Problem today on SWML 06/06/24

[DerekC]

Am travelling from Crewkerne to Alton this afternoon but realtime trains is showing lots of disruption. Problem seems to be between Woking and Basingstoke. Any clues as to how long it might go on?

 

[jfollows]

From https://www.journeycheck.com/swr/

Following a train hitting an obstruction on the line between Hook and Basingstoke all lines have now reopened.
What's Going On:
Train services running through these stations may be cancelled, delayed or revised. Disruption is expected until 18:00 06/06.
What We're Doing About It:
After being informed of a train hittng an obstruction on the track at Hook, and with support from emergency services the line has now reopened. Whilst the train service returns to normal, the following acceptance will be kept in place to help move passengers.

To help you with your journey at no any extra cost to yourself, we have ticket acceptance in place on
- Great Western Railway between Basingstoke, Reading and London Paddington
- Great Western Railway London Paddington - Exeter St David's
- Great Western Railway Salisbury - Westbury
- CrossCountry Bournemouth to Basingstoke
and
- Stagecoach South 7 Aldershot to Phoenix Green
- Stagecoach South 10 Farnborough and Fleet
- Stagecoach South 13 Basingstoke, Hook and Alton
In addition to the above acceptance, we also have replacement transport running between the following stations:
- Basingstoke
- Hook
- Winchfield
- Fleet
- Farnborough Main
- Woking

 

[DerekC]

Thanks. When I looked at the SWR main site it just said all lines were blocked. Anyway all good so far - just arrived Sherborne.

 

[setdown]

Bit of an interesting time at Soton Central this morning. 0800 to Waterloo not running. Announcements by the platform staff “don’t board the 0815, it’s very busy and you’ll have to change at Reading. Wait for the delayed 0730 which is 2 mins away, it’s direct”.

0815 departs fairly busy. The 0730 arrives a couple of minutes later. Great. New announcement: “The 0730 is now cancelled”. Not that anyone bothered to tell the guard on it, who is awaiting dispatch.

So after being told to let a train go, the suggested one is cancelled two minutes after the original announcement, as it arrives. And there’s no train to london for 50 minutes now. Great…

 

[DerekC]

From what I could gather on my trip (1L52 Crewkerne - Woking: 1A49 Woking -Alton) there were two main probl on SWML today. Train hit an object on the track at Hook around 13:00 and signalling failure in or around Bournemouth’s depot - not sure when. Woking was its usual chaos during disruption, with last minute platform change, incorrect automatic PA announcements etc.

 

[HST43257]

SWR delays continued this evening, first out of Waterloo during peak time. I was caught up in the 1700-1745 timeframe in London, initially planning to get the 1705 to Southampton, but eventually getting a less delayed 1735. However that was short formed so we couldn’t split the Weymouth fast and the Poole slow - so what do they do? They cancel the Poole slow! And what do they do for the next hour or two? Keep cancelling the Poole slows! So there I was at Brockenhurst (thanks to an extra stop), hoping to clear the Lymington branch and the route between Soton and Bournemouth - no stoppers for 1.5ish hours at least towards Bournemouth, and the Lymington branch had all trains cancelled, so I finally got an XC away, so I must try again another day.

I don’t know the ins and outs of the constant delays and cancellations in the Southampton, but it seems to me that the SWR peak time splitting arrangement is unsustainable for such an unreliable service. Given they ended up cancelling all the slow portions, surely they should have combined the calling points of the 2 portions?

 

[pompeyfan]

The nail in the coffin for recovery was a trespasser and emergency switch off at Christchurch around 1730. Poor day all round. Not good for the fare paying passengers or the staff.

 

[swt_passenger]

I don’t know the ins and outs of the constant delays and cancellations in the Southampton, but it seems to me that the SWR peak time splitting arrangement is unsustainable for such an unreliable service. Given they ended up cancelling all the slow portions, surely they should have combined the calling points of the 2 portions?

Well it’s been running quite reliably for 20 years or more that I know of. Yes it was obviously wrecked yesterday due to other reasons but that doesn’t make it unsustainable…

 

[DerekC]

One thing I noticed at Woking this afternoon is that whatever system drives the platform displays can’t tell which of two trains approaching on different tracks is going to arrive first. This was on platform 5 (down slow) when an Exeter train was approaching on the down fast alongside a Portsmouth via Basingstoke train on the down slow. Platform 4 (down fast) was being used for an up service at the time so the Exeter was diverted to 5. This had been planned about 20 minutes before as a platform alteration so both trains were shown on the Platform 5 display and until both were approaching the last signal before the platform the order was correct (i.e as the signaller had set the route up) with the Exeter first. However as the Exeter crossed to the down slow, the Portsmouth being held at the signal, the display changed to show the Portsmouth arriving first, with the automatic announcement made accordingly. Result some confused passengers, although the fact that the train came down the platform slowly with “Exeter St Davids” on the front helped!

I appreciate that predicting arrival sequence isn’t simple when you have more than one approach and decisions about priority being made by the signaller but I can’t work out why the system changed its mind having got it right to start with.

PS - apart from that, a much better day on SWML.

Edit - NB This post copied to “Interesting platform changes at Woking“ as it fits much better there