But currently, the trains both run late and have bad customer service. I doubt lateness will be solved any time soon, so why not at least have good customer service to attract passengers.
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This is what gets the current rail system a bad name
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The Sheffield - Scarborough train was 15 late leaving Sheffield. It caught up much of that before it got to Seamer.
Why was it late off Sheffield? Northerns fault or something else?
but if a train can make up 11 minutes of lateness through its journey, that shows there is built in slack in the timetables to recover little bits of lateness.
Why was it late off Sheffield? Northerns fault or something else?
but if a train can make up 11 minutes of lateness through its journey, that shows there is built in slack in the timetables to recover little bits of lateness.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I'd love to see what Alex Hornby (the king of good customer service in the bus industry, an industry that as a whole cares about customers even less than rail) would make of a rail franchise. I suspect get out due to immense frustration at the toxic culture that pervades a lot of it.
You’re happy for the trains you travel on to be regularly delayed due to being held for passengers, then?
Most trains, in fact the overwhelming majority, are on time. As for the industry having bad customer service, not in my experience it doesn’t. Or certainly no worse than comparable industries. If you think you’ve received bad customer service why not complain to the TOC concerned and contribute to improving it?
Its the delay repay thing. Every delay is analysed and someone is a fault. So TOC's are risk averse to having delays.
But how far back does this go. If the TPE train is delayed waiting for the Northern service could they blame the delay on Northern? And in turn, could Northern point to another party for the lateness of their train leaving sheffield. Which is when it gets silly.
Short delays of a few minutes should not end up in delay repay, and should be put down to sh!t happens.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
This should be done on a "greater good" basis and taking into account when the next train is and what alternatives can be offered.
Would it make sense to hold the Conwy Valley branch line (1tp3h) for an incoming service from Manchester to Llandudno which is 5 minutes late to give people time to get across? Almost certainly yes.
Would it make sense to hold an hourly Cornish branch train 10 minutes for the incoming Paddington express in August? Almost certainly yes again - almost every passenger will be connecting, though take into account whether it would cause a miss in the other direction - if it would, pre-ordering some taxis may be better.
Would it make sense to hold the Holyhead bound Mk4s for half an hour because the Conwy Valley had ended up way off pattern? Almost certainly not, as not only would that help far fewer people than it hindered, but it could cause missed ferries.
A "one size" policy doesn't work well, neither to hold nor not to. A decision should be taken based on the overall benefit. An IT system has the potential to make these decisions far more effectively than a human because they can very easily "drill down" in the timetable and check, on a real-time basis, what the impact will be, including on other connections and indeed other paths on the same line.
jfowkes
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Another strong contender here for the "this site needs a like button" file.
A briefing sheet for the guard when he joins a train with details of the journey, connecting pinch points with connection hold rules, and stuff like the fact that little puddlewick station is having the platform resurfaced to tell the passengers to be careful. Of course it would be electronic. Not war and peace, something about the length of Bletchleyites post.
Indeed. It's all well and good arguing the toss over "if you held this train for 30 seconds it would delay 19 other trains and cause 5000 passengers to miss their connections", but really what is needed is a station-by-station policy document on connections. Just as there are regulation statements for signallers, which state which train to send first in the event of laterunning.
It really wouldn't be beyond the wit of mankind to develop software that could generate such connection documents partially or fully automatically. But as others have identified, there is simply no incentive to work on projects like these which improve cross-industry cooperation and the passenger experience.
Well they’re held up waiting for crew pretty regularly, and the passengers are the reason the industry exists so why not …
To be fair, if there’s a frequent service at the connecting station then obviously it’s not a problem, but in the example of the OP, where it was a full hour to wait at a station which is nothing more than a bench in the middle of nowhere, I think it was a pretty spiteful and unreasonable thing to do. If that complaint has landed on my desk he would have got a rocket, not congratulated for saving a 30 second delay
What a self serving industry the railway is sometimes… (not most of the time, but yes, sometimes)
In a perfect world yes it would. Such a system would essentially rely on dispatch staff/guards/drivers having access to real time information about connecting services being delayed, covering every location (or at least access to a feed from the system processing the information and making the decision for them).
