Great Western Coffee Shop

Trains risk being cut from stopping at little-used railway stations in the Westcountry under the new franchise to run services in the region.

The Government is to give rail companies the power to "re-allocate" stops between larger stations, meaning small stations stand to get fewer services. Barely used stations could be closed altogether.

http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/story-16618155-detail/story.html?
http://www.thisisbath.co.uk/story-16618739-detail/story.html?

Interesting article saying lines have an aggregate number of stops per period.

So some stations could have the 2 the minimum requirement or 100 if aggregate is 100+2*N where N is the number of stations in agroup.

No wonder i couldn't work out the Taplow stops presummably we'll have to wait for the bids.

Taking a simple example ... 32 trains to "call" at Greenford - so that's 32 trips on the branch from West Ealing. There are three intermediate stations - Drayton Green, Castle Bar Park and South Greenford; the 32 trips will pass through 6 stations on their round trip - that's 192 passings, but only 183 stops are needed so there can be up to 9 skips. 

Similar scenario on Weymouth - 8 round trips needed, so 112 passing through the 7 stations from Yeovil Pen Mill Upwey, but only 107 stops needed.  So that looks pretty good for a thorough service at Thornford, Yetminster at Chetnole.  I'm not clear at to what would happen if a franchise winner decided to run 10 round trips to Weymouth ... the 107 stops could then be 20 at each of Yeovil, Yetminster, Maiden Newton, Dorchester West and Upwey, with just 2 each way per day at Thornford and Chetnole, couldn't it?

Tarka line is also interesting ... 14 round trips to Barnstaple, so 308 passings through the 11 intermediate stations, but just 194 stops required.  There's a lot more flexibility there ...

Seems quite a good system to me. Allowing freedom to run faster trains.

In terms of the Devon & Cornwall branch lines, I don't see anything for people to be worried about.   

Quite a neat way of safeguarding existing (and key) station stops without specifying in the detail contained in the current Service Level Commitment.

oh please please please cut some stops from the PNZ-PAD trains! the journey is such a drag at the moment!

It must certainly be hard work for the TM in Cornwall with all the short platforms.... ;D

There are a lot of people down here in the west who are trying to achieve exactly the opposite of that and try and achieve a similar frequency, quality, and regularity of train service at all stations that a lot of other areas take for granted. 

If the journey to PAD needs speeding up, then maybe intermediate stations up the line should be missed.  Fast from EXD to RDG (for set down only) anyone ?

Used to be a drag, it's been a bit of a pushmepullyou for a good few years now though!  :D

No thanks.  You would inconvenience hundreds of passengers every day by doing that...passengers trying to head for Devon and Cornwall.

Thanks for teh explanation Grahame, still can't can't work out what it might mean for Taplow. I suppose we will just have to wait and see which bidder offers what.

Is there any mecahnism for combinin g bids, by imposing teh best offers for each line into the winners bid. Probably not as it's all in "Commercial Confidence".

Re-route Newquay trains to St Austall or extend to Plymouth and axe Par stops.
Extend St Ives into Penzance and axe St Erth stops.

Then run:
Plymouth - Bodmin - St Austell - Truro - Penzance

I don't see the logic in that.   Approx populations west of Truro:

Penzance: 21,000
St Erth: 1,500
St Ives: 11,000
Hayle: 8,300
Redruth: 12,500
Camborne: 22,500

That's a catchment in the station areas of around 77,000. And you're suggesting an extra change of trains or a doubling back journey for longer distance travellers from 73% of that area (population wise) to give a slightly faster service to around 21,000 people.  As I understand it, the HSTs are typically getting quieter as they get towards the far west of Cornwall, so it's not as if you're slowing down packed trains by stopping them at wayside halts with little traffic on offer, is it?  And I can imagine more than a few people who visit St Ives by train from the east every summer being really thrilled (not) by having an extra excursion to Penzance to get there ...

