Great Western Coffee Shop

And finally: Ben Rule has kindly agreed to provide comments in response to a question from grahame, regarding the TransWilts line:

Dear Ben, delighted that you're coming here to help clarify some questions to which we have differing answers of plain "don't know"

Committment to lesser but growing services

Background:

Next Friday, the Melksham Rail Link bus which accounts for 6,000 annual (train) journeys is being withdrawn.  On 1st August, First bus route 234 which accepts rail tickets after the last train has gone is being withdrawn. During the recent RMT strikes, there was no TransWilts service and unlike other lines, servives didn't resume until Saturday afternoon.  And at other times, it often seems that the TransWilts service is the first to "go" in the area - despite other lines having more frequent services, so that cancellations just result in a 30 minute "drop back" when they happen there.  Trains can be "full and standing" 6 (yes six) days a week, with passenger traffic growing at an estimated 30% in 2015 over 2014, and with indications and studies suggesting that growth at this rate could continue for years to come, provided that there are good bus links (the rail link bus has grown 50% per 6 months!), reliable trains at the time that people want them, and sufficient capacity so that they're not denied boarding (which is starting to happen).

Initially, the "TransWilts service" was funded as a 3 year trail to December 2016.   The Franchise announcement of March 2015 and associated coverage suggested that trains are contracted to continue through the period to 2019, with replacement of 1 car trains with 2 car in May 2017, and with higher capicity trains with additional services in December 2018.  This all sounds rather good, except the "additional services" seem to have dropped from the Stakeholder publicity in June, and industry contacts who I believe to be well informed tell me that the extras are a costed option for which financing agreement has not yet been reached - "First would love to run them if someone pays them to - but no-one has offered to yet^.

People are taking jobs, moving home, selling cars in the expectation that they'll have a reliable public transport fit for their journeys into the future.

Question / Request:

Can you please clarify future plans (what's contracted and what's hoped) for the TransWilts and other lesser lines through the franchise to 2019. Can you comment with regard to assurance of service level, reliability, and provision of sufficient capacity to routinely carry all passengers.

So I can pick this up first of all. During the strike we had to prioritise the resource we had available. Only a very few of our managers have route competence over the Melksham route and these managers were needed on other lines. Melksham was not alone in having no service despite our best efforts to run as many trains as we could. Apologies we couldn't keep the service running last week.

Our franchise plans are that we will replace the current single car unit with 2 car class 158s in May 2017. These will have free wifi and air con as well as the extra capacity. In December 2018 these will be replaced with class 165 units with a further increase in capacity.

Above and beyond those franchise commitments we are very keen to see the success of the Trans Wilts route continue. We have expanded funding for CRPs so we can provide additional funding for Trans Wilts. We expect the line to benefit from our new customer and community improvement fund. Further details on this later in the year.