But Northern is run by the Government. It is Schapps who should be shouldering the blame.
True - there'd be outrage if
private companies were cutting corners the way that Northern have been doing over the past couple of years - they are untouchable though - no franchise commitments to worry about honouring, nobody is going to fine them - this is what we are stuck with - who'd have guessed that the Government that has mismanaged so many other public services over the past decade would make such a mess of running trains too?
Doesn't this make a mockery of the "reversing Beeching" programme? We've had Okehampton and the Blyth & Tyne project seems to be going ahead, but that could be your lot.
Completely - but I guess that the Government are hoping that the target audience for the "reversing Beeching" stories were the Shire Tories/ Pensioners who don't travel by train regularly and can be distracted by occasional headlines about how Shapps wants to "bring back the good old days" (and forget that he promised the same six months ago, and six months before that, and all we've seen is progress on two minor projects that would likely have happened anyway), whilst the poor people stuck at stations like Conisbrough (trying to work out whether Northern are planning to run the same timetable as yesterday or if it's been chopped/changed again) is just collateral damage
I'm sure Shapps will be back in TV studios soon with warm words about how he wants to "reverse Beeching", and the people who buy into the John Betjeman/ Old Maids Cycling To Communion/ Modern Life Is Rubbish stuff won't have a clue how bad *actual* rail travel now is on provincial lines
The "reverse Beeching" stuff always felt like "A Railway Story For People Who Don't Regularly Use Railways" - it wouldn't be how the railway would prioritise spending but it played well with the kind of nostalgic people who vote Conservative/ UKIP etc
The article fails to pick up on the point that not only is it a reduced timetable, but then it is further watered down by cancellations. It's a double whammy. I wouldn't mind a reduced timetable, if they actually stuck to it, you could plan and make your journey then around it.
Surely, the point of a reduced timetable is to reduce it to a point where it can be run in a resilient manner? Or is this just a stealthy way of making much bigger cuts and spreading it around so less people take umbrage?
Good points - if they said that they could only run half of the "Arriva" timetable, but at least ran 100% of that 50% then that'd be something that people could base their travel around - but the constant changes and short notice cancellations creates a lack of certainty - so that I wouldn't risk a ninety minute gap if I were doing a local journey in South Yorkshire - it's not worth it
The bus service from Sheffield to Doncaster (X78) used to be every ten minutes - it's been cut back to every twenty minutes but at least First seem to be delivering that timetable - it's not great but I'd rather based my journeys around a reliable twenty minute service than head out expecting a bus every ten/fifteen minutes and then find multiple journeys cancelled - it only takes a couple of bad experiences like this for people to give up on public transport - "once bitten, twice shy" etc
I suppose they are scared to say "this irregular line will be abandoned for the next six months, because we don't have enough staff/stock" and would rather give the impression that they are trying to run everything (even thought why clearly can't)
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