1903 Paddington - Plymouth 24th March

[whole diary]

[Henry]

 I

[TaplowGreen]

I suspect they may at last do something, they must be keen to avoid these sorts of pictures/reports being plastered all over the Press again............

http://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/Train-passengers-8216-forced-stand-hours-8217/story-28997853-detail/story.html

[a-driver]

I would say from those pictures the answer would be no!!  Although having said that I've heard the Pendolinos on the West Coast have a weight limit on them whereby the brakes will not release if that limit is exceeded. If that's true I suppose it could relate to the tilt mechanism.
Passengers have put themselves on those trains, how many would willingly leave it though if asked??

......exactly - which proves that prevention is always better than cure - hence the discussion above re: demand/boarding management.

But would it?  Once passengers become aware that there will be boarding limits boarding a train itself will become dangerous, a survival of the fittest.  The surge at Euston when boarding is announced is frightening.  VT^▸ (Virgin Trains - former franchises) will wait until the train is full and then ask passengers to leave the service.

OK we're at cross purposes - this thread primarily concerns GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) through Paddington.........however the situation you describe sounds even worse!

The issue I was trying to highlight, albeit badly, was that if you implent boarding controls from Paddington, granted, you'll fix the overcrowding issue on the train but will you be creating a potentially dangerous crush situation at the barriers as passengers fight to get themselves on the train before boarding is closed?

[TaplowGreen]

I would say from those pictures the answer would be no!!  Although having said that I've heard the Pendolinos on the West Coast have a weight limit on them whereby the brakes will not release if that limit is exceeded. If that's true I suppose it could relate to the tilt mechanism.
Passengers have put themselves on those trains, how many would willingly leave it though if asked??

......exactly - which proves that prevention is always better than cure - hence the discussion above re: demand/boarding management.

But would it?  Once passengers become aware that there will be boarding limits boarding a train itself will become dangerous, a survival of the fittest.  The surge at Euston when boarding is announced is frightening.  VT^▸ (Virgin Trains - former franchises) will wait until the train is full and then ask passengers to leave the service.

OK we're at cross purposes - this thread primarily concerns GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) through Paddington.........however the situation you describe sounds even worse!

The issue I was trying to highlight, albeit badly, was that if you implent boarding controls from Paddington, granted, you'll fix the overcrowding issue on the train but will you be creating a potentially dangerous crush situation at the barriers as passengers fight to get themselves on the train before boarding is closed?

.........seems to work OK for Glastonbury/Cheltenham Festival from Paddington and in Cardiff after the rugby without the mass frenzy you allude to?

[ellendune]

.........seems to work OK for Glastonbury/Cheltenham Festival from Paddington and in Cardiff after the rugby without the mass frenzy you allude to?

I was about to say "Before anyone says they can do I for Glastonbury etc..." but I was not quick enough.

When they have Glastonbury they use the space on P8/9 as  holding queue to do this safely, but they can only do this for one destination they can't do it for several as they only have the space for one queue of this nature. 

[a-driver]

.........seems to work OK for Glastonbury/Cheltenham Festival from Paddington and in Cardiff after the rugby without the mass frenzy you allude to?

I was about to say "Before anyone says they can do I for Glastonbury etc..." but I was not quick enough.

When they have Glastonbury they use the space on P8/9 as  holding queue to do this safely, but they can only do this for one destination they can't do it for several as they only have the space for one queue of this nature. 

Plus you're not involving the last trains out of Paddington for these events. 

[TaplowGreen]

.........seems to work OK for Glastonbury/Cheltenham Festival from Paddington and in Cardiff after the rugby without the mass frenzy you allude to?

I was about to say "Before anyone says they can do I for Glastonbury etc..." but I was not quick enough.

When they have Glastonbury they use the space on P8/9 as  holding queue to do this safely, but they can only do this for one destination they can't do it for several as they only have the space for one queue of this nature. 

Plus you're not involving the last trains out of Paddington for these events. 

OK so the basic current position then is that GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are unable to manage a situation which is at best totally unsatisfactory, at worst dangerous which they themselves have created by selling too many tickets for too few trains with inadequate capacity and making no real attempt to control the consequences....leave aside DFT^▸ (Department for Transport) issues, we're talking about the here & now.

[ellendune]

OK so the basic current position then is that GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are unable to manage a situation which is at best totally unsatisfactory, at worst dangerous which they themselves have created by selling too many tickets for too few trains with inadequate capacity and making no real attempt to control the consequences....leave aside DFT^▸ (Department for Transport) issues, we're talking about the here & now.

Are they allowed to not sell walk up fares on such occasions?

[a-driver]

.........seems to work OK for Glastonbury/Cheltenham Festival from Paddington and in Cardiff after the rugby without the mass frenzy you allude to?

I was about to say "Before anyone says they can do I for Glastonbury etc..." but I was not quick enough.

When they have Glastonbury they use the space on P8/9 as  holding queue to do this safely, but they can only do this for one destination they can't do it for several as they only have the space for one queue of this nature. 

Plus you're not involving the last trains out of Paddington for these events. 

