PLEA FOR FASTER HEREFORD/WORCESTER TRAINS

[whole diary]

[bemmy]

I have a lot of sympathy with the folks of Hereford and Worcester, but doesn't everywhere in the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) region have a slower service to London than it did 20 years ago? (Apart from places like Honeybourne and Ivybridge that have gained direct services.)

[Btline]

Of course, hopefully Shipton and Hanborough stops will be removed from off peak (and most peak) once the shuttles come in.

An hourly service for Hanborough is more than generous!

[IndustryInsider]

Of course, hopefully Shipton and Hanborough stops will be removed from off peak (and most peak) once the shuttles come in.

An hourly service for Hanborough is more than generous!

As has been said before though, Shipton only has one 'express' train calling at it a day anyway, and so if you remove Hanborough stops you will save around 2-3 minutes maximum. Hardly revolutionary stuff! I can't see a shuttle running all day mopping up Hanborough passengers, though I can see a couple during the peak bolstering the service. I think hourly for Hanborough off-peak (the long distance trains from Hereford/Malvern) and roughly every 30 minutes during the peak will be the way FGW^▸ (First Great Western) go with this one, rightly or wrongly!

To make the kind of improvements this thread was started for you'll need to only have trains stopping at Evesham and probably two of Moreton, Kingham or Charlbury. You'll then need to have other trains serving the likes of Honeybourne and Pershore to meet with the Service Level Commitment. With the current economic climate, FGW's upcoming franchise payments, and a shortage of rolling stock, I'd be very surprised to see much changing, save for the natural speeding up that can occur given the greater flexibility the redoubling will bring.

[stebbo]

Sorry to return to this when I think the subject has been done to death....

I lived for a while in Oxford so know the surrounding area. To be honest, if I lived in Hanborough I think I'd have long got used to driving into Oxford. It's not that far and probably more convenient. And if I lived in Shipton (it's not that big a place - smaller than Hereford.....(sorry)...) I think I could cope with a drive to Kingham or Charlbury.

Anyway, I don't post that often on this site and I'm pleased that I've managed to provoke a lively debate, whether you agree with me or not.

[Not from Brighton]

Perhaps Hereford and Worcesterites can only wish for more frequent problems on the cotswolds section.  This usually results in a diversion via Stroud and NO STOPS between Reading and Worcester! I arrived at worcester 15mins early once thanks to a "disruption"!

[willc]

Yes, it has been done to death, but people will keep trotting out the same half-baked stuff about the supposed horrors of calling at almost any station between Worcester and Oxford bar Evesham.

if I lived in Hanborough I think I'd have long got used to driving into Oxford. It's not that far and probably more convenient

On the basis you moved to Hereford in 1990, you probably have little idea what rush-hour traffic in Oxford is like these days - gridlock much of the time.

Stagecoach's No 11 bus is allowed an hour to get from Hanborough into central Oxford via Eynsham at this time of morning - cars aren't that much quicker.

If you lived in Hanborough, would you rather pay FGW^▸ (First Great Western) ^3.70 for a peak day return (and less with a season) and a sub-10 minute journey or battle through the traffic and pay the city council ^17-^20 a day for six to eight hours parking, or over ^22-^24 if you're there for more than eight hours? Granted, many employers, mine included, offer free parking, but why waste your life stuck in traffic when the train beats the car hands down?

Btline, for the umpteenth time, lots of people using Hanborough at all times of the day travel to or from Reading or London, traffic built up on the back of through trains over the past 16 years - they are not some recent invention.

Since I began commuting in 2001, a grand total of one extra morning peak train has begun calling at Hanborough, the first train from Hereford, from December 2006 - and the Cathedrals Express still flies past at 100mph. Yes, both return Herefords call, but mean a far better spread of services out of Oxford than there was before 2006 - while the 17.51 has lost its Hanborough and Honeybourne stops.

As for "an hourly service is generous" what nonsense - with a more frequent service between Hanborough and Oxford backed up by proper marketing, FGW would be coining it - eg, at present there isn't a train into Oxford from 8.01 until 10.16. Anyone can see that a train running not far behind the Cathedrals Express, calling at Hanborough and reaching Oxford before 9am would be a good earner - it might also take a good few Oxford-bound people off the express, who often have to stand from Charlbury, but before anyone gets any ideas, lots joining at Charlbury are also going all the way to London.

