Great Western Coffee Shop

Just curous about this. According the the link http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/sad0d0a5840644d0ac7a919e082c826f/details.html (http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/sad0d0a5840644d0ac7a919e082c826f/details.html) it does not include services to and from Gatwick are not affected. Assuming it is Reading West that is affected why are services to Gatwick OK?

Gatwicks look OK, but there are cancellations on the North Downs:

07:21 Shalford to Reading due 08:17
08:20 Reading to Shalford due 09:11
09:31 Shalford to Reading due 10:17

Educated guess - priority goes to the all-the-way trains, with short workings cancelled when there's a lack of stock?

Just seen it at reading one set of wheels off track and a very full yardof trains unable to get out.

Do they not outberth a few units at the other end of the Gatwick route, Redhill maybe? 

That's likely to be the reason why some services are (or were) operated by SN drivers...

Paul

Out of curiousity (because I would normally use this route on a Monday through Wednesday) I have just used journey planner to check times and all of the Reading-Gatwick services appear to be operating as normal.

Am I right in guess the derailment happened at the "worst" location in the depot - where all the sidings converge ready to join the normal (main) lines?

Two units are outberthed at Redhill I believe. To operate all Reading-Gatwick services requires 3 units, and all Reading-Redhill an additional 3 units. So 4 units must have been available at Reading to be able to operate the bulk of the service.

A good depot design should always have at least two exits ::)

Both Reading upper and lower depot's do have two exits, but the shape of the upper depot (basically a triangle) means that a derailment in the wrong place will block off most of the rest of the sidings.  I'm struggling to recall for definite but I think the new depot has three exit points (two from the outset and a third when the IEP part is completed), so that along with its elongated shape should mean that a derailment won't have quite the same implications in the future.

I know that.  What I meant was that the sidings themselves should not be single ended.  You are quite right that the new depot is to be double ended for this very reason.