Dilton Marsh - platform, services and incidents (merged posts)

[whole diary]

[Chris from Nailsea]

From First Great Western JourneyCheck:

20:23 Portsmouth Harbour to Cardiff Central due 23:56
This train will be delayed from Southampton Central onwards by between 10 and 14 minutes and is expected to be 16 minutes late from Westbury.
This train will call additionally at Dilton Marsh.
This is due to an earlier broken down train.
Additional Information:
This train will call additionally at Dilton Marsh by request only. Passengers at Dilton Marsh should hold their .

Message Received: 21/10/2013 20:58

... breath? 

[JayMac]

...hats? ...copy of The Times? ...counsel?

[Chris from Nailsea]

... noses? 

[JayMac]

...hands in the air like you just don't care?

[grahame]

The service at Dilton Marsh is "erratic" and "curious" - words used in the spring consultation by the local councils, reflecting local opinion.   For example after the 07:00 (isn) southbound train, there's nothing to take you to Salisbury for many, many hours.

This morning, even the 07:00ish didn't run ... so the 06:28 Cardiff to Portsmouth picked up the call at what would be a rather good Salisbury commuter time.

06:28 Cardiff Central to Portsmouth Harbour due 09:52
This train will call additionally at Dilton Marsh.
This is due to a member of train crew being unavailable.

The effect of the extra stop on the schedule?  Looks like that train may have the slack needed!
1 late from Westbury
2 late from Warminster
on time from Salisbury
1 early from Romsey (WTT^▸ (Working Time-Table) - public timetable it was late)

Dilton Marsh is no longer a 'halt' for a little village.   Dilton Marsh itself has grown, and the large residential area of Westbury Leigh covers what were once green fields on the other side of the line.

[Timmer]

Agreed the service to/from Dilton Marsh needs looking at since the vast increase to housing in the Westbury Leigh area. Something an extension of the Transwilts to Salisbury would solve nicely.

[Chris from Nailsea]

I agree - having distributed updated railway timetables to every household in Dilton Marsh on two occasions in the past (working together with Lee), I found there is a great deal of enthusiasm and pent up demand for improved train services.

[grahame]

15:28 Warminster to Great Malvern due 18:35

15:28 Warminster to Great Malvern due 18:35 will be started from Westbury.
It will no longer call at Warminster and Dilton Marsh.
This is due to a points failure.

Further Information
Owing to Network Rail protecting the infrastructure from failures caused by the warm weather this train is not able to start at Warminster. Customers for Westbury are requested to wait for the next available train service towards Bristol Parkway. Dilton Marsh will be served by Taxis from Westbury.

Are the schools still in?   The 15:28 typically takes around 30 school children home from Warminster to Dilton Marsh. Looks like they'll be on the 15:58 to Westbury and then back round in taxis.  And they aren't a very patient bunch ...

[grahame]

From Journeycheck

Alterations to services between Westbury and Warminster

Due to urgent repairs to the railway between Westbury and Warminster:
Train services running through these stations will be running non stop between Westbury and Warminster. Dilton Marsh will not be served. Disruption is expected until the end of the day.

Customer Advice

Due to a safety issue with the platform at Dilton Marsh the station is currently closed.

Replacement road transport services are conveying passengers between Westbury and Dilton Marsh in both directions until further notice. Customer at Dilton Marsh for Warminster, are advised to use replacement road transport to Westbury for connecting train services.

Customers at Warminster travelling to Dilton Marsh are advised to travel through to Westbury for road transport.

Following up from http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=20898.105 - early discussions on this topic when changes to TransWilts extended services to Southampton were amended

[grahame]

09:08 Portsmouth Harbour to Bristol Parkway due 11:59
09:08 Portsmouth Harbour to Bristol Parkway due 11:59 will no longer call at Dilton Marsh.
This is due to overcrowding as this train has fewer coaches than normal.

OK - Train Manager can't get through to operate the front doors, I suspect.   

Train not due to call until 10:54  (it's only 10:00 as I write) - so surely that would be time enough for them to plan for the train manager to dispatch at Warminster from the front door?   Next northbound train scheduled at 14:50.

[grahame]

"This train will call at Warminster, Salisbury, Romsey an Southampton Central" says the accouncement on 166202 as it stands in Westbury.  But then soon after leaving Westbury, it comes to a stand at the platform at Dilton Marsh, and passengers get off and on before it proceeds.  A hidden, unadvertised station - perhaps small wonder that so few people use it when - amongst other reasons - people aren't even told about trains that call there.


With time in hand on my way from Melksham to Taunton (scheduled to be at Westbury form 06:53 to 08:27 due to infrequent and disconnected services!) I took a side trip to Dilton Marsh to update myself and picture library.  Just myself off the train that called at 07:01; it also picked up one person.  With the next train at 10:12 (just as far as Warminster) or 11:13 (for Salisbury and Southampron) this one passenger departing is probably the total current southbound commuter flow.

