XC Southampton service extensions

[thefab444]

Judging by the early information available on the journey planners, which may well be wrong, the northbound services have a very varied selection of calling patterns south of Basingstoke. Southbound is much more consistent, although the late service from Newcastle runs via Andover and is looped by a service from Manchester.

Attached are the details.

 

[AlexS]

It is of course possibly to tweak things if you have the desire to do so... The routes in question were once diagrammed Shrewsbury-Birmingham-Leicester-Birmingham-Stansted-Birmingham-Shrewsbury.

So change is not impossible.

 

[swt_passenger]

Judging by the early information available on the journey planners, which may well be wrong, the northbound services have a very varied selection of calling patterns south of Basingstoke. Southbound is much more consistent, although the late service from Newcastle runs via Andover and is looped by a service from Manchester.

Attached are the details.

Cheers for that - saved me doing it as well!

The northbound Winchester starter at 0801 and the southbound divert via Andover on weekdays were in the Track Access application, but otherwise there was no evidence of any other skip stopping.

Hopefully just teething troubles in the database...

 

[swt_passenger]

The new XC timetable booklets are available in web form on their site, and those odd calling patterns for the new up trains from Southampton are still there.

0946 misses Winchester
1346 and 1547 miss Parkway and Winchester
1746 misses Parkway

This is really weird - can't can't see an obvious problem that prevents the missing calls, and the running times between Southampton Central and Basingstoke are all basically the same.

Anyone know what the reason for these gaps is?

http://www.crosscountrytrains.co.uk/SiteImages/Assets/3/Timetable_South_Coast_to_Manchester_North_East_Scotland_December_2010.pdf

 

[MCR247]

Don't they run via Andover and Romsey?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
The 1815 from Reading deffo runs via Andover & Romsey as it gets overtaken by the following Bournemouth service

 

[swt_passenger]

Don't they run via Andover and Romsey?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
The 1815 from Reading deffo runs via Andover & Romsey as it gets overtaken by the following Bournemouth service

No, the timings don't allow it - all 5 ex Southampton have the standard timings for straight up the main line, taking 31 or 32 mins, arriving Basingstoke at the following xx18. The existing Bournemouth starters are all at xx15 off Southampton and xx47 at Basingstoke, again 32 mins.

Also, I did say UP trains - you are referring to the one specific down train that we already know goes via Laverstock.

 

[Oracle]

Am I being more dense than nornal and reading that there are non-stoppers at Parkway? Is that a first? Are there any other trains that don't stop at Parkway?

 

[thefab444]

Only the handful of Southern and FGW services which run via Eastleigh.

In the past many trains skipped SOA; between around 1999 and 2003 there was an hourly Southampton - Waterloo service which was fast to Eastleigh. Prior to that there was The Royal Wessex fast service which called only at Winchester after Southampton Central.

 

[Oracle]

Thanks! I can only remember using the fasts Central-Parkway-Winchester-Waterloo.
Will there be any non-stoppers at Brockenhurst? It seems at the moment that there are just two Up and Down SWT trains in the am and pm peaks.

 

[wintonian]

Well they all seem to stop at Winchester and Parkway on a Saturday, the other thing that makes this rather odd is all the ones through to Bournemouth are still stopping at Brockenhurst.

and in the other direction the extras are calling at Winchester and Parkway.

All very odd.

 

[thefab444]

I should've mentioned, the fast BMH > SOU > WIN service ended in the BR/early SWT era. Possibly around the same time the Weymouth fast services started calling at Winchester (previously they were fast from Southampton Parkway).

Interesting how the London service from Southampton has been downgraded over recent years; now there is effectively only 2 trains per hour at xx00 and xx30, taking 80 minutes and 79 minutes respectively. In 2001, there were 4 trains per hour at xx00, xx15, xx30 and xx45, taking 85, 76, 90 and 77 minutes respectively. The service from Portsmouth via Fareham to London has got a lot better though, as prior to 2003 it was just an extended stopping service.

Will there be any non-stoppers at Brockenhurst? It seems at the moment that there are just two Up and Down SWT trains in the am and pm peaks.

No, although there are actually three SWT trains in the peak periods which do not stop there.

06.08 Poole - Southampton Central (- London Waterloo)
05.50 Weymouth - Southampton Central (- London Waterloo)
06.20 Weymouth - Southampton Central (- London Waterloo)
17.05 London Waterloo - Weymouth
17.35 London Waterloo - Weymouth
18.35 London Waterloo - Weymouth

 

[swt_passenger]

... the other thing that makes this rather odd is all the ones through to Bournemouth are still stopping at Brockenhurst.

