Mission possible

Anyone following this blog or the accompanying Twitter feeds will know that I've got a been in my bonnet about the lack of Bletchley calls on the fast services during the PM peak.  During the day and from mid evening we have trains that do Euston-Leighton Buzzard-Bletchley but not between 4-7pm.  The reason for this isn't clear, but it is specifically sanctioned in the West Midlands Franchise Agreement between the Department for Transport and London Midland ("Peak departures from London Euston may omit to call at Bletchley" page 79 section 5.5).

Well it took a dispute between London Midland and ASLEF (train drivers' union) to make it happen, but on two days in the past week Bletchley was back on the timetable for a couple of fast peak services home!

The dispute appears to have started over driver training in the Birmingham area, but the result is that the drivers are working only their basic contractual hours.  This has been rumbling on for weeks, but only recently has its impact extended to commuter services in/out of Euston.



17:46 timetable Monday 21/02/2011


On Monday, with no overtime being worked, from Euston London Midland had to cancel the semi-fast 17:24 and stop the fast 17:46 at Leighton Buzzard.  A conversation started on Twitter with @londonmidland about where the 17:46 was actually going to terminate.  It turned out that the train was going to have to run through to the platforms at Bletchley to drop off the guard so London Midland agreed to make that an official stop.  

On Friday London Midland had to cancel the 17:51.  Further conversations took place on Twitter and that morning @londonmidland confirmed that the 17:46 and 18:13 would have additional stops at Bletchley).

There are many positives that have come out of this.  Bletchley passengers have been helped enormously by the additional stops (Friday's 17:46 must have had 50+ who got off on platform 1).  Passengers bound for other destinations on other services have benefited by the correspondening reduction in passengers on their trains.

Twitter has proved its worth and @londonmidland has rightly earned a lot of praise for the willingness to take this things up.  After years of showing inflexibility when there are problems, London Midland and Network Rail have done well to take action and adapt their normal timetables.



17:46 timetable Friday 25/02/2011


Some people on Twitter on Friday night made the very valid point that we shouldn't have to ask for these timetable changes.  Hopefully though, London Midland have got the message and now they realise that thiese kind of changes can be made without the entire line grinding to a halt, we'll see them doing this pro-actively.

And who knows, is there maybe someone in London Midland's planning team who is now starting to think that Bletchley can reappear on the timetables for the fast services in the PM peak?  It would be nice to think so, because I for one greatly miss the old 17:40 that went non-stop to Bletchley...



.    

Rob Peter, pay Paul

8 carriages, probably 30-35 people standing per carriage.  Maybe 250 people were on their feet as the 1751 left London Euston tonight...

London Midland reckoned that when it ran with 12 carriages the 1751 had 400 empty seats.  The capacity of their 350/2 ("green") Desiros is 267 seats per 4-car unit so that's equivalent to 50% of the train being empty.

The 1812 train to Tring has apparently been leaving Euston with 200 people standing.  Decision taken with effect from today's new timetable - The 1751 reduces from 12 to 8 carriages and the 1812 increases from 8 to 12.

So how/why did they get it so wrong?  London Midland say that their stats are based on automatic counters which monitor the number of passengers joining and leaving trains at each stop.   Anyone who travels on the 1751 regularly though could have told them that on leaving Euston the first 7-8 carriages are full (with some people standing) and the other 4-5 are at least 60-70% occupied. 

London Midland say that they will monitor the situation over the next couple of weeks and make changes if necessary, but is the fortnight before Christmas really going to give an indication of what usage of the train is going to be like when commuting returns to normal in the New Year?

Congestion on individual trains is not unusual, and it wouldn't be such a disaster here if there were alternative services available.  The problem is that for Bletchley passengers there are not.

The old timetable was hardly favourable for people trying to get home to Bletchley but there was always the all-stops 1734 or 1805 to get you home.  If you fancied risking a change at Leighton Buzzard then there was also the 1746 fast train as an option.

