Slack is good

[Diplodicus]

I read the occasional disparaging forum comments on TOCs that "pad" their timetables. Indeed, I remember my initial puzzlement when my WCML journey was late all the way from Stafford through M Keynes only to arrive early into Euston.

However, I have decided that I would prefer my train journeys to be on time even if a few minutes longer. After all, the elapsed time from A to B is only a part of each overall journey time.

The other benefits for a bit of slack would be to make the always stressful process of changing trains en route a little bit less so.

Why not?

 

[yorkie]

I read the occasional disparaging forum comments on TOCs that "pad" their timetables. Indeed, I remember my initial puzzlement when my WCML journey was late all the way from Stafford through M Keynes only to arrive early into Euston.

However, I have decided that I would prefer my train journeys to be on time even if a few minutes longer. After all, the elapsed time from A to B is only a part of each overall journey time.[/quote]
That's your opinion and you're entitled to it, but I disagree.

The East Coast Main Line is popular because it offers fast journey times, that is what attracts people to the service.

The other benefits for a bit of slack would be to make the always stressful process of changing trains en route a little bit less so.

Why not?

I don't see how this is stressful; passengers are not penalised for missed connections. On the contrary; they are compensated where appropriate.

If the arrival time is crucial then rather than the operators pad timetables more, passengers should take earlier trains. Some booking engines allow for extra time to be specified for changes.

 

[MarkyT]

I don't see how this is stressful; passengers are not penalised for missed connections. On the contrary; they are compensated where appropriate. If the arrival time is crucial then rather than the operators pad timetables more, passengers should take earlier trains.

It's not trivial to have to add an extra hour to your overall personal journey to achieve that reliability in some cases, especially if the overall journey time is little more than that in the first place.

The important thing about 'padding' is that it is added intelligently to allow recovery not just to achieve a performance regime target at the final station. Rolling it all up between the last two stations is particularly infuriating as on an Intercity route, a train can run 20 minutes late throughout it's journey missing onward connections at every intermediate station then use all the padding in the last leg allowing it to still come in under 10 late at the final station. Thus all that inconvenience and hassle for the interchanging passengers goes completely unrecognised.

Scheduling longer station dwells at certain major stations en-route is another technique and often also suits the larger numbers boarding and alighting at larger towns and cities. This can become a constraint on line headway which would become dominated by such a long platforms reoccupation time. Pairs of platforms for each line as at Reading now and proposed for Croydon can provide the capacity for this technique.

 

[hassaanhc]

The important thing about 'padding' is that it is added intelligently to allow recovery not just to achieve a performance regime target at the final station. Rolling it all up between the last two stations is particularly infuriating as on an Intercity route, a train can run 20 minutes late throughout it's journey missing onward connections at every intermediate station then use all the padding in the last leg allowing it to still come in under 10 late at the final station. Thus all that inconvenience and hassle for the interchanging passengers goes completely unrecognised.

Chiltern Railways add roughly 5 minutes to the WTT arrival times at any terminus, which on one particular evening I was around Marylebone recently, allowed most trains to meet PPM when they would have failed it if the PTT and WTT times were the same. At least the "less popular" or "less reliable" TOCs don't resort to blanket +5 on WTT timings...

 

[Diplodicus]

I wasn't thinking so much about adding time to the final station time. Adding a little wait at each station gives operating staff a little more room for manoeuvre.

Missing a connection often involves penalties although not always financial. Sitting on a freezing cold Ely station having just missed the connection to Kings Lynn feels like a penalty to me.

 

[306024]

I wasn't thinking so much about adding time to the final station time. Adding a little wait at each station gives operating staff a little more room for manoeuvre.

Missing a connection often involves penalties although not always financial. Sitting on a freezing cold Ely station having just missed the connection to Kings Lynn feels like a penalty to me.

As more and more passengers are travelling by train these days, station dwell times have increasingly struggled to cope. In some cases trains can only keep time if the recovery time in the schedule is not used up by temporary speed restrictions.

Of course add extra time into a schedule and it wakes up the 'it was quicker in steam days' brigade, and capacity wise it isn't always possible.

As for an hour on Ely station waiting for the next Lynn, a trip to The Cutter is your best bet, and you can still watch the trains, although there is the financial penalty of the price of a pint.

 

[Hadders]

As for an hour on Ely station waiting for the next Lynn, a trip to The Cutter is your best bet, and you can still watch the trains, although there is the financial penalty of the price of a pint.

Which in many cases could be off-set by a delay repay claim!

