Paul Merton's Secret Stations

[whole diary]

[The Tall Controller]

A station can also be a request stop due to tight timings on the line it's on. Perranwell became a request stop when the loop at Penryn was installed and should a train not stop there it helps the line run to time.

[Rhydgaled]

A station can also be a request stop due to tight timings on the line it's on. Perranwell became a request stop when the loop at Penryn was installed and should a train not stop there it helps the line run to time.

Similarly I seem to recall that Gowerton was a request stop until the line through it was redoubled because it was on the single-track bottleneck section. In such cases I presume the 'request' status remains even if virtually every services timetabled to call are in fact requested to stop.

[froome]

Are the announcements bilingual?  If so, it may be to avoid the announcements going on for ever when repeated (as happens at stations, where the train for the Heart of Wales line will be half way to its next stop before the announcement has finished).

No, the announcements on the train are in English only (which of course might be a reason why they don't attempt to pronounce the request stops, as they are mostly Welsh names, except of course Valley). When you've heard Flandidno Junction said a few times, I would imagine the Welsh get pretty sick of hearing them.

[Hafren]

The Cardiff to Holyhead trains certainly state in their announcements that "this train will call at the following major stations" and the definition of "major" seems to mean ones that the train always calls at, even if there are no passengers.    When you think of it "This train WILL call at Valley ...." would be a bit of a lie in an announcement if there's no-one to get off and no-one waiting on the platform there.

I'm not sure if they do the same for Anglesey, but when Gowerton was a request stop it seemed to be tagged onto the announcement as 'Gowerton stops are made only by request' after the 'principal stations' bit. There wasn't much of a breath between the last 'principal' stop and the first 'request' stop. I have a feeling it was only announced a few stops before, perhaps intentionally to shorten the announcement. Apparently when the 175s were first introduced the system assumed a stop had been made after each door cycle, which meant it went out of sync with request stops - I'm not sure if they still do it like that or perhaps by distance or GPS now, but perhaps only announcing 'principal' stops is perhaps a throwback to this issue.

[froome]

The Cardiff to Holyhead trains certainly state in their announcements that "this train will call at the following major stations" and the definition of "major" seems to mean ones that the train always calls at, even if there are no passengers.    When you think of it "This train WILL call at Valley ...." would be a bit of a lie in an announcement if there's no-one to get off and no-one waiting on the platform there.

I'm not sure if they do the same for Anglesey, but when Gowerton was a request stop it seemed to be tagged onto the announcement as 'Gowerton stops are made only by request' after the 'principal stations' bit.

That is what happens on the Weymouth line as well for the Dorset request stops, but it doesn't happen on the Anglesey line (or at least hasn't happened when I've traveled along there). They just ignore the existence of those stations altogether.

[Rhydgaled]

I'm not sure if they do the same for Anglesey, but when Gowerton was a request stop it seemed to be tagged onto the announcement as 'Gowerton stops are made only by request' after the 'principal stations' bit. There wasn't much of a breath between the last 'principal' stop and the first 'request' stop. I have a feeling it was only announced a few stops before, perhaps intentionally to shorten the announcement. Apparently when the 175s were first introduced the system assumed a stop had been made after each door cycle, which meant it went out of sync with request stops - I'm not sure if they still do it like that or perhaps by distance or GPS now, but perhaps only announcing 'principal' stops is perhaps a throwback to this issue.

I don't know about Anglesey either, but as far as I can recall the automated announcements on 175s normally list only principal stations, with each request stop announced only once in the whole journey. I think that announcement is when the train departs the previous principal station, eg. on leaving Pembrey & Burry Port a Milford Haven service that calls at Kidwelly and Ferryside would say "We will be calling at the following principal stations: Carmarthen, Whitland, Haverfordwest and Milford Haven. Kidwelly and Ferryside stops are only made by request...". Clunderwen and Clarbeston Road aren't mentioned until leaving Whitland, and presumably Johnston would be announced on departure from Haverfordwest. That's how I think it goes anyway.

[grahame]

Here's a histogram of station usage along the North Wales coast:



Graphic representation of the relative importance of each station.

[Phil]

I'm no statistician, but I'd be interested to understand how that graph represents the relative importance of each station.

I can see how it represents popularity or frequency of use, but wouldn't a graph showing relative importance actually look a little different to that shown?

For instance Valley, serving as it does the RAF^▸ (Royal Air Force) station at which all of the RAF’s jet combat pilots pass through, should presumably rank a little higher in terms of importance than say Prestatyn, gateway to Pontins?

I suppose it all comes down to how you measure importance. It just looks a little odd to me, that's all.

[John R]

Here's a histogram of station usage along the North Wales coast:



Graphic representation of the relative importance of each station.

At the risk of digression, one of those would be very useful to demonstrate why the increase in frequency on the Henley branch makes perfect sense, despite the impact on intermediate calls.

[grahame]

At the risk of digression, one of those would be very useful to demonstrate why the increase in frequency on the Henley branch makes perfect sense, despite the impact on intermediate calls.

Please feel free to quote this in that other thread:



I have added the Marlow branch as it provides an interesting comparison.

[froome]

Here's a histogram of station usage along the North Wales coast:



Graphic representation of the relative importance of each station.

No, it is a graphic representation, I assume, of the number of tickets sold to/from those destinations.

It does not take into account:

a) How many trains stop at the stations - all for those that have highest usage, far fewer for those with the smallest.
b) The nature of journeys made and how this affects the ticket they buy.

As an example of the latter, the journey I've described on other posts involved us buying a return ticket from Llanfairpwll to Rhosneigr, two of the request stops that have higher usage than others (not surprising as they have the highest populations). However, our actual journey involved alighting at Bodorgan, to then walk along the Anglesey coast around to Rhosneigr. Bodorgan (and Ty Croes) have no hinterland populations (probably less than 100 people live within a mile of each station) but both have potential for rural tourism of the sort we undertook, and are important in that respect.

[grahame]

No, it is a graphic representation, I assume, of the number of tickets sold to/from those destinations.

It does not take into account:

a) How many trains stop at the stations - all for those that have highest usage, far fewer for those with the smallest.
b) The nature of journeys made and how this affects the ticket they buy.

Correct - it's a graphic representation of the ORR^» (Office of Rail and Road formerly Office of Rail Regulation - about)'s ticket sales figures for entrances and exits, and subject to the usual cautions that are expressed withe the ORR figures.

Llandudno Junction in particular is likely to be distorted if you look at traffic along the North Wales coast as it also has Llandudno local and Conway Valley local traffic shown, and also people transferring from the main line to those services not shown.

It would be possible to do all sorts of things with the figures such as divide them by the number of trains calling (and what does "calling" mean for one that terminates / does that count as 1 or 0.5?) and theres no indiction of shrinkage, growth, or potential in the diagram.

Edit to fix quoting