Specifying additional connection time - how should this work?

[py_megapixel]

You mean people who should be requesting additional time to change in their journey planner?

Not a critique specifically of the quoted post. This sort of thing is said quite often on this forum, and it does make sense. But I'm not sure it's particularly helpful, because IMO the current facilities to do it are really quite poor.

Trainline, which is used by a huge number of passengers, doesn't seem to have this feature at all.

I had a look at a random selection of TOC websites, which many passengers will also be using, and could find only one that has it - Cross Country. But theirs is so inflexible as to make it almost useless - you can only enter extra time in 30-minute increments, and it applies to every interchange station in your journey.

You could plan your journey on the National Rail Enquiries website and then click through to a TOC to buy. NRE has exactly the same lack of granularity as XC, but making matters worse it's buried under "More Options" and seems slightly broken (I selected "2 hours extra" and it was happy to give me connections of shorter than 2 hours in total). Also when I tried this for a few journeys, the TOC website I was redirected to threw an error or just redirected me back to its search page so it was impossible to actually buy the ticket.

The only journey planners I have found that have a vaguely decent option for this are most of the Trainsplit-based sites (but not Realtime Trains for some reason, the function is completely missing from there). You can enter any number of minutes you like, for either the whole journey or for specific stations, and it seems to work.

I wonder if the RDG should require ticket sellers to have a usable (for some definition) "allow extra time" feature? It is arguably quite an important accessibility feature.

 

[cav1975]

The feature on the forum’s site works well. I regularly use it to give extra time at Victoria when booking a Clapham Junction to Rainham Kent advance single.

 

[SaltAndVinegar]

GWR have... or... had... an "Accessible Booking Tool" which let you do this. It doesn't appear to be available, despite there being links to it on their website... not very 'accessible'!

TrainSplit, TicketySplit, RailUK Forums (all use the same back-end technology) let you specify extra time at specific points.

I regularly use it to give extra time at Victoria when booking a Clapham Junction to Rainham Kent advance single.

I strongly suspect you'd be able to catch a slightly earlier connecting service from CLJ regardless of having it on your itinerary. If it's restricted by SA, it's "Only valid on booked train and connecting services only". The mandatory leg on those advances is with Southeastern. Connecting services with Southern.

 

[Haywain]

TrainSplit, TicketySplit, RailUK Forums (all use the same back-end technology) let you specify extra time at specific points.

Given their share of the overall rail ticketing business they cannot be regarded as mainstream, much as I like the options presented.

 

[Plagiomnium]

I used to make journeys with a cross-London connection where I would walk between the stations, and journey planners (I'd use TOC websites and/or NRE) wouldn't give enough time for the connection because they assumed I'd take the tube. I would just book the legs separately - I don't think I had any idea there was a way to specify more connection time for a through itinerary. Of course I was pretty ignorant about how ticketing worked, but lots of non-expert passengers probably are, so I definitely think it should be made more available and prominent.

 

[befated]

Arguably the default connection times should be very generous, with a ‘shorter connection times’ option available for power users (who, unlike the less confident rail user, will know to look for it in advanced settings).

 

[blimmo]

Arguably the default connection times should be very generous, with a ‘shorter connection times’ option available for power users (who, unlike the less confident rail user, will know to look for it in advanced settings).

As long as I can buy advances with the shorter connection times this sounds sensible to me. Perhaps we can call the long ones default connection times and the shorter ones minimum connection times.

 

[Coleridge]

Arguably the default connection times should be very generous, with a ‘shorter connection times’ option available for power users (who, unlike the less confident rail user, will know to look for it in advanced settings).

I think the default connection time should be the minimum connection time for that station. After all, that's the whole point of the minimum connection time.