The HST's in Cornwall are very busy from nearly all stations-but mostly with shoppers going to Truro and Plymouth, the main stations for Long distance travellers are Penzance, St Erth*, Truro and Bodmin. *If all trains from St Ives went to Pnz then people could change at Penzance. A hell of a lot of people from Cornwall drive to Exeter or Tivvy to get trains to London to save about an hour and a half on the journey. Par can be busy also when there is a connection from Newquay. But the likes of Hayle, Lostwithiel, St Germans and Saltash really dont warrant the extra messing around which will get all the user groups up in arms but it's true, and there is no reason why every London train needs to call at Camborne, Redruth, St Austell, Par and Liskeard.

As you say vacman " A hell of a lot of people from Cornwall (and even Plymouth) now drive to Exeter or Tivvy to get trains to London to save about an hour and a half on the journey." No wonder the Dft wants to cut the number of Paddington/Penzance trains in the next Great Western franchise with more emphasis on regional services in Cornwall.Given the ongoing poor journey times on the Penzance/Plymouth/Exeter "Branch" line I can see this line eventually becoming a "regional only operation sometime in the 21st century with the main line long distance services terminating at Exeter.

Myself included here, is about 100 mins drive from mine to tiverton parkway, compared to an average train journey of 195 mins from St Erth to Tiverton Parkway

So thanks to the massive expenditure on roads there's not much point keeping the railway?

The Victorian rail infrastructure limitations west of Exeter when compared to todays fast modern trunk roads are inevitably becoming a determining factor in peoples longer distance travel choices from Cornwall and even Plymouth as the 21st century unfolds.Even the DFt has recognized these changing long distance 21st century travel patterns from Cornwall in the Great Western ITT document with its proposed reduction from 9 to 6 through Paddington/Penzance HSTs saying that some of the current HSTs through Cornwall have become little more than local commuter trains as Vacman has already pointed out.If the slow Exeter to Plymouth line is a low national investment priority then the Plymouth to Penzance line must be completely off the Dfts national rail infrastructure radar.Even Cornwall County Council recognizes this reality by demanding at least a half hourly regional service between Penzance/Plymouth/Exeter.Unfortunately the combined consequences of a century of no real rail infrastructure improvements west of Exeter together with John Majors expensively botched rail privatisation are now coming home to roost for us in the far South West particularly in our post 2008 global financial meltdown austere world.No one is suggesting for one moment that rail is not needed in Cornwall merely that the railways will have to adapt their offering to reflect the new financial and infrastructure realities and that sadly that means an increasing emphasis on regional rather national rail services in places like Cornwall.

The report itself is poor at that, using the headline stations to close altogether, im not aware of any stations that have less than 2 stops so this is not relevant at all, also the ITT states that the new franchisee must assume ticket office hours will remain as they are until they seek permission from dft for reductions. So this is devon is wrong again.

Woody is basically right, the Cornish mainline has seen massive passenger increases but i bet the average mileage per pax is about 25 miles, a few fast services is the only way to really compete with the car. ply-pnz can be done in around 75 mins with 3 stops that is a hell of a time saving without any investment in infrastructure. the other option could be tilting trains to shave a few minutes here and there.

There are also quite a few stops east of Plymouth, do most trains from Penzance to London really need to stop at Totnes and Tiverton Parkway?  Does everything except the up Cornish Riviera need to stop at Newton Abbot?  Could Taunton calls be removed from any services?

As for running trains fast from Penzance to Plymouth calling only at Truro, I can see this discouraging rail use if journey times are extended by people from other stations having to change at Truro or Plymouth.

The stop at Tiverton Parkway is essential so that all those people who have driven up from Cornwall can catch the train there!

But people go by road as the train journey takes so long and the number of stops west of Taunton on most trains from Penzance doesn't help here.

Woody, thanks for a very thoughtful post in response to my rather provocative question.

Many years ago, there was a TV sitcom titled "Never mind the quality; feel the width". I feel this phrase goes some way toward illuminating the current state of strategic planning for rail, where capacity is all-consuming and questions like "what are we really trying to achieve?" and "what are the side-effects?" have been largely forgotten.

There is a natural tendency for activity (where it can) to cluster in cities; the characteristics of rail tend to reinforce this trend, at the expense of the smaller cities and towns. Is this inevitable; is it a good thing? Is it what people want? These are questions that don't get sufficient attention.

