Why does FGW get so much bad press?

[LexyBoy]

May I suggest that those outside of FGW land who believe that there are dozens of free seats on peak HSTs between Reading and London spend half an hour on P10 at Reading at 0730?

Most complaints on my commute should actually be towards Network Rail and their complete inability to make the signals at Hayes work properly for more than a week at a time. Of course the passengers blame FGW...

Absolutely. (And of course TOCs take full credit for new trains/infrastructure paid for by the government). Most recently, the state of platform 10 which has led to London-bound passengers being held on the footbridge due to overcrowding.

Personally I don't have an issue with FGW however other pax may have issues due to the overcrowding on peak services. IIRC FGW have some of the most overcrowded services going.

Indeed, but as with most gripes about any TOC's services, this is due mostly to factors outside of the TOCs control. FGW can't order more carriages, and they've already put the price of season tickets up as much as possible, so what are they supposed to do about overcrowding?

 

[Flamingo]

Until the building work is completed, P10 at reading is very narrow with hoarding, and there are issues around people appearing from around the edge of hoarding at the last second grabbing for doors (and potentially falling under the train). That is the reason for crowd control. However, 10 is not the only platform going to London.

Regarding the empty seats on board, I guess I must be seeing things when I walk through doing my headcounts between Rdg and Pad.

 

[F Great Eastern]

FGW staff are great for the most part, I've used them maybe 6 times in the last 24 months during a short break to Wales to travel between a few places as well as between London and Bristol and Wales and Bristol for example.

One occasion I was going from London to Bristol, had a couple of cases and an arm injury in a cast, sitting in standard class, wanted something from the buffet wasn't sure what I wanted but didn't want to leave the cases unattended, train manager came along and asked if I was okay since I looked pale, and he offered to look after cases or go and get me something - top man.

Nice train manager / inspector on the Cardiff to Bristol DMU service that I can't remember where it went, the PA was down so on the 3 coaches just before each stop he'd advise people what it was and details on the service, all with a smile and great polite manner, couldn't do enough to help his customers.

 

[455driver]

My main gripe against FGW is overcrowding, I appreciate that the answer is not as simple as some make out, but FGW do not appear to be treating this with much urgency. I am not entirely convinced that is NO suitable rolling stock anywhere in the UK that could be leased or hired as a short term measure, even if not the optimum answer it would be better than nothing.

In that case you are wrong!

There is no (diesel) stock stored anywhere plus the fact that stock provision is all done by the DaFT and is nothing to do with the TOCs.

 

[broadgage]

--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Not that long ago, a locomotive and coaches were hired or leased for a service between Taunton and Cardif. Might have been by Cross Country or by FGW, I suspect that these , or similar vehicles are still available.

After all those who arrange charters or railtours get the stock from somwhere.

Even a couple of loco hauled sets would help appreciably if used in place of the most overcrowded DMU diagrams, not only would a full length loco hauled set obviate the overcrowding on the DMU, but two DMUs would be thereby freed to strengthen two other services.

In practice the answer simply seems to be "wait for the new electric services, nothing can be done until then"

 

[455driver]

How long does it take to "turn around" a loco hauled set compared to a DMU?
What about line capacity issues, the loco set will be slower pulling away etc?
What about the increased station dwell times because passengers cant shut a door behind them?
Who pays the increased leasing charges?

Then there is crew training, maintenance etc.

 

[cjmillsnun]

No, we have a large number of passengers who think there is only one carriage on the train.

I think ALL TOCs have that problem

 

[jon0844]

And to a degree, long may it continue as I watch people pack in to the first 2-3 coaches on an 8-car FCC service, walking down and having to make the difficult decision of what seat to take...

If people want to be nearest the exit at their destination and are willing suffer to do so, shut the hell up and stop moaning!!

 

[cjmillsnun]

Indeed, but as with most gripes about any TOC's services, this is due mostly to factors outside of the TOCs control. FGW can't order more carriages, and they've already put the price of season tickets up as much as possible, so what are they supposed to do about overcrowding?

I'm not saying it's their fault.

It's clearly a capacity issue as far as paths go and a lack of stock that they can do nothing about because they're hamstung by DafT and by the lack of any suitable stock.

But the public perception of FGW is an overcrowded peak, particularly between PAD and RDG.