On the timetable that came into force on the 12th, none of the above trains are available.  There's a semi-fast train that leaves Euston earlier at 1730 and then nothing direct (apart from the overcrowded 1751) until 1829.  The 1746 is no longer an option as there's no longer a Leighton Buzzard-Bletchley connection.

For all this we have the privilege of paying £3316 a year  :-(


(Ps: I nearly forgot to mention that the guard on tonight's 1751 had the good grace to apologise for the overcrowding.  She also explained that our 2 minute late departure from Harrow and Wealdstone was down to the extra time taken for passengers to board and leave.  I walked through the train after we left Hemel Hempstead and there was still people standing.  Admittedly there were free seats in the middle of benches of three, but as mentioned elsewhere there is rarely room for a third normal-sized adult to sit with any comfort in these.  Most people would rather stand.) 









  

Service improved? 4

London Midland have a page on their website titled Improving our services where they describe the steps they are taking to address a number of problem areas.

This is the fourth in a series of blog postings which covers an aspect of the service that London Midland say they are working on.



More punctual

Under this heading London Midland say that their priorities are to run their trains on time, safely, reliably and consistently.  The claim that they have "already made progress since the start of the year" and "aim to get back on target as soon as possible".

So what do we think?

It is ironic that this heading has come up in the week that has seen serious disruptions to the London Midland commuter services to and from Euston.  The worst incident was on the evening of Thursday 23rd when a series of signal/points failures and then a bomb hoax at Watford Junction station caused some trains to run in excess of an hour late and (at one point in the evening) a complete suspension of the service.  I think for the purposes of this piece it is probably better to look at a normal week.

The stats that London Midland produce do indicate an improvement in reliability (see ...and statistics).  How has that improvement been achieved though?  I'd suggest that it's by omitting one very important item from their list of priorities - journey time.

We live in a time when we are so obsessed with getting from one place to another as quickly as possible that we are prepared to spend billions on high-speed rail lines and yet we completely ignore the possibility of reducing journey times for a short-distance journeys.  

On our line vast amounts were spent on the West Coast Mainline upgrade work a few years ago and millions have been spent on buying newer, faster trains yet I don't believe we have seen any reduction in journey times.  If anything, the time to get from A to B with London Midland is now longer as trains seem to be making more stops and fewer commuter services have access to the fast line.   Then there are the instances where trains can run faster but they end up spending longer at intermediate stops, slowing down or even stopping in order to keep to the timetable (see Timetable flab).


With the previous three subjects dealt with in this series I've summed up my view by the award of a tick, a cross or a question mark.  With this one I have a real problem.  The definition of punctual is "acting or arriving exactly at the time appointed"  so strictly London Midland have achieved that.  I believe that they have done so though only by a complete lack of ambition in their timetable.

I really can't face giving this one a green tick but a red cross probably isn't appropriate either.  It's therefore got to be another yellow question mark  :-(


What do you reckon?  Do you feel that the service between your home station and London Euston is more reliable?  Is London Midland meeting your expectations in this area?  Are you getting to the office or back home consistently on time?   



Following the same order as used by London Midland, the next one in this series will be Better information.

Travel back to 1967

I've been loaned a copy of the ABC Rail Guide dated June 1967.  Probably not everyone's idea of a good read, but interesting nonetheless.

Before we get into the train services of the time, let's 'set the scene'...  In 1967 Britain had a Labour Government with Harold Wilson as Prime Minister.  The average salary that year was around £1,380 and inflation was 2.5%.  The average UK house price was £4,000 and a basic Auston Mini (the Mk2 version was launched in 1967) cost £509.

On 1 June the Beatles released Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and that month the no.1 slot in the charts alternated between Aretha Franklin's Respect and Groovin' by the Young Rascals.

The New Town designation order that resulted in the purchase of 22,000 acres of farmland for what was to become Milton Keynes was passed in January 1967, but that name was then still only associated with a village to the north of Bletchley.  

In June 1967 Bletchley railway station offered passenger services to Cambridge and Oxford as well as London and the north.  The 0714 from Bletchley would get a traveller to Cambridge for 0841. 

