Great Western Coffee Shop

Turned up at Slough today with the CIS showing an on time departure for the 6:35 to Oxford, it eventually departed at 6:51. My gripe is the CIS showed on time when I arrived but then kept adding 2 minutes until the platform was changed and we eventually departed from plat 4, causing much confusion as I am not sure the guard knew where to unlock the doors and left the last 4 coaches locked.

Had I known how late we were going to be I would have caught a stopper to reading and made my connection to Blackwater, as it was we ended up on the relief lines all the way to twyford following a stopper.

How are the delays on the CIS calculated, is it just based on the location of the train as it just could not seem to work out when the train was going to depart in this situation.

In my experience CIS tends to be optimistic when advertising delays. If a delay happens quickly then there's not alotnyou can do about that but when a train is running on a relief line and following other slow trains then it will not run to it's normal speed and as a result will pick up a couple of minutes here and there.

Another example happens frequently in Cornwall where a train from London will be running say 15 mins late out of Reading. CIS screens in Cornwall will still have it as on time as it 'thinks' it will make up the delay which most of the time it won't. As the train gets closer to it's destination still running 15 late, CIS will start to increase the delay but never reveal how late the train currently is which I think is a more useful measure.

There were a few problems on the main lines in and out of Paddington this morning.

Initially they were closed when engineering work overran and then, not long after re-opening, they were closed again by a points problem near Slough.  Unfortunately your train was one of the first to be caught up in the latter problem.  It was on time until Ealing Broadway at 06.27 and then got caught in a queue of trains using the relief lines.

It works purely on location & the forecast time taken to reach you from wherever it is located. CIS cannot forecast the future (even 5 minutes hence), thus, if a train is stationary, it cannot tell how long it will be in that state (could be a minute, might be 30!), and thus will always show a creep in those situations. You yourself couldn't be any more accurate, unless you knew why it was being delayed & who is working behind the scenes to get it moving at its booked speed!

Similarly, if it's doing half the speed its booked to - yes, it knows how late it is if it immediately started to travel again at its booked speed, but if continues to crawl, it can't forecast how long that will continue, and thus creep is the only way it works - by calculating exactly how late it is (by reference to where it ought to be at booked speed, and where it is actually located)...it doesn't unfortunately have a crystal ball (and neither do you) to be able to forecast how long the disruption will continue.

If you look at Realtime Trains http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/P70360/2014/05/02/advanced it'll show you which line the train is travelling on which would give you a rough idea.  For some reason, and I imagine its due to the limitations of the CIS system and the amount of information it can handle and process it does not take its feed from from the same ones as Realtime trains.
As for platform allocation, it will still be advertised as platform 2 until the train passes over Dolphin Junction.  Dolphin is the last junction before Slough where the train can return to the fast line.  Once the route is set over Dolphin Junction and the train it is continuing on the relief lines then the station screens will automatically change.  Until the route is set the station staff will not know which platform the train will arrive on.

Platform 4 at Slough doesn't fit a whole HST, it depends whether the driver runs the power car off the platform or if the signal is displaying a RED.  I imagine the guard has played it safe, as they should.  If they had been in the wrong location that's another few minutes of delay they've added!

If you look at the CIS screens once the train has stopped or departs from the station, the expected time does update accordingly.  Not much use I know.

I have seen "delayed" come up on the CIS before (Reading I think) does someone have to intervene to make this happen as this would have been more useful in this situation rather than the delay minutes keep rolling?

I'm pretty sure that's manual intervention...

Thanks for the info on the real time trains site,  l have the Android app but it does not seem to show anywhere near the ammount of info the website does

That will only come up when a train does not report at a location for an extended period of time. So it is is stopped somewhere then after a while the CIS screens will change it to delayed. As your train was moving the CIS screen won't change to show delayed.

At Hanborough we have a small LCD screen and a tall bright LED screen with voice announcements. However the screens sometimes show differing information. The small LCD screen usually shows after a train has left Oxford that it is between Oxford and Hanborough. However about 5 minutes after starting to display this it will change to show that the train is still at Oxford. I am told that the system picks up the data from one source up to around Oxford but when the train passes over Wolvercote onto the single track, the data comes from a different source showing different information. What is correct I wonder as I don't think the train has gone backwards on its journey to Hanborough.

I don't know about Andriod but iOS you can get the additional information by using the 'detailed' search option.


