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Avanti service reductions from Monday 26th July

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Dai Corner

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Never said it was about the money.

They are taking the easy option to run a minimum service rather than deploy what resources they have available. This is a result of us moving away from a turn up and go service and too much reliance upon advanced bookings to drive revenue.
Presumably the service to be advertised is one they feel confident can be delivered. Better to do that and maybe run some additionals if possible and required than have to make short notice cancellations, I'd say.
 
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craigybagel

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Never said it was about the money.

They are taking the easy option to run a minimum service rather than deploy what resources they have available. This is a result of us moving away from a turn up and go service and too much reliance upon advanced bookings to drive revenue.
Surely the "resources they have available" are what they're using to run a predictable and reliable 4tph service?
 

irish_rail

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One of Avantis issues i believe is they make do with the bare minimum driver wise, compared to a TOC like GWR that has far greater numbers of surplus drivers. I've heard it said AV rely on rest day work alot driver wise, not sure if that's true or not....
 

Bald Rick

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One of Avantis issues i believe is they make do with the bare minimum driver wise, compared to a TOC like GWR that has far greater numbers of surplus drivers. I've heard it said AV rely on rest day work alot driver wise, not sure if that's true or not....

It’s been more true the last couple of years, AIUI. They have suffered more than most through the pandemic.
 

Johnny Lewis

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As of 9.20am today (Friday 23 July) there is a headline note on their web page indicating that there are to be further changes on certain routes from Monday, but no details. Their timetable page has no timetable after Sunday (but still shows the "full" timetable applying until mid-September(!) - this should now be taken down as it's never likely to run.

I also tried booking a Manchester to London journey for Monday. The only clue was that, when I tried to book the 10.55 (the via Crewe service, which I assume is to be chopped), there were no Advance tickets available, and when I got to the point of booking a seat, I got a strange error message saying I was not authorised to proceed.

Real Time Trains is still showing the two trains per hour timetable applying.

I appreciate these are fairly short-term alterations, but it seems a pity that, with school holidays starting next week, the information is still not accurate on their website only 3 days before!
 

The Planner

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As of 9.20am today (Friday 23 July) there is a headline note on their web page indicating that there are to be further changes on certain routes from Monday, but no details. Their timetable page has no timetable after Sunday (but still shows the "full" timetable applying until mid-September(!) - this should now be taken down as it's never likely to run.

I also tried booking a Manchester to London journey for Monday. The only clue was that, when I tried to book the 10.55 (the via Crewe service, which I assume is to be chopped), there were no Advance tickets available, and when I got to the point of booking a seat, I got a strange error message saying I was not authorised to proceed.

Real Time Trains is still showing the two trains per hour timetable applying.

I appreciate these are fairly short-term alterations, but it seems a pity that, with school holidays starting next week, the information is still not accurate on their website only 3 days before!
They have a very finite amount of resource to deal with the changes, and then it has to come to us to be actioned as well. Give them/us a chance.
 

Haywain

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I wonder if they can be pinged by a positive passenger behind the cab. (Although if that is a real risk I would hope they turn off the app)
Passengers won't be within anything like 2 metres of the cab.
 

Failed Unit

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Passengers won't be within anything like 2 metres of the cab.
Maybe not an the IC units. But on units they are often just the thickness of the electronics away from the drive. Surely Coach A on an Azuma would physically be close enough to the drive if the had their phone switched on?
 

Bletchleyite

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Passengers won't be within anything like 2 metres of the cab.

Have a read of the algorithm, it's online somewhere. It is not strictly limited to 2m, and would pick up someone sat further away for a long period (basically with exponential drop-off past 2m by distance) - exactly what would happen on an InterCity train.

If people knew fully how it works (and it is published, just in a bit of an obscure way) they would be more active at managing when it's on and off.

If it was strictly "2m for 15 minutes or more" or people managed it actively there wouldn't be half the "false" pings we are getting.

That said, the driver's phone should be off when in the cab so it's probably not that in this case. Could it be rattling round messrooms etc?
 

LNW-GW Joint

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Have Avanti changed the social distancing on the trains? ie are all seats now available (at least in England)?
If so, that would mean overall there would be no great loss of capacity compared to earlier in the summer, just fewer trains.
 

Bletchleyite

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Have Avanti changed the social distancing on the trains? ie are all seats now available (at least in England)?

I believe so yes.

If so, that would mean overall there would be no great loss of capacity compared to earlier in the summer, just fewer trains.

True, though as more people are travelling that may well be inadequate.
 

Haywain

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Maybe not an the IC units. But on units they are often just the thickness of the electronics away from the drive. Surely Coach A on an Azuma would physically be close enough to the drive if the had their phone switched on?
Passengers are not permitted to be in the front third of a train travelling at 125mph so with Pendolino vehicles being 23m long (I think) and Azuma vehicles 26m long that’s a good distance from the nearest passenger even if drivers phones are switched on. And no need to talk about units as this thread is about Avanti.
 

