Thames Valley infrastructure problems causing disruption elsewhere - 2014

[whole diary]

[grahame]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-30392928

Persistent rail delays on the commuter line between Reading and London Paddington are "not acceptable", the rail minister has said.

First Great Western (FGW^▸ (First Great Western)) apologised on Monday after passengers faced delays of up to an hour following signalling faults in Acton, west London.

Rail Minister Claire Perry said she would be meeting Network Rail and FGW to discuss the problems.

Network Rail said it did not know what was causing the wider ongoing issues.

{continues}

My emphasis ...

[TaplowGreen]

Very reassuring! But at least it's getting some publicity in Parliament (.......thought they'd all be on their Christmas hols by now!!!)

[Jason]

I liked the use of the stock photograph from during the Reading platform remodelling works where there was almost no standing room on those either

[JayMac]

This afternoon's cause of delays in the Thames Valley?



 

(Picture courtesy of forum member Ollie, via Facebook)

[Timmer]

You couldn't make it up. 'Move along now please'.

[TonyK]

Wrong sort of pigeon.

[stuving]

There is now this apology on the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) site.

Apology from Network Rail and First Great Western

Dear Customer,

We're sorry if you were caught up in the delays experienced by many of our passengers in the London and Thames Valley area on Monday 08 December.

Data cables at Hanwell, west of Paddington which link signalling and safety equipment on the line to Network Rail^s signalling control centre, were not working properly. This meant we could only safely run trains on two of the four lines into and out of London Paddington, severely limiting the number of trains we were able to run compared to normal.

This had a knock-on effect on other services across our network, causing delays and cancellations as we worked to keep customers moving.

Network Rail is sorry for the disruption caused, and continues to investigate exactly what happened so that steps can be taken to avoid it happening again.

First Great Western has lifted ticket restrictions for the whole of Monday 08 December, and tickets will be valid on other train operators^ services. Customers affected by the delays can claim compensation, according to their ticket type, and details of how to claim are on our website at www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/compensation.

Season ticket holders will be compensated as part of the relevant Passenger Charter arrangements.

Yours Faithfully,

Patrick Hallgate
Route Managing Director
Network Rail

Mark Hopwood
Managing Director
First Great Western

Now, is that datalink issue the one caused by traction current? I can imagine that, if something that did work suddenly starts to suffer from  interference, finding it could be difficult. The cost of good EMC^▸ (ElectroMagnetic Compatibility)* is taking great pains everywhere with screening and earthing, and it would only need a concealed short-circuit at one point between two earths to undo it.

Which is not any kind of excuse. And of course there's still today to apologise for.

*EMC=electromagnetic compatibility

[Western Enterprise]

Now, is that datalink issue the one caused by traction current? I can imagine that, if something that did work suddenly starts to suffer from  interference, finding it could be difficult. The cost of good EMC^▸ (ElectroMagnetic Compatibility)* is taking great pains everywhere with screening and earthing, and it would only need a concealed short-circuit at one point between two earths to undo it.

Which is not any kind of excuse. And of course there's still today to apologise for.

*EMC=electromagnetic compatibility

There is some good banter on this subject over at the "http://www.wnxxforum.co.uk" website, which has a lot of railway professionals on board.
Some of the stuff is so technical that even they don't know what is going on.
The consensus of opinion seems to be that all the signalling on the eastern bit of the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) should be ripped out and shredded!.

WE

[ellendune]

The consensus of opinion seems to be that all the signalling on the eastern bit of the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) should be ripped out and shredded!.

I assume this is the section that was resignalled by Railtrack in the mid 1990's for Heathrow Express. Has it really worn out in less than 20 years?

[Electric train]

The issue with the Eastern end of the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line), the old Slough IECC^▸ (Integrated Electronic Control Centre) area, it uses SSI^▸ (Solid State Interlocking) (Solid State Interlocking) whilst it was not a very early version of this I feel there may have been some corners cut at the time with the install also as electronics go 20 year makes it geriatric.

The Thameslink signalling development team are also developing an ETRMS / ECTS system for the GWML principally for Crossrail operation which could see the introduction of ATO^▸ (Automatic Train Operation) (Automatic Train Operation) .............the Drivers can then say look mum no hands 

[NickB]

Well its been all clear on journeycheck for 2 days now but I can't help feeling something is still busted. All of my HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) leaving London have taken 10mins longer to maidenhead, pausing around hayes, and today the 7.16 inbound took 40mins.

Have fgw just suppressed the data for the TV ?!?! 

[TaplowGreen]

Well its been all clear on journeycheck for 2 days now but I can't help feeling something is still busted. All of my HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) leaving London have taken 10mins longer to maidenhead, pausing around hayes, and today the 7.16 inbound took 40mins.

Have fgw just suppressed the data for the TV ?!?! 

............maybe that's regarded as normal service now, not worthy of highlighting? 

[Richard Fairhurst]

You may be interested in http://recenttraintimes.co.uk/ which sets all these figures out in black and white. Or, more often, red.

[IndustryInsider]

You may be interested in http://recenttraintimes.co.uk/ which sets all these figures out in black and white. Or, more often, red.

Maidenhead to Paddington's most punctual fast train in the peaks appears to be the 07:59 with a 90% chance of a 5 minute or less delay at Paddington.  Some others are very poor though - the 08:35, too late for most commuters, but still a busy train is at only 43%!

Coming back the 17:35 has a 100% record which is pretty impressive.  Less impressive is the 45% recorded by the semi-fast 17:42 train.

Data based on the last three months.  A very useful website, but it's a shame longer time periods can't be analysed, as whilst three months sounds quite a long time, it is in fact only 60 or so occurrences of a given train of course.

[Jason]

What an excellent link, thanks for posting.
Paddington to Reading evening peak for the past 7 days is as red as I'd expect!