My train journey today

[whole diary]

[johoare]

Today I was taking the children to London and this is how it went..

Firstly I decided to travel from Slough not Maidenhead as Slough gets half hourly fast trains all day.. Maidenhead has no fast trains off-peak

1. Drive to Slough
2. Pay ^6.60 to park (ouch) even though it's after 10am (off-peak at Slough appears to start at 4pm - no wonder the car park is half empty)
3. Have two attempts at buying tickets (first machine didn't fancy credit cards today)
4. Spend a little time on platform 3 but due to signal trouble at Reading there were no fast trains (well the delayed 10.11 did come through but it didn't stop)..
5. Spend about 20 minutes on platform 5 until a train arrives
6. Attempt to get on the train.. Can't get on..
7. Go back to car and drive...

So I paid out for car parking and train tickets that I didn't use.. And then had to pay central London Parking prices AND the congestion charge..

Marvellous...

[6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01]

why couldn't you get on?

[lordgoata]

If it was anything like the trains going through Maidenhead, they were running less carriages than normal, and were so jam packed people were hanging out of the doors ...

[johoare]

Indeed.. There was no room to get on...Goodness knows how people further down the line managed..

[JayMac]

By all accounts it was a bit of a nightmare trying to get into London on the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) yesterday morning (02/06/2011).

I'm glad I'm a cheapskate and went via Salisbury from Bristol. PA^▸ (Public Address) at Bristol TM^‡(resolve) was warning of severe delays and short notice cancellations at, and from Reading. Can't have been much fun if you had no other journey options.

[johoare]

Well yes. Not helped by the (new) CIS^▸ (Customer Information System) at Slough appearing to just give up... Mind you I know how it felt 

[bobm]

Tonight looks little better according to the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website

Line problem between Slough and Maidenhead.
Train services via Burnham have been disrupted due to a problem with line-side equipment between Slough and Maidenhead.Engineers have worked as fast as possible to restore services to normal. Short notice alterations, cancellations and delays of up to 75 minutes can be expected.
South West trains and Chiltern Trains, London Underground, CrossCountry and Chiltern Railways will accept First Great Western tickets between any reasonable routes. First Capital Connect and Southern will accept First Great Western tickets between London and Gatwick Airport. Limited services to all destinations from Paddington have restarted from 19:30hrs
Last Updated: 03/06/2011 19:39

WoE services particularly badly hit. The 17:33 to Taunton cut back to Bristol Temple Meads and the 18:03 to Penzance and the 18:33 to Plymouth cancelled completely. Bad news for a Friday night especially.

[Brucey]

At Bath Spa yesterday afternoon there were very few happy passengers.  Services to London were advertised as "taking an alternative route".

The school holidays, coupled with disruption on nearly every route plus the temperature didn't make for good travelling conditions.

Not to mention the delayed Portsmouth Harbour service (that all Weymouth passengers were advised to take as far as Westbury despite a Weymouth service calling within 20 minutes) that was substituted with a two coach Class 150

Don't get me started on the morning service.  People who only travel by train once in a blue moon playing musical chairs because seat reservations weren't printed at PMH.  "You sit here", "No, this is my seat", "I've got the window", "We've got children, we need the table".  Arghhhhh, for goodness sakes, just sit anywhere, the train was less than a quarter full anyway.  Thank you to the conductor who backed me up (in saying that her seat reservation wasn't valid anymore) after I refused to move after having already moved twice.

My last FGW^▸ (First Great Western) journey for a long time but I certainly wasn't a happy traveller.  I had planned to take the mother on this "day trip", but lucky I didn't, else her opinion of the modern railway would be scarred forever!

[johoare]

Tonight looks little better according to the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website

Line problem between Slough and Maidenhead.
Train services via Burnham have been disrupted due to a problem with line-side equipment between Slough and Maidenhead.Engineers have worked as fast as possible to restore services to normal. Short notice alterations, cancellations and delays of up to 75 minutes can be expected.
South West trains and Chiltern Trains, London Underground, CrossCountry and Chiltern Railways will accept First Great Western tickets between any reasonable routes. First Capital Connect and Southern will accept First Great Western tickets between London and Gatwick Airport. Limited services to all destinations from Paddington have restarted from 19:30hrs
Last Updated: 03/06/2011 19:39

WoE services particularly badly hit. The 17:33 to Taunton cut back to Bristol Temple Meads and the 18:03 to Penzance and the 18:33 to Plymouth cancelled completely. Bad news for a Friday night especially.

I am getting a little fed up with FGW at the moment tbh.. They seem to have given up on their passengers (as I had to give up on them yesterday.. even tho I gave them some money for the privelege)... oh well..And these short trains are ok until it all goes wrong as they are all so hot even when they're not totally packed.. so packed is dangerous in my opinion...Heading into summer now.. marvellous.. I can hardly wait...

[bobm]

To be fair to FGW^▸ (First Great Western) yesterday and today's problems have been out of their hands. The signalling at Reading and Maidenhead are for Network Rail to sort and the fatality at Castle Cary is beyond anyone on the railways' control.

Where FGW can assist is ensuring passengers (and would be passengers) are kept informed. I saw what was on the website but I wasn't travelling at the time so I don't know how well they succeeded in that.

East Coast railways publicly criticised Network Rail after problems with the signalling and overhead lines. I hope FGW don't go down that avenue - there's a danger it could be counter-productive. 

[johoare]

Well yesterday they were telling people not to wait on platform 3 for the fast trains with no reason ( although I guess it was because the one I saw didn't stop so others wouldn't too) but to go to platform 5.. This is fine if they run trains long enough to get everyone on.. It was 10.50am so not the height of the peak...If they chose to run short trains which just about work when things are ok (just) .. They should come up with a plan when things are not ok.. They didn't..

I could have spent a long time at Slough trying to get on trains where there was no room.. I decided that wouldn't be fun...or that I'd get where I was going.. Hence paying Apcoa and FGW^▸ (First Great Western) money for tickets which I didn't use... oh well.. not their loss I guess 

[bobm]

I decided that wouldn't be fun...or that I'd get where I was going.. Hence paying Apcoa and FGW^▸ (First Great Western) money for tickets which I didn't use... oh well.. not their loss I guess 

If you haven't already I'd send the tickets to FGW and explain why you didn't travel. Nothing to lose and if I had been in the same circumstance I would.

[johoare]

Yeah I have thought about that (but ended up using the travelcard portion on bus/tube in London so imagine I won't be allowed).. I'd like to claim my ^6.60 car park ticket back too but imagine that also won't help... It was a very expensive day out in the end...:-(

[gpn01]

Yeah I have thought about that (but ended up using the travelcard portion on bus/tube in London so imagine I won't be allowed).. I'd like to claim my ^6.60 car park ticket back too but imagine that also won't help... It was a very expensive day out in the end...:-(

But it could have been much, much worse!  Am about to write up what happened this evening!

[johoare]

Yeah I have thought about that (but ended up using the travelcard portion on bus/tube in London so imagine I won't be allowed).. I'd like to claim my ^6.60 car park ticket back too but imagine that also won't help... It was a very expensive day out in the end...:-(

But it could have been much, much worse!  Am about to write up what happened this evening!

Oh dear.. What has happened now? :-(