Thames Valley infrastructure problems causing disruption elsewhere - 2017

[whole diary]

[bobm]

Platforms 1 to 6 reopened.   Air conditioner in a CCTV^▸ (Closed Circuit Tele Vision) room failed and equipment started to overheat apparently.

[JayMac]

Still an infrastructure failure then! Recent posts don't need splitting. 

As you were...

[NickB]

Fwiw I diverted to Marylebone from Paddington when I became aware of the problem. I expect a full and robust challenge from GwR about my path home. I.e.  Not my problem.
What might it take for GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) to come out in front and admit to the giant problems that they have ??

[Timmer]

I have to say communication by GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) was much improved during the incident with proper regular updates posted on Twitter and the website. Perhaps some good came out of last weeks chaos, not that it takes away from the inconvenience and disruption that is caused when things go wrong.

[TaplowGreen]

They need to get their act in gear a great deal more before Waterloo's capacity is drastically cut next month - I can't see "go to Waterloo if you need to get to Reading/onwards" being much of an option based on the advice SWT^▸ (South West Trains) are already giving all of the their regular customers, let alone another influx from Paddington if (when) GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) fall over again.

[a-driver]

If a train operating company has been performing as badly as Network Rail Western region the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) would have hauled them in, fined them, issued ultimatums, strip them of the franchise.... and probably done so in public.
Why do the DfT do this, because it's easy to attack private companies in the form of the train operating companies. It's a hell of a lot more difficult to pubically attack an organisation that you effectively have direct control over, a nationalised organisation, so it's easier to sweep it under the carpet and allow rail passengers to carrying on blaming the TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company).
Network Rail as a result of the actions of our government, Network Rail are no longer able to retain experienced staff and attract new staff.  The railways are in a slow decline which will only pick up momentum. The railways need to be at the forefront of technological, all we are doing to temporarily repairing an old antiquated system. The bits we are renewing are done on the cheap and is being maintained by staff who probably don't fully understand how it works. . 

[Oxonhutch]

Strong rumours of a void day for last week's chaos have been detected.

[PhilWakely]

It's a hell of a lot more difficult to pubically attack an organisation that you effectively have direct control over...........

That statement brought tears to my eyes   

[charles_uk]

Strong rumours of a void day for last week's chaos have been detected.

According to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s Twitter team, Wednesday and Thursday have been declared void days:

"Last Wednesday and Thursday are void you can get a refund for those days from Monday 17 July. -Andy"

[TaplowGreen]

It's a hell of a lot more difficult to pubically attack an organisation that you effectively have direct control over...........

That statement brought tears to my eyes   

That sort of attack is definitely below the belt.

[Timmer]

According to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway)'s Twitter team, Wednesday and Thursday have been declared void days:

"Last Wednesday and Thursday are void you can get a refund for those days from Monday 17 July. -Andy"

A good decision there. Can't replace the time that people lost that evening but at least there is a bit of financial compensation for the inconvenience caused.

[ChrisB]

And I want to hear if anyone fails to get a compensation response over 8 weeks going forward please - the have put management resource into their contractors workplace recently & the response times are dropping steadily.

[Sixty3Closure]

Most impressed with the young graduate  engineers in the Crossrail programmes who were given a great deal  of responsibility for huge complex projects....but they always seemed to have a wise, experienced workforce under them to fall back on, and to advise and warn. No matter how brilliant the young high flier, you need that bedrock under them to catch them should they fall. The loss of the skilled and experienced professionals in engineering, (teaching/nursing civil service.. the list goes on ) in their 50s is the cause of much of these problems. Why does the older worker get thrown on the scrapheap just because they are seen to be 'expensive' and expendable. It's crazy.

I think there's external factors as well. Where I work we lost huge numbers of 50 something workers recently with pension changes before dramatic increase in penalties for taking it early. Even now there's people leaving because they're worried there won't be a pension fund in a couple of years or increasing meddling by the government just adds to the uncertainty. I think there also comes a point when you decide you've had enough of changes (attacks?) on your terms and conditions/benefits, below inflation pay rises and continual change. I've had about half a dozen reorganisations in the last two-three years.

None of these things are aimed directly at older workers but as someone said earlier they're the ones most likely to say they've had enough and leave or take redundancy.

Oh and the commute doesn't help...

[a-driver]

It's a hell of a lot more difficult to pubically attack an organisation that you effectively have direct control over...........

That statement brought tears to my eyes   

That sort of attack is definitely below the belt.

Why is that? 

DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) starts asking questions to Network Rail about their performance. Network Rail responds by telling the DfT "you control our budget and you sign off our major engineering projects". The ball lands back in the DfTs and they've no where to return it to
Passengers blame the TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company), as far as the DfT are concerned them being distanced from any blame works for them.

[SandTEngineer]

It's a hell of a lot more difficult to pubically attack an organisation that you effectively have direct control over...........

That statement brought tears to my eyes   

That sort of attack is definitely below the belt.

Why is that? 

DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) starts asking questions to Network Rail about their performance. Network Rail responds by telling the DfT "you control our budget and you sign off our major engineering projects". The ball lands back in the DfTs and they've no where to return it to
Passengers blame the TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company), as far as the DfT are concerned them being distanced from any blame works for them.

I am somewhat doubtful about that anaylsis.  NR^» (Network Rail - home page) do have performance (and other) targets set by the government (aka DfT) and they can hold NR to account over them if they really tried.  Unfortunately, personally I don't see much evidence of that at present (i.e. things seem to just carry on as they were before ).