The station had been rebuilt in by 1964 with the steam shed that stood on what is now the site of the car park closing the following year, 1965.

So what was the service like to and from Euston in June 1967?   In some respects, not much different to today.   Looking at southbound trains for a fairly typical (now) 0700-0730 and 1740-1810 commute:

Northampton	-	-	0701
Wolverton	-	-	0715
Bletchley arr	-	-	0723
Bletchley dep	0704	0715	0724
Leighton Buzzard	0712	0723	0732
Cheddington	0717	-	-
Tring	0723	0733	-
Berkhamsted	0728	0738	-
Hemel Hempstead	0733	-	0749
Apsley	0736	0745
King's Langley	0740	0749	-
Watford Junction arr	0745	-	-
Watford Junction dep	0746	-	0758
Harrow & Wealdstone	0753	-	0805
Euston	0808	0815	0822
Euston	1742	1755	1805
Harrow & Wealdstone	-	1809	-
Watford Junction arr	1805	-	1825
Watford Junction dep	1806	-	1826
King's Langley	-	1820	-
Apsley	1813	-	-
Henel Hempstead	1816	1825	1834
Berkhamsted	1822	1830	-
Tring	1827	1836	-
Cheddington	-	1841	-
Leighton Buzzard	1838	-	1852
Bletchley arr	1846	1854	1900
Bletchley dep	1847	-	1901
Wolverton	1854	-	1908
Northampton	1908	-	1922

The services are slower (each journey looks to be around ten minutes longer than the equivalent today), but every train calls at Bletchley so there was far more choice than there is today (there are seven trains each way between Bletchley and Euston 0700-0800 and 1700-1800).

In addition to the local services, Bletchley was also a stopping point for express trains coming down from and going up to the north.  There were no such southbound calls during the morning 'rush hour' but someone able to travel during the day could enjoy:

• From Blackpool - Bletchley 1119 Euston 1200
• From Barrow - Bletchley 1304 Euston 1343
• From Carlisle - Bletchley 1319 Euston 1400
• From Blackpool - Bletchley 1519 Euston 1600

There were similar trains southbound in the evening and the equivalent services northbound throughout the day.

The standard one-way fares for the journey were First Class 19/3 (£0.97) or Second Class 12/9 (£0.64).   The return fare would have been double the single.  

The biggest surprise of all in the timetable is the listing of an overnight sleeper services calling at Bletchley:

• From Euston (2125) and Bletchley (2215) to Larbert (0540), Stirling (0550), Gleneagles (0622) and Perth (0640)
• From Stranaer Harbour (2210) and Dumfries (0110) to Bletchley (0649) and Euston (0742)
• From Liverpool Lime Street (0030) to Bletchley (0400) and Euston (0457)

For these services the supplement (on top of the normal fare) was First Class with single berth 45/- (£2.25) or Second Class with double berth 30/- (£1.50).

Finally, the ABC Rail Guide rather quaintly lists the following information for Bletchley:

- 46 3/4 miles from London
- Population 22,110
- Early closing Wednesdays
- Refreshment Room

(The refreshment room stood on what is now platforms 2-3 and was still in operation, serving alcoholic drinks as well as tea, sandwiches and cakes in the late 1980s).

For anyone like me who is interested in the local history of this area and/or the railway I can recommend one website and one book:

• Where the lines meet (the Railway History of Bletchley)
• Bletchley to Rugby: including Newport Pagnell & Northampton by Vic Mitchell and Keith Smith (available from Amazon)

Timetable flab?

Do the railway companies deliberately build slack time into their timetables? Does 'timetable flab' exist?  If so, why do they do this?


Does 'timetable flab' exist?

OK, I'll start by saying that my 'evidence' is limited only to my observations over one month, but I reckon that this provides weight to the argument that slack time is built into the timetables for at least some trains.

Through July I've kept a log of outward and homeward journeys, noting the trains taken and arrival times at the destination.