In the same way.  At other locations, the CIS screens will show 'boarding' or 'arrived' even though there may not be a train in the platform.  This happens when the train has been given a route into the station and passed the last signal before entering the station.  For example, at Paddington 'boarding' will be displayed for Thames Valley services when the train has passed the last signal before entering the station (which is adjacent to Royal Oak tube station)

What would be good of course is information announcements from human beings, and/or customer service/station staff on platforms giving advice, rather than the default position whenever there are problems (ie disappearing as rapidly as possible)?

Staff won't, most of the time, have any more delay info than the CIS....

What would be good of course is information announcements from human beings, and/or customer service/station staff on platforms giving advice, rather than the default position whenever there are problems (ie disappearing as rapidly as possible)?
[/quote]

The thing is, most people have unreasonable expectations when there is severe disruption.  For example, when the lines are closed because of a fatality, we genuinely don't know what time it will reopen but you tell a passenger that and we're lying or talking BS.  Why would anyone stand on a platform doing there level best and get shouted at, abused or spat at?
We're pretty sure that passengers think we now exactly what time a fault with signalling equipment will be fixed or exactly what that train sitting in platform 2 will work next when in reality people in control are working out how much fuel that set has and where that set needs to finish at the end of the day for maintenance requirements hence the reason why sometimes you get a last minute set swap.

The thing is, most people have unreasonable expectations when there is severe disruption.  For example, when the lines are closed because of a fatality, we genuinely don't know what time it will reopen but you tell a passenger that and we're lying or talking BS.  Why would anyone stand on a platform doing there level best and get shouted at, abused or spat at?
We're pretty sure that passengers think we now exactly what time a fault with signalling equipment will be fixed or exactly what that train sitting in platform 2 will work next when in reality people in control are working out how much fuel that set has and where that set needs to finish at the end of the day for maintenance requirements hence the reason why sometimes you get a last minute set swap.

[/quote]

I don't think its "unreasonable expectations" to expect some advice on (for example) alternative sources of transport etc? People are not stupid and they understand that there isn't always a definitive answer on when trains will resume .I have been commuting for the best part of 20 years and I can never recall seeing a passenger spitting at a member of staff - if it has happened (and I'm sure it has) then it is reprehensible - as is leaving sometimes vulnerable customers without any sort of help or advice late at night - to be honest, some of the rudest, most aggressive people I have encountered in these circumstances have been railway staff, a couple of individuals at Slough spring to mind......it's a two way street....there is no excuse for being rude to rail staff, but similarly in the case where the whole service has fallen apart for whatever reason, there should be staff available to give help and constructive advice, not just "no idea mate" when asked what's going on.

I would just like to say as the OP my intention was not to complain about the service but to understand how the CIS works. On the whole my regular commute on FGW has actually been quite trouble free and I have no real complaints.

In this situation I had considered getting on all 3 stopping services that departed slough during the time I was waiting for the service in question, because the CIS kept adding a couple of minutes it gave a false sense of hope that the train would arrive shortly. Based on the information provided, I am probably better looking at real time trains to get an idea where the train is in the future.

As trains were using the relief lines, and the disruption was known about it probably would have been helpful for manual announcements to be made informing passengers of the likely delays to services and advising that it may well be better to catch a stopping service. I'm guessing none were made.

No announcements made, it's fairly minal staffing at that time in the morning at slough, certainly the gateline is not manned until well after 6:30.

I agree, on the whole the service is pretty good, much better than it used to be but it's just that when things do go wrong everything seems to fall apart information/help wise.

Slough station is staffed 24/7. Surprised to read the above comments of lack of announcements at the station, I think Slough are normally good during disruption. On the other hand if staff are on the platform they wouldn't be able to make an announcement as I don't think they have a wireless microphone like Ealing Broadway have.

In the days when I used to commute from Slough the platform staff were awful - there was one guy who sounded like he smoked about 200 cigarettes a day who I once saw reduce an elderly lady to tears by yelling "Are you calling me a liar" when she questioned something he'd said.....a couple of soldiers who happened to be on the platform had a "quiet word" with him which led to an apology! There was also an older grey haired chap with glasses who seemed totally detached and walked around talking to himself most of the time!  Only a few years ago but guess it may have changed since then!  :)

definitely no manual announcements, even the platform change was an automated one, about 2-3 mins before the train arrived.

Not sure what the shift patterns are but I am guessing that the gateline gets manned as more staff come on shift.

There's several like that at Marylebone too - witnessed by recent twitter complaints. It's the one thing in their Customer Service that has been complained about for years, yet nothing gets done about it. Staff elsewhere on Chiltern's patch, strangely, are very good.