Great Western Coffee Shop

A masterclass in how to complain from the MTLS forum (link below.)
http://forum.moretrainlessstrain.co.uk/index.php?topic=72.msg155#msg155

Very interesting. Seems the Easter weekend chaos wasn't confined to just the ex-Wessex services. I feel sorry for all those who travelled out of Paddington on West of England services that day.

The problem with Easter is that it doesnt fall at the time of the summer timetable and falls at various times in March/April. This combined with the exceptional weather at the time would have contributed to services out of Paddington being very busy. I don't think there would have been much FGW could have done this time round other than stop people boarding once the train was pretty full. Unlike on local services where you can add another unit (if you have any spare!), you can't add another carriage to a fixed HST set just for the odd service, well you can but it's not very practical.

What did concern me was the second to last paragraph:

"In effect by choosing to board a crowded train passengers are telling us that they would rather stand on a train than wait for the next service."

If I wrote something like that to a customer I'd be fired. That is a pretty ignorant statement to make and its not the first time I've heard it being used by FGW. Yes People do have a choice not to board but a)they are inconvenienced and delayed if they don't b)the next train would probably be just as jammed.

I don't think for one minute if you asked a passenger what they thought about having to be crammed in conditions that are illegal for transporting cattle and that by boarding a packed train they are sending a message out to FGW that it's ok to run services like this.

It's certainly a masterclass in how to complain.  It's also a masterclass in not understanding modern life.  In the 21st Century there are many times more people with time and money to travel than twenty years ago - for instance.  And because of work patterns, time off tends to be at the same time.  For the same reasons that the complainant considered it a good idea to leave London for the South West on the evening of Maundy Thursday, it is hardly surprising that thousands of others also thought it was a good idea.  Many of them decided to travel by train.  Why?  Because the roads would be jammed with thousands of people trying to do it that way.  It probably took two hours to get past Stonehenge on the A303 that evening.  Flying would be very limited as the few seats would have been booked well in advance.

For the same reasons that I don't go to Tesco on a Saturday morning or to the pub on a Saturday night, I didn't travel on Maundy Thursday.  If you don't like crowds, it seems obvious to avoid travelling on the busiest day in the year for travel.

If you do decide to travel on such a day, it is hardly realistic to expect dozens of trains and crews to be miraculously provided from nowhere and then stored away again until August.  It's no more realistic than expecting the DfT to provide temporary motorways at Bank Holidays to relieve congestion.

I'm not speaking with my FGW cap on here, but what does the complainant expect FGW customer services to say to him in reply?  As most of us here know, it is impossible with current systems to run the railway with an airline type seat booking system and even if it was possible, even fewer people would have travelled on that day.

Finally - putting my FGW cap on - from somebody who has asked people to leave a severely overcrowded train, the usual response is something that you wouldn't want your granny to hear.  The only way I could ever get people to leave an overcrowded train without being subjected to violence is to call for the police.  A health and safety limit on trains would be completely unenforceable.  It would have to apply to tube trains and DOO trains as well.  The capital would grind to a halt.  There will never ever be enough carriages to avoid peak time overcrowding.

Was this Maundy Thursday? I was on the 1505 from Paddington going to Westbury, and indeed there were people standing for long periods of time (beyond Westbury). But then again, this is nothing new. In the 15 years I have been travelling on this route, this has always been the case on Maundy Thursday - the Easter exodus is not spread over hours or days as at Christmas, rather everyone heads west at once. Some years ago a BR Western Region manager told me that Maundy Thursday was the busiest day of the year for Inter City travel, because of this exceptional concentration of demand, and the fact that all the commuter peak traffic still has to be catered for.

It's probably unrealistic for the railway to have the resources available to meet this seasonal peak. FGW can use pricing/reservations to manage passengers onto other services, but they are also required to carry anyone who turns up and pays full fare (like me).

A busy train is uncomfortable for both standing and seated passengers, additionally this passenger was under the impression of having reserved a seat, which turned out not to be the case. I supposed FGW could have used boarding controls at Paddington to move people onto the 2035, but I suspect that the problem would just have been redistributed.

Sorry for rambling on, especially since I can't offer an economic solution, but then I don't think that there is much that FGW could have done in this case, whatever one thinks of the quality of their reply to the original complaint.

Hi

Whilst I understand the original disappointment with FGW's Easter train from London to Plymouth, this level of overcrowding happens frequently from London/RDG to Bristol.

Every Friday evening, or if any morning/evening if a train is cancel (this happens 1-2 times a week), I have to stand from RDG to Bristol PW or Bristol PW to RDG.

This happens because FGW cannot match supply with demand. I find it annoying to see half empty HST trains on some routes, and standing room only HST trains on other. How FGW can resolve this without a significant change to routes, or extra trains is difficult to image. Unless FGW + Dft can get together and commit to

- better routes to match passenger journeys
- more reliable rolling stock
- extra trains
- longer trains for certain peak time routes
- extra line capacity between London-Reading-Didcott to handle more trains

Then we will continue to suffer.

Simon

The problem with extending trains, is that now in many cases it will involve extending platforms & that is a costly busisness! I don't know the exect figures, but I am led to belive the cosham platform extension cost over ^1 million pounds, for I belive 2 coach lengths! It is when you see things like that you really wonder why TOC's don't want to get the DfT to extend platforms

It was actually Portchester station (next one up the line) , extended by 1 coach length (both sides of the line.) I know this , because I was one of the people who campaigned for it to be extended.

The SRA (who came up with the ^1 million figure) ruled it out on grounds of cost , but SWT (probably fed up with the likes of us constantly complaining about being herded to the front coach door to be let out) came up with a more "cost - effective" proposal that allowed the work to be done.

Heres what Christian Wolmar did on Maundy Thursday (link below.)
http://www.christianwolmar.co.uk/articles/tt/april13,07.shtml