Great Western Coffee Shop

TravelWatch SouthWest ^ Public Transport Users Forum - meeting, Taunton, Saturday 1 March 2008

Representing the admin team from this forum: Graham Ellis, Lee Fletcher and Chris Hankin attended this meeting.

Notes from Chris: This was my first such meeting, and I found it a very interesting day: lots of input from all sorts of other groups, representing public transport issues throughout the South West. The following is a summary of my impressions of Andrew Haines^ presentation only, based on the hand-written notes I made during the day: please note, it is not a complete or official record, and where ^soft quotes^ are indicated, they are not necessarily verbatim.
Also, our collective thanks to First Great Western for providing the refreshments!

^All Change for First Great Western?^ Andrew Haines, Chief Operating Officer, First Great Western:

Andrew, (wearing a daffodil for St David's Day and also later emphasising that he is an optimist by nature!), started by reviewing recent events:
^   issues with Network Rail (saying that he was working with Dave Ward to resolve these);
^   a ^relatively small scale but, in terms of public relations, very significant local fare strike;
^   the recent announcement of a breach of the franchise ^ which he affirmed was due to ^cock-up, not conspiracy^.

He then reviewed what he found when he took over at FGW ^ examples he gave were:
^On-train staff have half the number of managers you would expect^- compared with other TOCs.  For example, there was a train waiting at a platform and a train crew were in their restroom - but nobody put the two together ^ Andrew stated, ^Frankly we made a pig^s ear of how we resource it^.

Andrew then summarised the HST refresh programme, and covered in more detail this week^s announcement.  He also talked about improvements FGW have already made ^ for example, the Customer Information System is now based in Paddington, rather than Swindon, because in times of disruption, Paddington is the busiest station for FGW.

Andrew then explained his management ethos ^ people working for FGW are ^colleagues^ he has a ^swear box^ on his office for ^1 each time they are referred to as ^staff^ or ^employees^!  He wants to strengthen local operations management: he gave an example of there being over 400 catering colleagues ^ but with no one manager responsible for them.

In terms of FGW resourcing for the future, Andrew gave an example of ^500,000 worth of spares at Laira ^ so FGW don^t have to rely on warranties. Also, all gateline staff will be given lots more training in customer service.

However, on the question of additional trains, Andrew emphasized that there is a national shortage of rolling stock: this does not affect just FGW, but all TOCs.

Turning to the subject of fares, Andrew confirmed that the increase in fares this year will raise ^30m ^ but the FGW subsidy drops by ^50m.  In other words, for every ^1 raised by FGW through fares, they have to pay ^1.60 to the DfT ^ Treasury.  Andrew said that we ^need to have a much more intelligent debate about fares in this country.^ He went on to emphasize that we need to obtain ^political engagement^ with politicians being committed to helping to resolve issues, rather than ^fare strikes and placard waving^.

In the ^question and answer^ session following Andrew^s presentation, he was joined by Mark Hopwood and Julian Crow.

I jotted down some points from this session:

There will be more timetable changes ^ this is an evolving situation: extended journey times need to be allowed for, as there are more people travelling, and the use of HSTs at local stations is causing dwell time issues on the timetable;

There is no ^newer/better stock available: Andrew told us that he had a letter from the DfT stating that ^there is no more rolling stock available and no matter what case you had put, you would not have got any more^;

On the possibility of franchise specification reviews (as the franchise specification was ^unfair^ to FGW: questioner^s point), Andrew pointed out that FGW would only have a case for such a review if they were able to show they ^had got their act together^;

There were several other questions, but due to time constraints, it was unfortunately not possible for these to be addressed fully.

Further details of this meeting are available at http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org

Many thanks for that summary of Andrew Haines' talk, Chris.  Have a read through it everyone - there are some interesting points there.  Also have a look, if you like, at my blog - here (http://www.savethetrain.org.uk/update/index.html) - where I have made some further comment.

Other talks during the day:

Paul Jenkins, MD of Thamesdown Transport, about the consultation process last autumn with regard to bus route changes, and how they have been analysing the results and coming up with what will be - they hope - a timetable and route network that can address the majority of the concerns, and consider them all.   