For the last few weeks I've had no regular homeward train but I have taken the 07:00 from Bletchley to Euston on 21 occasions (every working day except Wed 21st).  
The official timetable for this morning commuter train is as follows:

0608   Rugby 
0618   Long Buckby
0633   Northampton (arr)
0637   Northampton (dep)
0649   Wolverton
0655   Milton Keynes
0700   Bletchley
0707   Leighton Buzzard
0743   London Euston

The actual arrival times in July for London Euston were:

Arrival    Days
0737         x6
0738         x4
0739         x7
0740         x1
0741         x0
0742         x0
0743         x1
0744         x2

(The 07:43 arrival was on Thu 18th when there was a signalling problem in the Berkhamsted area. One of the 07:44 arrivals was on Wed 7th when the switch onto the fast line at Ledburn Junction was affected by a late running Virgin train. The other 07:44 arrival was on Tue 13th when we were again delayed by a signalling problem.)

It surely can't be a coincidence that the 07:00 managed to get into London Euston ahead of schedule on 18 out of 21 days, averaging an 07:39 arrival instead of the scheduled 07:43.  

Network Rail and London Midland appear to have theor own operational schedule for this train which is different from the one they publish for passengers.  Once we cross over onto the fast line at Ledburn Junction we charge down south (probably with a Virgin train or two following us at a similar speed).  Then, a mile or two from Euston we slow right down, sometimes to not much more than walking pace.  We usually see a London Midland train pass us on its way north, and then we speed up again (my guess is we have to wait for that other train to clear the platforms). 

Immediately after we pull onto platform 11 at Euston we are chased off the train.  Before we've even had a chance to get off there's usually an automatic announcement telling us that the train is out of service, and we sometimes get the lights turned off while we are still picking up bags etc.  The station and train staff then make sure everyone is off and the doors are locked.  I haven't seen the train actually leave but I reckon that it pulls out before the scheduled 07:43 arrival time, probably to allow a following train onto the same platform.

Further evidence that this train has extra time built into it's schedule comes from a comparison with northbound trains with the reverse of the same station stops.  The trains which leave at 13 minutes past the hour and the 18:49 20:13, 21:13 which do Euston-Leighton Buzzard-Bletchley Euston are scheduled to do the same distance in 36-40 minutes.   Why should the southbound journey require 43?


So what's going on?  

I guess that there are several possibilities...

London Midland could be being pessimistic because they think that helps us.  "We probably can get you to London earlier but there's a risk we won't make it and we wouldn't like to let you down"? That could be ture, but I doubt it.

Maybe when London Midland and Network Rail last sat down to do a major timetable revision (the 07:00 has been around for a while) they expecting a slower journey down to London.  Perhaps they've missed the fact that the journey south isn't as problematic or unreliable as they feared.  Possible I guess, but difficult to believe.

That leaves us with a third option which is one that gets mentioned by the cynics whenever the railway companies claim service improvements.

Have London Midland built in a stack of slack time in the timetable to protect themselves should delays occur? The benefit for them manipulating the timetable for the 07:00 would presumably be: 

• The 07:00 can arrive 5-6 minutes after it's normal arrival time without missing the scheduled ETA. 
• There can be a delay of 15-16 minutes before the train is reported as officially late for the performance statistics reported by the Office of the Rail Regulation (the figures for delayed trains include only those that are 10 minutes or more behind schedule - see ... and statistics). 
• We can be 35-36 minutes late before London Midland have to pay compensation (0-29 compensation = zero, for 30-59 minutes they will give an annual season ticket holder from Bletchley £4 in rail vouchers and for more than an hour it's £7)

I guess there's two ways to look at this...  One way would be to ask if it really matters.  Day after day we get into London less than 40 minutes after leaving Bletchley so why complain?  I guess that those of us of a suspicious nature just wonder whether we are we being taken for a ride (I'm sorry for the terrible pun!)  


What do you think?      

Late afternoon trains

I had a feeling that Bletchley wasn't as well served by trains for the journey home in the afternoon as it used to be, but I didn't realise how poor things had become until I missed my usual 17:51 (semi-fast) from Euston and the following (all stops) 18:05.  There wasn't a train to Bletchley until 18:29 (semi-fast).

