Merseyrail crowned UK's top train operator in 2025 survey

[BurtonM]

try to appreciate why it is that people in the real world like them...and learn from it.

IMO this is a slippery slope as if the feedback on Merseyrail is anything to go by, it'd give Northern in particular yet another free pass to be rubbish.

 

[The exile]

Meanwhile, down here in Bristol, also a west coast city of between 475k and 500k whose glory days as a great port are behind it, I’m sure my fellow commuters would be happy to accept things you’re complaining about if it meant we got the rest of the package!

 

[Kite159]

One thing I would change with Merseyrail is running 4tph for longer. Especially on Friday/Saturday nights when I've been on full & standing trains from Chester when it's dropped to 2tph and the first train since a service from Holyhead, from Wrexham & from Crewe (on a weekend where Runcorn - Liverpool was closed so there were extra passengers avoiding the magical replacement bus)

 

[jamesst]

One thing I would change with Merseyrail is running 4tph for longer. Especially on Friday/Saturday nights when I've been on full & standing trains from Chester when it's dropped to 2tph and the first train since a service from Holyhead, from Wrexham & from Crewe (on a weekend where Runcorn - Liverpool was closed so there were extra passengers avoiding the magical replacement bus)

There should (!) be some movement on more frequent evening services soon, there were definitely talks happening over that aswell as later late night services at weekends

 

[Krokodil]

The point here is that people don't feel that Merseyrail is a fair comparison to other TOCs with different operating models - and I think that's reasonable as they're not a 'typical' TOC.

Indeed, comparisons should be with London Overground and the Elizabeth Line (which are very close behind Merseyrail in terms of satisfaction), plus Thameslink. It's a suburban metro and comparisons against other types of operator don't tell you anything because expectations are different on an Intercity or Regional operator.

Are they really very much different to the 'metro' services provided by, say, SouthEastern or Southern?

In theory you are right but it's not easy to compare because the survey covers entire TOCs. It's not broken down into metro/regional/highspeed services within each of those TOCs.

 

[WirralLine]

There should (!) be some movement on more frequent evening services soon, there were definitely talks happening over that aswell as later late night services at weekends

Another example is the 30 min frequency on morning Chester services at exactly the sort of time you'd expect people to start using them.. for example from Bromborough Rake to Chester (give or take a few minutes) its at 0600, 0630, 0700, 0730, 0800 then every 15 minutes, id say the 15 minute service should start an hour earlier at 0700. I needed to be in Chester for 0830 last week, I could either catch the 0800 which would get me there around 0825, hoping theres no delay, or get there 35mins early by using the 0730.

 

[jamesst]

Another example is the 30 min frequency on morning Chester services at exactly the sort of time you'd expect people to start using them.. for example from Bromborough Rake to Chester (give or take a few minutes) its at 0600, 0630, 0700, 0730, 0800 then every 15 minutes, id say the 15 minute service should start an hour earlier at 0700. I needed to be in Chester for 0830 last week, I could either catch the 0800 which would get me there around 0825, hoping theres no delay, or get there 35mins early by using the 0730.

The early morning services towards Chester are a mess to be honest.
When the 15min frequency first came in it was pretty much the 4min turnaround at Chester from early morning. It was quickly realised this couldn't cope with increased peak loading or any adhesion issues- of which the Chester line is renowned for.
The result has been chopping and changing all over the place so morning peak services from Chester run at different times to the rest of the day whilst services towards Chester run half hourly- with some random peak extras thrown in- until around 9am.
If there's a line that needs a total timetable recast its this one.

 

[RichardAsh1981]

Seven minutes late when the trains are every 15 minutes is a significant delay. The most sensible outcome is to run the train fast, get it back on schedule, and go from there. Annoying for one train load of passengers (although some people will be delighted at a non-stop ride home), yes, but the greater good and all that.

Unless you have the misfortune to travel to or from a station which doesn't get a 15 minute service - like the Ellesmere Port line, or Capenhurst which gets skip stopped in the standard timetable. Wait on the platform for your late train, get on, get off one stop later and wait again for a following train, which is often 10 minutes away.

The early morning services towards Chester are a mess to be honest.
[...]
If there's a line that needs a total timetable recast its this one.

Something which was said to be part of the introduction of the new trains, which would be quicker. In practice end to end times are the same and late running continual because dwell times keep getting longer.
The May timetable contained (but there was no announcement of the change) extra time in various morning peak services, but it doesn't seem to have been enough to fix the problem.

One thing I would change with Merseyrail is running 4tph for longer.

The solution to this from a capacity point of view used to be running six car trains, for instance summer Sundays always got sixes to compensate for being half hourly. But as 8 car working on the Chester line is still not a thing, we haven't had that capacity since 2019.

 

[Pacef8]

If i may add the first train to chester is not until 8.30 through bebington if you work in Chester on a sunday.