There's some fairly recent work by Passenger Focus that highlights the importance of providing through journey opportunities. Using Tiverton as a railhead doesn't work for the many passengers trying to visit Cornwall. Don't give up on through journeys just yet, and do something to make it easier for people to get to those sad places like Wadebridge that lost their rail connections years ago.

Vacman, you have hit on an important point here. Around the country in general, journeys under 25 miles are the vast majority. Those middle-distance journeys are responsible for a large share of the downsides of car travel.

The more frequent trains on today's railway have helped to capture a growing share of these middle-length journeys. I still have the feeling that rail management would rather concentrate on the few percent of very long journeys.

This is a problem for which there is no simple solution. Close some stations and you please people using the stations remaining open and upset those using the stations to be closed. One of the problems is that there does not appear to be enough public information on the use of stations. The annual entrances and exits stats give some indication of numbers but does nothing to tell you where these numbers are travelling to and from. Source and destination surveys are required but these are very expensive in staff resources to do. You need to know where the revenue is coming from, i.e. the numbers of high fares vs. low fare users to make a sensible judgement. This was where the Beeching 1960s closures worked in the dark, or at least if there was some detailed info, it was not very easily available to the public but I expect that was because the politicians of the day used such information selectively to achieve their political aims. The same may be true today. The other issue is that railway operations have high standing costs and relatively low marginal costs so a small change in user numbers can have a much bigger impact on profit (or loss) margins. This is why there are so many cheap fares available to attract the non-essential rail user with enough conditions to stop the essential user from benefitting from these margins. If you close the stations that have relatively small numbers of users, the loss in revenue could have a much bigger impact on profit margins. This problem is not confined to Cornwall. Here on the Cotswold Line there have been similar arguments (discussed here on the Coffee Shop) from Worcester users who would like to see stations in Oxfordshire having a reduced frequency service so that 15 minutes can be knocked off the Worcester to London travel time as a result of fewer stops. The problem is whilst it would probably attract some more people from Worcester to use the trains, the likely loss of revenue (even allowing for the lower average fares at the eastern end) would be much greater because a large proportion of rail users board CL trains in Oxfordshire. Trains with fewer stops on these lower population density areas that didn't stop would run with many fewer travellers on board and at a loss to the TOC so in the longer run services would be closed as uneconomic. At the same time less frequent services at the eastern end would mean current rail users deserting rail. Fortunately most rail managers understand these complexities but daren't voice it because of the unwelcome noise they would create but it is the politicians who do not.

Surely that data is available to train operators though?  We might not get to see it, but each sale has 'from' and 'to' information (with the exception of rovers) and a reasonably accurate assumption of what trains are most popular can also be gleaned from this by using either the train the ticket was issued for (advance tickets) or time the ticket was sold at (on the day purchases) backed up with operators own passenger counts.

I agree with II. However this info is not available in the public domain as far as I know. I think it might be regarded by the current TOC that it would be confidential commercial information that it would not want to disclose, particularly at the current time when the Greater Western ITT is very current.

Eventualy new trains will be used on London to Penzance services.
These will probably be some form of multiple unit, about which I have misgivings, as posted elswhere.

An advantage of multiple units though is that one could run a service that divides en-route, not to serve two different destinations as is common, but both portions to serve the same desinations though with different calling points.

Think for example of a 12 coach train running fast from London to Taunton where it divides.
Front 6 for Exeter, Plymouth, and Penzance.
Rear 6, all stations to Penzance.

That would give a fast service for the principle stations, together with a reasonable service frequency at the less used stations. No one would have to change, though some might choose to if this saved time.

Unlike dedicated fast and slow trains from London, this type of service would only take up one path on the congested part of the route near London.

If passenger numbers continue to grow one might even justify an 18 car train.
Front 6, fast to Penzance
Mid 6, slow to Penzance
Rear 6, terminate at Taunton.

I think that might cause a bit of a problem with the length of platforms at stations like - Paddington?

