Overcrowding during Easter

[robert thomas]

The positive on Saturday was Northern were running a Manchester to Hope service, so that would likely have still encouraged the walkers to get out but probably put people off making non-essential travel to Sheffield.

It made for an amusing annoucement at Piccadilly yesterday. "Any passengers for Hope should make their way to platform 3 now as this service will soon be departing"



I noticed the Stalybridge to Huddersfield was open yesterday. It had been closed previous weekends and will be closed subsequent weekends. That may have related to Hope to Sheffield being closed yesterday, allowing a slower Manchester to Sheffield service to run via Huddersfield. I'm not sure it was any quicker than a replacement bus but at least the ones that ran would have been a train.

Quite a number of walkers and 'ale enthusiasts' took advantage of the Stalybridge to Huddersfield being open.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 9 Apr 2023 ==



English services should not be under the control of Welsh politicans. I would actually say only the South Wales locals should actually be part of a devolved franchise. The North Wales services have not improved as the result of them moving from the North West franchise to the Wales franchise.

How is this any different from some Welsh services -GWR ,Avanti & Cross Country- being under the control of Westminster Politicians?

 

[northwichcat]

There’s been a strange obsession with leisure ever since Covid. The country is doing really well as a result…

It's not that strange. People have finally woken up to the fact that exercise in the countryside can help both prevent and reduce physical and mental health issues. A 5 mile walk around a large town or city doesn't have the same positive impact as a day trip to the countryside.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 9 Apr 2023 ==

How is this any different from some Welsh services -GWR ,Avanti & Cross Country- being under the control of Westminster Politicians?

Do the Welsh voters not vote on who they want to be their MP in Westminster? Who represents the needs of people in Cheshire, Shropshire, Herefordshire, Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester, Liverpool etc. in The Senedd?

 

[yorksrob]

These services are the absolute bare essentials. No one has yet produced an argument for why transport should be considered the same, except for “I want to use it for my leisure requirements”.

There’s been a strange obsession with leisure ever since Covid. The country is doing really well as a result…

Leisure is probably one of the few things keeping the economy going at the moment.

From my own personal experience, having spent months stuck in the house working, I certainly have much less tolerance for hanging around at home.

 

[duncanp]

Even in my own case, as someone who absolutely despises Christmas (*) and is only too happy to work most of it, I object to the idea of working Christmas Day simply to ferry arrogant ungrateful types around.

I think it is quite unfair to suggest that everyone who wants to travel on Christmas Day is "...arrogant and ungrateful..."

 

[northwichcat]

I think it is quite unfair to suggest that everyone who wants to travel on Christmas Day is "...arrogant and ungrateful..."

Agreed. The only public transport service I've heard of operating on 25 December are the ones serving Merseyside hospitals. I mean how dare people want to visit others who have to spend Christmas in hospital and shame on the drivers who agree to work on 25 December to provide that service!

 

[43066]

It’s something of a misnomer that there’s loads of people lining up to work Christmas. Just from my own observations, the first thing most people do when they look at their shifts for the year is to see what they will be doing at Christmas, and this equally applies to those who don’t officially celebrate it. This doesn’t just apply to Christmas Day and Boxing Day either, there’s plenty of people who expect to have the whole festive period off, and a good number of people who will achieve that come what may, even if it means going sick.

Even in my own case, as someone who absolutely despises Christmas (*) and is only too happy to work most of it, I object to the idea of working Christmas Day simply to ferry arrogant ungrateful types around.

(* and who despises it that little bit more with every year that passes, because of the way the whole festive period increasingly seems to bring out the worst in people).

Absolutely. And I’d bet my bottom dollar that most of those complaining wouldn’t countenance working Christmas themselves, and are currently enjoying the long Easter weekend!

 

[bramling]

Agreed. The only public transport service I've heard of operating on 25 December are the ones serving Merseyside hospitals. I mean how dare people want to visit others who have to spend Christmas in hospital and shame on the drivers who agree to work on 25 December to provide that service!

Are there not 364 other days to do these sorts of things?

