Snow problems 20-Dec

I figure that not everyone may have seen the emails put out by London Midland today which describe the problems experienced and the contingency measures taken by that company to get us to and back from London.  I copy the relevant extracts below without comment.

*************************

20 December 2010 08:21

Major disruption to services on Monday 20 December


Update 0810hrs

We are currently experiencing major disruption on a number of our routes due to the extremely cold weather. The following are particularly affected:

Snow Hill lines


If you travel on our trains that pass through Birmingham Snow Hill, we advise you not to travel unless absolutely necessary. Temperatures overnight were so low that the fuel in many of our diesel trains has frozen, despite our best efforts to prevent this, leading to widespread cancellations.


Euston lines


The weather is also causing severe disruption on our routes to and from London Euston. This is primarily due to ice damage to various parts of our trains and doors freezing up en route. Again, we have worked through the night to minimise the impacts and have a team of engineers repairing faults as quickly as they can.


Please accept our apologies for the disruption to your journey today.


For more information throughout the day, you can follow @londonmidland on Twitter, refer to our website londonmidland.com, or visit nationalrail.co.uk/disruption.


Best wishes,
London Midland

**********************

20 December 2010 16:27

Major disruption to services this evening.

Good afternoon,

Although we continue to work to keep our trains free of ice, we are experiencing problems with frozen fuel and ice damage. Due to a lack of available trains, we are running reduced timetables on some routes, whilst others are subject to delays and short notice cancellations...

(Details about non-Euston London Midland services)...

Euston route

We are also having a number of problems on our trains into Euston, many of which are being damaged by a build up of ice en route, which is leading to delays and cancellations.

To minimise disruption caused by points failures, trains are not permitted to cross between the fast and slow lines today, which means that further delays will be experienced due to increased congestion. As a result, Tring to Euston local services have been suspended, with other trains making additional stops at affected stations, including Kings Langley and Apsley (xx.24 / xx.54 departures from Euston).

If you are travelling today, please note that - where the option exists - tickets can be used to travel on either Virgin or London Midland services to/from London Euston...

(Details about other non-Euston London Midland services)

...We are doing everything we can to keep disruption to a minimum, but please visit our live travel information page before travelling.

Please note that live departure boards can only give updates on services once they have left their origin station. If you live near to a terminus (e.g. Kidderminster, Stourbridge Junction, Dorridge, Stratford, Whitlocks End, Longbridge, Redditch, Four Oaks, Lichfield, Birmingham, Coventry, Northampton, Milton Keynes, Tring, London), it is worth checking trains in the opposite direction to see how services are running.

On all other routes we are planning to run a normal timetable, although experience tells us that the freezing conditions will cause delays to some services.

The main causes of delay are likely to be points failures (often as a result of compacted snow and ice), poor road conditions preventing staff getting to work, frozen train doors and ice damage to couplings between trains. Both Network Rail and ourselves will be working around-the-clock to prepare as best we can.

If you use Twitter, you can also follow @londonmidland for helpful travel advice and updates.
Once again, please accept our apologies for today's disruption.


Best wishes,
London Midland

********************

I count myself as fairly lucky today.  I arrived at Bletchley station to find the 0700 was cancelled and the 0653 had alraedy gone.  I got a late-running, 4-coach 0712 which plodded along behind the all-stops train so didn't get too overcrowed.  We got into Euston at 0857, 1 hour 13 minutes later than the 0700 was scheduled to arrive.

I left the office early intending to get the 1613.  I arrived at Euston at 1645 to find that the 1524 hadn't yet left. All intermediate stops (Watford, Hemel Hempstead, Berkhamsted, Tring, Cheddington & Leighton Buzzard) were cancelled so it was first stop Bletchley.  The journey still took just over an hour, and I felt sorry for the Milton Keynes passengers who were turfed out at Bletchley when London Midland decided to terminate the train one station early.

A friend arrived at Euston in time to get the 1613 but found that trains were either cancelled or were running short (4-cars) and were too crowded to board.  The last thing I heard, she was still waiting for a train home after two hours of waiting.

So how did you get on?


.