Is it not available to each bidder so that they can effectively plan their bid, or do they just get the plain usage figures?


Interesting idea, and worthy of consideration I would have thought depending on what type of train eventually works down to Cornwall.

I don't pretend to know a huge amount about the Cornish network, but with a split at Exeter the fast train would go five minutes ahead of the slow one calling (presumably) at Dawlish, Teignmouth, Newton Abbot, Totnes, Ivybridge, and Plymouth.  Dawlish, Teignmouth and Ivybridge stops could be rotated for every other train.

That would then put it around 15-20 minutes behind the fast service from Plymouth with the extra stops it would then arrive at Penzance maybe around 10-15 minutes before the next fast train an hour later.

I'd suggest that the fast train also calls after Plymouth at St. Austell, Truro and Camborne (and maybe Liskeard and Bodmin Parkway on alternate trains) to make it useful to more of Cornwall and give it viable passenger numbers, and that the idea of running an 18-car train would never realistically see the light of day, but apart from that is his idea workable?  You get the two trains an hour Penzance to Plymouth that Cornwall wants and needs, but the locals at places like Redruth and Hayle still get the benefits of a direct train.  The opposite could happen in the other direction.

Interesting choice of Camborne over Redruth when I believe the latter is actually busier.  Although the two towns are separate, combined with Pool they form the largest urban area in Cornwall.  It may well be that this conurbation only needs one station served by most intercity trains and as Redruth also serves as the railhead for the Lizard peninsula and Helston there may well be a case for most intercity trains to call here but not at Camborne.  Line speed through Camborne is also higher so there would be more benefit in not stopping there.

That's a fair point, Zoe.

Camborne and St Austell have greater population than Truro, so would be more priority than Truro based on population spread.
truro has a population approx 20k, camborne approx 40k, St Austell approx 23k. Therefore Those two warrant more fast trains in my thoughts.

Redruth is busier though.  The 40000 for Camborne is the combined population of the Camborne-Pool-Redurth conurbation which is the largest urban area in Cornwall.

Redruth has better parking facilities and interlinking bus services from rural outlying areas to a large bus layby right outside the ticket office.

There are two sides to the "sensible judgement". The rail operator is interested only in the size of the fare (vs. the cost of carrying the passenger). However the value of the journey to the passenger and to the nation as a whole is probably not closely correlated with the length of the journey. That's why DfT finds it necessary to specify minimum number of trains calling at each station.

I'm curious to know what prevailed in the days pre-1948 when private rail companies had somewhat less detailed regulation.

Yes, platform lengthening would be required, and would be a costly and disruptive matter at Paddington.
My proposal does however have two major advantages.
Firstly, no other platforms need lengthening, Taunton already has very long platforms, and beyond Taunton the trains would be no longer than now.
Secondly only one path is required from Paddington and not 2 or 3, an important matter as the railway gets busier and potentialy more congested.

Reading?

Truro has a FAR higher rail footfall and is also a railhead for the Roseland Peninsular, Perranporth, St Agnes and even Newquay as a lot of people from Newquay drive to Truro to catch trains. If a stop on fast trains was needed then Redruth is miles ahead as again, it is a railhead for most of the Lizard, Helston and other areas, Camborne may well have a larger population but that certainly isn't reflected in the footfall nor the amount of people i see on a daily basis at each of these stations. TBH you could argue for all of the current stations but that won't speed up the service which is what we all want, to suggest cutting stops east of Plymouth doesn't really stack up as most of the Cornish trains already are relatively fast east of Plymouth but agreed, some Totnes, Newton Abbot and Tivvy stops could be withdrawn. Tivvy in particular as there is quite a big time penalty for stopping there due to the relatively high line speed.

There's also a time penalty for stopping at Taunton as like Tiverton Parkway the line speed is 100 mph so I'd have thought at least one extra up train could have a Taunton call removed.  Currently there are two down trains that run fast between Reading and Exeter.  The issue with not calling at Newton Abbot and Taunton though is that Newton Abbot serves Torbay with a population of over 100000 and Taunton also serves a large area.  You don't have to call every train at these stations though so I think if Totnes, Newton Abbot, Tiverton Parkway and Taunton were all removed from some of the Penzance trains there would be quite a time saving east of Plymouth.  You could save even more time by running non-stop from Plymouth to Reading but Exeter is too important to not stop at.

