Great Western Coffee Shop

Making use of the poll we've been running [here] (http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=13011.0) on how people will get to and from the station, and taking figures for journey numbers from other urban areas across Wiltshire, I've been making some guestimates at how traffic may look at Melksham at some time in the not - too - distant future, and how stations resource will / would / would not be needed to cope.

See my blog story - "Getting people to and from Melksham Station not 20 but 700 times a day" (http://www.wellho.net/mouth/4191_Getting-people-to-and-from-Melksham-Station-not-20-but-700-times-a-day.html) - the subject of which gives you some idea of the changing numbers we  could see, and my suggestion "A radical proposal - a cheap and effective home to city commuter transport solution" (http://www.wellho.net/mouth/4190_A-radical-proposal-a-cheap-and-effective-way-to-provide-home-to-city-commuter-transport.html) of how the peak elements of that might be achieved in a sustainable way by a bus element using existing vehicles.

There are other elements that could step in here too - it has been noticed that the Faresaver X72 route passes close by the station in the mornings and that may be an alternative from Bowerhill for people wanting to catch the Swindon train.  I'm not totally convinced as passengers are much more inclined to use a balanced service (i.e. the same thing at each end of the day) and Faresaver have ceased to run by the time that the later evening trains get home (they could, though, connect with the first one).   However, we have told them of their fortuitous timings, and would love to help market it were it to become a stop on their service.

From Journey Check today :-


Melksham: Ticket Vending Machine problem
The ticket vending machines are out of order at Melksham station.
Additional Information
Please purchase tickets at the ticket office or, if unavailable, at the first available opportunity to do so when no other means of purchasing them is available at the station.
Last Updated:14/07/2017 08:10


I bet Grahame is surprised that Melksham now has a ticket office !!!!

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They're getting a bit ahead of themselves - the ticket office isn't due to open until January next year  ;D  [no, that is not a serious  schedule ]

This is a good week for the ticket machine to fail.  Traffic levels are seriously down because people's journeys are screwed up far and beyond just an extra 30 minutes transit time caused by taking a bus not a train between Swindon and Chippenham.  And all trains that run have conductors with ticket machines who have been well able to get through from what I've seen.

Separate thread to follow (if I don't get too depressed!) about the problems the engineering works (or more importantly how remaining services and buses have been set up or not set up).   Not going anything like as well as the Bath TPODs did  :-\