Euston to Milton Keynes - Avanti vs West Midlands?

[GodAtum]

I will be need to do this journey during a weekday, leaving Euston is the morning and returning in the afternoon. Both services are about the same travel time, but I can book a seat on Avanti.

Are the trains usally crowded as I'm doing the opposite way to most commuters? Would I likely get a seat on West Midlands?

 

[Watershed]

It really depends a lot on the destination of the train you get. If it's an Avanti service to Manchester than it's likely to be busier than one to Liverpool or Chester in my experience, whilst the WMT service to Crewe is often much busier than their Milton Keynes terminators or Birmingham via Northampton services.

Getting a reservation with Avanti is the only way to be (relatively) sure of a seat southbound, but for the northbound journey if you decide to go for WMT, you can more or less guarantee a seat by looking up the platform on Real Time Trains before it's officially announced on the boards at Euston. Ideally you want to be down the ramp and on the platform as the inbound train pulls in, which is typically 15-20 minutes before your train departs.

 

[richardderby]

Never had a problem getting a seat on WMT Crewe services as always eight cars, only exception is on weekends when the Midland main line is closed..

 

[WolvertonWorks]

as I'm doing the opposite way to most commuters

In recent years it has surprised me how many people one sees alighting at MKC in the morning "office worker" peak.

People used to live in MK and commute to jobs in London so the morning flow was MKC-Euston but nowadays there is a considerable flow of people coming from EUS direction to work at Network Rail and Santander - along with Red Bull (and I can't see many of their staff commuting by train given the industry ) - the largest employers in MK nowadays.

There also seem to be quite a lot of people coming to MK for work from Northampton - housing is cheaper in Northampton so not surprising.

 

[Bletchleyite]

In recent years it has surprised me how many people one sees alighting at MKC in the morning "office worker" peak.

People used to live in MK and commute to jobs in London so the morning flow was MKC-Euston but nowadays there is a considerable flow of people coming from EUS direction to work at Network Rail and Santander - along with Red Bull (and I can't see many of their staff commuting by train given the industry ) - the largest employers in MK nowadays.

This is nothing new. There has for a very long time* been more inbound commuting to Milton Keynes than outbound, but mostly by car. I think with a number of high-profile companies like Santander and Network Rail (as you say) moving into the centre from peripheral office parks it's probably shifting a bit to rail.

* At the start of my career, for one example, I had a colleague who commuted to our office by train from Walthamstow daily.