Wokingham Station improvements

[whole diary]

[stuving]

Last night the station was a mere ghost - you could see right through it, between the few bits of wall holding the roof up. This morning, it was just a heap of wreckage being gobbled up by a digger. That's not really a big step in the construction process, but does register as an important change when you see it.

[stuving]

There's an article in the Wokingham Times this week (I can't find it on getwokingham) in which someone complains that the times on all the various displays do not match. She could have added that the display on platform 2 was blank a lot of the time, which I also noticed a couple of weeks ago. There were other comments about the half-built state of the station that show the "news" is that old - not unusual, for the Times.

Quite what that clock issue was about I have no idea - if you can talk to a display to put train data on it, how come you can't give it the right time as well? And don't these displays also provide feedback of what they are showing?

Anyway, things have moved on a bit since then, though not all steps are forward ones. Most urgency has been directed towards laying the new road surface (not the new link road - that comes later). Access for several weeks has been very awkward via a long one-way stretch, controlled by contractor's men with radios. The first width of tarmac has already gone down.

We also have a coffee shop - but no newspapers. And the canopies are being roofed. Not at all modular, just a steel frame and corrugated sheets with insulation in between. The frame's very solid - maybe it's now normal (if not an elfan rule) to build anything kids could climb on solid enough to withstand several of them doing that.

Finally, the bicycle racks have been taken out of their cage again. Not sure why - there's paving still to go down, but the racks are not likely to bolt down on top - maybe they just get in the way.

[stuving]

The fiddly bits of the station are now almost finished, such as the P2 canopy. I checked with the planning drawings, and this is it - no back, let alone sides, to come. I do wonder what the point is of going to all this trouble to put up protection against only the most vertical of rain. And it does look a bit - well, crude, frankly. Its very limited usefulness as a shelter is really rather obvious - most people say exactly that on first seeing it.

[bobm]

Official opening by Baroness Kramer now delayed due to the weather - the second time it has been put off.

From GetWokingham

The official opening of Wokingham's ^6 million station has been postponed again.

Transport Minister Baroness Susan Kramer was due to open the new station tomorrow, but officials have decided to delay the ceremony in light of pressure on the network from recent adverse weather.

The station was scheduled for a formal opening with former Transport Minister Norman Baker in November, however the date was delayed because of a Government reshuffle.

The new building was expected to be completed in August but work was stalled due to "unforeseen challenges with the ground works".

Passengers have been using the station since October, with the increased space and modern design drawing praise but commuters criticised a new charge to use the toilets.

[stuving]

One of the side effects of Baroness Kramer's scheduled opening of the station last week was that it set a deadline for all the frantic final fettling to finish. So here is what it looks like - and with a bit of sunshine, too.

It certainly is prettier than the old one, though given what a slum that was you could call that faint praise. You can see how tall and narrow the canopies are - and I'm still not convinced Wokingham only has the vertical kind of rain. The canopy on P2 (picture 3) is down the level crossing end, in the wider bit where the seats were put. Unfortunately the trains don't stop there any more - even 8-cars only reach back to the entrance gate.

Since our footbridge is glazed, a lot of people wait inside - kids sitting at the foot of the stairs, the rest of us on the overbridge. From there you can see not only the CIS^▸ (Customer Information System) by the entrance, but arriving trains too, so apart from no seats it's far better than under the canopy. I'm sure that it will offend tidy-minded station designers, and that may explain why so many footbridges are not glazed.

If you saw the plans, you may remember there was going to be a "totem" (not a pole, maybe a totem plank?). It would go on the pavement, beside where the lift tower is (picture 4). It was to be 9 m high by 2.5 wide - almost exactly the same as size as the tower - and also of brick, so I imagine that's why it has been left out. It was to have a BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) logo captioned "Wokingham" and a clock - the clock might not fit with the lift inside, but I wonder if the logo is still going to appear.

[wabbit]

Having waited for a train there the other day, I can safely say that the word "canopy" does not = "shelter". Nice improvement overall, pity about some of the finer detail (or lack of).

[stuving]

According to the local Tories' newsletter/election leaflet that's just come through he door, her baronessship is due to have another go at opening the station on Friday. No time - and no other announcement, so I rather suspect it was information for councillors that wasn't for publication ...

[stuving]

According to the local Tories' newsletter/election leaflet that's just come through he door, her baronessship is due to have another go at opening the station on Friday. No time - and no other announcement, so I rather suspect it was information for councillors that wasn't for publication ...

