Especially because the ferries have been cancelled!
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Storm Amy Travel Disruption (03/10 onwards)
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Yes, for that reason, and because it will be roughly 100mph gusts on the summit. Full refund from Calmac though, although the Craignure bunkhouse are lying low.......
1. Each update to the forecast here has increased the windspeed.
2. The maximum now forecast here is 75mph which is extreme even for Oban - most storms peak at 55-65.
3. The peak coincides with the front coming through at 18.00 - I think it's known as a line squall as the wind veers
4. After moderating overnight it increases tomorrow morning but only into the 40-50s. However it's then blowing from the NW so it may particularly affect areas such as Cheshire.
That bunkhouse may be full of people waiting to leave the island
2. The maximum now forecast here is 75mph which is extreme even for Oban - most storms peak at 55-65.
3. The peak coincides with the front coming through at 18.00 - I think it's known as a line squall as the wind veers
4. After moderating overnight it increases tomorrow morning but only into the 40-50s. However it's then blowing from the NW so it may particularly affect areas such as Cheshire.
That bunkhouse may be full of people waiting to leave the island
If I were on my last Corbett I think I'd call in sick to work, find somewhere to curl up, and finish it the next day!
That is a rather misleading one-line summary.
The Perth-Dundee-Aberdeen is planned to remain open.
That's a possibility, but would that stop them answering their phone?
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
They could be brought down in advance of the forecast weather and stay in hotels as commercial business might.
They could also be working in advance of the forecast weather, and/or unwilling to work overtime.
And pay the train drivers for two shifts while working one? Also, I'd love to see how you would be getting that past the reps.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
And therein lies the problem with the adversarial working culture of the railways. With expenses paid in a decent hotel plus overtime pay I'd consider it a nice free holiday and a change of scenery.
I disagree.
Firstly, if you are driving today, you are needed today. Therefore to get you transported somewhere else (which for drivers counts as working time, and therefore has to be within the maximum turn length and Hidden regulations) means taking you off shift today.
Secondly, whilst there may well be volunteers to do as you suggest, recent experience shows take up is likely to be low at the short notice weather warnings imply. That’s nothing to do with an adversarial culture (which is by no means everywhere), but wuite a lot do to with the principle that many drivers simply don’t want / need to work additional hours. Especislly if it involves time away from home and familiy at short notice.
QueensCurve
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Peter D Stirling?
Banham7
Member
Line is currently flooded at Lockerbie, 1S61 has been at a stand outside the station for roughly 20 minutes now.
bramling
Veteran Member
Same for my rowing plans!
Does always surprise me how people don’t seem particularly bothered going out in their cars during wind storms. Every time there’s a more significant named storm, it’s only a matter of time before there’s unfortunately a news headline along the line of “person killed in their car as a result of storm”. I’d rather take my chances in a train, at reduced speed of course.
dk1
Veteran Member
That’s not how ASLEF would look at it if it’s not in local agreements. Then you’d have the problem of how is it shared fairly if any particular driver is going to gain over and above from working these unofficial turns. It’s far more complex than many think.
bramling
Veteran Member
That just isn’t going to happen, and I’d question if it’s really good value for the taxpayer / farepayer.
And I don’t really see why you’d need to do it. If necessary just run shuttle services Preston-Carlisle and Glasgow-Carlisle. Not ideal, but keeps people moving where it’s viable to do so.
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Yes why would you want to do it to be potentially stuck somewhere if things go wrong? Sure some might do it if the price was right, but is that really good value to the taxpayer / farepayer? And, like you say, it’s counter-productive if you now have a load of uncovered shifts on the days either side.
Rail companies often get updates a few hours before the public facing sites.
dk1
Veteran Member
From my experience cost to the tax and fare payer rarely comes into the equation when it comes to keeping the service going. Permission doesn’t need to be granted from any other than a senior operating manager.
With regards to a lot of conversation in this thread, whilst weather forecasting - and real time weather data - has come up on leaps and bounds in the 21st century it is also not perfect.
In fact weather forecasting is one of the most difficult calculations to do requiring many supercomputers for the MetOffice. The fact that it is as accurate as it is, is quite impressive really.
If the forecast changes at short notice, it is sometimes hard - not impossible - for TOCs to reverse course. Much like if you’d planned to go for a hike, you might have made alternative plans and even if it was now available, you are likely to not go for that hike now.
You can actually cause more confusion in terms of passenger information that way. So it’s a balancing act between flexibility of the train service and accuracy of passenger information. Increasingly the latter has been preferred to give consistency and clarity about what the planned train service will be even if that means quite disrupted, maybe above what could have run in a perfect world. Again you have the to deal with the small element of unpredictability on what exactly the weather will be across routes / areas as rarely is it bang on or as neat as any given forecast.
But saying that we could pretty much rinse and repeat every storm thread every month because the same conversations happen time and time again with both ‘sides’ explaining why things work the way they do.
In fact weather forecasting is one of the most difficult calculations to do requiring many supercomputers for the MetOffice. The fact that it is as accurate as it is, is quite impressive really.
If the forecast changes at short notice, it is sometimes hard - not impossible - for TOCs to reverse course. Much like if you’d planned to go for a hike, you might have made alternative plans and even if it was now available, you are likely to not go for that hike now.
You can actually cause more confusion in terms of passenger information that way. So it’s a balancing act between flexibility of the train service and accuracy of passenger information. Increasingly the latter has been preferred to give consistency and clarity about what the planned train service will be even if that means quite disrupted, maybe above what could have run in a perfect world. Again you have the to deal with the small element of unpredictability on what exactly the weather will be across routes / areas as rarely is it bang on or as neat as any given forecast.
