Maybe I'm wrong, but my understanding wasn't that they couldn't. More that they didn't want to given it may give people the wrong idea since these services will form the Henbury services in time meaning they couldn't simply be extended to Parkway from Filton like now. Basically giving a worse service now to avoid the obvious negative reaction when they'd have to cut it from Parkway again in the future.

These days it would be the 39/x39, and given they would also get caught up in the traffic at the globe, and would take longer due to bus stops on the way, I don't think that would have helped. And I'd imagine you'd also get into murky territory with things like delay repay if you switch to a non railway provided bus.

Not sure how many were done to the late running engineering works and how many were actually to do with the long running staff shortage - especially as most of the afternoon Ashley Down services were cancelled too. Looks like just 3 (out of I think 11 timetabled services) called today.

Did seem to be well used when I was heading to Cardiff and back again for my teams match today! Does look like a couple of the extra services were cancelled pre match though, and pretty surprised the extra services that did call weren't the Cardiff to West County services as they would have given a direct service from Weston!

Unfortunately not.

I'm not sure why but the Filton shuttle hasn't been running this week due to the engineering works at Bath. I'm assuming to release a unit to provide services either side of the line closure.

Stapleton Road, Lawrence Hill and obviously Filton have other services but Ashley Down doesn't, so guessing they rolled a dice on what passing service to stop instead.

I'm aware Sundays are a mess on GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) in general right now, so ASD is not unique here, but how is having only two northbound services run today anywhere near acceptable? Especially when one of them was 40 mins late and it doesn't look like there was any effort to add stops to other services to make up for any of it.

Bit of a cross post hereas I also posted this in one of the ask the manager threads (as this concern was a question I had asked about before the station opened).

Sadly it looks like what I was worrying about in the leadup to the station opening is happening. The reliablility of the Filton shuttle (i.e. the fact it seems to get cancelled all the time) seems to be getting in the way of Ashley Down being a useful station.

Yesterday late afternoon / early evening had a few services cancelled (and whilst they were able to stop a couple of Gloucester stoppers, it doesn't look like anything was added towards Temple Meads) and it looks like the same today.

Sadly if this continues it is going to put people off using the station as they aren't able to rely on it. Certainly for me if it carries on I may just default to getting the numbeer 70 bus to Temple Meads instead. Having the station is great but people need to actually be able to rely on the service too.

Bit of a cross post here (as I'm also going to mention it in the Ashley Down thread), but sad to say my worries being turned into reality over the last couple of days due to the poor reliability of the Filton shuttle. Several evening peak services cancelled yesterday, and whilst it does indeed look like the services to Gloucester had a stop at Ashley Down added to give it some peak servce, nothing was added in the opposite direction to Temple Meads. And it looks like the same is going to be the case this evening too. This kind of thing is exactly what I was concerned about and is going to stop people being able to rely on the train service. Certainly for me if this continues I'll just default to getting the number 70 bus to Temple Meads instead.

My understanding is that the proposed location of any potential Lockleaze station is on Constaple Road rather than on the original site of the old Horfield station, so that probably has something to do with it.

As for why it was dropped - again my understanding is that it was essentially and either / or between Ashley down and Lockleaze / Horfield and Ashley Down won. Probably a bit more complicated than that mind you!

It's worth adding that given there is no Sunday Filton shuttle right now, GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are stopping some of the Cardiff to the South West trains at Ashley Down to provide a Sunday service. Given even during the week these services tend to have a decent amount of dwell time at Temple Meads is really don't see why this can't be extended to other days.

And they also seem to be happy to stop a variety of services (mainly Gloucester services I think) at Ashely Down for football and cricket (if the last few days are anything to go by) with limited impact on the timetable (based on rtt it looks like the main impact has been due to crowds rather than the regular dwell time on the stop itself).

South of the river, some of the Cardiff to South West services are already timetables to stop at  Bedminster and Parson street too so again I really don't see why this can't be extended to more times!

I do wonder if the greens have a shot at this.

No incumbent, they weren't that far away in 2021 and have had a pretty big boast in the area (obviously getting an MP^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context) in Bristol central, but also doing very well in some of the other local constituencies and obviously did well in the Bristol council elections too).

Whilst WECA^» (West of England Combined Authority - about) is a lot more than just Bristol, I'd expect low turnout and a general dissatisfaction at Labour (both locally aimed at Rees and Norris, and nationally given the government are having to make some hard decisions that will upset people) to help the greens more than anyone else.

I've submitted a couple of questions, one pretty general around the current rolling stock issues and the resulting cancelations and one pretty specific about timetabling so not really expecting the specifics to be answered but can hope!

I'm not actually sure if I'll be around at the time due to work, but will try. Need to hope for a quiet work day!

NRE^▸ (National Rail Enquiries) are now showing Saturday 28th September as the opening date (tipped off by the local street WhatsApp group who clearly have a fair few people keeping an eye out!).

I saw this first flagged on Reddit 2 days ago, but looks like more people are noticing now based on the GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) twitter replies! Though it does seem to be fixed this morning now.

Not sure what flows it affected but certainly affected Bristol Temple Meads to Paddington and the reverse.

Not exactly great when people who have to travel aren't able to buy the cheapest tickets that are supposed to be available!

Any ideas on what went on?

(And no this isn't just the usual advance fares being sold out on specific services or days, it seems to be the case across all of at least September and October as for as I can tell anyway!)

I think we only got just under 2 weeks notice for Portway Park and ride opening so who knows in terms of timing!

As for services, I'm a little confused too as all the initial press said hourly in the day but half hourly in the peak. However the most recent comments (and the timetables in RTT^» (Real Time Trains - website)) show just the hourly services provided by the Filton shuttle that have pretty poor first and last train times (first train to temple meads at 7.48am, last train to Temple meads at 8.55pm).