Great Western Coffee Shop

How on earth does Vandalism between London at Reading effect the TransWilts?

Use of units to replace displaced HSTs I would assume.

If you need another unit, cut / shorten a service out of Bristol on one of the lines that has multiple trains per hour by all means ... you'll lead to crowding or a 30 minute delay.  But kill the only southbound service over a line in 24 hours - surely not.  It  would show scant regard or caring for people who want to get to / from the abandoned station(s)!

I disagree, it looks like the unit was used for the cancelled 1855 Swindon - Cheltenham Spa. Instead of a very long wait for a train towards stations for Cheltenham (1955 was cancelled) inconveniencing many people.

Instead a unit which would probably be running fairly empty was cancelled between Swindon and Westbury (where a different unit was used). Due to the poor service at Melksham (admittedly), however in the circumstances this option will have delayed far far fewer people. I'm sure FGW laid on appropriate taxis for any passengers who might have needed to go to Melksham, whereas road transport towards Gloucester would need to be more substantial (and expensive).

Imagine if you were at Swindon and you were told that your service to Cheltenham was being cancelled as FGW considered a service onwards to Melksham was more important, and subsequently seeing the train leave and not being very busy. I'd be pretty hacked off.

FGW made the right decision in the circumstances, however i'm sure we have differing opinions.

I think the flip side to that argument is "imagine standing at Melksham to discover that one of only two trains a day had just been cancelled".

Now, I can see this from both sides: for an FGW controller in today's difficult circumstances (which were not of their own making!) this may very well be the least bad option that inconveniences the fewest people, and thus the best operating decision to be made. From the point of view of a Melksham resident, to see this train cancelled bit only between Swindon and WEstbury, it could start to look almost spiteful! Hopefully one day when Melksham has a decent train service again the controllers won't have to make these kinds of decisions anymore.

None of us is party to the details of "why"; we are just assuming, and as such we may be assuming wrong. We also have the benefit of time afterwards to talk about what had, perhaps, to be a quick decision.  And that may have involved the balance between a couple of hours gap on one line (popular because of its appropriate service) and a 24 hour gap on another line on which is less popular because the service that FGW run is only a twelvth of what has been deemed, in a tough report, to be appropriate.

Yes - I hear you.  Probably cheaper to do what they did.  But I'm not sure about your customer analysis; it depends how you explain it ...  "Sorry - you have to wait for the next Gloucester - this train is the ONLY service tonight to Melksham, Trowbridge, Westbury, Salisbury ... so we have to run it" ...

I find it ironic that the only train that's running a short route on the whole west fleet tonight is the one that provides the most limited service.

This train is usually 2 units (class 153) rather than one.  How about the middle option of reducing the Swindon - Westbury section to a single car and running both the scheduled train and an (? extra, wasn't it ?) up to Gloucester

Yeah ... let's agree to differ.  But let's remind the TOC that they don't get themselves a lot of brownie points by canning the only train - especially when it's blamed on events that are many miles from where  the train was even supposed to go.