Strange Southern timetable

[GodAtum]

I'm confused as to why my trains are missing:

1811 Clapham Junction - Portsmouth Harbour , Bognor Regis
1814 Clapham Junction - Caterham

There are also some new trains that I have never seen before:

1812 Clapham Junction - Brighton
1815 Clapham Junction - Horsham

 

[tsr]

All Southern services via Clapham Junction are subject to extensive retiming until 31 August inclusive, in order to accommodate the numerous diversions of London Bridge services to London Victoria (and vice versa). This has been advertised for approximately 1 year and is due to the Thameslink Programme works.

The Portsmouth Harbour & Bognor Regis service you mention has been retimed to leave Clapham Junction at 1808, largely in order to call at Redhill. There is no direct equivalent to the Caterham train, because all Caterham services at that time will be running on the Down Slow line and calling at all stations.

The additional Horsham train you mention caters for passengers who would usually board a service with similar timings from London Bridge or East Croydon. The Brighton train appears to be an additional service to replace any lost capacity at that time.

 

[louis97]

Southern are running an amended timetable this week because London Bridge is closed.

 

[Minstral25]

I wish they would stop saying Diverted from London Bridge - they have completely changed the timetable and it is very confusing.

For example the Horsham service mentioned above is in the normal timings of the late evening services from Victoria and matched neither the normal peak services from Victoria (18:19 from VIC) nor the service from London Bridge (18:30) plus they have added a call at Purley.

Result lots of confused passengers (They have also changed platforms at Victoria so the service now departs from the main concourse instead of the Brighton Line platforms. Just adds to the confusion.)

To be fair FCC and Southern have been banging on about it for weeks so I am surprised so many regular commuters were confused. I'd worked out my train but thanks TfL for delaying my District Line to Victoria perfectly so I could watch it depart without me.

 

[TEW]

The works have been well advertised at London Bridge but I'm not convinced the wider impact on services across the Southern network has been advertised as well. The handful of Southern services to Guildford are not running all week but there were a lot of passengers this morning completely unaware of that, and there was no obvious information at the station that the services weren't running.

 

[GodAtum]

I knew London bridge was closed but not that it would affect my services from Clapham as that does not go to London bridge.

 

[Class377/5]

The problem seems to be that most people haven't checked the posters stating amended service because the headline states London Bridge, which is a correct thing to put. But its been put out for weeks on stations about changes to travel and check before you travel but people never do and never will.

This leaflet that Southern have been putting out for months states just changes to service, a pretty big hint that its not just London Bridge. You'd think people would check before they travel when they know there's major works going on (and not just at London Bridge either).

http://www.southernrailway.com/download/31831.8/changes-to-southern-services-23-to-31-august/

 

[87015]

The problem seems to be that most people haven't checked the posters stating amended service because the headline states London Bridge, which is a correct thing to put. But its been put out for weeks on stations about changes to travel and check before you travel but people never do and never will.

This leaflet that Southern have been putting out for months states just changes to service, a pretty big hint that its not just London Bridge. You'd think people would check before they travel when they know there's major works going on (and not just at London Bridge either).

http://www.southernrailway.com/download/31831.8/changes-to-southern-services-23-to-31-august/

Months? The first time that appeared at London Bridge was last Thursday. The white Thameslink leaflets they have been putting out for months do effectively say nothing, let alone non-London Bridge journeys. There might have a lot of comms, but most of it has been poor, vague and very bland - it still doesn't provide amended timetables despite all the pages or a list of stations where ticket acceptance is in place. Having temps giving them out who don't understand a thing and no actual rail staff doesn't really help either.

They still haven't told people about the LTP changes from 1 December when peoples trains to work cease to exist or become utterly useless and terminate at Bermondsey either.

Southerns information is always poor, they don't give anything out live (apart from twitter, which is no good unless you want to trawl through hundreds of messages and happen to know the time and start location of your trains)

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Southern had posters up at Epsom warning of these London Bridge works at least 3 - 4 months ago.

 

[higthomas]

When I was on my travels around the Southern network last week I saw lots of posters about it, and whilst at Redhill found a detailed booklet giving amended times of seemingly all Southern services out of London.
I got quite a positive impression of the information campaign.

 

[TimG]

Months? The first time that appeared at London Bridge was last Thursday. The white Thameslink leaflets they have been putting out for months do effectively say nothing, let alone non-London Bridge journeys. There might have a lot of comms, but most of it has been poor, vague and very bland - it still doesn't provide amended timetables despite all the pages or a list of stations where ticket acceptance is in place. Having temps giving them out who don't understand a thing and no actual rail staff doesn't really help either.

They still haven't told people about the LTP changes from 1 December when peoples trains to work cease to exist or become utterly useless and terminate at Bermondsey either.

Southerns information is always poor, they don't give anything out live (apart from twitter, which is no good unless you want to trawl through hundreds of messages and happen to know the time and start location of your trains)

I think they are hoping to sneak in the 2015 changes with minimum chance for people to complain. People need to know about these changes as far in advance as possible. People may need to find alternative childcare or employment. This is not quick.

 

[Class377/5]

Months? The first time that appeared at London Bridge was last Thursday. The white Thameslink leaflets they have been putting out for months do effectively say nothing, let alone non-London Bridge journeys. There might have a lot of comms, but most of it has been poor, vague and very bland - it still doesn't provide amended timetables despite all the pages or a list of stations where ticket acceptance is in place. Having temps giving them out who don't understand a thing and no actual rail staff doesn't really help either.

