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Interesting idea in Railway Magazine  - how many stations can you travel through on a journey where each station name is in alphabetical order?

For example

Ascot
Bagshot
Camberley

or

Arram
Beverley
Cottingham

My best is 4

Barry Docks
Cadoxton
Dinas Powys
Eastbrook

I've got four too......

Bruton
Castle Cary
Taunton
Tiverton Parkway

Or if this counts and you go via Didcot Avoider and thus don't go through Didcot Parkway

Appleford
Choseley
Goring & Streatly
Pangbourne
Tilehurst

I've got six with changes:

Bourne End
Cookham
Furze Platt
Maidenhead (c)
Twyford (c)
Wargrave

With a seriously long change at Reading you could manage:


Bourne End
Cookham
Furze Platt
Maidenhead (c)
Reading (c) (RDG - HOT direct morning service)
Twyford
Wargrave

Original question was "stations you can travel through..."

Maidenhead to Reading involves going through Twyford, and that's not alphabetical.

How about an entire branch that can be done alphabetically:

Falmouth Docks
Falmouth Town
Penmere
Penryn
Perranwall
Truro

 ;)

If you're at Swindon at this time in the morning, there's a train which starts at 06:12 calling at
   Chippenham
   Melksham
   Trowbridge
   Westbury

You guys ought to get our more :)

But this sounds fun...going to have to think about this one...

I could start off with Bath Spar

Chippenham

Swindon

Didn't 'amiddl' mean consecutive letters in the alphabet?  That's what his three examples were anyway.  Not to say that the other examples aren't an equally absorbing challenge for those of you keen on quizzes!

Mine were consecutive so still looking for a challenge greater than 4 consecutively. but didnt define the rules so I guess non consecutive counts.

Yet to find a 'seven' but have found another 'six':

Canonbury
Dalston Junction
Haggerston
Hoxton
Shoreditch High Street
Whitechapel

If more stations were to reopen in the future, would that lead to longer sequences?  :D

Chippenham
Chippenham West
Lacock
Melksham
Staverton and Holt
Trowbridge
White Horse Park
Westbury

I've got a seven, though it's slightly off the patch!  ;D

Aberdour
Burntisland
Kinghorn
Kirkcaldy
Markinch
Ladybank
then Perth or Springfield, depending what route you take.

Does that qualify as two sevens for me?!

mmm...since when did "L" follow "M"? (Apologies if I am missing something!)

Back to school readytostart.  ::) :D

Here's a seven:

Burnage
East Didsbury
Gatley
Heald Green
Manchester Airport
Style
Wilmslow

From an area I use to live in.

Oops, back to primary school for me!  :D Still a five though!

(cough) Styal ?   ;)

And I have a rather limp offering of a five from me:

Ashchurch
Cheltenham
Gloucester
Stonehouse
Stroud

Obviously, Kemble rather got in the way between there and Swindon, to deny me a six (sorry, Kemble!)  ::)

I've found another 'six' in FGW land:

Bedwyn
Hungerford
Kintbury
Newbury
Newbury Racecourse
Thatcham

If anyone wants a really absorbing challenge, then an exercise we used to do to improve geography and timetable knowledge for new starters was to see who could work out the shortest possible journey time for a journey which involves changing trains at a station starting with each consecutive letter of the alphabet.

The rules were simple. 

1) You started off any time after midnight on the Monday morning from your chosen station starting with 'A' and then went through the alphabet.
2) The list of eligible stations was any station listed in the National Rail Timetable index.
3) You had to change trains at each station and allow the mimimum change time for that station (usually 5 minutes but less or more for a few stations as listed in the timetable) - so you couldn't stay on the same train (unless it happened to have a timetabled dwell at that station above the stated connection time).
4) If travelling through London, you had to allow for transfer time by London Underground as stated in the National Rail Timetable.
5) You could change trains at stations en-route to your next letter where no through service existed as long as it met all the criteria in 2-4 above.
6) You were allowed to disregard the letters 'X' and 'Z' as there are no eligible stations starting with those letters!

So, for example, you could start with 'amiddl's' example and go from Ascot to Bagshot on the 06:23 arriving at 06:29, then from Bagshot to Camberley on the 06:59 arriving at 07:05, then you could go Camberley to Datchet on the 07:17 (changing at Staines) arriving at 08:17 and so on...

Anyone up for the challenge?  I'm sure 'bignosemac' will!  ;)

Two bits of advice though; 1) The letter 'J' used to be key 2) Don't expect to do it in less than a day!

That's using the rail industry's definition of "Simple", right?  ;D

3) You had to change trains at each station
contradicts
You started off ... from your chosen station starting with 'A'
Are you staring at A, or changing there?  Surely you start anywhere and your first change is at "A"

1) You started off any time after midnight on the Monday morning
Which Monday morning?  Any time at all is after midnight on the previous Monday, so what does this mean?

5) You could change trains at stations en-route to your next letter where no through service existed as long as it met all the criteria in 2-4 above.
So you can't go from Reading to Saundersfoot except on the direct Summer Saturday train?


