It used to be the case that York-London attracted a premium compared to West Yorkshire-London, but East Coast (possibly in GNER or National Express days) harmonised the fares, to make York-London valid via Leeds and Leeds-London valid via York.
Bradford-London has to be valid via Leeds, as it would be absurd to suggest otherwise (this would surely have protected route status), and therefore there is no reason why Bradford-London shouldn't be valid via York.
In fact it can be quicker to get to West Yorkshire via York on occasions, and not so long ago a passenger was going to Huddersfield and wanted to know which GC train to get from London. I asked if they had a reservation and they produced a reservation to York so I directed them to the Sunderland train. I then checked the timetable and it was indeed quicker to change at York. That's no longer the case in the current timetable.
Bradford-London is reasonable via York, and it is a permitted route in the Routeing Guide. Therefore GC have no right to prevent a Bradford-London ticket holder travelling between York & London.
As GC operate no trains on part of the permitted route, there are no valid trains on that section of route, but that doesn't in any way impact on the validity of the ticket between York & London.
GC must adhere to the Routeing Guide, and I am confident the Guards would honour such tickets.
If the Twitter person doesn't know what the validity is, then they need to ask a competent person and get back to the passenger. Lack of knowledge is not a good enough excuse for making up rules that don't exist.
Must admit I enjoyed it when David Whitley was running LM Twitter, because he knew the lot, and being senior could make things happen. But deep down it was known that could never last.
Neil
I've heard that "Jim" is very knowledgeable
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If the relevant managers at GC have any integrity, they'd introduce a "Not via York" flow at the same price as the current one, and increase the price of GC Only tickets that permit travel via York.
I'm not convinced you can mix'n'match TOC restrictions and route restrictions for walk-up tickets like that.
For "normal" tickets, Bradford-London is more expensive than York-London so is therefore reasonable and not unexpectedly permitted via York.
If GC want to reverse that situation, that's
their problem, and they should not be surprised if people start short on tickets from Bradford, at York.
I wouldn't consider the GC only inter-available fares, even at the Bradford prices, as they're still far too expensive! The ECML is like an airline as far as I'm concerned, and I rarely travel with GC as it's cheaper to use EC and I can pick my choice of seat!