 

[chorleyjeff]

As for an hour on Ely station waiting for the next Lynn, a trip to The Cutter is your best bet, and you can still watch the trains, although there is the financial penalty of the price of a pint.

Blimey. That is hardly the sort of response a passenger/customer would expect about how to deal with a problem caused by the service provider. Of course you must be joking but in my experience it is no joke waiting for an hour on a deserted station late on a cold windy Winter evening when it is not your fault.
For a second or two I thought I was back in the era of BR quality service but maybe that is still the mindset in some places.

 

[PHILIPE]

GWRs Night Rivieras can start up to an hour late and arrive R/T at destination.
There is so much time built in to cover Engineering Works over varying routes.

 

[306024]

Of course it's

.......no joke waiting for an hour on a deserted station late on a cold windy Winter evening when it is not your fault......

But once you find yourself in such a position it's just a case of making the best of a bad job. That wasn't any official advice by the way, just a personal tongue in cheek recommendation.

 

[Bald Rick]

As for an hour on Ely station waiting for the next Lynn, a trip to The Cutter is your best bet, and you can still watch the trains, although there is the financial penalty of the price of a pint.

That is poor advice from a professional railwayman.

An hour wait at Ely demands at least two pints in The Cutter, as you well know. And it is no penalty.

 

[6Gman]

Some station dwell times are unreasonably short.

For example, the Chester - Euston Voyagers - 2 minutes at Crewe.

This can work on a quieter service with a single set, but when it's the likes of the 1635 (Crewe 1654-56) 2 minutes is unachievable.

Train rolls in. Large numbers of passengers alight. Then even larger numbers board. Usually a double set so much passing of passengers up and down the platform looking for First or the relevant coach for their seat reservation.

General outcome is that it's past 1657 before despatch procedure can start. Departure 1658 or later - and then it needs to cross the Down Fast at some point (Crewe or Basford Hall Jn) to get onto the Up Fast.

 

[306024]

That is poor advice from a professional railwayman.

An hour wait at Ely demands at least two pints in The Cutter, as you well know. And it is no penalty.

My apologies, I am suitably embarrassed

Mind you, have you seen the prices in The Cutter, delay repay doesn't go so far there

 

[HarleyDavidson]

If they put much more padding to the Portsmouth line timetable we'll be able to use it as a darn mattress.

There's padding and then there's excessive padding and that's what the majority of the SW timetable contains, excessive padding.

I know on a Sunday if I leave Waterloo with a 1Pxx or 2Pxx, once I leave Clapham, all I need to achieve is ~70 mph and I'll arrive at Woking RT, if I want to and decide to blatt it, with one I'll arrive so early, I can key off, walk down the platform to the coffee shop & get coffee and key back on again and still be waiting 2-3' to leave, with the other I just sit outside Woking waiting for the Down Poole to clear off.

That's irritating to passengers so I keep my speed down, I just trundle along at about 70 and as I approach Woking I arrive JIT, so I get proceed aspects all the way in a smooth linear ride. Job done.

On a weekday on 1Pxx, you do need to blatt it, full linespeed all the way to Woking, it's then a 45-70 trundle to Haslemere, quick blast to Petersfield, up to 60, then shut off & let it coast all the way to Havant.

With 2Pxx it's accelerate to 80 just after New Malden, then leave there and you should get the road all the way into Woking, you can do 90 if you're later than 4', after than you have to be quite brisk to avoid picking up a TIN from the following 1Pxx.

With a 2Pxx to Southsea, you have loads of padding and someone it their wisdom, books it just 2' behind a 2Exx (Soton - Southsea) from Portcreek (Hilsea), which is always late due to SN always being late.

1Axx services from Waterloo to Alton, call at Clapham (alternate), Surbiton, West Byfleet, Woking & all shacks to Alton (Bentley alternates), they're allowed 7' to do the trip from West Byfleet to Woking! That's a 4' trip. It's done because they have to allow the 1Pxx services to overtake, as they haven't got enough platforms at Woking, well they have, it's just that the down Weymouth will possibly have to wait a minute outside (don't when I'm around, they don't see me for dust/spray!).

In the London area the 2Fxx & 2Gxx are now a complete joke, they're meant to be fast Surbiton - Wimbledon, a 6' journey if done properly, they allow us anywhere between 8-10' an average speed of just 36.6 mph, they inserted more padding in there to aid performance through the Raynes Park corridor, which it doesn't, because if you drive it properly, you'll be late. That's anywhere between 2 & 4' late because you're too close to the preceding 2Hxx/2Oxx services.