It’s fairly clear that such a system doesn’t exist, and the funds to provide it won’t be forthcoming. Therefore the only sensible real world solution is to prioritise on time departures for “the greater good”, with a few limited exceptions. Ultimately by doing this you’re reducing the number of missed connections that will arise in the first place, which is surely the objective of the exercise.
The Planner
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Some splendid ambiguity there between a junction margin and reoccupation in the rules. It also begs the question why the margin is made up of diamond time instead of squiggle.
And as you say, the vast majority of trains run on time so holding a few services which are clearly not going to have a major knock on effect by a couple of minutes at the extreme of the day and network should be done and held up as examples of how the railway provides GOOD customer service.
jumble
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Many years ago I was staying in Interlaken and we had to get to Basel for a flight
The first train would miss a connection in Bern by minutes and so a relative was going to drive us to Bern
The weather went so bad and the night before the relative said they would not risk it
I went to Interlaken station and the station master assured me he would arrange for the train in Bern to be held if I travelled the following morning
There was a staff member on the platform in Bern who hurried me onto our connection and off I went.
I remember thinking at the time this would never have happened in UK
Yes.
Indeed; the train in question had a lengthy dwell at Malton and had to wait outside York station for a platform/path to become available; if the train had waited for the passengers to make the connection, there is no indication whatsoever that the train would have been delayed. It would probably still have had to wait time outside York station!
I don't understand why some people are still claiming that the train would have been delayed had the connection been made; there is no evidence of this, as the train had 2 mins dwell at Malton and was held for over 2 minutes outside York station.
I am curious to learn if the people who think that what happened at Seamer was the right thing to do would also argue against the rail industry's own policies and the reality of what happens at places like Par and Inverness?
I've seen plenty of schedules "signed off" with apparently non-compliant margins at York. It doesn't really work if you apply all the rules like a stickler!
Yes. Many people here have been suggesting and indeed trying to explain that there is a very much case-by-case basis for connections and holds, many TOCs DO have connectional policies and is often a judgment call given the time of day, the location, the number of passengers and so on.
mike57
Established Member
And yet as a passenger I can have the RTT app on my phone, pull up the service I am on, and with one click see the real time status and platform numbers of the trains around the time of my trains arrival at any point on its journey, as long as I have a data connection on my phone, which these days is just about everywhere
One potential issue is that Par and Inverness, the trains are run by the same TOC, whereas here at Seamer, they are not. I'm not saying that it should be that way, its just that the realities of organising an inter-TOC hold are harder.
Indeed. And whilst mobile phone usage is prohibited in the driving cab, there is nothing stopping guards (or OBSs etc.) from doing so. And for lines with no other staff except the driver, operators could look into a locked-down tablet in the cab, with access to signal diagrams or similar.
These are all the kinds of things that can and do happen in other countries where railway operators lay greater importance on the passenger experience.
Well yes, but only because the train can’t physically leave without them.
I don’t know the specific location, but it may very well be that guards wasn’t privy to that information. Generally discretion can be exercised for a few seconds here or there, but without being there and seeing the situation unfold it’s difficult to know.
More generally if you gave people a rocket for minimising delays in a business which can be charged fees a couple of hundred pounds per delay minute, I suspect you wouldn’t be in your job very long. Rightly or wrongly the industry is set up to incentivise delay minimisation.
The only reason the vast majority of trains run on time is because of the huge amount of work that does in to ensuring as many as possible depart on time.
It may well be the case that holding that particular train at that particular location at that particular time would have made sense. The issue is that there are many examples of locations where it wouldn’t make sense, and there’s the need to apply a consistent policy.
RTT is excellent but still doesn’t give you the ability to know whether delaying a particular train would be overall beneficial. I think what @Bletchleyite was suggesting was a system which has access to real time information and makes decisions about holding trains based on a “greater good” algorithm. It’s certainly an interesting idea but the question is what to do in the absence of such a system and when there are no funds to develop one.