 

[duncanp]

Agreed. The only public transport service I've heard of operating on 25 December are the ones serving Merseyside hospitals. I mean how dare people want to visit others who have to spend Christmas in hospital and shame on the drivers who agree to work on 25 December to provide that service!

Lothian Buses in Edinburgh provide one of the most comprehensive Christmas Day bus services in the UK, with services operating from about 9am to roughly 10pm. THis has been the case for many years, even when I lived there during the 1980s.

Presumably they do this because they feel there is sufficient demand to make it worthwile, and there are enough drivers who are willing to work on that day.

Edinburgh can't be that different from other towns and cities in the UK, so if there is a demand for Christmas Day travel in Edinburgh, why not in other cities?

To say that people who want to travel on Christmas Day are "...arrogant and ungrateful..." is insulting, and bordering on the gratuitously offensive.

 

[northwichcat]

Are there not 364 other days to do these sorts of things?

It sounds like you're very strongly against people putting others before themselves at Christmas. I think you've just posted one of the most arrogant things I've ever heard!

 

[bramling]

It sounds like you're very strongly against people putting others before themselves at Christmas. I think you've just posted one of the most arrogant things I've ever heard!

I’m merely absolutely sick of the rather hypocritical attitude frequently seen, which boils down to the expectation of *others* working in order to provide a service for people who would never consider working such days *themselves*.

Personally, I’d be only too happy not to have Christmas at all. Then everyone can have a normal service on the 25th and 26th December, albeit as normal working days.

 

[Wolfie]

It sounds like you're very strongly against people putting others before themselves at Christmas. I think you've just posted one of the most arrogant things I've ever heard!

Whereas as you seem to be demanding that others do so for you, your family and others in a similar situation. Who exactly is being entitled and arrogant?

 

[12LDA28C]

Time them for relatively quiet weekends? October, early November, January, February and March (assuming Easter is not in March) and, if absolutely necessary, non-bank-holiday weekends in April, May and September.

I'd be interested to see stats to see if the incidence of engineering work on busy weekends (i.e. bank holiday weekends and all weekends June-Aug) has increased since the 90s. I swear it has, though have no hard evidence to back this up. It also seems to be the case that weekday engineering work (obviously more disruptive than the weekend) has increased in incidence.

Just a wild guess, but rather more work can get done during possessions over a 4-day Easter BH weekend than during a normal 2-day weekend, which might have a bearing on why Easter is targeted.

 

[43066]

Just a wild guess, but rather more work can get done during possessions over a 4-day Easter BH weekend than during a normal 2-day weekend, which might have a bearing on why Easter is targeted.

Indeed. Hence why they will often impose long blocks over the Christmas week and august bank holiday. That’s arguably better than having many more disrupted weekends throughout the year.

 

[yorksrob]

Well, it will be interesting to see how LNER's experimentation with a mid-week blockade goes.

 

[The Planner]

Well, it will be interesting to see how LNER's experimentation with a mid-week blockade goes.

Blockades with a diversionary route are rarely an issue providing a decent diversionary service can be ran, the Trent Valley was closed for a week last year and there is another one this summer. Old Oak Common will have a good few week long blocks over the next few years as well. Though anecdotally I have heard that Carstairs hasn't fared brilliantly for freight.

 

[yorksrob]

Blockades with a diversionary route are rarely an issue providing a decent diversionary service can be ran, the Trent Valley was closed for a week last year and there is another one this summer. Old Oak Common will have a good few week long blocks over the next few years as well. Though anecdotally I have heard that Carstairs hasn't fared brilliantly for freight.

I hope it does work. My weekend leisure journeys tend to be longer and more lucrative for the railway than the commute.

 

[zwk500]

Blockades with a diversionary route are rarely an issue providing a decent diversionary service can be ran, the Trent Valley was closed for a week last year and there is another one this summer. Old Oak Common will have a good few week long blocks over the next few years as well. Though anecdotally I have heard that Carstairs hasn't fared brilliantly for freight.

Out of interest, what was the freight plan, everything via Edinburgh? What did they do about the container trains?

