Twitter rail...

There were two interesting discussions on Twitter on Friday.   The first involved First Capital Connect which was accused of blocking one of the established commentators on the railway scene.  This was denied, but it did highlight the different approaches of the Train Operating Companies (TOCs).

@LondonMidland is generally considered to be a shining example of how a TOC can use social media to keep its customers informed and to listen to feedback from passengers.  Somehow they (and the "they" is understand to be one person) manages to post messages as early as 06:00 and as late as 07:00.  The day of the week also seems to be irrelevent. Some of the messages they receive aren't pleasant, but @LondonMidland always seems to find a response which is considered (and often humorous).

First Capital Connect's equivalent, @FirstCC appears to operate only from 0900-1700 which seems strange given that the majority of their customers will be using its services outside of those hours.  On the blocking question, it seems that they have had to take measures to protect their staff from having to deal with abusive messages.  They've used the Twitter feature which only gives access to their messages to Followers.  Two people who were sending inappropriate stuff have been barred...

The second interesting question was about railway staff with personal Twitter accounts posting up messages both to and about their customers.  This is an emotive issue, and on Friday it was suggested that it's an area which can impact on a railway company's brand and reputation.

My personal view on all this is that messaging on Twitter should be treated in the same way as any other conversation.  We should all be open to other people's views but that it shouldn't be allowed to get personal.  The TOCs, their staff and their customers have a lot to gain from sharing information and opinions.  We just need to be open, honest and polite  :-)    

What do you think?

Celebrity etiquette?

What would you do if you found yourself sat on a train next to someone you are 99.9% certain is him (or her) off the telly?  Would you try to engage them in conversation, or would you treat them the same as any other passenger (which usually means avoiding eye contact and only speaking if there is absolutely no alternative)?

I found myself in this position on a packed 18:05 from Euston last Thursday.  A man I recognised as a TV comedian and panel game participant got on the train at Euston. 

The celebrity didn't look very happy, but then no one does when they are stuck between two other adult men on a bench of three seats.  No room to move, no room to sit back.  He stayed, rigidly sat upright until we got to Watford where he got off.

This has happened to me twice before.  On an overground train out of Liverpool Street I found myself sat opposite the recent winner of one of the BBC Apprentice series (presumably off to Lord Sugar's HQ in north east London) and then there was an occasion when I found myself walking along an almost empty London Underground platform past the (then) England cricket captain.

I reckon that the first two were probably grateful that no one acknowledged who they were (on the Thursday's 18:05 there was no room for autographs) but the cricketer did look like he was hoping someone would speak (if he was then he was disappointed!)

Has this happened to you to, and if so what did you do?  If you spoke to them then how did they react?  Did they seem pleased to get the attention, or were they annoyed?



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The Great Escape

At around 5pm on Friday, a problem with overhead power cables brought a First Capital Connect train from Kings Cross to Cambridge came to a grinding halt just 500 yards from Foxton station.   There would have been nothing unusual or news worthy about this except for two things:

1. Fifteen of the passengers got fed up with waiting and forced open the doors, got down to the track and walked to Foxton station where they made their own way home
2. The remaining passengers were 'locked in by a rail official and threatened with being arrested if they so much as tried to leave" (Daily Telegraph).  It was after 9pm before some of these passengers eventually made it into Cambridge

So what would you do?  Would you wait patiently on the train or would you too make a break for freedom?  

I'm unsure what my reaction would have been, but I do have a lot of sympathy for the 'Foxton Fifteen'.  Late on a Friday afternoon, it's getting dark and they wanted to get home.  The news reports don't tell us what information they had got from the train crew but if it was "not a lot" then I'm not surprised that a few people decided to take things into their own hands.



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Two people, two lives

Consider two commuters:

Both live in Bletchley.  Commuter 1 works in London, Commuter 2 works in Milton Keynes.  Both like to get to their workplace before 9am

Commuter 1 gets up before 6am and drives down to Bletchley railway station in time to board the 07:00 to Euston.  He/she leaves the house before anyone else in the house is awake.

Commuter 2 gets up at 7am and shares breakfast with the family.   They leave the house at 8am for the 20 minute drive to their workplace in Milton Keynes. 

Both are at their desk by 8:30am.

Commuter 1 pays around £600 a year to park at the station and £4,200 for an annual season ticket (with London Travelcard).   Adding on the cost of the fuel for the drive to the station, the commute costs around £5,300 a year.

Commuter 2 gets free parking at his/her out of town workplace.   It's a 15 mile round trip so fuel is a bit more expensive, but the commuting cost per year comes out at about £1,500.

Commuter 1 is stuck in London at lunchtime.  There's plenty of shops nearby, but anything purchased has to be lugged home.

Commuter 2 has a lot more flexibility.  The hour at lunchtime is enough time to drive to anywhere in the city, including popping back home.  they can also usually manage to drop the car off/pick it up from a service when they need to, and things like doctor and dentist appointments are rarely a problem.