For a long time we've had a gap in trains to Bletchley before 5pm.  If you miss the 16:24 then it's a 45 minute wait for the 17:05.  What we haven't previously had though was gaps after 6pm.

I've got a copy of the timetable that it was in force a year ago (17/5-12/12/2009) so I figured I'd do a comparison based on arriving at London Euston after 17:50.

A year ago there was a semi-fast train departing at 17:54 which got into Bletchley at 18:43 (49 minutes).  If you missed that one then the next train was the fast 18:13 (first stop Leighton Buzzard) which got into Bletchley at 18:50 (37 minutes).  The next was the semi-fast leaving at 18:24 which arrived at 19:17 (53 minutes). 

Today, the last train before 6pm leaves earlier at 17:51 and is a semi-fast getting into Bletchley at 18:39 (48 minutes).  Miss that and it's the all-stops 18:05 which doesn't get into Bletchley until 19:04 (59 minutes).  Arrive at Euston after after that one and the following train is a semi-fast which leaves Euston at 18:29 and gets into Bletchley at 19:18 (49 minutes).

Analyse the above and you see that in 2009 we had:

• 3 trains spread over 30 minutes
• A maximum gap between departures from Euston 19 minutes
• A fastest journey time of 37 minutes and an average of 46 minutes

In 2010 we've got:

• 3 trains spread over 38 minutes
• A maximum gap between departures of 25 minutes
• A fastest journey time of 48 minutes and an average of  52 minutes

Every one of the changes is to the detriment of passengers travelling home from Bletchley.

So what has happened?  Bletchley appears to have been put into the same category as Harrow-on-Wealdstone, Hemel Hempstead, Berkhampstead and Tring.  All get three trains between 17:50 and 18:30, either all-stops or slow (the journey time being a lot less significant for the stations closer to London).  Leighton Buzzard only gets three trains but they still have a 29 minute express (the 18:13).   Passengers from Watford Junction and Milton Keynes are very well off.  Five trains over the same 40 minute period (a mix of slow, semi-fast and express).

Unfortunately I haven't got timetables going back 5, 10 and 15 years but I am absolutely certain that these would demonstrate even better the decline in the Bletchley service.  I seem to remember that we once had a train departing from Euston at 17:40 which was first stop Bletchley, sometime around 18:15.  Those were the days...


(Before anyone points out that the above ignores the 18:13 from Euston changing at Leighton Buzzard onto the Southern service for the final leg to Bletchley, see Rail Delay Claim online.   That posting tells the story of what happens if the connection isn't made.  With trains calling at Leighton Buzzard during the mid-week rush-hour home not stopping at Bletchley it's not a journey that's worth the risk unless you don't mind sitting on a draughty platform for half an hour...)   

Platform planning?

Three trains into platforms 8-11 within minutes of each other...  Automatic gates in operation...  Only one member of the platform staff in attendance... 

The above occurred this morning.  The 07:00 from Bletchley normally pulls into Euston around 07:38.  Since the new timetable came into force the arrival platform has been  platform 11 (it used to be no.17).   This morning there was an 8-car train disgorging its passengers on platform 8 (all stops from Bletchley due in at 07:34?) as we pulled onto platform 11 and disembarked.  Within a minute or two a 4-car (07:40 arrival from Tring?) was pulling into platform 10.  

Twenty carriages' worth of passengers at the same set of platforms at the same time would be bad enough, but on when its platforms 8-11 at London Euston then queues and frayed tempers are guaranteed...

The picture above was taken on a quiet Saturday morning but it does illustrate one of the issues with this part of Euston station.   The platforms themselves are more than wide enough but where 9 & 10 (which are effectively bay platforms) cut into the walkway too many people are forced through too narrow space.

To make matters even worse, the flow of passengers through the barriers is distorted with some crossing from left to right and others from right to left.   The problem is made worse by the fact that the underground station entrance, the ticket office, the information booth and the gate for people who can't use the automatic barriers are all on the same side.