Better on the 07:28 headed for the Bath and Bristol area - 7 passengers joined that train, and as an educated guess a higher number would have joined the 07:44.  No-one got off the 07:28 arrival.

Come December, the 07:01 goes 5 minutes earlier - the only commuter train soutbound now leaveing before 7 a.m..  The 07:28 goes to 07:32 and the 07:44 creaps earlier to 07:42; not huge changes but a drift, and not in a direction that I would expect to encourage (m)any more passengers.

Having arrived at the hidden station (I checked at Westbury with the train manager), I had to find the times of my train back.  OK - I knew, but just as there was a "need to know" to get there, so there was to get back. A Portsmouth to Cardiff poster is situated at the bottom of the ramp up to the northbound platform, but the print is tiny, the data overloaded.  Before 07:30, a lack of lighting makes it impossible to read ... and condensation would mean it was still impossible even with a torch.

On the well lit and modern platform, the information point has no display, there is no overhead display, and no notice of when trains call at all.  A clue of people arriving provides a clue that ther's a train due soon ... not sure that even that clue would be present at other times of day (after the morning peak).

At the southbound platform - the 07:01 calls









At the northbound platform - the 07:28 calls


My camera has adjusted light levels and makes it look far more readable than it was!









Seconds after the very first train from Dilton Marsh has arrived into Westbury (that's it in the foreground), the last (of two) commuter trains to Chippenahm and Swindon leaves (that's it in the background).  No chance what so ever of making a connection, next train to Swindon not for more than two hours ...

[grahame]

With the loss of the Westbury to Southampton 'locals' from December (with the exception of the early morning one) I took a look at what the Dilton Marsh service will look like ...



* A gap from 06:57 to 13:34 in trains to Salisbury, then nothing direct until 22:07
 - just 2 stops down the line, though a good connection off the 09:54

* 8 southbound and 13 northbound services. 
* 5 of the 8 southbound services go no further that Warminster
* 7 of the 13 northbound services only start from Warminster (and one expires at Westbury)

In looking at this, I also looked at SWR^» (South Western Railway - about) services at Warminster after the Bristols cease - I will commend in a separate thread on these;  my interest here is that these could likely provide those 5 extra DMH^» (Dilton Marsh - next trains) southbound stops - filling the morning gap so services to Salisbury and beyond in some cases are 06:57, 07:40, 11:40, 13:34, 14:15, 15:45, 22:07 and 23:12

[grahame]

Looking at easements ... I think these both say more or less the same thing - that passengers fro Dilton Marsh to Westbury or beyond there may travel via Warminster.  They do NOT say that passengers from Dilton Marsh to stations to the south can travel via Westbury, which would seem to be even more useful and a much shorter double back

030173 - Local - Customers travelling from Dilton Marsh to Westbury and beyond may doubleback via Warminster. This easement applies in both directions.

030154 - Local - to allow the doubleback Dilton Marsh to Westbury via Warminster, even though the  fare for the doubleback through the origin/destination is higher than the overall fare. This easement applies in both directions.

Can anyone suggest why there's this imbalance of easements?

[grahame]

It's really good to see the southbound call at Dilton Marsh at 08:05 on 1F05 last week, and to see it scheduled again for next week.  The West Wilts Rail User Group and others have been asking for this service to make the additional call for some time, to pick up an identified flow to school in Warminster; at present, many parents drive pupils to school in the morning and then they (pupils) get the train back in the afternoon.

The team at GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) have been concerned that a Dilton Marsh stop by this train would impact unacceptably on its timekeeping, and I appreciate that's something they need(ed) to consider. However, looking at the service last week, it actually gained time between Westbury and Wishford on four out of the five days.  I have chosen a monitoring point after Warminster, but before Wilton and the Salisbury area to record, in order to get the full effect of the extra stop in the frame, but not add any complications from other traffic. Obviously, the train cannot leave Warminster early, so we should never see Wishford more than 1 minute early.

Day   ex Westbury   pass Wishford   max lateness before Westbury
14   On Time      1 early
15   On Time      1 early
16   1 late      On Time      (was 5 late at Keynsham)
17   On Time      On Time      (was 4 late from Cardiff)
18   On Time      1 early

I was almost hoping to see the service "under stress" - more delayed from Westbury - to provide more data. I will keep my eyes open. However, it appears to have slack in the schedule anyway before it leaves Westbury (see 16th and 17th notes), which is an even better prognosis for how this train will do with a permanently timetabled Dilton Marsh Stop.

[grahame]

21st - 7 late at Westbury, 5 late at Wishford (Delay at Bathampton; 2 late Southampton, on time Portsmouth)
22nd - on time at Westbury, 1 early by Wishford

Evidence so far suggests that a Dilton Marsh stop does not cause timekeeping problems!