XC to serve Bath Spa from May timetable change.

[whole diary]

[The Grecian]

A lot of new post-privatisation services I suspect were run as an ORCATs said as much as a genuine service. Wales and West (before it split into the Wales and Wessex services) ran some peculiar services down the Marches Line via Shrewsbury and Hereford including Liverpool-Portsmouth and Manchester Pic - London Waterloo. I think at one point you had four different Manchester - London services - Euston (VT^▸ (Virgin Trains - former franchise (or, possibly, in a France context, Versement Transport - a payroll tax on employers to fund local transport) )), St Pancras via the Hope Valley and Derby (MML^» (Midland Main Line. - about)), Paddington via Birmingham and Reading (XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise))) and the Waterloo service via Hereford, Bristol and Salisbury (WW). You've only got the one direct route now though.

I doubt many people will use this service for long-distance travel - XC run similar services from Bournemouth to Newcastle at 0600 and one from Gatwick which I think are at user unfriendly times for anyone who wants a direct service. But we'll see.

[moonrakerz]

I'm certainly not knocking XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) for providing this new service. Anyone who wants to run extra services from Bath is always welcome as far as I'm concerned.

Is it really an extra "service" ?

To me it seems just a way of playing the system to get some more money for not really doing very much to benefit the travelling public. As mac says it may make financial sense - but that is all.
I suppose, as all those MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context) said: "it's within the rules" !

You could say that the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) services from Worcester to Malvern and the occasional service to Brighton fall into the same category

If you would like to "search" my previous posts - I already have !   

[Tim]

Wales and West (before it split into the Wales and Wessex services) ran some peculiar services down the Marches Line via Shrewsbury and Hereford including [...] Manchester Pic - London Waterloo.

It may have been an ORCATs raid but I for one found it very useful as did so many others that you were not always able to board at Bath.   It allowed the Marches route to compete with the via Birmingham route

[grahame]

Wales and West (before it split into the Wales and Wessex services) ran some peculiar services down the Marches Line via Shrewsbury and Hereford including [...] Manchester Pic - London Waterloo.

It may have been an ORCATs raid but I for one found it very useful as did so many others that you were not always able to board at Bath.   It allowed the Marches route to compete with the via Birmingham route

The original intent of these services were to give a direct link to Eurostar - catering for the traffic from Wales and the North West to Brussels and Paris; the services survive in much modified form as SWT^▸ (South West Trains)'s Bristol to Waterloo service; once they were transfetted to the South West franchise they had stops added at places like Salisbury, which had previously been passed through nonstop as the Ludlow to Salisbury flow was minimal 

[super tm]

Wales and West (before it split into the Wales and Wessex services) ran some peculiar services down the Marches Line via Shrewsbury and Hereford including [...] Manchester Pic - London Waterloo.

It may have been an ORCATs raid but I for one found it very useful as did so many others that you were not always able to board at Bath.   It allowed the Marches route to compete with the via Birmingham route

The original intent of these services were to give a direct link to Eurostar - catering for the traffic from Wales and the North West to Brussels and Paris; the services survive in much modified form as SWT^▸ (South West Trains)'s Bristol to Waterloo service; once they were transfetted to the South West franchise they had stops added at places like Salisbury, which had previously been passed through nonstop as the Ludlow to Salisbury flow was minimal 

Yes and the 0531 Pad to Swansea only started running to repalce the early morning train from Waterloo.