MDB1images

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For the lockdown periods, TPE ran Preston-Glasgow to fill some of the Avanti gaps (with Avanti taking the Edinburgh service instead of TPE).
We don't know if TPE are reducing services as well.

It was the opposite way around over lockdown(Avanti ran to Glasgow; TPE to Edinburgh, with the exception of 1 or 2 services).

TPE aren't planning to reduce services on WCML despite having similar issues with COVID/isolations.
TPE have a little bit more resilience as still on a COVID variation of the timetable on WCML.
 

Nicholas Lewis

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Have Avanti changed the social distancing on the trains? ie are all seats now available (at least in England)?
If so, that would mean overall there would be no great loss of capacity compared to earlier in the summer, just fewer trains.
They have removed social distancing restrictions but with a reduced level of service that's going increase overall passenger density substantially and the risk is you're on a train that if you have the app many people could get pinged should one of your fellow passengers test positive.
 

island

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Passengers are not permitted to be in the front third of a train travelling at 125mph
This cannot possibly be true. Coaches A-C are the front third of a (northbound) 9-coach Pendolino and carry plenty of passengers.
 

duncanp

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I am travelling from Birmingham to London with Avanti on Sunday 15th August.

Having signed up for e-mail alerts, last week I received an e-mail saying that tickets were available to book, and duly booked a 1st Class advance single.

Now if you look at their ticket availability page, it says that the timetable is "not confirmed" for Sunday 15th August.

So I have no idea whatsoever whether I will be able to travel on my booked train, and I suspect Avanti don't have any idea either.

You couldn't make it up, really. <( <(
 

73128

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Avanti website (link above) says two trains an hour to Wolverhampton, with some continuing to Blackpool or Edinburgh. Probably an error though.

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XAM2175

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Now if you look at their ticket availability page, it says that the timetable is "not confirmed" for Sunday 15th August.

So I have no idea whatsoever whether I will be able to travel on my booked train, and I suspect Avanti don't have any idea either.
The reasonable assumption is that the ticket availability page hasn't been updated, no?
 

Welshman

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I had booked one of their North Wales to Manchester Avanti only tickets via Crewe for this coming Wednesday[28th July].
I checked the website at 7am and found the revised timetable for this week is now up. As expected, the Euston - Manchester via Crewe services are now cancelled, so my ticket is now useless.
I requested a full refund at 7.15am, and by 7.30am had heard that a full refund would be made. So I'm impressed with the speed they are reacting to a problem not immediately of their making.
 

Jez

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How on earth is there going to be enough capacity in the coming weeks between Crewe and Manchester if TFW are going to be the only fast service calling at just Wilmslow and Stockport and some of these will i'm sure still be the usual 2 carriages 175s. Is there any road replacement transport being provided as otherwise its going to be ridiculously busy. The TFW is busy enough as it is without the absence of the other fast and longer train.
 

sd0733

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How on earth is there going to be enough capacity in the coming weeks between Crewe and Manchester if TFW are going to be the only fast service calling at just Wilmslow and Stockport and some of these will i'm sure still be the usual 2 carriages 175s. Is there any road replacement transport being provided as otherwise its going to be ridiculously busy. The TFW is busy enough as it is without the absence of the other fast and longer train.

It isnt going to be anything close to covering capacity.
Everything is already busy and there is less than half the capacity between Crewe and Manchester come Monday, currently generally 11 car Avanti, 2x 3 car Northerns plus 3 car (being optimistic) Tfw totalling 20 coaches per hour, as of Monday this becomes 9 per hour.

TfW and other ToCs are being shafted by Avanti by some of their swinging cuts but its the likes of TfW, Northern, Tpe etc who will take the flack for not providing enough capacity. Cutting the largest capacity trains on many of these routes is going to cause mayhem now passengers are returning in numbers.
 

Jez

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The national rail enquires journey planner suggests using the Glasgow service from crewe and changing at Warrington Bank Quay for Manchester but how many people who just turn up on the day will do that I don't know. It will be interesting to see how thing work out over the coming weeks.
 

craigybagel

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The national rail enquires journey planner suggests using the Glasgow service from crewe and changing at Warrington Bank Quay for Manchester but how many people who just turn up on the day will do that I don't know. It will be interesting to see how thing work out over the coming weeks.
Although technically that isn't actually a permitted route ticketing wise!
 

Watershed

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Although technically that isn't actually a permitted route ticketing wise!
Which is why journey planners won't suggest it.

I would maintain that diverting the XC is the least worst option in the circumstances.
 

Bishopstone

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I wonder whether, across a number of impacted TOCs, there will be attempts at demand suppression by way of ‘consider whether your journey is necessary’ messaging, or similar.

It’s a good job that those of us who have been working from home didn’t all return to the office on July 19th, having eschewed ‘advice’ from the outer reaches of the Covid sub-forum.
 
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