But saying that we could pretty much rinse and repeat every storm thread every month because the same conversations happen time and time again with both ‘sides’ explaining why things work the way they do.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
That is exactly what I mean. In other industries, the customer comes first.
Boilinthebag
Member
Just being stopped on an Avanti north of Lockerbie due to report of flooding. All the watercourses have been in flood as we pass over them.
A lovely change of scenery to Carlisle? Some people like to be in their own home with their family ant night. And how is it a “nice free holiday”? They’re required there for work in your plan!
Many will simply not want to do the overtime, especially in severe weather where the risk of disruption is higher and is in no way “adversarial”.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
It's a lovely little city.
You can enjoy your downtime, you don't work 24/7.
Every man has his price.
The thing that's adversarial is the culture that leads to stuff like the "no doing a route twice in one day" being immutable. In normal operations this is fine, as on most routes there's only time for one return trip in a day anyway, but a bit of flexibility in emergency situations makes a lot of sense.
Okay but these are Preston crew presumably? So probably not as exciting as you make it out to be!
And you could enjoy your downtime at home…with all your home comforts and/or family rather than in some cheap Premier Inn and then getting up at the crack of dawn to start running some shuttles. There’s a lot of logistics we’ve not even touched on.
And as for “every man has his price” well I’ll ignore the mildly sexist remark as it is a known quote, but increasingly this is not the case. The majority of people won’t do overtime regardless and some probably would take the opportunity. But it’s pretty disruptive, so many would go “Nah, thanks” and it would then add a heap of cost onto the railway (taxpayer) to run this service with the overtime, hotel/taxi costs etc. In certain circumstances it is cheaper to reduce particularly discretionary travel.
You're at the wind up surely? A night away from the wife and kids to stay in the cheapest Travelodge room the railway can find as a "free holiday" in the "lovely little city" of Carlisle in a storm, all so I can go to work and do a 18 hour shift because I'm stranded when the line shuts because a tree comes down or the line or it's flooded? Thanks but no thanks. It's nothing to do with the unions, just not something I would ever consider doing. I joined the railway so I wouldn't have to suffer and put up with crap terms and conditions any more.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
It is indeed a quote; misquoting it would just sound silly. Clearly it applies to women too.
Keep upping the figure until enough bite.
Taking the cheaper option when this provides particularly poor customer service is seldom the right choice. I will take this as further confirmation regarding the point made above that the customer is not the priority on the railway. Its unique position of being protected by subsidy allows this situation to persist. OK, to be fair, the customer's experience isn't the priority on Ryanair either, but at least it is cheap, an accusation that cannot be levelled at Avanti.
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Who mentioned cheap Travelodges? That's again the adversarial culture - if you are wanting to scratch backs, as it were, you offer a decent quality hotel and a meal in a quality restaurant, the costs of which are a pittance compared to changing a light bulb on a station in "railway inflation" terms.
(Notwithstanding that while I don't like Travelodges generally I do really like the Carlisle one, it's in a former telephone exchange with big rooms with high ceilings and massive windows - very much not the norm!)
This all just typifies the "can't do" attitude that pervades the railway, though, and it's not going to get any better under GBR as I'm sure the "cheminot" attitude will grow once it effectively reverts to being part of the Government. I'll leave it there as we are clearly not going to agree (and later on there will probably be actual disruption to post about in this thread rather than theorising about it), but in closing I really do think Avanti need to do much, much better.
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What a rare treat , the opportunity to potentially get stranded from your family and operate on a day that you are hihgly likely going to end up doing some sort of degraded working or get stranded on a train in the middle of nowhere.
I think its a fallacy that you are going to just throw a bit of money at the problem and a few people will jump at the chance to do this.
People already on shift are likely to be uninterested in this when the alternative is a relatively easy day in comparrison , and people that are rest day aren't going to jump at the chance to do this when theres already enough overtime and RDW going about doing better stuff .
With reagards the point about customer service , providing inconsistent service during times like this is also going to be pretty poor customer service , what about when the next time there is a major storm its close to the christmas period so you can't even with all the money in the world recruit people to stay away from family and run these shuttles . But customers expect it cos you did it next time.
I think its a fallacy that you are going to just throw a bit of money at the problem and a few people will jump at the chance to do this.
People already on shift are likely to be uninterested in this when the alternative is a relatively easy day in comparrison , and people that are rest day aren't going to jump at the chance to do this when theres already enough overtime and RDW going about doing better stuff .
With reagards the point about customer service , providing inconsistent service during times like this is also going to be pretty poor customer service , what about when the next time there is a major storm its close to the christmas period so you can't even with all the money in the world recruit people to stay away from family and run these shuttles . But customers expect it cos you did it next time.
Don't really know what you mean by adversarial culture (I think you mean it as a swipe at the union but not sure, would welcome an explanation!) but judging from my experience of railway training, the budget for hotels really doesn't stretch far and you would end up in the cheapest dump they could get away with that isn't a homeless hostel. Being away from home isn't a treat, it's a pain in the behind. So again it's a no thanks from me.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Sorry, last post on this subject but I should clarify. I mean the way the approach to human resources is a constant battle between Unions and employers rather than a collaborative "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" which is much better. This comes from both sides; it's not specifically an anti Union post.
bramling
Veteran Member
This is stretching credibility a bit far. Yes Carlisle is nice, but I’m not sure being there for work purposes in the middle of a significant storm is a lovely experience. Yes some people would do it for a price, probably a quite high one, but it’s hardly going to be mainstream.
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