Even if we did have such a system in place you’d unfortunately still have people being left behind from time to time, just as you do where a blanket “depart on time” policy is in operation.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
The system processing it based on quite detailed criteria (including stuff like through Advances sold and e-ticket scans) is what I'd envisage, FWIW. It could take other things into account, such as what the connecting train is doing. If you consider my theoretical Cornish branch example, if you imagine that the inbound from Paddington is say 15 late, but it is already known that the fault on the train will mean the next Paddington connection is definitely cancelled, then the overall benefit may be best if the branch train waits and the following round trip is cancelled to bring it back on time, because there's already known to be nothing for it to connect with, and the people in whatever charming little coastal town it is might be better served by spending an extra hour in the pub, on the beach, having chips or whatever than standing in the cold at an interchange station with few facilities as many of the Cornish ones do.
I'd go with what @Watershed says, to be honest, that is that each station should have a "risk assessment" done for each connection (clockface makes it easier, as it'll be the same all day) to establish how long it should be held and in what circumstances, so passengers on incoming trains are informed in advance of what will happen. This would include such things as "if it's -5 outside and the station has no shelter, it is unacceptable under any circumstances to strand passengers there for an hour", which might include such things as pre-arranging taxis or communicating to the train that passengers should take some other action, e.g. continue to Scarborough where waiting facilities are available.
It's not simple, but it's worth doing if you care about customer service.
But looking at the example given, I would say under say 3 minutes = always hold unless there are specific circumstances. Closing doors in peoples' faces as they cross from a train that's already there is unacceptable, and a train under 5 minutes late is in some ways not considered late at all. Some guards might have held it anyway and told a fib about assisting a disabled passenger when asked "please explain", but they shouldn't need to.
What you're described there is a traffic management system, and even then you're still only make algorithmic predictions on clashes based on the timetable ahead. They are good, but need a lot of background skills and development and are often only used currently on the most intensive lines and operations.
I'm not even sure that would he helpful here because this wasn't a clash in terms of train operation, but more passenger connections.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
I was, yes.
@Watershed suggested a manually worked out version of the same thing. I don't doubt that that's what SBB have had for years.
I'm sure you would, but if it's managed more actively you've also got the option to inform passengers to change their action so they're not left at a station without facilities in the cold for an hour.
For instance, if I was going from Ormskirk to Southport on a windy winter Sunday (half hourly service) and I knew the connection would miss, I'd continue to Moorfields or Central to wait inside, knowing that Sandhills is horribly windswept and an awful place to wait without even any toilets. Informing people of that has value.
And, pardon my cynicism, the incentives are perverse.
For as long as the second TOC risks adverse consequences if the connection is held, and the first TOC bears the costs if it isn't, the poor passengers (the very reason for running the service in the first place) don't stand a chance.
And that's without taking into account the 'wooden dollars' side of things - it's utterly infuriating and so unnecessary!
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
The UK rail system is quite possibly the most intensively-worked in the world outside of the likes of Japan, I'd say. Of course if you're talking Cornish branches or the (vaguely equivalent) Conwy Valley you can just work it out and print it on a bit of paper as there aren't many variables, but if you're talking about the South East or the WCML it's hugely complex.
In this example, perhaps 3 minutes. In other places 3 minutes would cause carnage to the timetable. The issue is that the 3 minutes would still need to be attributed somewhere for delay reasons. Whether you think that is right or wrong is a different matter, but it would probably be attributed to "waiting connections - not authorised" or "authorised outside connectional policy" (reference). That would then need to be explained and would cost some 'money'. Utlimately no bother if the train has no other interchanges and reaches its destination on time (as it may well have done here), but that can't be guranteed.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Yes, this.
The incentives need to be based around passenger delay minutes, not train delay minutes. An option would be to base it on Delay Repay scaled up to actual passenger numbers (rather than just those who claim).
True, yet traffic management systems are still somewhat in their infancy in the UK in terms of being used in the full operation of services.
That would be nice, but I can imagine that being a major headache to try and calculate! In future yes, perhaps train loadings can be exactly measured on & off, but that still doesn't tell you exactly what is happening.
Isnt there a PIS system at Seamer. A glance at that would tell him the extent of the delay to the Northern train.
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