However if you leave Surbiton between 2 & 4' late, you get a clear run and still arrive at Wimbledon ON TIME! It sort of tells you that the TPU have completely screwed that up.:roll:

 

[yorkie]

Missing a connection often involves penalties although not always financial. Sitting on a freezing cold Ely station having just missed the connection to Kings Lynn feels like a penalty to me.

If more padding is allowed on the train into Ely, it may not be an official connection into the train from Ely.

Some XC services are timed for 2h 30min between their arrival at Birmimgham New Street and their departure from York, on the fast route via Doncaster, with only three intermediate stops, despite the distance being under 130 miles and speeds of up to 125mph. About a quarter of that time is spent stationary and you can end up waiting for platforms or blocking other trains from reaching their platforms so it really isn't all that great having so much padding.

 

[The Planner]

Posted this before, but XC see it as the passenger perceiving it better being stopped at a long dwell than sitting outside a station as part of being pathed out.

 

[greenline727]

In the bus industry we are measured such that ALL journeys at ALL timing points should be between 1 minute early and 5 minutes late. That's ALL the way along the route, not arrival times only.
We are not in control of any of our infrastructure, so we have to work hard at our timings to assist the drivers in maintaining them. We also build in "waiting" time at important locations along the route (which also helps in managing loadings).

I get very angry when rail planners insist in keeping times tight along the journey, and then pad the last section to meet the targets. A train planner has control over infrastructure, and knows where all other trains should be, so should be able to time effectively along every journey.

On many occasions I've missed connections along a journey, only to see that the train was "right-time" at the final station.
On the other hand (and I do only travel on SWT on Saturdays), I seldom have any problems with missed connections on their network. I seem to recall that (around) 2010 the SWT timetable was completely recast to add in "reasonable" running time, which added around 10% to an hours journey, but at that time it meant that 90-odd% of journeys achieved "actual" right time al all stations.

In summary . . . . if the train is pretty much guaranteed to be right-time along the journey, but my journey is likely to be 5 minutes longer . . . . that sounds "win-win" to me. I don't care if I could "sometimes" do the journey earlier 20 years ago . . . what I want is "right-time" all the time.

Just an opinion . . . . I'd be interested in what rail timetable planners think . . . and how much pressure they're under to time to unachievable timings. Are the "Rules of the Plan" (I believe that's the term) ever updated?

 

[edwin_m]

Are the "Rules of the Plan" (I believe that's the term) ever updated?

The term you are looking for is "Sectional Running Times". Rules of the Plan are to do with the gaps that have to be left between trains at the timetable, and are now known as Timetable Planning Rules. Network Rail is gradually working their way through the SRTs and correcting any erroneous ones, but since the relevant timetable has to be revised whenever this happens it is a slow process.

There's a good operating argument to say that our approach to padding is damaging. For example a train from the north coming through the Welwyn bottleneck 9min late is likely to delay at least one other train, but appears in the operator's performance statistics as on time if it reaches Kings Cross less than 10min behind schedule. Some of the sharper operators do appreciate the difference, and there have been some moves to improve things by focusing more on "right time" statistics than on the "within 5/10min" figures that originated with the Passengers Charter in the 90s.

There's a good case to change the system used south of London and in some other countries where the "padding" is included by extending all the SRTs along the journey rather than just adding a margin approaching stategic junctions and final destination. The problem then is that if there is a temporary speed restriction just north of Welwyn the train will have much less chance to recover.

Sometimes also the train is shown in the working timetable as arriving somewhere slightly before the time shown in the public timetable. This is a different form of padding and has the advantage that if everything is running to time (on the working times) the train should get a clear run into its platform. Otherwise, with the padding in the form of a timing margin on the approach, then if the train approaches the station on time a previous train may still be occupying its platform. The arriving train then has to wait outside the station, which wastes energy and annoys passengers but may also further delay another delayed train that is trying to get into the station at the same time.

 

[The Planner]

I get very angry when rail planners insist in keeping times tight along the journey, and then pad the last section to meet the targets. A train planner has control over infrastructure, and knows where all other trains should be, so should be able to time effectively along every journey.

And we do, if an operator wishes to put +5 in the public timetable at the end of the journey that is up to them, the working timetable is unaffected.

Just an opinion . . . . I'd be interested in what rail timetable planners think . . . and how much pressure they're under to time to unachievable timings. Are the "Rules of the Plan" (I believe that's the term) ever updated?

4 times a year. The biggest issue we have is getting SRTs changed, especially those that used to work in the past but suddenly become tight.