OK so the basic current position then is that GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are unable to manage a situation which is at best totally unsatisfactory, at worst dangerous which they themselves have created by selling too many tickets for too few trains with inadequate capacity and making no real attempt to control the consequences....leave aside DFT^▸ (Department for Transport) issues, we're talking about the here & now.

It's not just GWR you are levelling those allegations at though.  You're aiming those at the industry as a whole, an industry where no train operating company has managed to solve and the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) isn't interested either, why do you think that is?  The train company doesn't sell tickets for too few trains.  Many run during the day relatively empty.
If you want to implement boarding controls, once you get to the last train out of the evening and you've got queues leading out of Paddington what are you going to do?  Do you think season tickets holders will be happy that there ticket is now only valid one specific train?  And what happens if they impose limits on season tickets?  how will commuters reach London then?

[didcotdean]

It can be argued that selling a ticket valid only on a particular date would be expected to be used on that date, if not known on which train so could be controlled in some fashion. There can't be the same consideration though with the return portion of say off-peak returns which could be used on any day within a calendar month.

GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) notably hadn't prohibited the use of GroupSave to anywhere on Thursday, although it was on a certain number of trains to Penzance on Friday as is always the case.

Corralling passengers etc at Paddington wouldn't solve anything at Reading though where people with reserved seats couldn't get their way onto some trains and probably wouldn't be able to get to the seat anyway.

[ellendune]

The whole system was founded on the idea at privatisation of a railway that would continue to decline. Crush loaded trains on a daily basis were never even thought of when the rules were made and any peak crush loading would not last long as demand declined (usually in response to reduced services).

No one has worked out how to turn this into a system to cope with a  growing railway. 

The long franchises of Chiltern have shown us a way to increase infrastructure and even train capacity.  But DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) does not seem to like long franchises as it curtails their fondness for micro managing while denying all responsibility for the outcome of their actions.

If they are to continue to curtail capacity by their desire to micro-manage then they need to redesign he ticketing system to allow it to manage limited capacity.  The danger there is, however, they would use it to supress rather than manage demand every day. So, although I want them to redesign the ticketing system I would rather a growth of capacity - accepting that there will always be problems on certain days.

The DfT still come out with the mantra that there is capacity because off peak trains are not full, there will always be off-peak trains with spare capacity.  Unless we get elastic trains.

[IndustryInsider]

Out of interest, taking London - Plymouth as an example, given a similar service pattern, how many seats will be added by the new trains?

Impossible to be very precise, given we don't know the frequency of trains and times they will run.

However, as a guide, the latest seating layout in HST^▸ (High Speed Train)'s has an average (depending on whether it's a full size or mini-buffet) of 490 Standard and 70 First Class seats (560 total), the SET^▸ (Super Express Train (now IET)) trains were specified for 526 Standard and 101 First Class (627 total) for the 9-Car Electric version and a 5-Car Bi-Mode unit (running as a pair) would have 540 Standard and 90 First Class (total 630).  An extra carriage on the 9-car sets could up that total to well over 700, but even then you'd find it hard to eliminate standees on days like Maundy Thursday!

You'd assume that the AT300 follow on order for 'West of England' services would have similar capacities to the SET units currently being built, though if rumours of provision of a buffet car on those sets are realised, then that would knock out about 15-20 seats at a guess.  However the Wikipedia article on these Class 802s states a total capacity of 655 seats on a 9-car unit.

Clear as mud at the moment!

[broadgage]

OK so the basic current position then is that GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are unable to manage a situation which is at best totally unsatisfactory, at worst dangerous which they themselves have created by selling too many tickets for too few trains with inadequate capacity and making no real attempt to control the consequences....leave aside DFT^▸ (Department for Transport) issues, we're talking about the here & now.

Are they allowed to not sell walk up fares on such occasions?

IMO^▸ (in my opinion) it is not the walk up fares that are the problem, it is the sale of discounted advance tickets for services that are expected to be overcrowded.
Trying to ban the sale of full fare tickets in order to give more space for those with discounted tickets seems a very odd way of proceeding. As is the idea of limiting boarding to those with discounted advance tickets whilst turning away those with full fare tickets.
Near the beginning of this thread, someone speaks of obtaining an advance ticket for ^19, such tickets should not in my view be sold for services expected to be busy.

[John R]

Near the beginning of this thread, someone speaks of obtaining an advance ticket for ^19, such tickets should not in my view be sold for services expected to be busy.

I totally agree, and it would appear poor commercially to do so. However, I suspect that TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company)'s may be afraid of the bad publicity they may get if they don't offer them on busy services, as they will then be accused of "ripping people off", and no matter how logical the argument, they will lose it in the eyes of the media and public (a bit like when they withdrew GroupSave for Reading's day out at Wembley).

[ellendune]

Near the beginning of this thread, someone speaks of obtaining an advance ticket for ^19, such tickets should not in my view be sold for services expected to be busy.

I totally agree, and it would appear poor commercially to do so. However, I suspect that TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company)'s may be afraid of the bad publicity they may get if they don't offer them on busy services, as they will then be accused of "ripping people off", and no matter how logical the argument, they will lose it in the eyes of the media and public (a bit like when they withdrew GroupSave for Reading's day out at Wembley).

I suspect there would be some members of this community who would make that accusation.