 

[Statto]

One thing I would change with Merseyrail is running 4tph for longer. Especially on Friday/Saturday nights when I've been on full & standing trains from Chester when it's dropped to 2tph and the first train since a service from Holyhead, from Wrexham & from Crewe (on a weekend where Runcorn - Liverpool was closed so there were extra passengers avoiding the magical replacement bus)

Add in Sundays, which could do with a frequency increace as well, & maybe an earlier start time too.

 

[185]

A number of people have suggested all those criticising the operator must be spotters. I wasn't aware so many spotters read the Wirral Globe.

8 hrs ago
User ID: 1753076
This really has to be a joke.
They should be stripped off the contract!!!

5 hrs ago
User ID: 1721565
The Globe should've kept this article for April Fools Day

1 hr ago
User ID: 4874803
MERSEYFAIL are you avin a laugh.

1 min ago
User ID: 1721565
I reckon this poll must've been conducted by the North Korean Electoral Commission, chaired by one V Putin

 

[geoffk]

...as well as failing to sell tickets in the way the vast majority of passengers want to buy them in 2025.

Avoid Dublin buses then........

 

[Horizon22]

A number of people have suggested all those criticising the operator must be spotters. I wasn't aware so many spotters read the Wirral Globe.

A lot of people only travel within their local area regularly, and therefore don't how good (or bad in this case!) other operators have it.

Ultimately some of their fellow residents were surveyed!

 

[Tetchytyke]

number of people have suggested all those criticising the operator must be spotters. I wasn't aware so many spotters read the Wirral Globe.

The comments section of local newspapers is always an absolute cesspit of idiocy.

But familiarity breeds contempt. If you use them every day you’ll get all the delays and that will cloud your judgment. Go to another city for a social visit and you’ll get a very different impression of their commuter railways.

I visit Liverpool fairly often and think Merseyrail is a very good commuter railway. Not perfect, but very good. I used to commute on T&W Metro every day and so I think that network is rubbish. If I commuted in Liverpool and only occasionally visited Newcastle I’d probably think the opposite.

 

[John Luxton]

I find it somewhat hard to believe that four staff members are “getting in the way of passenger flows” and I’m sure that, unlike yourself, many see healthy staffing levels as a positive rather then a negative.

That's not an unfair observation on the Northern Line platforms. They gather at the bottom of the Hunts Cross facing escalators nearly every time I have passed through often just chatting.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That's not an unfair observation on the Northern Line platforms. They gather at the bottom of the Hunts Cross facing escalators nearly every time I have passed through often just chatting.

Yep, my exact observation.

If the service was fully DOO, ONE dispatcher on the Northern Line island would be beneficial. Maybe two at a push so you could dispatch from both sides at once, but as there's only 4tph to Hunts Cross this probably wouldn't be needed. As it isn't DOO the on board manager or whatever they're called can deal with that. Though it's notable that Thameslink (with trains normally four times the length and hugely, hugely more people) are now fully self dispatched at all stations if I recall.

There is absolutely no need for four members of staff there and they do cause an obstruction by where they choose to stand and chat. And if they are standing and chatting, that's proof they are not needed.

Same at the gateline - there are more staff than there need to be and they pretty much always stand causing an obstruction.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 23 Jun 2025 ==

But familiarity breeds contempt. If you use them every day you’ll get all the delays and that will cloud your judgment. Go to another city for a social visit and you’ll get a very different impression of their commuter railways.

I visit Liverpool fairly often and think Merseyrail is a very good commuter railway. Not perfect, but very good. I used to commute on T&W Metro every day and so I think that network is rubbish. If I commuted in Liverpool and only occasionally visited Newcastle I’d probably think the opposite.

I don't, to be fair, think Merseyrail is rubbish. I just think they get their priorities wrong, resulting in staff where you don't need them, no staff where you do need them, a bizarre ticketing policy, a faint air of dilapidation in places etc. It could be a LOT better if they resolved these priorities.

I think overall Merseyrail is a lot better than Metrolink, for instance. I've not used the T&W Metro often so I can't really comment on it aside from that first impressions were that it was basically a carbon copy of a German U-Bahn but with added gatelines. But Merseyrail really should be a LOT better than Metrolink given that the latter operates at a surplus and the former consumes subsidy like it was as competition to do so as quickly as possible - I seem to recall that aside from Island Line it's the most heavily subsidised TOC per passenger mile by a long way?

I've criticised that attention to detail elsewhere. For instance, muck around ventilation grilles on Electrostar units is very visible if the TOC can't be bothered specifying for the cleaners to run the vacuum over that once a week, taking maybe 30 seconds to a minute per vehicle. Or a Northern service I was on a while back which had a large, mucky cobweb across two of the grab poles which had clearly been there a while. Attention to detail matters (and is often not costly), and if you ignore it sloppiness tends to pervade.