Virgin Trains worst Christmas performer for punctuality

[whole diary]

[Chris from Nailsea]

From the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page):

Virgin Trains blamed a series of setbacks in December and January for putting in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom)'s worst performance on punctuality over Christmas.

Network Rail said the company only operated 80.6% of its trains on time.

Services were hit by overhead line damage in Northamptonshire, extremely high winds and a death in Bedfordshire and track problems in Buckinghamshire.

Overall, UK train companies ran 88.7% of trains on time compared with 81.1% for the same period last year.

Last Christmas Virgin Trains ran 65.1% of trains on time and Network Rail said Virgin's performance was hampered by seven days of less than 80% punctuality.

The worst impacts were caused by overhead line damage at Stowe Hill in Northamptonshire on 13 December, extremely high winds across the route and a death at Leighton Buzzard in Bedfordshire on 5 January, plus a track circuit failure at Kings Langley in Buckinghamshire on 30 December.

The best performing company was London Overground, which ran 97% of trains on time over the festive period, compared to 93.2% last year.

Every company showed an improvement compared to the same period last year, Network Rail said.

Companies which failed to meet the national average for punctuality were Stagecoach South West Trains, Southern, National Express East Anglia, London Midland, First Scotrail, First Capital Connect, East Coast and Crosscountry.

[inspector_blakey]

How ironic. There's a big article (almost verging on a puff-piece, really) in a recent edition of RAIL trumpeting Virgin's approach to the winter weather in 2010/11.

[TerminalJunkie]

Companies which failed to meet the national average for punctuality were Stagecoach South West Trains, Southern, National Express East Anglia, London Midland, First Scotrail, First Capital Connect, East Coast and Crosscountry.

So, about half of them, then. 

[IndustryInsider]

Interesting how everyone reporting this story has gone for the negative aspect rather than the positive spin that NR^» (Network Rail - home page) were intending to put on it, i.e. all TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company)'s much better than last year, which was of course weather affected.

[JayMac]

It's also a little unfair on Virgin. None of the problems mentioned, that caused the poor punctuality figures, were their fault.

Infrastructure, weather and a person hit by a train.

No mention of rolling stock failures.