 

[mrcheek]

My main gripe against FGW is overcrowding, I appreciate that the answer is not as simple as some make out, but FGW do not appear to be treating this with much urgency. I am not entirely convinced that is NO suitable rolling stock anywhere in the UK that could be leased or hired as a short term measure, even if not the optimum answer it would be better than nothing.

Whilst other TOCs do nothing to obtain extra rolling stock, FGW has bought its own HSTs, converted buffet cars to house more passengers, and refurbished all existing standard class carriages to high density seating, to create extra capacity.

on local routes, they also went as far as to start loco hauled services to cover for lack of available modern stock.

So, they have done a fair bit to help!

 

[Captain Chaos]

I'm not saying it's their fault.

It's clearly a capacity issue as far as paths go and a lack of stock that they can do nothing about because they're hamstung by DafT and by the lack of any suitable stock.

But the public perception of FGW is an overcrowded peak, particularly between PAD and RDG.

I have always found it strange that FGW is always picked out for criticism for overcrowding between Paddington and Reading. Is it really that much worse when compared to similar flows like I don't know, Euston - Milton Keynes/Watford or perhaps Kings Cross - Stevenage/Peterborough? I'm sure most TOC's operating out of any major city in any country in the world to the nearest commuter town and I'm sure it's probably no different. So, why the criticism?

 

[tsr]

No, we have a large number of passengers who think there is only one carriage on the train.

Ah...

Easement 139153: All passengers to Slough must have been indoctrinated at Stourbridge Town. This applies in both directions.

 

[Tibbs]

I have always found it strange that FGW is always picked out for criticism for overcrowding between Paddington and Reading. Is it really that much worse when compared to similar flows like I don't know, Euston - Milton Keynes/Watford or perhaps Kings Cross - Stevenage/Peterborough? I'm sure most TOC's operating out of any major city in any country in the world to the nearest commuter town and I'm sure it's probably no different. So, why the criticism?

Having travelled from Watford to Euston for the past 2 years, I can say that it's unusual that if people are standing at the front of the train there are spaces at the back. Even at Watford people are pretty good at spacing out along the platform.

In terms of passenger numbers the trains feel much less busy than the Windsor - Waterloo line I used to use. Fewer identikit city drones travelling on the Euston line perhaps.

Maybe it's because the stairs at Watford come out at roughly the middle of the platform?

 

[PHILIPE]

There will be no more loco hauled stock on FGW unless anything completely unforeseen happens. They were hired in and paid for at the instigation of DaFT to cover their backs and save face when the Waterloo trains terminated at Exeter following the increaes in track capacity in Axminster area enabling a more frequent SWT service to be run. This increase was achieved resourcewise by truncating the SWT services that ran to Paigntion and Plymouth at Exeter. DaFT realised that the gaps left in the service could only be covered by FGW and were left with red faces so to save face the only thing to do was to utilise the Loco Hauled trains until such time as the 150s were cascaded down from LM during 2011.

 

[island]

Ah...

So is the solution more PPMs?

 

[cjmillsnun]

I have always found it strange that FGW is always picked out for criticism for overcrowding between Paddington and Reading. Is it really that much worse when compared to similar flows like I don't know, Euston - Milton Keynes/Watford or perhaps Kings Cross - Stevenage/Peterborough? I'm sure most TOC's operating out of any major city in any country in the world to the nearest commuter town and I'm sure it's probably no different. So, why the criticism?

Probably no worse than Waterloo - Woking, however there are less coaches per service than a commuter line as most of FGWs stock are HSTs or short DMUs

 

[Flamingo]

And to a degree, long may it continue as I watch people pack in to the first 2-3 coaches on an 8-car FCC service, walking down and having to make the difficult decision of what seat to take...

If people want to be nearest the exit at their destination and are willing suffer to do so, shut the hell up and stop moaning!!

That's the problem, they won't!

 

[chuckles1066]

Nice.

It does surprise me that many commuters don't seem to take more interest in their service.

I did try when I used the railways (very briefly) at the tail end of 2010.

Even wrote to my local MP.

But there's only so many times you'll get shot down in flames for daring to complain about FGW's one-train-an-hour-service-that-frequently-turns-up-shortformed policy before you think "I'll go back to using my car".

Just my 2 Euros worth

 

[LE Greys]

Probably no worse than Waterloo - Woking, however there are less coaches per service than a commuter line as most of FGWs stock are HSTs or short DMUs

Which is hardly FGW's fault, the line got shafted by Network South East when they replaced 50+10 formations with 6-car Turbos. It was the usual BR mistake of not allowing for growth, and we are paying for it now. Still, the Turbos really ought to have been replaced or supplimented by now (they are twenty years old after all) but as has been pointed out up the thread, that's more the DfT's fault than any TOC.