 

[philosopher]

It’s something of a misnomer that there’s loads of people lining up to work Christmas. Just from my own observations, the first thing most people do when they look at their shifts for the year is to see what they will be doing at Christmas, and this equally applies to those who don’t officially celebrate it. This doesn’t just apply to Christmas Day and Boxing Day either, there’s plenty of people who expect to have the whole festive period off, and a good number of people who will achieve that come what may, even if it means going sick.

Even in my own case, as someone who absolutely despises Christmas (*) and is only too happy to work most of it, I object to the idea of working Christmas Day simply to ferry arrogant ungrateful types around.

We do seem to be getting off topic here, but not everyone has a car and you do have to realise those without a car already have a much harder time getting around. Those with cars can pretty much go anywhere within the UK they want 24 / 7. Those without cars generally can’t do this, with their journeys restricted to times when trains or buses are running. Most non car driver rail passengers probably already do work round engineering work as much as possible, for example if I am going on a long walk in the country I pick a destination that is not impacted by engineering works for that day. Those with a car on the other hand can travel when they like.

Some of those without cars may have decided have to trade convenience for generally lower travel costs, but for others there may be financial or medical reasons why they can’t drive. I do agree those without cars have to accept some loss of convenience, but I do think as much as possible those without cars should not be deprived of making trips that those with cars can take and that includes leisure as well as work trips. If the railways are going prioritise commuters or freight then alternative modes of transport should be improved to allow those without cars to undertake certain leisure journeys.

 

[Haywain]

I do think as much as possible those without cars should not be deprived of making trips that those with cars can take

This already happens by the simple fact that railways (and bus services) do not go everywhere that roads go.

 

[The Planner]

Out of interest, what was the freight plan, everything via Edinburgh? What did they do about the container trains?

ECML, fair few rejected apparently. We aren't at the point where flexing passenger trains greatly to allow freight paths is treated as it could be.

 

[zwk500]

If the railways are going prioritise commuters or freight then alternative modes of transport should be improved to allow those without cars to undertake certain leisure journeys.

This is starting to delve into the much wider topic of 'post-covid public transport policy in GB' or something like it.

The fundamentals of it are that the railway cannot be open everywhere, every time, for every person. It must close at some time, and therefore the judgement is that by using public holidays the overall impact on people is lower than it might otherwise be. Where other methods are appropriate they are used - 9-day Blockades being an increasingly regular occurrence, but the simple fact of the matter is that the WCML can't be closed for too long because it carries such a substantial volume of traffic it's impossible to accommodate it on other lines without disruption.
As we're still not really far enough away from COVID to know how travel patterns have really been affected, and I agree with others that there should be close-following reviews of this for the next few years to see whether there are less disruptive opportunities, but the nature of major blocks means you need a 2 or 3 year lead time to book all the people, equipment and materials to be in the right place and so any changes are going to take time to filter through. And that lead time can't be easily reduced, especially where specialist pieces or large numbers of equipment are required.

 

[hkstudent]

I hope it does work. My weekend leisure journeys tend to be longer and more lucrative for the railway than the commute.

Yes but on another side off peak leisure tickets are comparatively cheap, compare to the expensive Anytime of course.
If the railway want to focus on ob leisure travel, would they need to push up the price to cover the cost?

 

[Bikeman78]

In the old days, railways used to keep spare stock precisely to handle peak demand.

Should people have to spend large amounts of money to stand because this mean, tight-fisted, penny-pinching, skinflint Government is dictating to the railway industry that they have to cut costs?

The split into different TOCs hasn't helped. Back in the day, the NSE mark 1s that did rush hour runs on weekdays could run to Aberystwyth or Pwllheli at the weekend. I think the class 310s used to run to various strange places as well. There will be other examples.

 

[TheBigD]

Blockades with a diversionary route are rarely an issue providing a decent diversionary service can be ran, the Trent Valley was closed for a week last year and there is another one this summer. Old Oak Common will have a good few week long blocks over the next few years as well. Though anecdotally I have heard that Carstairs hasn't fared brilliantly for freight.

