It's not yet Easter, but we are out of the bleak midwinter.   So we should start seeing some more people out and about at the weekends.   Some figures from today:

09:47 at Melksham. 17 passengers on arrival at Melksham, 3 got off and 19.  making 36 passengers using the service for all or part of the journey from Trowbridge to Chippenham

11:02 at Melksham. 13 passenger on arrival at Melksham. 7 got off and 1 got on making 14 passengers using the service for all or part of the journey from Chippenham to Trowbridge

11:47 at Melksham.  35 passengers on arrival at Melksham. 2 got off and 13 got on making 48 passengers using the service for all or part of the journey from Trowbridge to Chippenham

13:02 at Melksham. 16 passenger on arrival at Melksham. 3 got off and 3 got on making 19 passengers using the service for all or part of the journey from Chippenham to Trowbridge

Encouraging indeed.

There's going to be something happening / something special just about every weekend - in fact the very occasional weekend may be special because nothing special is happening so we're very much into averaging out and also looking at the type of people we have.

For today, I believe that 6 arrivals were for "TrainWest", and perhaps 10 departures for the Swindon Town match. Others were going shopping in Swindon, to Hither Green (? where's that - no really, I do know!), and I spoke to a chap going to Southampton.  A usually reliable source (train staff  ) tell me that a number were going to Rugby - Gloucester, I think.  So even today it was a real mix.

What's very encouraging is that several of the people I spoke with reported that they had used the train very, very occasionally in the past but were now using it frequently.  Another couple said that hadn't known that Melksham had more than the very occasional train, and yet another starts a job in Swindon soon and will be commuting by train.  He set off with a sheet of times for the bus from the part of Melksham he lives in to the station!

Talking to the "old hands", comment is repeatedly made about how much more relaible the current service is than the old one ever was.  * Very important ... * Thank goodness ... * and THANK YOU FGW^▸ (First Great Western) for not having the TransWilts service at the top of the "cancel this is short or trains / crew" list.   

One of the issues that keeps coming up is the connections at Westbury for Warminster and Salisbury.  We have put forward a couple of suggestions on these; not made it for May, alas, but perhaps in December?  There is an element of tradeoff between robustness and connections - a service is more "robust" if it doesn't connect, but then it can be taken to the extreme of putting the cart before the horse.   Just to let any readers know ... yes, we have noticed that certain trains leave  Westbury just before a train arrives that could provide them with more eager passengers for Melksham, Chippenham and Swindon ... and we have noticed that some of the TransWilts trains arrive in Westbury just as the throb of the diesel engine of the onward train fades into the distance.

Access to Granville Road in Melksham (lots of our passengers live there!) is an issue too - with the residents feeling that it's a frustratingly long way around.   That's being worked on ... but don't expect any changes until 2015.    And frustration at booking advance tickets from Melksham a day or two before travel, only to find / be told you have to go to Chippenham or Trowbridge or Westbury to pick them up before you travel.   That's being worked on too, and should be solved long before Granville Road.

11:47 Melksham to Swindon (today, Saturday 10th May)
8 off, 7 on at Melksham ... 23 on train to Chippenham.   
So 31 users on Trowbridge to Chippenham section
6 off and 2 more on at Chippenham

15:22 Swindon to Westbury
14 on train from Chippenham to Melksham.  9 off and 2 on at Melksham
So 16 users of train on Chippenham to Trowbridge section.
5 of the 14 had joined at Chippenham and 2 has left the train there

The 15:22 is an interesting "case" as the previous train is at 14:36 ... these two mid-afternoon trains within an hour of each other may to some extend dilute one another ...

Estimating that as 420/215 for the whole day; almost all day trip traffic, and the counting was morning / outbound to be reflected into afternoon / evening return traffic.  Would have loved to have logged an 8th train so I could just have double numbers but got involved in a hospital run for a friend (away from station / background not relevant to thread)

Nice day brought out the crowds BUT Swindon Town not playing at home which already adds something like 160/80 on match days - around 17 Saturdays per year, with 40 fans from Trowbridge / Westbury and an extra 40 from Melksham going to the match and back.

To be fair to the staff involved, I think perhaps there ought to be a 5th option between "Third best" and "Least best":

* Fourth best is staff giving a less than optimal answer

i.e. what they told you wasn't wrong as such, in that it would have actually got you there - it just wasn't the best option for the journey.

To my mind, the "wrong" answer would have sent you off in the opposite direction altogether.

Sorry to be pedantic... I have a good teacher in my boss at work   

Sunday, 8th June
08:50 at Melksham.  11 passengers on train when it arrived, 1 joined, 0 left - 12/1
09:52 at Melksham.  31 passengers on train when it arrived, 7 joined, 0 left - 38/7

13:32 ex Westbury.  12 passengers ex Trowbridge, -4 + 6 at Melksham - 18/10
Note that the 13:05 Westbury to Paddington (ex Penzance HST^▸ (High Speed Train)) left Westbury at 13:31 (just a minute ahead of the TransWilts train) and the Train Manager on the 13:32 had shouted for anyone for Swindon to transfer to that as it was leaving ahead of us.   Correct call on his part, but it cost us around 15 passengers.

Interesting day on Heart of Wessex with buses from Yeovil Pen Mill to Weymouth ... but that's a story for another place.

Difficult one.  The 15's an estimate - could be 2 or 3 out either way.   I don't really know what I would suggest you record, or indeed whether we simply record actual numbers on the basis "these things happen", leave off the recording, or whether we should even be counting the HST^▸ (High Speed Train) / seeing if we can tell who used it for just that stretch.  Your call, John, as the enumeration expert.


Correct  ... an intermediate signal could significantly increase capacity but could be a timetabling nightmare to make best use of with few lay-bys close by.   For local-after-freight, local-after-HST, freight-after-local, though ...

See thread on Trans Wilts Community Rail Partnership Board.   A little history there but a question still to be answered