Am I being over-sensitive in finding the above retweet from @virgintrains appalling? The original tweet from ohbex was fine (if he/she was pleased with the service then they are very welcome to say so) but I personally think Virgin are wrong in using it for marketing purposes.
Many people have had their travel to/from work, friends and family disrupted this week, and the problems aren't yet over. Anyone who has been monitoring Twitter will have seen many posts highlighting Virgin Trains' monopoly of the fast line into Euston. While the London Midland fast services have been switched to the slow line where they have crawled behind the all-stops trains, the Virgin Pendolinos have continued to roar past, apparently untouched by the weather.
When things go wrong on the West Coast Main Line and the Virgin Trains services appear to be given priority, London Midland passengers are left fuming. OK, their trains have further to travel but we've paid our fares too (and can be paying more to travel 40-50 miles than some Virgin passengers will have paid to do 200+).
If this were the first time that @virgintrains had decided to forward a passenger compliment during a difficult period for travellers using other operators' services then it wouldn't be so bad, but they have 'previous' on this.
Unfortunately, even if Virgin Trains read this blog post they probably still wouldn't get the point, so we should probably just be grateful that @londonmidland has a much better idea of what is and is not appropriate ;-)
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In Friday's Daily Telegraph (28/5/2010) there was an article by Andrew Gilligan titled For most of us, high-speed rail is anything but. The piece covers a lot of ground and challenges a number of things that seem to be accepted as gospel, but what caught my eye was the paragraph which suggests that instead of spending money on grand flagship projects, the government should be investing in improvements to existing, ordinary services.
The West Coast mainline received a lot of funding aimed at increasing capacity and reducing journey times for the long-distance services, but what did it do for us commuters? I reckon the answer is "not a lot". We had to put up with a long period of inconvenience while track and signal 'improvements' were made, but some of the changes that have resulted include:
- A significant reduction in the number of non-West Coast maninline (Virgin Trains) services using the fast-line. There are fewer fast trains between Bletchley and Euston and the semi-fasts that we get are sandwiched between the 'all stop' trains.
- Less flexibility when things go wrong - To increase line speeds Railtrack (as was) had to reduce the number of points on the line where trains could switch from fast to slow and vice versa. What this means now is that if there is a problem on the line, perhaps a failed train or lineside equipment failure, then trains are more likely to get stuck.
- A drop down the list in terms of priority when things go wrong. This does seem to have improved in recent years but there certainly seemed to be a time when the local services were cancelled left, right and centre when there was a significant problem while Virgin Trains West Coast Main Line services appeared to come off significantly better.
The cost of the West Coast main Line upgrade apparently increased six-fold by the time it was finished, coming out an eye-watering £14.5 billion (National Audit Office). Was it worth it?
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