Fast to Taunton ?

Reading is like Exeter though, too important not to call at.

Tiverton Parkway is also a railhead for much of North and East Devon, and - other than Penzance, Truro and St Austell - has a higher footfall than every station in Cornwall.

Maybe so but they have other rail based options i.e. use the Barny line, as for the Torbay arguement for stopping at NTA, easy, change at EXD instead as all trains from Torbay go through to EXD anyway (at the moment).

Which is going to leave anyone from the Newton Abbot/Torbay area with extended journey times and a 30 - 40 minute ride on a DMU which can be quite overcrowded and so encourage people to go by road.  Also not everyone from the area arrives at Newton Abbot station by using the Torbay branch but journey times to London will be extended for everyone if they have to change at Exeter.   There's also the issue of people heading west from Torbay/Newton Abbot.  I don't think it would be a great idea to have to travel via Exeter to get from Torquay to Truro.  Yes some Newton Abbot calls on Penzance services can be removed, for example the down Cornish Riviera or Royal Duchy trains need to stop there (the up Cornish Riviera already does not) but I think there should still be a direct intercity service to London.

Let's get controversial......

How about going back to the old BR days and running a few fasts at peak hours - non-stop PAD to Exeter/Bristol Pkwy and Temple Meads/Oxford/Swindon and vice versa?

And now I'll wait for the customary abuse (though I know there are those out there that agree with me).
 

If you ask someone if they want their journey extended by 30-45 minutes just so a bunch of pasty-munching pixie-shaggers can save three minutes, what do you suppose their response would be?

Devon can lay claim to Pixie folklore and the pasty as well.

Ottery St Mary has an annual Pixie Day, and Dartmoor legend has many stories of Pixies.

A recipe for a pasty dating back to 1510 was found in 2006, in an Audit book for the Borough of Plymouth.

 ;)

"Pasty-munching pixie-shaggers" applies to anyone South West of Tiverton.

To suggest that I was referring only to residents of Cornwall is just a teeny bit racist, and you should be thoroughly ashamed of yourself.

 :P

The ORR annual 'exit and entry' figures for the rail leg of a journey are definitely calculated (primarily) from ticket sales data.  Interchange figures are calculated by piggy backing on the Orcats system, in so much as it defines the likeliest routes (and therefore interchanges) taken from A-B.  For ticket sales to group stations (eg London Terminals) they then have to estimate the most likely destination.  Rovers and zonal tickets such as travelcards are another problem,  but I'd expect they'll apply some sort of statistical rules, for instance if they assume that nearly all outboundary travelcards sold at Winchester start with a trip to Waterloo I suspect they'll be quite safe.

If you go to the report section of the annual station usage figures on ORR's website, Appendices 1 and 2 explain how they get from ticket sales to station usage:

http://www.rail-reg.gov.uk/upload/pdf/stn_usage_report_1011.pdf

Paul

 

There are always going to be differences of opinion on long distance services ... whether to stop them at intermediate stations at a cost of slowing down the service as a whole, or to reduce the service at those intermediate stations of add in further more local services, which would involve a change on the way.  There's also the question of whether the timetable should be clockfaced, or whether a varied stopping pattern with some exceptionally fast trail-blazer services should be run.

What a pity that elements in this thread have degenerated towards the trading of insults, as this dilutes the discussion and reduces the seriousness with which reader - almost certainly including members of the franchise bid teams - give to considering what's written. I am informed that the insults were intended to be traded in jest, but on a public facing forum jest can quickly (an unintentionally) turn to offense.  And I deeply regret that the poster who wrote the jest that was found to be offensive has declined to reword his post or apologise, but has instead replied to me with a 'clever' message that just results in my having to waste more time writing this.  In this instance, I'm not going to take this any further - I'm going to leave it for the reader to form his own view on the merits (or otherwise) of the "jest" and the follow up.

