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Taking your bike on a train pits common sense against brain dead bureaucracy. Two battle-worn commuters compare tales of woe

Yesterday Chris Peck, the policy coordinator for cycling organisation CTC, lamented the experience of taking your bike on the train in the UK. Today, two seasoned cycle-train commuters share their rail tales.

Adharanand Finn

When I moved to Devon in January I had a neat plan for getting to work in London cheaply and in an environmentally responsible way. I'd buy a bike, cycle the five miles from my house to the train station, stick the bike on the train, and then cycle the rest of the way to the office once I got to London. It was a simple plan. Executing it, however, has been a weekly trial through labyrinthine train company systems that usually leave my head fried.

Although there are only five bike spaces on a train for around 650 passengers, space is usually not the problem. The difficulty is booking a space, which you have to do at least four hours in advance ^ don't think you can just turn up with your bike.

I usually book my train tickets online, but you can't book a bike slot at the same time, even though you can book everything else from a seat near the toilet to a plug socket. No, you either have to make a special trip to the station the day before or ring the train company directly. Both involve waiting in painfully slow queues. Then when you do get through, their "systems" are invariably down. Often, weighing everything up, its easier just to leave the bike behind. It's almost as though they're making it difficult on purpose.

Ben Thomas

"I bought a ticket to the world, but now I've come back again." That was 1983, before I'd ever taken a bike on a train. But a quarter of a century on, I'm in a position to challenge the cosmopolitan Tony Hadley, because I've bought a lots of tickets, if not to the wuh-huh-hurld, at least to Paddington, via Slough ^ and come back again. Yes, on First Great Western trains, on the Thames Valley line, as far as Oxford, travelling off-peak, with a bike, I'm something of an expert.

And I know this much is true:
^ Angry writing scrawled in every guard's van tells you it costs ^3 to put your bike in there, and you need to have a reservation for it. It doesn't and you don't
^ If you put a non-folding bike anywhere other than in the guard's van, hassled staff will always fight you (verbally) until you get it off
^ If they lose, the transport police get to have a go (physically). They've got sticks
^ If you put a new bike in the guard's van, someone will put a very heavy one next to it without putting a chock under the wheel and it will fall on yours and dent it (or if it's carbon, smash it)
^ If you don't look like you're running fast enough to get your bike aboard before the final whistle, you'll be told how much it allegedly costs the train company to be late leaving (^600 a minute, as if you care).
^ Guards often seem to come and go on any given route, but catering trolley staff stick around. Some, like Neil on First Great Western, know everything about the trains and the service
^ Standing on the pedal of your bike and pushing it along with your other foot at 3mph is cycling. No arguments please. It is
^ "Cycling" in a station gets you shouted at, hooted at by train drivers, and regaled with grisly stories by police officers. Unless you're on a BMX, in which case you can burn rubber down the slope to the main entrance, through the concourse, along platform eight and up the ramp to London Street without anyone in authority apparently noticing

But this is all just part of life's rich tapestry. Taken together, I love my daily commute, and that's not something many people can say. Putting this alongside Adharanand's account, it's clear that the bike/rail system in this country has the potential to be uniformly excellent. It's just a case of someone having the will and the resources to apply current good practice across the country. If only.

At the of the day, bikes cause delays. Is people asked where to stand and were told correct information all of the time there would be few problems. As for the comment about being shouted at for loading a bike in the wrong place, rightly so - they cause congestion and present a risk in the event of evacuation. If you ask me, it's know it all commuters having a rant. Must be a slow news day.

I have one of these or very similar..........they fold in half


http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Dahon_Cadenza_2009/5360042685/

It fits into the disabled space in carriage G.  In four years I have gotten off - once at charlbury and once at Morton when a disabled person actually wanted to use the space - which is fair enough - thats what I expect.  I am fortunate enough to be able to afford first and therefore have that luxury

However I do remember two years ago when the cotswolds was under water..........I was taking the bike down to London and got on at Newport.............

TM comes along and asks me if its mine, I say yes - gives me laldy about how it cannot be there its not diabled.  I explained that I commute with it daily on the cotswolds line and if there is a person who need to use that space getting on at ANY Station, even if not pre booked, I will get off.

Not good enough - at Bristol Parkway I was made to get off with the bike and push it to the Guards van at the rear - if he'd have wanted to be vaguely reasonable he could have let me put it in the front power car but no........

The day before I had been hiking - I had blisters all over my feet - I hobbled to the back of the train whilst he'd following me yelling at me about delaying the train.  By the time I got to B I lost it and turned and basically told him to stop being a knob, he was making me do this and I was going as fast as I could.

As I'm loading it into the guards van, the platform staff are muttering about "I bet she doesn't have a first class ticket anyway " - at which point I turned around and shoved about ^1500 of tickets under their noses and told them to can it.

He still works for FGW - I see him at Paddington fairly frequently......I avoid his trains.

That was an example of someone who just seems to hate bikes!

There was 6 bikes and at least 5 pushchairs that got on the 16.53 Bri - Tau yesterday.

A 2 car 158, needless to say it was dangerously overcrowded.  So much so, paying passengers were turned away at Bristol.

If people asked where to stand and were told correct information all of the time there would be few problems.

Or try this one
http://www.northernrail.org/community/cycling/travelling_with_bikes (http://www.northernrail.org/community/cycling/travelling_with_bikes)
Most of the commitments for 2007 have been achieved, except the last - Pacer replacement. Fat chance of that, I am afraid. The changes on refurbishment are restricted to removing the 'internal wall' on 158's so that bikes can fit more easily in the space that was the 'cupboard'. Limited finance has meant that only a few have had this done.
The Northern Rail Cycling Strategy, launched in 2007, as you can see from the commitment is due to be updated in 2010. The Strategy was reached in discussions between the company, local authorities, cyclists representatives and other via Northern Rail's Cycle Users Forum (I am part of the volunteer Secretariat) which meets several times a year. Northern are, to my knowledge, the only TOC with a Cycle Strategy and one of the few TOCs who have a  Forum.

Either 'fold' or 'book' end of.

It isn't that difficult.

Held up a train at Trowbridge many years ago as I cycle tour in Brittany, always booked when you had to, guard tried to prevent me from boarding having let too many casual bikes on. He wasn't moving the train with my bike halfway through the door and I would have liked to have seen the outcome if I had missed the ferry at Portsmouth due to his stupidity, or he had tried to call the BTP.

Either 'fold' or 'book' end of.

Edit : I've just found the page at http://www.atob.org.uk/Bike_Rail.html which aptly highlights what a hassle it is to take a bike on a train.

So you had booked, and he had let someone else take your space? What happened?

Either 'fold' or 'book' end of.

 I think my semi folding mountain bike is a nice compromise