starters do the opposite. Except this doesn’t apply early mornings or evenings, when everything calls at both. And in disruption, if they remove services then they add the extra stop to whichever remains. This is almost impossible to include clearly in line diagrams. Regular commuters know the calling pattern, while everyone else uses the ‘this train calls at...’ bit for accurate info. The train computers are very good at adding or removing stop info when orders are made, unlike some other rolling stock.

What I don’t like is the ‘not stopping at’ announcements in the core - I get why they do it, but it’s the opposite of every other train in the world.

And don’t even get me started on manual announcements made at some stations… “calling at all stations” when it doesn’t!!

 

[Cricketer8for9]

They managed it for the Metropolitan line

With 60+ years of history and the experience those commuters bring.