With wider experience of First Group, I usually think that complaints about FCC are directed at Thameslink, because the GN side of the operation hardly seems to have changed since NSE, except for there being longer trains. It was adequate then, it is adequate now. Scotrail is generally OK as well, my only complaint is that they weren't able to swap 158s for 156s a few years ago. With TPX, I'd complain about the seats being uncomfortable, and I certainly echo the 'victim of its own success' comment someone else made. However, the buses are a major let-down. My memories of First Aberdeen are that they put the fares up by 10p a year from a baseline of £1 for a single in 2004 to £1:80 last year and insisted on exact fares (a royal pain in the backside), they were never comfortable, the timetables were a work of fiction and the university bus was usually an ancient rattletrap. Stagecoach generally seemed much better, but they tended to work the country routes, so it's probably not a fair comparison.

 

[NSEFAN]

Which is hardly FGW's fault, the line got shafted by Network South East when they replaced 50+10 formations with 6-car Turbos. It was the usual BR mistake of not allowing for growth, and we are paying for it now. Still, the Turbos really ought to have been replaced or supplimented by now (they are twenty years old after all) but as has been pointed out up the thread, that's more the DfT's fault than any TOC.

I'm too young to remember BR from first hand, but looking at how things were it appears to me to have been a "do it cheap or not at all" sector in its final days. I'm told the class 50s weren't exactly the most reliable locos, and needed replacing. The purse strings were controlled by the Treasury who really didn't like giving BR subsidy, let alone enough money for future proofing. I'd say BR did very well considering the stranglehold placed on it by the government.

One of the ideals of privatisation was that this problem would go away and the industry would have more autonomy to build new trains and run new services. If anything, the exact opposite has happened thanks to the DfT and former SRA.

 

[F Great Eastern]

Indeed, but the average commuter thinks that train ordering and train length is down to the private companies since after all we had all of the companies move into the private sector, but what they do not know that despite that being the case, the government still have a large amount of control over rolling stock and this has been a lot of the problem.

They then come out with overcrowding would not happen under British Rail since they would order new trains when needed but the private money grabbing laughing all the way to the bank TOC's are trying to squash everyone in like sardines to squeeze out every single penny before paying for new trains, but don't realise that actually the overcrowding is actually done by too much governmental control and interference rather than not enough government control they claim.

 

[jon0844]

I got the impression BR was more able to shift stock around (where it was approved for use) given it was one company (well, broken up into regions but you know what I mean) and cope with problems quicker than waiting for the Government to approve new stock or cascading stock - but that is only an impression, so I don't know if it was actually the case.

I would have thought that while BR would have had the same battles and tight budgets, it wouldn't require a franchise change every 5, 7 or one day 10 or 15 years to sort problems out.

 

[mrcheek]

I would have thought that while BR would have had the same battles and tight budgets, it wouldn't require a franchise change every 5, 7 or one day 10 or 15 years to sort problems out.

as far as I recall, BR simply didnt care about stuff like this

 

[transmanche]

the government still have a large amount of control over rolling stock and this has been a lot of the problem

I'd say that the Government (via the DfT) has more control over the day-to-day operations of the railway than they ever did under BR.

 

[LE Greys]

I got the impression BR was more able to shift stock around (where it was approved for use) given it was one company (well, broken up into regions but you know what I mean) and cope with problems quicker than waiting for the Government to approve new stock or cascading stock - but that is only an impression, so I don't know if it was actually the case.

I would have thought that while BR would have had the same battles and tight budgets, it wouldn't require a franchise change every 5, 7 or one day 10 or 15 years to sort problems out.

That's certainly the case. 317s started off on the Bedpan Line (as it was called before Thameslink), then spent some time working out of Euston before finally ending up on the Great Northern and West Anglia sub-sectors. Theoretically, the private companies should be able to do the same by leasing from ROSCOs (probably why they went for that model in the first place) but in practice it tends not to happen because they are tied into contracts. BR also had economy of scale to work with (318s are basically 317s with some minor differences, and these resulted in a whole family of EMUs) and had BREL to order from. It was far easier to sort things out that way.