---

OK .. personal view / thoughts here, as someone who rarely travels west of Taunton (so these thoughts should be taken with a pinch of salt as they lack local knowledge)

There's a conundrum that tries to trade off speed v flexibility of journeys, and another conundrum that looks at clockface v local changes at specific times of day which break the pattern.  I think I would rather have a train every hour on the main long distance route from my City to London than a less frequent service (and not clockface) that's sometimes quicker. And I would rather have a train that's well loaded and makes commercial sense - since that helps its long term viability - than a "flagship" service that might well get morphed into something else far less palletable once the marketing wheeze has died down if it turns out to be racing through stations where it could fill up.   I would prefer direct services for my journeys, but if there's a good regular option with a planned / timetabled connection every hour or two, that's likely to be better than a sporadic through service.

What could that mean at some date in the future, given rising volumes and potentially different trains with different acceleration patterns and capacities?   Hourly PAD-RDG-TAU-TIV-EXD-NTA-TOT-IVY-PLY and perhaps beyond (see next paragraph). Hourly PAD-RDG-NBY-KIT-HGD-PEW-BDW-PEW-WSB-CLC-TAU-TIV-EXD (wait while the PLY train stops / exchanges passengers / prceeds) - EXT-SCS-DWW-DWL-TGM-NTA-TRR-TQY-PGN.  Beyond PLY?  Either run it hourly, major stations only if it's express stock / long train / more speed than accelleration, or run it every 2 hours and fill in with a local train that's every single station but takes the same time because of different characteristics.   Whichever of those options you choose, you've got the possibility of making the Cornish service every half hour with an hourly intermediate service ...

Enough said.  The residents of the area, business travellers to the area, DfT, local councils, Network Rail, and (one hopes) the four bidders are all better informed than I am on this area, so they're probably streets ahead in looking for the best way to provide.  I just worry about "best for what / whom" sometimes.

North Devon-ites are hardly in a position to mock any other region of the UK in terms of their mating habits or for that fact anything. Pot, Kettle..................... I suppose it is difficult to get on a train at Barny without them dropping their knuckles in the cess. But we digress, Cornwall's principal stations combined have a far higher footfall than Tiverton Parkway so the majority should rule, and this isn't every train i'm on about just most of the ones from Cornwall.

A large traffic from a group of stations is different to a the same traffic at one large station as a single stop incurs less delay than multiple stops. 

I guess some questions that need to be considered are:

1.  If you were to reduce the number of stops, how much would time would be samed for through travellers?

2. If you substituted additional local services to replace the stops, how frequent would they need to be to ensure that passengers form the smaller stations were not unduly delayed?

At least someone is starting to take this seriously. 

West Cornwall MP, Andrew George, has launched a petition in support of the campaign to persuade the Government to protect a base line of at least 9 through services from Penzance to London when the next 15 year rail franchise is let later this autumn.

Invitations to tender for the Great Western franchise were published recently and included an option to cut through services from Penzance to just 6 per day.

Mr George^s petition will be presented to Rail Minister, Rt. Hon Theresa Villiers MP, in October at the same time as companies tendering for the franchise submit their bids.

Mr George said, we have already sent a strong message to the Minister. Any cut in through services would be bad for business, bad for the tourist industry and for the thousands of commuters who depend on this vital lifeline service.

It is important that companies tendering for the service and Government Ministers are made fully aware just how strongly we feel about the future of our intercity services. I therefore call upon local people and visitors to sign up to this petition.^



http://andrewgeorge.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=86ea22b9ac3d905f4e00b84f5&id=0e79a07bb8&e=eee8643a38 (http://andrewgeorge.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=86ea22b9ac3d905f4e00b84f5&id=0e79a07bb8&e=eee8643a38)

How about run some extras, like 3/4 non-stop from PAD-PLY, stop running normal Plymouth Paddington trains west of Plymouth and retain them hourly.