Commuter 1 usually leaves his/her workplace just after 5pm and gets the 17:51 to Bletchley.  Assuming the train is on time, they are at Bletchley and home by 7pm.

Commuter 2 also leaves his/her workplace just after 5pm but even after being held up by a bit of rush-hour traffic, they are easily home in time to watch the 6pm news on TV.

On a good day Commuter 1 spends 3 hours 30 minutes a day travelling to and from work.  On a bad day, train failures, points/signal problems, or engineering works can easily extend this by another hour or more.  For the privilege of sitting (and occasionally standing) on a train with a bunch of other people (listening to the tinny noise coming out of earphones, putting up the ones who shout at their mobile phones and trying to avoid inhaling whenever there's a cough or a sneeze), he/she pays out an average of just over £23 a day.

The journey time for Commuter 2 is pretty reliable, and they spend about an hour and a half a day travelling in their own car listening to their own radio or CDs.  Any coughing or sneezing is their own, and they NEVER have to stand.  The cost of commuting is less than £7 a day.

Commuter 1 sees London as a place to go to to pay the mortgage.  Commuter 2 sees London as a leisure destination.

Commuter 1 dreams of getting a local job.  Commuter 2 just dreams... 

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Top ten irritants

I don't know what sparked it off, but on the way home on Friday (with nothing to read) I ran through a list of things which most irritate me about some of my fellow passengers.

None of us are perfect (and I'm the last to claim that accolade), but in no particular order this is what winds me up:

1. People who insist on having a conversation with the London Midland ticket inspector at the 'manual' gate at London Euston (blocking the way for those of us who are trying to get on or off the platform)
2. People who do everything they possibly can to deter anyone from sitting next to or opposite them.  We all take up a bit more room when there is plenty of space, but when the train is busy the knees and legs should be tucked in, papers should be folded, and bags should come off the seat next door to go on the lap or up in the luggage rack
3. Users of iPods and other MP3 players who insist on maximum volume and either don't realise how much noise can leak out from their earphones or don't care.  The thought that their hearing is probably being damaged provides no satisfaction when we have to put up with the tinny, hissing noise that can be heard metres away (this wasn't such a problem on the old 321 trains but the background noise level on the Desiros is much lower) 
4. People who put their feet on the train seats.   Shoes on or off, on newspaper or not, I think this is disrespectful to others
5. Passengers leaving the train who stand in the middle of the doorway just to save a fraction of a second when they get off (if they tuck into one side then two people can get into the same space, freeing up room further back for people to get out of their seats)
6. Passengers who bring full-sized bikes onto the trains (or who have foldaway bikes which they keep assembled) when there are restrictions during the morning and afternoon peak
7. Passengers walking through Euston dragging small trolley bags behind them.  They seem to forget that they have an extra metre in tow when they cut across in front of the rest of us who also have workplaces to get to or trains to board
8. People who leave food and drink waste on seats and tables when they leave the train.  Why should the rest of us have to tidy up behind them?
9. Motorists and cyclists who disembark at Bletchley and think that normal rights of way don't apply.  We've got the people in their cars who ignore the one-way signs and come out of the car park entrance and the Cyclists who treat the ramp from the bike shed like the launch pad for a downhill race.  If there hasn't been an accident yet then it can't be long before there will be one
10. ?

I've deliberately stopped at number 9, leaving you an opportunity to nominate something else which you find irritating about your fellow commuters and occasional passengers on the London Midland line into Euston (maybe me!) 

Alternatively, if you think I'm wrong about any of the items listed above then feel free to throw a contrary viewpoint into the ring  :-)


Comments below

Not a great day...

I normally try and keep to a single subject per post, so I hope you'll forgive me if a I do a bit of a 'moan dump'.

None of today's incidents were major or unusual (and some of them have become routine), but I don't normally have this number of things to whinge about in such a short period of time...

I still can't buy a paper at the station (see Bletchley station shop).
The air-conditioning in the end carriage of the 07:00 to Euston wasn't working.  The conditions were well described by a travelling companion as "warm and humid".

As usual, the 07:00 arrived at Euston early (timetable flab).  As we got out onto platform 11 at 07:39 the four coach train pulled into platform 10 (on time at 07:40). The result was two train-loads of passengers trying to squeeze past the narrow end of the platform and through the barriers at the same time (see Platform planning).

I did get a paper at the W.H.Smiths on the concourse at Euston.  The trouble was that as I walked out of the station I realised that I had two sets of the Sports and Business supplements.  I may be an idiot but I'm an honest idiot.  I walked back and returned the extras.  the look I got from a member of the shop staff was priceless...

Coming home, in the scrum that is the queue to go through the manual gate onto platforms 8-11 (see Ticket failure), I was elbowed in the side by a woman who was standing back like she was in the queue for the ticket office one minute and then determined to fight her way through to the front the next (the comment she made when I objected was classic - "get a life").

Boarding the 18:29 I found a half decent seat (with a table so I could do some laptop work) in the last but one carriage of the train but in the last few minutes before leaving the guard announced those fateful words "would passengers intending to travel beyond Northampton please make their way to the front four carriages".  Now we know that the train splits at Northampton with the front four carriages going on 'up north' (for this train that being all stations to Crewe), but there really is no rush to move. 

