Gloucester - station, facilities, services, events & incidents (merged posts)

[whole diary]

[MVR S&T]

From Cross Country Journey Check:

 Delays to services between Cheltenham Spa and Bristol Parkway
Due to a points failure between Cheltenham Spa and Bristol Parkway all Southbound lines are blocked.
Impact
Train services running through these stations may be delayed. Disruption is expected until 20:45 24/12.
Last Updated:24/12/2018 19:46

[bobm]

From Journeycheck

Gloucester: Lifts out of order

The lifts will be out of order between Platform One and Platform Two from 13/10/2016 until the end of the day at Gloucester station.

Aren't platforms 1 and 2 in fact one long single platform?  Even more strangely have they really been out of order for more than three years?

[ChrisB]

There’s also the same warning/date for Exeter Central on journrycheck now too

[froome]

I'm waiting to see the same warning for Oldfield Park. 

[Red Squirrel]

Apparently the footbridge to Gloucester Eastgate is also closed until further notice.

[PhilWakely]

Whilst waiting for a train at Pinhoe this morning, the delightful lady announcer - having requested our attention - politely advised customers to hold the handrail when using the stairs, or use the lift provided during icy conditions.

Pinhoe station has not had a footbridge - let alone a lift - since ceasing its original life back in 1966!

[Timmer]

I'm waiting to see the same warning for Oldfield Park. 

For a short while Oldfield Park had a footbridge whilst the steps leading to platform 1 were demolished and replaced with the disabled access ramp you see today. I think it was around the early 2000s.

[Bmblbzzz]

Pilning: The escalator is currently out of order. Please use the jet packs provided.

[grahame]

Coming down the Stroud Valley from Sapperton - should your passenger train make for Gloucester or Cheltenham Spa?   

Since Eastgate closed many decades ago, there's a choice to be made and the solution adopted by GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) services from and via Swindon and Stroud is to go in to the remaining Gloucester station, there reversing and heading on to Cheltenham Spa.  Cross Country services have - with one or two exceptions each day - made the decision to simple leave out Gloucester.

Yesterday, the 16:58 from Cheltenham Spa to Paddington missed out the Gloucester stop ... and from being 1 minute late off Cheltenham, called at Stonehouse 9 minutes early (then waited time at Stroud).  That's an indication of the time cost ... 10 minutes.

No 'point' here other than to inform ... but it does set me thinking.  As a system analyst, I have oft scratched my head and wondered the best way to provide services around this area; as someone who does not live in the area, I am not going to sit here and evaluate any ideas I might think of.  Comment from others welcome, though.

[Lee]

I suppose really the question is not so much how long but how much it costs, how much revenue it generates, and what the balance of the two is.

Once I had finally got them off the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) through FOI^▸ (Freedom of Information), I studied all the Jacobs Consultancy business case reports that underpinned the infamous 2006 Greater Western Franchise. They were full of analysis of what could be saved both timewise and financially by missing this or that stop out. However, there wasn't any such analysis of missing Gloucester out, and that probably tells you all you need to know.

Mind you, the whole concept of a rail "business case" is very "old normal", and who knows when we will see those days again, if we ever truly do.

My instinct is that Gloucester's services are probably at the lower end of the expectation range, and reducing them further would probably not be a sensible move for a number of reasons.

[ChrisB]

How else would you get from Gloucester to Stroud, for example?

[IndustryInsider]

How else would you get from Gloucester to Stroud, for example?

Not only that, but Cheltenham and Gloucester go together nicely to justify the new hourly through service to London.  Take out the Gloucester call and the numbers wouldn't stack up.

[grahame]

No 'point' here other than to inform ... but it does set me thinking.  As a system analyst, I have oft scratched my head and wondered the best way to provide services around this area; as someone who does not live in the area, I am not going to sit here and evaluate any ideas I might think of.  Comment from others welcome, though.

How else would you get from Gloucester to Stroud, for example?

Oh indeed ... my "10 minutes" posted as a learning point; seeing what happens when something goes wrong is often very educational.  No suggestion from me to drop the Gloucester call in otherwise unchanged current service patterns - what would be rather unfortunate!

From Stroud to Gloucester ... why not take government advise which until yesterday suggested you get off a stop early if that was a quieter station, and walk.  Cue large numbers of very annoyed peolple on the road from Stonehouse to Gloucester  

[Robin Summerhill]

There is of course nothing new in trains taking diversions tp pick up additional traffic.

There is at least one daily service from Paddington to Swansea via Bristol

Once upon a time NE/SW trains ran direct and non stop betweeh Sheffield and York. Now they alternate between goinf via Wakefield/ Leeds and Doncaster

At least one XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) train on the NE/SW route bound for Cardiff deviates via Bristol

Manchester to Hayfield services operate via Glossop

Many Lancaster to Leeds trains take a trip to Morecambe on the way

But back to being strictly on topic, Paddington to Cheltenham trains have always reversed at Gloucester and they could always, theoretically, have gone direct fromTuffley to Barnwood. In steam days, that was one of the reasons that Horton Road had a fleet of large prairie tanks for.

Styal line services have been reversing at Manchester Airport since the station opened

It would be a very oddstate of affairs indeed if class 800s on the Carmarthen to Paddington run didn't call aat Swansea!

[infoman]

Two things in my ideal World,although some one may have suggested them in the past

First option(now lost due to Morrisons) would have been the triangle at Gloucester.

Trains from Cheltenham to London/Bristol could have stopped on the main line and picked up passengers from Gloucester and then continued to to stonehouse/Bristol Parkway.

With a footbridge to the triangle to get passengeres to and from Gloucester station.

Second option which can still be done,trains from London which terminate at Cheltenham could have a signal installed just before cheltenham station to take you onto platform one.

This would be good for trains running late and dare I say racing days

From the time a train arrives at cheltenham from London to the time it gets over to the other side and ready to start its return journey is fifteen minutes.