Again not part of the
FGW▸ area, but I thought it might be of interest :
From Keith Burton at the Stop The Train, which was set up to campaign for services to local stations on the Sheffield/Leeds line to be restored to the level they were at prior to December 2004 (link below) :
http://www.stopthetrain.org.uk/Station Improvements : Good - Train Capacity Bad !!
A recent announcement of over ^600,000 to improve facilities at local stations on the Sheffield/Leeds line is always welcome but they have not addressed the lack of capacity on the trains that actually stop at these stations.
David York for SYPTE says he want to encourage MORE people to use public transport, but already with the growth in use over the last 5 years the trains are overcrowded (see picture taken on the train below - this is a typical scene as I travel on these trains everyday).
SYPTE needs to work with Northern to add more carriages to the stopping services at Darton, Wombwell, Elsecar and Chapeltown before trying to cram more public onto already overcrowded trains. The photo taken above was not the worse level of crowding I have seen recently as on a number of occasions people have not been able to board the train at all and I have seen a woman in a wheel chair at Meadowhall refused access to the train because it was so packed there was no room to get the chair onto the train!
Stop the Train.. we want to get on.
Tell the SYPTE that we want to ride on the trains, but in order to do that they need to STOP the trains so we can get on, and there need to be seats or even just room on the trains!!
In the evening when the train leaves Sheffield back to Leeds, it is often full on leaving Sheffield, and passengers trying to join the service at meadowhall can not get on.
As well as the obvious inconvenience for passengers this situation means that the rail company cannot collect the fares. It doesn't take a genius to work out that the rail company is losing thousands of pounds per week.
These peak time trains need to have at least 3 carriages on them as two is clearly inadequate.
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