It was interesting to note that they planned to put the new timetable into action last autumn, but due to the number of responses and the amount of extra work and changes needed, they have delayed until the Spring.  What a pity that FGW weren't in a position to take a bit of extra time late in 2006 to take full consideration of all the concerns; our inputs on the TransWilts asking them to run the morning train later and the evening train earlier resulted in them making changes in the opposite direction. Mind you, the cynics suggested that they did use these consultation inputs - but to come up with a service which they hoped would be so little used it could die quietly.

Andrew Seedhouse of Goverment Office South West - the gentleman who's previous job was to "manage expectations" (his own words) with regards to train services provided in the South West - spoke on how the new bus pass concessionary fare scheme card printing is coming along; the scheme goes national as from 1st April, with anyone holding a card able to travel anywhere in the country on local buses.

Louise Harrison - Head or Regional Transport at GOSW - spoke on "Towards a sustainable transport system".  I personally find it hard to follow and understand all the various reports and stages and issues that looking far ahead bring - but I do applaud some of the things she was saying such as looking at the flows / corridors / journey needs as a whole and not just one element at a time, and looking wider at things like the need to travel so much in the first place.   Lee, Chris - please correct me if I misunderstood what Louise was saying, as GOSW has got itself such a reputation for supporting road schemes to build the way out of specific road traffic issues in the past.

Taking a look at my own region - West Wiltshire - I see a major triangle of routes that people want to travel within the area - across the top from Swindon to Bath and beyond, and then up from the bottom - the Warminster / Westbury area - to Bath on the left and Chippenham / Swindon to the right.  The traffic across the top is well catered for by road and rail, but both roads down to the Westbury area are overcrowded along most of their lengths,  not having been designed for major trunk flows.   The railway up from Westbury to Bath has a good frequency of passenger trains but they are often overcrowded. The railway from Westbury to Swindon is in excellent shape, but has few trains, resulting in passengers travelling around two sides of the triangle for most of the day, or driving as the bus is relatively slow.

I wonder what Louise's views / suggestions for the furure development of sustainable transport in this region might be - bearing in mind that major growth is planned all along the Westbury - Swindon corridor which at present is the corridor that's, perhaps, the worst congested and has the poorest public transport provision at a regional level, with poor interchanges to local transport at places such as Melksham.

Carrying on with the environmental and sustanability issues, Professor Frank Chambers spoke on SouthWest Climate Change Impacts Partnership and was canvassing for more knoweldgeable members.  Once again, I personally find some of thei stuff hard to identify with as I don't have vision that far ahead.

The last talk was by Gordon Edwards - a rail campaigner I much admire, and on the board of TWSW - but this time he was talking on "Delivering a bus passenger champion". I may have commented in the past that I don't really feel that rail passengers have an appropriate independent voice - but we do have Passenger Focus.  I hadn't though about it before, but Gordon was telling us that bus passeners have nothing, and commenting on options the government are looking at to provide such a voice - but perhaps to do it on the cheap - at national level - with passenger inputs being at a single central point, and for them to be taken up with the bus operator's professional association rather than with the individual operators.   There were a number of options there - not really my field, but I do wonder if the better solution now that we're talking so much about multimodal journeys would be for a multimodal traveller's representation, very much like we have in TravelWatch SouthWest.

Next TWSW Meeting will be held on Saturday 4 October 2008 at SCAT, Taunton.

They also have a new web address (link below.)
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/

Can be found in the link below.
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/newslog280408.html

As well as some topics previously discussed on this forum, it includes :

- FirstGroup and Stagecoach have both announced orders for a large number of new buses.

- New bus network for Swindon.

- Higher bus fares on the routes between Weymouth, Dorchester and Yeovil.

- NedRailways is targeting a move into the South West bus market.

- PlusBus doubles sales.

Latest Newslog from TravelWatch Southwest, with quite a few items related to topics discussed on this forum (link below.)
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/newslog160608.html

Latest Newslog from TravelWatch Southwest (link below.)
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/newslog230608.html

Latest newslog from TravelWatch Southwest (link below.)
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/newslog300608.html

Can be found in the link below.
http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/newslog070708.html

Details of this meeting, held in Taunton, can be viewed at http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/Meeting4.html

And if I am allowed to 'bang the drum' for members of this forum, items 3 and 6 may be of interest: http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/20081004_just_a_minute.html

Thanks for watching  ;) :D ;D !