Its been on the front page of the Southern website for months. I doubt very much that regular commuters only ever depend on leaflets these days.

There are plently of posters out there so if you don't check, what else can be done? Employ people to pester everyone daily until it sinks in?

Your last point over staff who don't understand the railway is a fair one.

They still haven't told people about the LTP changes from 1 December when peoples trains to work cease to exist or become utterly useless and terminate at Bermondsey either.

Im assuming you mean 1st September with this? Again there been stuff around about this too.

Southerns information is always poor, they don't give anything out live (apart from twitter, which is no good unless you want to trawl through hundreds of messages and happen to know the time and start location of your trains)

Completely untrue. Try this link. Or if you have a smartphone thery have an app.

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/plan-your-journey/live-running-information/

 

[FOH]

Have to say I thought their information was pretty good - I was actually getting sick and tired of the constant announcements, leaflets, posters etc ... Just below the London Bridge headline it states "We are operating a revised train service across the network". I don't see what more they could reasonably have been expected to do. As for platforms changing - I'm guilty of learning platforms too but I always accept the danger of a change and I certainly wouldn't moan about it as I only have myself to blame in those circumstances.

 

[TimG]

I think they are hoping to sneak in the 2015 changes with minimum chance for people to complain. People need to know about these changes as far in advance as possible. People may need to find alternative childcare or employment. This is not quick.

I have asked and they will be published in October

 

[Minstral25]

Its been on the front page of the Southern website for months. I doubt very much that regular commuters only ever depend on leaflets these days.

There are plently of posters out there so if you don't check, what else can be done? Employ people to pester everyone daily until it sinks in?

Your last point over staff who don't understand the railway is a fair one.



Im assuming you mean 1st September with this? Again there been stuff around about this too.



Completely untrue. Try this link. Or if you have a smartphone thery have an app.

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/plan-your-journey/live-running-information/

There are a lot of commuters who don't use access via there PC to see this information - it is not acceptable to use Websites/Twitter as primary information points in these circumstances and I think this has been borne out as a lot of commuters are confused.

The posters and messages direct users to web sites rather than passing information. The revised timetable appeared on posters at Redhill Station on the Thursday evening before the closedown on Friday. There has been no information in advance to say that FCC services are withdrawn from Redhill for the week. (It appeared on FCC's website at the weekend)

Even the booklet you pointed out shows the wrong information and only gives off-peak services no detail of peak changes.

To be fair there has been a lot of posters and information available - but it has been so generic that most people haven't understood it and the detail on the website has been quite poor.

However I do accept that the information is there just not readily available. I think at major stations like Redhill having purple people explain the services a week or two before would have been helpful.

As for the services - finding 50% of the normal London service cut and all the replacement trains at 8 coach length instead of normal 12 coach trains has been a nightmare (at least in my part of the peak). However I think other routes have done better

 

[Class377/5]

There are a lot of commuters who don't use access via there PC to see this information - it is not acceptable to use Websites/Twitter as primary information points in these circumstances and I think this has been borne out as a lot of commuters are confused.

The posters and messages direct users to web sites rather than passing information. The revised timetable appeared on posters at Redhill Station on the Thursday evening before the closedown on Friday. There has been no information in advance to say that FCC services are withdrawn from Redhill for the week. (It appeared on FCC's website at the weekend)

Even the booklet you pointed out shows the wrong information and only gives off-peak services no detail of peak changes.

To be fair there has been a lot of posters and information available - but it has been so generic that most people haven't understood it and the detail on the website has been quite poor.

However I do accept that the information is there just not readily available. I think at major stations like Redhill having purple people explain the services a week or two before would have been helpful.

As for the services - finding 50% of the normal London service cut and all the replacement trains at 8 coach length instead of normal 12 coach trains has been a nightmare (at least in my part of the peak). However I think other routes have done better

Very valid although all I would say is there are staff at a lot of station and you can always ask. Will point out that NRES has a phone line as well.

The basic facts is there are just too many changes to produce posters for everyone. The general idea was taken is make people aware of a major block and seek information on their journey, a sensible approach.

 

[Minstral25]

I agree as I did find out but many didn't. Perhaps the posters have been week. Highlighted "London Bridge Closure" with pretty pictures rather than "Major Timetable changes August 24-31" which would have got much more attention from passengers.

 

[Class377/5]

I agree as I did find out but many didn't. Perhaps the posters have been week. Highlighted "London Bridge Closure" with pretty pictures rather than "Major Timetable changes August 24-31" which would have got much more attention from passengers.

That's fair, tho I'd add both to give the idea everything is changing and the reason behind it.

 

[GodAtum]

As I was not going to London Bridge this week I ignored all the information that said "London bridge changes". Anyway, I wonder why trains out of Victoria are so busy, I thought the reason why they closed London Bridge this week was because all the commuters are on holiday :roll:

 

[Tetchytyke]

There are a lot of commuters who don't use access via there PC to see this information - it is not acceptable to use Websites/Twitter as primary information points in these circumstances and I think this has been borne out as a lot of commuters are confused.

People working in the centre of London don't use computers? Pull the other one.

 

[Class377/5]

As I was not going to London Bridge this week I ignored all the information that said "London bridge changes". Anyway, I wonder why trains out of Victoria are so busy, I thought the reason why they closed London Bridge this week was because all the commuters are on holiday :roll:

Actually it did stay trains to/from London. Big hint there when you actually read the posters that Victoria services would be affected.

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