The main advantages of this I see are:

Current stops between Paddington and Plymouth are retained and therefore the market is kept
Large speeding up for Cornwell passenges.
Uses about the same number of HSTs are present
Better lode factor on all trains

But having the disadvantages of:

Reduction in service to Cornwell from London
Using precious Reading-Paddington capacity
Reduction in service from Cornwell to places such as Exeter

The Great Western route to Cornwall is one of the few GW main lines without a clockface service and this thread demonstrates why, due the argument about which places should have a better or worse service. If you look at Reading each station where many trains stop between Taunton and Plymouth:

Reading - I believe two reasons virtually everything stops at Reading are a) it's a rather popular station and b) having a fast train head through for Paddington will simply mean it gets stuck behind the previous service as there are so many trains using the fast lines every hour, so any time saving is negligible.

Taunton - a big railhead for much of Somerset plus the town itself of around 40,000.

Tiverton Parkway - an odd station in that it's in the middle of nowhere, but it's well-used by people from North Devon, mid-Devon and Cornwall. If you severely slashed trains I suspect most of these people would simply drive rather than use alternate services.

Exeter St Davids - if the previous poster was suggesting that stops be cut there, I'd point out that it gets more use than any other station in Devon or Cornwall. Plus it has a 30mph speed limit so any time saving is negligible. Although rather bizarrely for a few years Virgin used to run a train that called at Totnes, NAbbot and Taunton, but not Exeter. I have no idea why but I digress.

Newton Abbot - serves a town of 20,000 plus Torquay. Again I suspect cutting stops would cause some people to drive rather than use the train.

Totnes - only serves a town of 8000 but gets a far better intercity service than Dawlish or Teignmouth, both of which are larger. But then it does serves Paignton and the South Hams, the latter of which is the wealthiest part of Devon. People with money and influence don't like having their trains removed - see the Deerstalker express saga in the early 90s.



Removing stops at any of these to speed up journeys further west is not going to go down well, just as removing stops at Didcot to speed up Brizzle and Wales services doesn't seem popular.

Apart from Broadgage's suggestion the only thing I can suggest is this:

Hourly Pad-Rdg-Exr-Plym-standard intercity stations to Penzance.
Hourly Pad-Rdg-Berks and Hants stations-Taun-TivP-Exr-NA-Tot-Ivy-Plym

Maybe every 2nd hour a Plym Newquay service allowing fewer stops on the Pad-Penzance service.

However this requires a) a business case b) sufficient trains and c) sufficient capacity including for overtaking. For c) you'd have the opportunity at Taunton, Tivvy Junction, Exeter, Dawlish Warren, NA, Totnes and Hemerdon (I think one side's still there anyway) but it'd all take a lot of effort.

From the DfT's Great Western Franchise Stakeholder Briefing Document (http://assets.dft.gov.uk/publications/rail-passenger-franchise-great-western/f-stakeholder-briefing.pdf):


This, based on the 1,144 responses to the consultation, suggests that the answer(s) will be far from easy to reconcile ...  ::)

You can please some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time.

The problem comes when attempts are made at pleasing all of the people all of the time.

Sadly, I cannot fault your logic here :D

Looping trains at Totnes, and Hemerdon (on the up, no loop on the down) isn't really practical given the signal sections between Newton Abbot and Plymouth, looping a train at Hemerdon could require a train to wait in the loop for up to 15 minutes, and the up to 10 minutes at Totnes - it would be much more effective to run the train straight through as it could easily make it to Newton Abbot or Plymouth if there is enough headway between trains, looping the train would only further increase the journey time of the train overtaking because of how far away the previous signal is and having to wait for the train it will overtake to enter the loop fully and overlaps to clear.

That's correct with the current Reading layout, but the new layout with 5 platforms on the mains is designed specifically to allow for through trains to overtake in the normal timetable without stopping.

There was a proposal somewhere (in one of the many reports, strategies or consultations [1] over the last few years) that the additional Bristol to Paddington fast IEPs run non-stop between Parkway and Paddington.  There may now be more through trains planned.  So Reading passengers may actually have to get used to reading the timetable properly...

Paul

[1] Found it again eventually - in Network Rail's CP5 enhancement proposals of Sept 2011.