The only current morning call at Shipton is by the halts train, while in the afternoon and evening peak, the return halts train and the 17.51 stop - and that's hardly a great imposition on a service that is far quieter than the Herefords which sandwich it - and with only two or three coaches unlocked, checking doors are shut there is a swift business, even with an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) on a Saturday afternoon.

[stebbo]

Even in 1989 the traffic in Oxford was bad. I lived in Summertown and walked to work in the City centre. On a Friday, I'd leave St. Giles at the same time as a bus to Woodstock and arrive in Summertown before the bus. It was pretty bad too when I was a student in Oxford in the 1970s.

But a partner in my firm used to drive in from Woodstock area; another drove in from Islip and neither complained.

A whole different topic, but perhaps Oxford needs a tram system. Anyone for another blog....?

[Mookiemoo]

Its not that - FGW^▸ (First Great Western) and their unreliability have caused me to lose at least 2 contracts in the last four years.  Maybe I am wrong to rely on a service that claims to get me to Pad at a certain time but failed to.

Now, with the padding, there are contracts I cannot even consider because the journey time is so long - and not all journeys to london have got longer - I remember taking 5 hours to get liverpool to Euston - not its about 2!

As for the intermediate stations - thats what you get for living in the sticks.

My local station is a stick - there are no expresses on that line but iof there was, then I wouldnt expect an intercity express to stop there. 

Major populations should be served by express trains and intermediate by stoppers.  Sorry for those at hanborough, shopton etc who seem to think they need to have an express service

[Btline]

As for "an hourly service is generous" what nonsense - with a more frequent service between Hanborough and Oxford backed up by proper marketing, FGW^▸ (First Great Western) would be coining it - eg, at present there isn't a train into Oxford from 8.01 until 10.16. Anyone can see that a train running not far behind the Cathedrals Express, calling at Hanborough and reaching Oxford before 9am would be a good earner - it might also take a good few Oxford-bound people off the express, who often have to stand from Charlbury, but before anyone gets any ideas, lots joining at Charlbury are also going all the way to London.

A service arriving at 9 am would create an hourly service! And it should not be an express filling that gap.

When you compare Hanborough to other places in this country, a half hourly service is excessive. Hourly is generous. HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) should not be stopping at these places at all off-peak. If you want to get to London - change. It is what you do in this country if you use such a village station! Why does this line have to be the odd one out?

FGW would generate far more income from speeding up the Worcester/Hereford trains, and getting a large amount of regular business travellers, (inc First Class season tickets) as well as those occasional leisure travellers who will actually use the service!

Further south, the copious amounts of Oxford P&R^▸ (Park and Ride) customers can use the shuttles.

[willc]

it should not be an express filling that gap.

I did not suggest the express should be making that stop - or isn't "a train running not far behind the Cathedrals Express" clear enough for you?

When you compare Hanborough to other places in this country, a half hourly service is excessive.

Why is it excessive, if the revenue is there for the taking? Which it is in the case of Hanborough, for the reasons I outlined previously. The traffic into Oxford may be easier off-peak, but the parking fees are still sky-high - an hour's on-street parking in the city centre (a mere ^2) costs more than an off-peak return from Hanborough using a Cotswold Railcard. And, I repeat, lots of people boarding at Hanborough are travelling past Oxford and have driven there from places like Witney.

As I've said in the redoubling thread, other village stations, like those between King's Lynn and Cambridge, get a half-hourly peak service to and from Cambridge and London, and an hourly off-peak train. And, to cite the example you threw at us earlier, the village stations between Hastings and Tunbridge Wells and between Horsham and Barnham have hourly trains to and from London most of the day. The Hastings line service is half-hourly in the peaks.

Or is that because they aren't between Worcester and Oxford, they are exempt from criticism? Should they also be stripped of this apparently extravagant level of service?

Major populations should be served by express trains

In terms of British cities and towns, Worcester and Hereford are not major population centres (combined population not dissimilar to Tunbridge Wells plus Hastings, to take one example) - and the overwhelming share of the growth in passenger numbers and revenue along the length of the Cotswold Line for the past two decades has been from Evesham and the stations east of there.

Neither BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)), nor Thames Trains, nor FGW^▸ (First Great Western) has ever shown any inclination to step up the number of fast trains from Worcester, even when there were still spare train paths available on the route. That speaks for itself in terms of their analysis of the likely prospects of boosting income by such an approach.

As for out in the sticks, all our well-used stations bring in the money that allows Worcester to enjoy the level of all-day service that it does at present, so you can park and ride from your bit of the sticks. For example, it's not that long ago that if you missed the 18.20ish off Paddington, then that was it if you wanted to travel beyond Moreton until the last train of the day. The recently-introduced 5.02 from Worcester is an extension of a train that has run from Moreton at about 6am for many years.

HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) should not be stopping at these places at all off-peak

So although off-peak Cotswold HSTs are carrying around lots of empty seats already, they should now miss out station stops and so carry even fewer passengers. That's the economics of the madhouse.

And what level of shuttle service develops, if any, remains to be seen. With the pressure on local government finances in the next few years, the ability of Oxfordshire County Council to offer support for them isn't clear - and they won't be serving Honeybourne or Pershore anyway.

a large amount of regular business travellers, (inc First Class season tickets)

Doesn't sound like the best plan to be relying on in the current economic climate - and hardly anyone commutes regularly on journeys taking as long as Worcester - even if you sliced off 15 or 20 minutes, that wouldn't change.

And I just looked this up for a laugh - and I did - a first class annual season (Cotswold Line only) between Worcester stations and London is ^13,708. If you want to have the option of travelling via the Stroud Valley line as well, then that's ^15,872. Even if the journey time came down, I can't see those selling like hotcakes. If you earned that kind of money, you would buy a home nearer London and save yourself the travelling.

[bemmy]

Now, with the padding, there are contracts I cannot even consider because the journey time is so long - and not all journeys to london have got longer - I remember taking 5 hours to get liverpool to Euston - not its about 2!

As for the intermediate stations - thats what you get for living in the sticks.

AFAIK^▸ (as far as I know), all journeys to London from the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) area have got longer in the last 20 years or so.

It's what you get for living west of London and south of Birmingham. 

[Btline]

The Hastings line actually has 2 tph. One semi fast and one slow. Thus the larger places on the route (and Hastings) get faster trains. In the peaks, some trains split to increase frequencies further, without eating up any more paths.

[willc]

Is it just me, or is this like wrestling jelly?

Just in case you have forgotten, you wrote the following - which didn't appear to me to be about what the overall level of service on a route was, it was about the service offered at a type of station.

When you compare Hanborough to other places in this country, a half hourly service is excessive. Hourly is generous. HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) should not be stopping at these places at all off-peak. If you want to get to London - change. It is what you do in this country if you use such a village station! Why does this line have to be the odd one out?

So just such a level of service is provided at other village stations on other lines elsewhere in this country - and indeed is better than that at Hanborough, where the current service isn't quite half-hourly in the morning peak (6.14, 6.42, 7.34, 8.01 towards Oxford) and more like hourly the other way in the late afternoon and early evening. The Hastings line also gets extras in the peak to and from Cannon Street, making it 3tph at these places out in the sticks.

And yes, Hastings does get faster trains - but all its trains, fast or slow, are operated by one type of EMU^▸ (Electric Multiple Unit), with 1/3 and 2/3 doors, which aren't exactly inter-city and not at all, I'm sure, the kind of thing certain people on here want to see whisking them from Hereford and Worcester to London.

If some sort of shuttle does emerge, giving a half-hourly frequency at the eastern end of the line and it pays its way, then it may very well be that, just as happened in the late 1990s with mid-evening trains extended beyond Moreton, the numbers might stack up in favour of extending that frequency all the way to Worcester - or help make the case for further redoubling as part of Oxford and Worcester resignalling schemes to make such a service easier to operate.

If that were to happen - and FGW^▸ (First Great Western) or any successor gets a new, more flexible rolling stock fleet - then a Hastings Line-style timetable might emerge but until those circumstances arrive, an hourly off-peak service, stopping everywhere but the halts and a half-hourly peak service in the direction of the main morning and evening flows, with one or two faster trains skipping the odd place - and hopefully some shuttles - is what is likely to emerge post-redoubling.

[Mookiemoo]

And I just looked this up for a laugh - and I did - a first class annual season (Cotswold Line only) between Worcester stations and London is ^13,708. If you want to have the option of travelling via the Stroud Valley line as well, then that's ^15,872. Even if the journey time came down, I can't see those selling like hotcakes. If you earned that kind of money, you would buy a home nearer London and save yourself the travelling.

Hmm - I did - for most of the time for five years straight.  2004 thru 2008 - ok I did it monthly so you dont notice the cost as much (and I did have month or so breaks in there)

[stebbo]

I think it fair to say there are more people living in the SE than around Shipton and Honeybourne, hence more stops on the Hastings line.

Plus, Hereford may not have a large population within the City itself but it has a large "hinterland". I know of people who live 20-25 miles from Hereford who come in to catch the train.