Why didnt it stop?!?

[whole diary]

[bobm]

I assume you could reduce the impact of a Slough, Maidenhead or Twyford stop by running the train in front of a Heathrow Express service.  That then puts a bigger gap between the stopper and the following HST^▸ (High Speed Train).  That would mitigate some of the capacity lost west of Slough by a train stopping on the main.

[a-driver]

I assume you could reduce the impact of a Slough, Maidenhead or Twyford stop by running the train in front of a Heathrow Express service.  That then puts a bigger gap between the stopper and the following HST^▸ (High Speed Train).  That would mitigate some of the capacity lost west of Slough by a train stopping on the main.

I think it is pretty much how the timetable runs.  Departures from Paddington between 17:00 and 19:00 on the fast lines only.  Some of this is from memory as well as actually working some of the services.  There may be the odd LTV^▸ (London [and] Thames Valley) service I've missed off which may run on the fast lines for part of the journey, feel free to add and amend where necessary!!

17:00 Bristol TM^‡(resolve)
17:03 Penzance
17:06 Bristol TM (stops Twyford)
17:10 HEx
17:15 Carmarthen
17:18 Oxford (stops Maidenhead)
17:22 Hereford
17:25 HEx
17:30 Taunton
17:33 Paignton
17:35 Oxford (stops Maidenhead & Twyford)
17:40 HEx
17:45 Swansea
17:49 Worcester (stops Maidenhead)
17:55 HEx
18:00 Bristol TM
18:03 Penzance
18:05 Frome (stops Twyford)
18:10 HEx
18:15 Swansea
18:18 Oxford (Fast Line as far as Maidenhead, also stops Twyford)
18:22 Hereford
18:25 HEx
18:30 Weston-Super-Mare
18:35 Exeter
18:40 HEx
18:45 Swansea
18:47 Cheltenham (stops Twyford)
18:50 Oxford (stops Slough)
18:55 HEx

[NickB]

Here's a controversial suggestion... The trains serve where the people travelling live, and then what you find is that more people live where there is a decent service.
Ie. without wanting to rain on a purist's day but if an hst didn't have to stop between paddington and wales then it could travel REALLY BLOODY FAST^▸ (Federation Against Software Theft) but, ummm, it wouldn't have any passengers. Equally, if maidenhead didn't have HST^▸ (High Speed Train)'s 5 years ago then I wouldn't have moved here.

And returning to my problem on Thursday, yes, it seems to have been my fault for not paying attention. I thought i saw plat1 which it has always been, when it had switched to plat11. 19.45 vs 19.48. Fair enough. For the record I didn't "abuse" any staff as was suggested, just travelled back. But what I appreciate from this site is being able to find out why my evening got delayed by 30mins. Thanks.

[Btline]

And if you want to travel north from those stations, what do you suggest?

Add another hour to the trip by sending them (free?) via London?
Or asking them to travel north on slow London Idland and change further out? Where do you suggest?

Un-thought out posts help nobody and are rapidly getting fellow members to ignore you!

They're sorting that with HS2^▸ (The next High Speed line(s))! Besides, I wasn't suggesting removing these stops, merely showing the effect on the line.

On FGW^▸ (First Great Western), taking Crossrail to Reading from Slough and Maidenhead isn't difficult?

Not thought out? Very thought out thank you!

[Btline]

No HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) should be stopping on the fast lines! It eats paths.

HSTs will have to be first stop Reading West or Swindon then. Won't be able to call at Newport or Cardiff either, they're both on 4-track sections with fast lines.

Eh? Why not? The capacity issues are between Paddington and Reading. Not sure what you mean.

[Btline]

Un-thought out posts help nobody and are rapidly getting fellow members to ignore you!

Particularly when we respond throwing a challenge down (as I did in respect of Hanborough's pax numbers doubling in 7 years when btline asserted that the service was rubbish and passengers were fed up), and we don't get a response.

Here's another one, then.

If the GW^▸ (Great Western) main line needs all 20 three minute paths as far as Reading for non-stop services, where do they all go?

(edited to fix quote - bobm)

16 trains per hour is the maximum. A train every 3 minute with 4 spare paths for performance (source: network rail's RP2 documents)

So Grahame's response is a sensible set of destinations.

Sorry for not relying on the other thread, I've been quite busy and I must have forgotten.

[Btline]

Here's a controversial suggestion... The trains serve where the people travelling live, and then what you find is that more people live where there is a decent service.
Ie. without wanting to rain on a purist's day but if an hst didn't have to stop between paddington and wales then it could travel REALLY BLOODY FAST^▸ (Federation Against Software Theft) but, ummm, it wouldn't have any passengers. Equally, if maidenhead didn't have HST^▸ (High Speed Train)'s 5 years ago then I wouldn't have moved here.

And returning to my problem on Thursday, yes, it seems to have been my fault for not paying attention. I thought i saw plat1 which it has always been, when it had switched to plat11. 19.45 vs 19.48. Fair enough. For the record I didn't "abuse" any staff as was suggested, just travelled back. But what I appreciate from this site is being able to find out why my evening got delayed by 30mins. Thanks.

