Crossover (both ways) connections

[whole diary]

[grahame]

This is the 18:50 on a Saturday evening post December, scheduled a 12 minute hold at Worcestershire Parkway..
https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/L97618/2019/12/21

I do NOT think the above is an example of a "crossover" connection, but initial thoughts had me wondering if the train was scheduled to arrive at Worcestershire Parkway in time to provide a connection INTO a train on the Bristol to Birmingham line, and dally there to that it could also provide a connection OUT OF that same train.

I could quite envisage a train arriving into Westbury from Oxford via Swindon at :55, a train from Cardiff to Portsmouth calling from :00 to :01, then the train that arrived at :55 carrying on at :05 to Yeovil Pen Mill with alternate extensions to Weymouth.

This sort of thing also forms part of a fiendish little bus plan ... with the bus arriving at the station 5 minutes before the train calls, heading off for a 10 minute loop around 'burbs so clode to the station that no-one would dream of using the bus, and calling at the station again 5 minutes after the train has called.

Are there examples of these sorts of things happening already?

[Robin Summerhill]

I could quite envisage a train arriving into Westbury from Oxford via Swindon at :55, a train from Cardiff to Portsmouth calling from :00 to :01, then the train that arrived at :55 carrying on at :05 to Yeovil Pen Mill with alternate extensions to Weymouth.

There is the considerable downside in this scenario of the poor blighters going from say, Melksham to Frome, spending nearly as much time looking at Westbury station as they do in transit.

Westbury was a complete pain in the proverbial for this back in the 60s when trains could be held for anything up to 12 minutes either waiting connections and/ or for station duties.

Even worse was on offer at Templecombe with S&D^▸ (Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway) trains. As evidence in 1965:


0558 Bristol to Bournemouth West held for 24 minutes
0903 Bristol to Bournemouth West held for 22 minutes
1525 Bristol to Bournemouth West held for 7 minutes
1755 Bristol to Bournemouth West held for 12 minutes

https://www.flickr.com/photos/93122458@N08/26488808442/

0732 Broadstone to Bath (not shown as a through service but it actually was) held for 30 minutes
1310 Bournemouth to Bristol held for 9 minutes
1540 Bournemouth West to Bristol held for 18 minutes

https://www.flickr.com/photos/93122458@N08/26555296416/

I for one would not enjoy going back to that state of affairs again. It was irritating enough over 50 years ago