Do I have to be able to do it on an all line rover?

With a walk between adjacent stations (allowed by journey planners) I've found a 'ten'. Does require changes as well.

Beckenham Hill
Bellingham
Catford (c) (walk)
Catford Bridge
Ladywell
Lewisham (c)
Nunhead
Peckham Rye (c)
Queens Road (Peckham)
South Bermondsey

I don't know - it all seemed as simple as A-B-C to me!   ;)

To clarify:

Changing trains at each station means that you couldn't count the same train if it then went on to call at the next letter further on into its journey, as is the case with the 06:23 from Ascot, which after calling at Bagshot, then goes on to call at Camberley.  To count, you have to change at that station and then get another train to a station with the next letter.

For the purposes of timetabling, your departure from your station beginning with 'A' can be any train departing at or after 00:01 on a Monday morning.  If you choose not to depart until 10:30pm then you've wasted several hours as the total time is based on a clock which starts ticking at 00:01.

As far as changing trains is concerned, you can go from your next letter to the following letter via any station with an unlimited number of changes if you wanted to, as long as you allow for the minimum change time at each connecting point, including transfer times through London on the Underground.

And yes, you should easily be able to complete it on an all-line rover.  I hope you bloody well have a go now!  :P

I'm going to 'bloody well have a go' IndustryInsider. I like these sort of brainteasers, particularly as it involves stations, trains and timetables. It's going to take a while to do a full A to Y (there is no National Rail station beginning with Z) but I've got the tools at my disposal.  ;D

Just not going to give it go right now. It may be my day off tomorrow, but I still need to sleep sometime!

That's the spirit!  I'll even set a marker for you which should be pretty easy to beat.  'H' to 'I' to 'J' really killed me, but it isn't as straightforward as you think!  Not sure my third visit to South Wales was the best idea, either!  So, can anyone beat 17:37 on the Wednesday?  I'm sure I used to get finished on the Wednesday morning in the old days ;)

MONDAY
Aber 06:47
Barry Docks 07:30

Barry Docks 07:79
Cadoxton 07:52

Cadoxton 08:07
Dinas Powys 08:11

Dinas Powys 08:26
Eastbrook 08:28

Eastbrook  08:43
(changing at Cardiff Central  08:54-09:06)
Fairwater 09:15

Fairwater 09:40
(changing at Cardiff Central  09:50-10:01
Grangetown 10:05

Grangetown 10:23
Heath High Level  10:40

Heath High Level  11:04
(changing at Cardiff Central  11:14-11:25 and Didcot Parkway 12:46-13:01)
Iver 14:03

Iver 14:19
(changing at Reading  14:52-15:11 and Newport 16:30-17:22)
Johnston 20:17

Johnston 20:44
(changing at Whitland 21:12-22:10)
Kidwelly 22:51

TUESDAY
Kidwelly 06:05
Llanelli 06:17

Llanelli 08:08
Manorbier 09:53

Manorbier 11:29
Narbeth 12:03

Narbeth 14:01
(changing at Swansea 15:22-15:28 and Bristol Parkway 16:59-17:20)
Oldfield Park 18:03

Oldfield Park 18:11
(Changing at Bristol Temple Meads 18:28-18:56)
Parson Street 18:59

Parson Street 19:07
(changing at Cardiff Central 20:20-21:26)
Quakers Yard 22:08

Quakers Yard 22:55
Radyr 23:23

WEDNESDAY
Radyr 06:31
(changing at Cardiff Central 06:48-07:03)
Sarn 07:37

Sarn 08:54
Tondu 08:57

Tondu 09:29
(changing at Cardiff Central 10:07-10:25 and London Paddington/London Waterloo 12:32-13:23
Upper Halliford 14:30

Upper Halliford 14:44
Vauxhall 15:29

Vauxhall 15:37
Wimbledon 15:49

Wimbledon 16:02
(changing at London Waterloo/Waterloo East 16:19-16:40 and Paddock Wood 17:26-17:30)
Yalding 17:37

That looks pretty good ...

I was wondering about Jewellery Quarter for my "J" if I tried it - not so far from the home counties where there are more stations in a small area, and lots of Brummie scope for K, L, etc ... Impressive too that it can be done on a single ticket as you've avoided all those silly ALR restrictions!

Jewellery Quarter could well be the jewel in the crown in achieving a better time.  It wasn't open back in the early 90s when I used to do this with staff, so perhaps I overlooked it this time by mistake!

Have to admit that my initial plans also involve Jewellery Quarter for my 'J'. Great minds think alike eh?

I'm keeping my powder dry for the moment but will say that my first attempt doesn't start in Wales. May end there though....  ;)

To clarify: Goal is to do A-Y in the shortest time. Being able to do so on an ALR, avoiding the despicable 10am restriction in certain places, is a bonus?

Oh, and are walks allowed between stations? If those walks would be permitted when using an official journey planner?

Oh dear grahame. Just noticed this is an alphabetical fail as well. Join readytostart in remedial class.  :P ;) ;D

Yes to both of those.