But the capacity isn't there due to the way the railway is set up. The network is crying out for the maximum fast line service to Reading and each Maidenhead stop removes at least one path.

East Coast could make a killing stopping all over Herts and Cambs, but there is no capacity until after HS2^▸ (The next High Speed line(s)).

Plenty of trains run fast and are busy (as journey times are low). Eg WCML^▸ (West Coast Main Line) and ECML^▸ (East Coast Main Line)

[NickB]

Then FGW^▸ (First Great Western) and predecessors should never have run fast to maidenhead, then us meddlesome commuters would never have moved here. Oh, and crossrail wouldn't have been built.
It's pretty simple - lines equal passengers, and passengers equal lines.

[a-driver]

Then FGW^▸ (First Great Western) and predecessors should never have run fast to maidenhead, then us meddlesome commuters would never have moved here. Oh, and crossrail wouldn't have been built.
It's pretty simple - lines equal passengers, and passengers equal lines.

Basically, if infrastructure spending during the 90s kept pace with the growth in commuter traffic places like Maidenhead would be far better off, we would have a far more flexible railway line.  It didn't, and now we are living and managing with the severe constraints it brings.  Oh and I think the decision to build CrossRail wasn't purely based on Maidenhead and let's be honest, if there wasn't any political pressure would there have been fast services to Maidenhead??

[grahame]

It's pretty simple - lines equal passengers, and passengers equal lines.

Basically, if infrastructure spending during the 90s kept pace with the growth in commuter traffic places like Maidenhead would be far better off, we would have a far more flexible railway line.  It didn't, and now we are living and managing with the severe constraints it brings. 

But the growth that has come with services in the 21st century simply wasn't anticipated in the 90s or even at the start of this century.  Growth forecasts of 0.8% were used (at least for the area I live in) in 2004 for the 2006-starting franchise but it turned out to be that traffic grew at 8.0%.  What looks just like a transposition of digits when written that way, but they're annual and compounded figures.     0.8% growth 9 times (i.e. over a ten year period) was predicted to take each 100 passengers up to 107, but the 8.0% growth over the same period achieved has taken 100 passengers up to 200.

[Btline]

Crossrail was built for Canary Wharf not Maidenhead!

Besides why would Maidenhead be the reason? According to people on here, everyone is going to shun it and get an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) to Paddington (despite overall journey times and comfort being better on Crossrail).

Do not fear, you will have a decent service on Crossrail. There will be no need to stop HSTs. 4 trains per hour, guaranteed seat, air con all the way to the west end or City. Why would you cram onto a packed HST and then again onto a sweltering tube train? Most commuters in the South East are crying out for that!

[Network SouthEast]

Basically, if infrastructure spending during the 90s kept pace with the growth in commuter traffic places like Maidenhead would be far better off, we would have a far more flexible railway line.

What infrastructure spending in the 90s? The creaking infrastructure that in part saw Railtrack go bust? Or the shoe string schemes that saw BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) having to cut something somewhere to spend money elsewhere? Have you forgotten that during the first half of the 90s that rail travel was still in decline?

It didn't, and now we are living and managing with the severe constraints it brings.  Oh and I think the decision to build CrossRail wasn't purely based on Maidenhead and let's be honest, if there wasn't any political pressure would there have been fast services to Maidenhead??

Probably, Maidenhead saw over 4 million journeys last year. Taken with the rising usage of stations between there and Paddington it is inevitable some fast trains will stop there as the stopping services are overwhelmed.

Don't forget that Crossrail was originally planned to go to Aylesbury,  and when focus turned to the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line), Slough was analysed as western terminus, but there was a good business case to make Maidenhead.

[TonyK]

According to people on here, everyone is going to shun it and get an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) to Paddington (despite overall journey times and comfort being better on Crossrail).

Don't remember reading much of that...

[Electric train]

Don't forget that Crossrail was originally planned to go to Aylesbury,  and when focus turned to the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line), Slough was analysed as western terminus, but there was a good business case to make Maidenhead.

The 1980's Crossrail surveys I was involved at Paddington and many WR locations as far west as Oxford and Newbury, the scheme then was Oxford / Newbury Thames Valley electrification to London. Going to Aylesbury was all part of the idea to sell off Marylebone station with the High Wycombe services terminating in Paddington, electrification to High Wycombe and inclusion in Crossrail was seen as a later phase.

Heathrow was not even planned for.

The Eastern terminus was Southend and not Shenfield

[johoare]

I was travelling back from London today and firstly was most surprised that the 19.48 was running but decided to go for it since it was running on a bank holiday and since it's so fast to Maidenhead .. As I came out of the underground entrance shortly after 19.30 it was already on the board and I could have sworn it said platform 1 but I honestly can't say one way or the other if that is true.

Having then done a bit of shopping and got a coffee I took another look (having read this post I knew it was a good idea) and indeed it was then platform 9..

So either a 9 looks like a 1 from a distance to me (I do need to get my eyes tested however), or I just assumed it would say 1 and read it as such, or the platform changed...