 

[VP185]

I work for FGW on the LTV side. Aside from Network Rail infrastructure failures and poor signalling decisions made by Network Rail signallers most of the delays stem from ignorant and selfish commuters.
We can arrive into Ealing Broadway bang on time or even early with a 6-car train, and 90% of the people waiting at Ealing Broadway will crush themselves into the front carriage. Even when the front carriage is crammed to capacity they still stand blocking the doors trying to get on despite the fact 10 other sets of doors are completely clear. This of course, is the fault of FGW.... and you can't tell them otherwise. We end up sitting there 2 mins longer than we need to, this has a knock on delay to the train behind.
I've worked for a few other TOCs and if I thought FGW were rubbish I would have no hesitation in saying so. Simple fact is, they are the best TOC I've worked for. It is unfortunate that we seem to have the rudest, most ignorant and selfish commuters in the country travelling to/from Paddington
Recently commuters have been highlighting the fact First Group made £230 million profit or thereabouts. Many commuters believe that £230 million was just FGW alone! They have absolutely no idea and firmly believe changing the franchise holder will see all new trains arrive overnight with a seat for everyone.
Most complain about the empty seats in First Class and that it should be declassified with no thought as to how this will be policed. Declassifying will mean everyone bundles into First Class first. This will mean First Class ticket holders probably won't get a seat.
First Class ticket holders pay, what, 2 or 3 times as much as a Standard Class ticket holder. They pay for the space, the peace and quiet and the guarantee of a seat. Declassifying it means they may as well pay for a Standard Class ticket. The lost First Class revenue needs to be recouped somehow.
They also don't realise that a lot of branch line and rural services don't make a profit and are therefore never likely to see new trains.
You've only got to look at the Twitter feed to see the same people complaining day in, day out, that they are late for work, yet they don't have the sense to travel on an earlier train. They constantly moan, yet they still opt to travel by train. If you don't like the service, don't use it. Simple as. We all have choices.
Anyway, rant over.... for now!

 

[londoncommuter]

I commute between Slough & Ealing every day and people especially at Hayes & Southall just cram on and don't move down the train. You get funny looks when you ask to get off!!!

Fair play to FGW, the busiest trains seem to have 5 or 6 coaches, I can only think of one that is a 3 coach service at the minute that I use, 7.27 from Slough to Paddington.

Network Rail really should do more improvements at Hayes, delays always seems to happen around there.

 

[reb0118]

.........One gent started screaming (no exaggeration) at me as [to] why I had not been giving updates every five minutes (despite nothing to update), and told me in no uncertain terms that my going through (talking with all 300 passengers on the train to address any individual concerns and questions they might have) was not good enough, and the sort of rubbish customer service he had come to expect from FGW.

How can you please people like that?

Simples, it's a straight RoRA Section 16 (2) offence:-

passengers with an invalid attitude will be ejected, you may stop the train if necessary (not required on slam door stock)

You can't win them all. You can give generic or specific help but there is nearly always somebody who feels that you have not done enough. That said it is nice when a passenger actually makes a point of thanking you after a long delay.

 

[LE Greys]

I commute between Slough & Ealing every day and people especially at Hayes & Southall just cram on and don't move down the train. You get funny looks when you ask to get off!!!

Fair play to FGW, the busiest trains seem to have 5 or 6 coaches, I can only think of one that is a 3 coach service at the minute that I use, 7.27 from Slough to Paddington.

Network Rail really should do more improvements at Hayes, delays always seems to happen around there.

Airport Junction and up HC trains crossing the down relief might have something to do with it.

As for the passengers boarding the front coach, it's certainly not just an Ealing thing, Stevenage has exactly the same problem, although they at least have the option of moving the stop boards down the platform by two coach lengths (happened two years ago) to try to distribute people a bit better. From a purely-selfish point of view, long may it continue, since I can have the whole of the northernmost coach to myself.

 

[A-driver]

Airport Junction and up HC trains crossing the down relief might have something to do with it.

As for the passengers boarding the front coach, it's certainly not just an Ealing thing, Stevenage has exactly the same problem, although they at least have the option of moving the stop boards down the platform by two coach lengths (happened two years ago) to try to distribute people a bit better. From a purely-selfish point of view, long may it continue, since I can have the whole of the northernmost coach to myself.

Try the down platform at Hatfield in the evening peak. Often the doors on the front few coaches don't even open and you sit there for an age whilst the rear 2 coaches empty!

I suppose what we really need is more London end coaches on rush hour trains as the 'customers' obviously demand that. Perhaps they should remove all the country end coaches and put them on the London end...