... and if you look at this on SWT^▸ (South West Trains) news, it has already happened! I just went to look, and the velvet curtain remains resolutely undrawn, but you can't prevent a press officer or journalist reporting something just because it has not happened yet ...

[stuving]

... and so it came to pass. The sun came out, a horde of onlookers foregathered and with due ceremony - for this is  the 400th NSIP project - the words were revealed.

Most of the crowd were councillors, DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) and council transport department, or SWT^▸ (South West Trains) (badged as alliance) I haven't seen so many SWT badges on the station since Tornado came to visit! There were quite a few cameras, both still and video for interviews afterwards (mainly with the Baroness, Tim Shoveller, and John Redwood MP^▸ (Member of Parliament)).

In his pre-reported speech, Cllr David Lee (billed as "Leader of Wokingham Borough Council^s leader") said:

Improvements to the station have been a long term aspiration of the borough council. I am delighted residents, and those who work in the town and use the station, now have a better travel experience thanks to this investment

On the day, he also said that he hoped passengers would soon have faster trains, and more shelter on platform 2 (apparently the council are working on this), while the level crossing would be closed less of the time. Given that Tim Shoveller repeated the claim about extra services to Waterloo (all of two per day, AFAIK^▸ (as far as I know)) as a result of the 458/5 programme, if anything it will go the other way.

[stuving]

There were quite a few cameras, both still and video for interviews afterwards (mainly with the Baroness, Tim Shoveller, and John Redwood MP^▸ (Member of Parliament)).

And you may see it on telly tonight - on South Today, at least,  together with a piece about reopening the line at Botley after the second-hugest current emergency trackbed rebuilding job.

[stuving]

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

Wokingham's ^6m train station revamp opened by transport minister

The station is at the junction of the Waterloo to Reading line and the North Downs line

A ^6m revamp of a train station in Berkshire has been officially unveiled by transport minister Baroness Kramer.

The Wokingham terminal, which has remained open during the refurbishment, features a new glazed station building with a larger waiting area.

It is the 400th station to benefit from the government-funded National Stations Improvement Programme (NSIP).

South West Trains managing director Tim Shoveller said the station was "now fit for the 21st Century".

The station features a larger booking hall, modern information screens and a cafe, as well as better access for cars, taxis and buses.

Liberal Democrat peer Baroness Kramer said Wokingham was "a great example" of the success of the ^220m worth of improvements to 400 stations in England and Wales.

The official opening was due in November but was postponed because of storms that disrupted the rail route.

Improvements to the station link road will start in the autumn.

Oh dear.

What "terminal"? The station was open throughout, not the building.

The road access is not yet improved, being work in progress. Whether it will be "better" once the new road layout is finished is moot.

One of those new screens has rarely worked, and is still dark.

The November date was cancelled because that minister (Norman Baker) was reshuffled out of the job. And by 10th February, when Baroness Kramer cancelled (for the following day), any storm damage on this route was fixed.

And the work on the link road started last autumn.

But apart from that ...

[bobm]

As a journalist I just want to cry when I see stories written like that.  If you can't get basic facts right there is no hope for the rest of the article....

[stuving]

The local rag did rather better - this from getwokingham (the Wokingham Times).

I'm not sure whether the ^6 million included the footbridge and roads or whether it's just the NSIP funds for the station - the footbridge was Access for All money.  But that's minor, and none of the parties is making it very clear. And the tendentious content in Cllr Lee's words are all his own work, for which the reporter is blameless.

There also a DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) report here. That says NSIP was set up with ^150 M of funds, and has delivered ^150 M of improvements - so maybe be they are grossing up these project costs with everyone else's contribution.

[stuving]

Last night there were some ominous-looking vehicles gathering by the station, and as soon as the last train passes the pneumatic drills started. They were cutting a trench across the road at each side of the level crossing, and I assumed this was the start of work to put in the traffic lights that will surround the crossing (and be linked to it).

This morning I saw that they had actually been renewing the tarmac on the crossing (around the plastic bits next to the tracks). They had also renewed the white lining, but only where it had been removed. Since the white paint outside that part has mostly worn off, you can see that it's quite a blatant example of jobsworthiness. And all for a few months at most.

[Ollie]

That's not good, they could have quite easily done the rest of the Keep Clear message..