Last year London Midland acknowledged the problems on platforms 8-11 and agreed to reduce the impact by keeping the barriers open for particularly busy time slots during the morning rush-hour.   When two trains have arrived at about the same time there is still queuing, but it is nothing like as bad as it would be if the automatic barriers were operating. 

So the questions that need to be asked are:

1. Why has London Midland and/or Network Rail decided that it's a good idea to have three (full) trains arriving on platforms 8-11 within minutes of each other?
2. Why weren't the automatic barriers open this morning?
3. Why was there only one member of staff on duty?

From experience I know that there is absolutely no point whatsoever raising these questions with London Midland customer service.  Send them an email and you get a reply saying that they are experiencing a particularly busy period and it may take longer than usual to reply (I'm told that there 'standard' was 2.5 months earlier this year).  All you'll eventually get is a letter apologising for the inconvenience and saying that it has been raised with the appropriate department.

We don't want a belated apology and a promise of an investigation.  We want actrion to make sure these problems don't occur again!

Inadequate information

This morning it's raining (not a lot, but enough to get wet waiting on the platform).   Most people waiting for the 07:00 therefore sheltered under the platform awning.

The 06:53 slow train from Milton Keynes to London Euston comes and goes on time.  At 06:59 we get the announcement that the 07:00 is the next train on platform 4, so we leave the shelter and walk out to take up our usual positions on the platform.  We wait, and we wait...

At 07:03 I use my phone to check the National Rail Live Departure & Arrival Boards and find that they don't have the train listed for Bletchley, but it is showing as due to arrive 2 minutes late arriving at London Euston (This isn't unusual, the 'system' appearing to assume that a train has passed through the station if the departure time has been exceeded and there has been no positive report of a delay).

At around 07:07 we get an announcement that the 07:00 has been delayed and the next train onto platform 4 will be the 07:05 Southern service.  In the distance we can see a couple of workmen in orange high-vis jackets on thge track, and two trains are pulled into the passing loop.

At 07:10 a London Midland 8-car Desiro pulls onto Platform 4.  There's no announcement, and the train looks to be 80% empty.   After departure, the onboard announcement says that it's the delayed 07:00.  We pull onto the fast-line immediately (unusual for the 07:00) and when we get to Leighton Buzzard the usual crowd are waiting on platform 2 (so they had had an announcement to tell them about the platform change).

The train makes up time, arriving at London Euston at 07:46, only three minutes later than usual.  As we pull in we get an apology for the late arrival which "was due to a signalling problem outside Bletchley".


If this were an isolated incident then I wouldn't bother mentioning it, but unfortunately it isn't.

• YET AGAIN Network Rail have had a signalling problem which has impacted on the London Midland service.

• YET AGAIN London Midland have either not know what's happening or if they do know then either can't be bothered or are to disorganised to tell us.

• YET AGAIN we have evidence of the amount of slack that London Midland and Network Rail have built into the timetable.  The 07:00 which is scheduled to arrive at 07:43 in London Euston frequently gets in around 07:37/38.  Here they had a ten minute delay at the departure station but managed to cut that back to three minutes at the destination.

Please can we have the level of service that we pay for?

So how was it for you?

London Midland introduced their summer timetable on Monday. Minimal changes on paper, and so far my experience has been nothing significant in practice.

The 07:00 from Bletchley which comes down from Northampton and calls only at Leighton Buzzard perhaps has slightly fewer vacant seats but only on Monday did we have people standing (there was talk of problems with a southbound Virgin train which could explain that).

The 17:51 from Euston home has been OK apart from some messing about with platforms at the London end (18 one day and 8 the next). For some reason London Midland decided to add an additional stop at Harrow-on-Wealdstone but fortunately that hasn't resulted in a later arrival at Bletchley (providing evidence that there is plenty of slack time built into the rail operator timetables).

Given some of the problems that we've had in the past with the introduction of a new timetable, London Midland and Network Rail are probably to be congratulated for their efforts this time around (or is this just early days?)