On the Desiros passengers can make their way through the train to the front at any point in the first hour of their journey and there's at least 5-6 minutes in Northampton itself to do the switch.  All London Midland are doing by making these announcements at the last minute before departing Euston is causing people to panic, shifting people from seats at the rear of the train to the front where they sometimes end up unnecessarily standing.  (This time the guard did actually make an announcement after Watford that he'd seen people stepping off the train and rejoining further up, taking the risk of missing the train altogether!)

Like many people who get off at Bletchley, I sometimes work my way down the train after passing Leighton Buzzard to get closer to the doors which stop nearest the bridge steps.  I don't object to people sitting across two seats with their feet out over the narrow alleyway, but why oh why do some of them refuse to move to allow others to walk past?

I got off at Bletchley thinking the troubles were over.  Silly me, I'd forgotten the people who insist on driving the wrong way out of the car park (see One Way?)


Thank you for listening, I don't know if you enjoyed reading the above but I feel much better for having got the gripes off my chest  ;-)

Horror on the rails...

Imagine the scene:  It seems like a normal day for the commuters on the (insert train) to Euston... Little do they know that their lives are going to be changed forever...

The train pulls into the next station...  The passengers who aren't asleep or reading their newspaper look out to see the usual crowd waiting to board.  No one notices that today they look a little different different.  The dead look in their eyes and the distortion of the mouth...  Little do they know that they are about to meet the mutant vampires from (insert station name).

The vampires board and the attack begins...  Each bite turns a man or woman into another mutant...  At following stops more people board and they too are overcome until the entire train (almost) is filled with fiends... The guard (Sean Bean?), a female passenger (Helen Bonham-Carter?) and the driver (Pete Postlethwaite?) are the only ones not taken.  They barricade themselves into the cab... 

As the train approaches London it slows and the driver jumps...  The guard nearly joins him but realises the woman hasn't followed so stays on board...  They've missed their chance...  They first try to stop the train but realise that that will just leave the vampires on the loose, so they decide to take it all the way in and crash it at Euston, thereby saving the people of London, England and the World...  In the final scene Sean and Helen are seen clinging together seconds before the train turns into an inferno as it crashes into the buffers on platform 9...


The above was a completely idiotic idea I had for a film as my train pulled into an intermediate station this morning.  I looked out and saw these people boarding and the mind went racing...

So why have I written about the above here?  The reason is that I think it illustrates the inbuilt prejudices that many of us seem to have about passengers from other stations.  I know from talking to people who board at Bletchley that we acknowledge that we have irrational views about our fellow commuters from the other stations like Milton Keynes ("they take all the best seats") and Leighton Buzzard ("they shove themselves in...")

Why do we do this?  Is it down to some kind of tribal need to identify with one group with whom we have most in common and be cautious of those who are different in some way (even if that difference is just the geographical location of our homes)?

Some reading this may have already dismissed this as rubbish written by a raving fool.  If so then my apologies.  Please don't go away - you might find the moans and groans about the various aspects of our rail service in the other blog postings more interesting and relevant.

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.  Eustoncommuter would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused  ;-)



(Ps: I wouldn't have had time to come up with this of course if we had a paper shop at Bletchley station).  Someone is apparently refitting the shop but there's no indication of a reopening date...) 

Distance and time

Stuck on the train this morning with no paper to read (See Bletchley shop post) and unable to sleep, I thought it might be interesting to work out how far and for how long a typical commuter probably travels on this line in a year.  The numbers are sobering...

Journeys

365 days in the year, minus 104 Saturdays and Sundays, minus another 40 days for holidays, sickness, etc.  This leaves a possible 221 commuting days, or 442 round trip journeys.

Distances

The distance between Bletchley and Euston stations is approximately 46 miles, so in a year we potentially travel 20,332 miles.  It's around 3,500 miles between London and New York so this is the equivalent of three round trips across the Atlantic...

Time

Journey times vary depending on the service and delays, but I'm going to assume an average of 50 minutes.   Total journey time on London Midland trains equals just over 368 hours or 15 days 8 hours.   It takes around 11.5 hours to fly from London to Hong Kong so we spend the same amount of time on a train as someone would on a plane flying to the Far East 32 times (16 round trips).


Matters arising

The above is all pretty depressing stuff, but it's when you dig deeper into the numbers that things really start getting disturbing.

I pay £3,320 for my season ticket to travel between Bletchley and Euston (no tube).   Focusing on the 3 round-trips to New York, I could easily do those flights with a decent airline (economy but with meals and movies included) for around £350-£400 each.  Why should the cost of rail (supposedly heavily subsidised by the UK tax-payer) cost three times as much as flights to New York?!!!

368 hours a year on the train.  If a commuter starts travelling down to London from the age of 22 and retires at 65 then he or she will have actually spent 1 year 9 months and 23 days on the train...

Nooooooooooooooooooooo.....