I don't follow your logic there. Why might you expect the existing hourly Man Picc service to change at all? Brockenhurst has always been an hourly XC stop as far as I remember...

 

[thefab444]

Well it wasn't hourly when there wasn't an hourly XC service. But still, all XC pax services which pass through call there, and probably always will.

Browsing my 2001 timetable, there was a dated summer Saturdays only service, the 08:57 Birmingham New Street - Poole, which did not call at Southampton Airport Parkway (fast WIN > SOU).

 

[wintonian]

I don't follow your logic there. Why might you expect the existing hourly Man Picc service to change at all? Brockenhurst has always been an hourly XC stop as far as I remember...

Brock pop about 2000 -3000 is versus Southampton Airport and Winchester, I know were talking about different services and the paths possibly come into play but there doesn’t really seem to be any reason for missing out those 2 stops.

 

[thefab444]

In terms of pax numbers, SOA gets around 1.4 million per year, BCU about 1.25 million. Despite the village being fairly small, it gets high numbers of London commuters from the surrounding area, plus the sixth form college and it also has a wide catchment area for day trippers.

Still, the stop skipping doesn't make sense. I was told it was due to freight paths.

 

[Oracle]

Brock has a million and one students arriving in the morning from the Bournemouth direction before 9.00. Also it has of course the Lymington branch traffic! In addition, isn't it the first/last station, or was, for SuperSavers? It used to be economical to drive from Ashurst to Brock as there were cheaper tickets available, save that ANF car park is free and Brock's isn't!! That's why we get so many commuters parking here.

 

[wintonian]

True as I remember my college days

But yes even if you look at the pax numbers it dosn't make sense.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
When I lived in New Milton we used to get the 08:50 ish or the Southern one about the same time.

Most students from that direction come from New Milton/ Hinton Admiral/ Sway - Bournemouth having its own college.

 

[Oracle]

I am sure that some of the students are ex-Bournemouth..foreign in other words! Brockenhurst sends buses into Wiltshire! Totton College has buses that go to Amesbury and Porton! However, very few Totton students use the train even though the college supply a free minibus that connects with the station.

 

[thefab444]

Well, there are students at Brockenhurst from places as far away as Wareham and Salisbury! Certainly plenty from Bournemouth and Poole. I know of a few who commute SAL - BCU on the train, although most use the bus.

 

[swt_passenger]

Had a look at this XC Southampton service this morning, with a quick trip up to Basingstoke and back. The first down arrival, from New St, was showing on the displays to run through and terminate in 2B, however they got away with tipping out in platform 2A because the immediately following SN arrival was late! Also, and as is often the case, the platform displays at this time showed an impossible situation, with the terminating XC train arriving westbound at about 0916, and a late running FGW Portsmouth service coming the other way at exactly the same time... :roll:

Following a check through the 4 car Voyager for 'stowaways', off it went westbound to shunt somewhere. The normal locations for a shunt move like this are the up or down goods loops, but at this time of day both are occupied with SWT ECS. Surprisingly it turned out this train ran down to Totton Yard to reverse (the TM reckoned it will be the standard procedure), and it reappeared at about 0944 just in time for its 0946 departure.

Around 30 people got on, not bad for a train that hadn't appeared in the timetable before today. As discussed earlier in this thread, the service non-stopped Winchester, which I imagine must have looked a bit odd for the pax on the platform there as we sped on towards Basingstoke.

I returned from Basingstoke at 1040 on the next down Southampton service arriving at about 1115, the unit ran into platform 3A as I expected from the journey planner, which used to be normally occupied by the Poole stopper for around 20 mins. The SWT unit was now sitting in 3B, and departed around 1132, with the XC this time following it out and shunting in one of the loops, I forget which.

Hope this of interest.

 

[Oracle]

Totton Yard eh? Clearly reversing at Redbridge, which is possible in theory, is not practicable. Of course they can also run wrong line on the bi-di through Totton P2 and the causeway to Redbridge to avoid clashes with SWT on the Up line.

 

[swt_passenger]

Totton Yard eh? Clearly reversing at Redbridge, which is possible in theory, is not practicable. Of course they can also run wrong line on the bi-di through Totton P2 and the causeway to Redbridge to avoid clashes with SWT on the Up line.

It was a bit of a surprise when the TM explained it. Of course a third option is to just run down past the west end crossovers and stop on the down slow, and shunt back into the station from there, of course timing wise it might conflict with the down Salisbury service. IIRC this 'central' shunt move was reasonably common a couple of years back, before they rejigged the platforming plan to allow both Southern services to usually reverse in the platforms? That was probably some time after the SN Brighton services had been running, perhaps the timetable change after 6 months?

 

[Oracle]

The final option which would not be used is to go onto the Western Docks branch and reverse.