Great Western Coffee Shop

A very interesting day at the Great Western Stakeholder's meeting today.  And documents handed out were a 50 page "Our new Great Western Franchise" and "Annual Stakeholders Report 2014-2015" of the same length.   As this is "looking forward", here's one of the "new franchise" pages - for the TransWilts which is (of course) my particular interest.

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/gwr_18_1.jpg)

Thanks Grahame, interesting stuff.

Document can be found at https://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/-/media/pdf/aboutus/ourbusiness/stakeholders%20report/nfgwf.pdf?la=en (https://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/-/media/pdf/aboutus/ourbusiness/stakeholders%20report/nfgwf.pdf?la=en)

Mention of SLCs in the 'look at us, aren't we good' publication from First Group. SLCs not yet published by the DfT.

Also, still no firm announcement on the AT300s for the South West.

Fist Group should've hired Shane Warne. Much better at spin.

I read somewhere on Tuesday (Plymouth Herald?) that First had missed Junes deadline due to them not handing in correct paper work on time, likely to be done in 4-6 weeks, though it was stressed by First that it was entirely there fault and nothing to do with the DFT

Was there any mention of upcoming major blockades in connection with Electrification/Crossrail?

There were more discussions on timing of things than on blockades ... with some insights into elements which are unknown - new technology, pushing things beyond what's done before, and decisions and bureaucracy that's outside the control of the railway industry.  "If we made a worst case assumption for all of these things, we would have to quote deliveries so far in the future ...".   It was acknowledged that the disruption of blockades has a negative effect on the brand, but for a "new railway" and not just incremental improvements, some of this has to be lived with.

I would suggest that the group / people present were very much that rare breed who look forward to the future (and they're in roles where they need to do that) rather than looking at the transient operational issues which we have to go through to get there.  Actually I was rather out of place as more of the TransWilts tactical arm rather than our prime strategy person who was between a rock and a hard place and rightly went elsewhere.

I see that the proposed weekday class 800/801 service pattern has been tweaked compared with the version presented earlier in the DfT consultation response. Didcot loses a stop on the peak time service to Worcester, and Reading gains one, as well as a stop on the hourly services to Cardiff.

Looks like parts of this presentation are out of date before the new franchise has begun:
http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=15875.msg177995

[sigh]All too good to be true sadly.

Hmmm - from what the SoS has just said in Parliament, I'm not sure it was FGW's fault. The NR rejig today has definitely been on the cards....

Looking like a rejig on stock requirements?....

From the Plymouth Herald...

After this announcement - they were obviously given the heads-up....

I did find it strange that whilst the Gatwick service is being doubled and that it has links to Heathrow, that only 1 tph was going to be provided direct from Reading to Bristol Pway and stations to Swansea, things may change again but I hope this alteration remains.

I notice the earlier (but not early enough) service to the West, 06:37 from Pad. Based on a previous topic there were many members of this forum that were hoping for an 08:00 arrival in Exeter, 09:00 in Plymouth alas that does not appear to be in there future plans.

I'm taking this to mean that there will only be 387s from Swindon in the morning but not too Swindon in the evening, not exactly sure on the reasoning for this.

I haven't read all the pages but I searched for all mentions of Heathrow within the pdf file. There was only one (on page 33) concerning the withdrawal of Heathrow Connect. No mention of a Heathrow to Gatwick service

I was referring to Readings links to Heathrow and Gatwick, rather than between the two, apologies for not a clear enough explanation.

Don't forget yesterday's announcement - that document may have been put together well in advance and timings within the document may change and any extra services not bought uin the franchise may not be commercial any longer. What I'm saying is that there may be a Mark II sometime...