I'll add to that that the trains on the alternative routes have sufficient capacity. No point sending punters to St Pancras (for example) if you are only operating toy size trains (5 car 222s).

As for the freight, in my area the diverted Felixstowe to Coatbridge was booked in to loops that were already occupied by other freights.

 

[nw1]

Railways should be run professionally and cost effectively. There should be very little unnecessary slack or surplus stock.

A "professionally run" railway is one which can cope with peaks in demand, not one run with insufficent stock which causes people to have to stand when they have paid significant amounts of money for the ticket.

"Professional" means, to me, running a high-quality service, and if this means spending extra money on contingency planning so be it.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 9 Apr 2023 ==

The split into different TOCs hasn't helped. Back in the day, the NSE mark 1s that did rush hour runs on weekdays could run to Aberystwyth or Pwllheli at the weekend. I think the class 310s used to run to various strange places as well. There will be other examples.

I agree, I never got my head round why it was seen as a good idea to adopt this (to me) monumentally stupid and fragmented approach to privatisation. I actually prefer nationalisation (or rather I did, but with this Government I'm now having second thoughts...), but I would have been much happier with a single private company running the railways. Or at the very least, a very small number of TOCs approximating to NSE plus the old Regions.

 

[JonathanH]

A "professionally run" railway is one which can cope with peaks in demand, not one run with insufficent stock which causes people to have to stand when they have paid significant amounts of money for the ticket.

No railway, even one with the most professional set up imaginable, can cope with a sudden influx of passengers all wanting to travel at the same time. At some point, the crowds at St Pancras and Marylebone will have cleared, with passengers being professionally managed onto the available trains.

 

[nw1]

No railway, even one with the most professional set up imaginable, can cope with a sudden influx of passengers all wanting to travel at the same time. At some point, the crowds at St Pancras and Marylebone will have cleared, with passengers being professionally managed onto the available trains.

I was specifically replying to @Robertj21a's assertion that "professional" means "not having slack in the fleet" when to my mind it would be the opposite. I wasn't speaking about the specific case of what's going on this weekend, which is for various reasons unusual. I think it's fair to tolerate some overcrowding on this specific weekend, as it happens (due to the Oxford bridge situation) but was more arguing the general point that railways should provide enough stock to satisfy "normal" peaks in demand.

 

[JonathanH]

I was specifically replying to @Robertj21a's assertion that "professional" means "not having slack in the fleet" when to my mind it would be the opposite.

But, clearly being professional is exactly running an efficient railway that doesn't spend money over providing which ultimately costs money, whether it is the taxpayer, or passengers. It is a balance to be struck.

 

[nw1]

But, clearly being professional is exactly running an efficient railway that doesn't spend money over providing which ultimately costs money, whether it is the taxpayer, or passengers. It is a balance to be struck.

I think the balance has moved in the wrong direction post-Covid in particular though.

I would say the correct balance is "provide enough seats to cope with normal peaks in demand". Exceptional situations such as the unsafe Oxford bridge are exceptional circumstances and should not require extra stock to cover for.

It's particularly galling when quite large numbers of newish EMUs have been withdrawn in recent years. This sort of thing I really strongly object to. And when politicians try to make the railway's job difficult by imposing demands for cost-savings.

 

[zwk500]

"Professional" means, to me, running a high-quality service, and if this means spending extra money on contingency planning so be it.

Professional means running the railway as effectively as possible, and having large amounts of stock laid up for 1 or 2 times a year peaks is not an effective method of running things. It's not like the old Mk1s that could sit in a siding for 6 months and then be brought out with barely an oiling to be put into service. Modern trains need to be running regularly to keep them running smoothly, so having spare sets would lead to complex allocation of units to make sure they stay in traffic.

The railway isn't the only one that plans for the normal peaks plus a little bit more, the Motorways and Airports and Seaports also regularly fall over on bank holidays yet very few people suggest we should double the size of the port of Dover for the Easter weekend, or that we should add lanes to every motorway purely for the Christmas and Easter bank holidays.