TravelWatch Southwest hold a twice yearly meeting of representatives of transport user groups from the South West - the "South West" being Gloucestershire / Wiltshire / Dorset through to Cornwall.   I have attended meetings as the representative of "Save the Train" and more recently for the TransWilts Community Rail Partnership ( http://www.transwilts.org.uk/ ) ... and Chris from Nailsea has represented this forum. 

The Transport User Group community is a strong one, with groups offering each other mutual advise and support, and sharing information for the common good of improving services (using the word "services" in the very widest sense), or at least doing their very best for services at times when increased red tape and tax, and decreasing funding, act against better / continuing provision.   Keynote speakers fill us in on what's happening in the travel and transport world, explain things from an administrator's / operators's view, and help us get answers to questions we have / check into rumours that might have come our way straight from the Horse's Mouth.

As well as Chris, I often meet up with other forum members at TravelWatch, as a number of our members here on "The Coffee Shop" are active in other groups to the extent that they represent them;  I'm flagging the meeting in the public diary for these folks and if you're with a group that's not represented there, it's worth asking for an invite ... let me know if you want contact details / an introduction sent. 

The TravelWatch web site is at http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/ and there are a number of very good papers there available for all.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/hundreds-of-bus-services-to-be-axed-as-councils-cut-subsidies-2187954.html

 Should be a lively meeting  !!!!!!!!!

Pretty good natured bunch ... but with buses replacing trains for the Exeter, Torbay, Plymouth and Cornwall crowd, they're not exactly going to arrive refreshed from a comfortable and quick journey!

TravelWatch SouthWest meets twice a year ... it's a meeting of a representative of each interested public transport group in Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, Dorset and counties to the south west thereof.   Next meeting on Saturday, in Taunton. [details] (http://www.travelwatchsouthwest.org/new/)

Several active forum members attend regularly, and I already know of their attendance this time too.  But I'm also aware that at least some less active forum members, and indeed people who just browse here and have not joined, may be there.  If you're coming along, please say "hi"  -- Graham

Today's meeting was, as ever, a very interesting one - particularly the presentation by one of the keynote speakers, Patrick Hallgate of Network Rail, from my point of view.

It was also good to enjoy a chat over a beer with grahame, bignosemac and ChrisB after the meeting - curtailed only by our respective needs to catch various trains homewards!

The next TravelWatch SouthWest meeting is on Saturday 2 March 2013 - hopefully we can arrange a similar opportunity to meet up socially on that occasion, too.

Could you give some idea what the speakers were saying?

Give me a while, ellendune, and I'll compile something later today.  ;)

Is there a corresponding Travel Watch for the Thames Valley?

My understanding (and subject to correction) is that there are a number of "TravelWatch"es, but not covering anything like the whole of the UK.   And that "TravelWatch London" has a different basic - perhaps a more formal an statutory one (?) that the others.  I don't know of one that includes the Thames Valley (downstream of the Oxfordshire / Wiltshire border) in its remit.

There's been a lot of passenger transport liaison / user organisations over time, and there have been renamings too ...


If you're researching further, have a look a these name:

Transport Users Consultative Committee
Rail User's Consultative Committee
Public Transport Forum
TravelWatch
Passenger Focus

and here are a couple of links that may help

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmtran/750/750vw52.htm
http://www.passengerfocus.org.uk/about/history

I know that Passenger Focus was working on a resource listing all user groups, so they should be able to help with "groups of groups" too  :D

There used to be separate passenger watchdogs (Transport User's Consultative Commitees at one time?) all over the country, but they were replaced by just one by 2005, whose 'public' name is Passenger Focus, their official name is different though.

Passenger Focus has a concise history here:  http://www.passengerfocus.org.uk/about/history 

It follows that 'Travelwatch South West' is not actually the formal successor to the earlier regional talking shop, and their use of the word 'Travelwatch' is also a bit misleading, as there is no real comparison between their status and the similarly named organisation in London.

What I can't get clear is whether Passenger Focus's national remit actually inlcudes London, or if it is somehow delegated to London Travelwatch, which seems to be an older organisation by a few years, presumably tied up somehow with the GLA?

Paul

Of course we must remember that London is so very different to other cities that it has to have special treatment.  They still ahev regualted buss services that other aprts of the country just dream about. This has always been the case. Could it be because important politicians live in Londo  Or am I just cynical?  ::)