How busy have your trains been?

[bramling]

Agreed - and I have been to Crawley ! (and I detest Croydon as a place to visit) - but as the Yanks say - a "one seat journey" to Blackfriars for the River and attractions / London Bridge for nicer places - Greenwich say not Abbey Wood must be worth something I guess. Or it ought to be.

There's still very little usage of the GN Thameslink services through London, especially the Peterborough/Horsham services. The Cambridge/Brighton services see more use to Gatwick, and on sunny days to Brighton, but that's about it. By far the bulk of northbound journeys to the GN side still seem to start from St Pancras or Finsbury Park. Perhaps Farringdon will change that when Crossrail opens.

 

[bramling]

Does Croydon still have it's Wimpey bar ? Must admit, last time I visited it, trip back to the centre was on a phase 1 CIG.

Croydon did once have one reason for visit, namely that a couple of times of day it was possible to board a class 205 there for a through journey to Uckfield! There's also a rather nice former railway pumping station there. That's, er, about it...

Whilst Horsham-Peterborough may win the award for most boring places Thameslink has connected, the most dubious combination has to be Luton-Rainham. It's a matter of conjecture which of those is the more displeasant.

 

[Hadders]

Interestingly the Peterborough 700s in the evening appear to have declined in loadings since the new timetable came in, which is presumably a response to the evening 365 services making a re-appearance.

Personally I always go for the 365 'pullman' services wherever possible.

 

[yorksrob]

Croydon did once have one reason for visit, namely that a couple of times of day it was possible to board a class 205 there for a through journey to Uckfield! There's also a rather nice former railway pumping station there. That's, er, about it...

Whilst Horsham-Peterborough may win the award for most boring places Thameslink has connected, the most dubious combination has to be Luton-Rainham. It's a matter of conjecture which of those is the more displeasant.

Oh yes, I love a 205 - never had one at Croydon sadly. Have had the Hastings set though.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Does Croydon still have it's Wimpy bar ?

If you mean the one half way between East Croydon and Reeves Corner, I'm afraid not. It closed about a year ago.

 

[Jamesrob637]

Croydon did once have one reason for visit, namely that a couple of times of day it was possible to board a class 205 there for a through journey to Uckfield! There's also a rather nice former railway pumping station there. That's, er, about it...

Whilst Horsham-Peterborough may win the award for most boring places Thameslink has connected, the most dubious combination has to be Luton-Rainham. It's a matter of conjecture which of those is the more displeasant.

Omg Luton to Rainham sounds like the sixth circle of hell. On a par with some train rides in the Ukraine.

 

[bramling]

Omg Luton to Rainham sounds like the sixth circle of hell. On a par with some train rides in the Ukraine.

They even managed to choose the worst of the three Dartford routes to send it, just to complete the tour of hell.

 

[greyman42]

Regarding future travel, today i booked a seat for the 23 December from Brum to York on the 1501 and was told that i had got the last seat.

 

[Jamesrob637]

Regarding future travel, today i booked a seat for the 23 December from Brum to York on the 1501 and was told that i had got the last seat.

You were probably lucky to get even that. The 23-27 window was announced a fair bit ago now. Appreciate you might not have been able to book before today though.

 

[yorkie]

My recent trains have generally been very quiet however, as part of a longer journey, yesterday I boarded an evening peak XC train at Banbury and alighted at Oxford which was a 9 car Voyager and I would say that the number of passengers on board would make social distancing impossible on a 4-car (unless 1st was declassified) and a bit difficult on a 5-car. That said, walking to the very rear coach we did manage to get the end coach all to ourselves.

My current XC train is quiet, however the legendary Kevin Kramer is the Guard

 

[Scotrail314209]

From what I’ve seen online, long distance trains were packed this evening with people heading out of London.

I wonder how much was spent on walk up tickets...

 

[route101]

Glasgow Central was quite busy yesterday, Glasgow to Paisley I had an empty front 3 coach unit. Rear was busier.

 

[philosopher]

1110 London Marylebone to Birmingham Moor Street today. There were only three people in the carriage until Leamington Spa. The other carriages looked similarly empty. From Solihull to Birmingham the train was busier with about 20 in the carriage. It looked like about 100 got off at Birmingham Moor Street.

Marylebone Station despite being very quiet still had AMT coffee, Pret and Marks and Spencers open.

 

[ValleyLines142]

If you mean the one half way between East Croydon and Reeves Corner, I'm afraid not. It closed about a year ago.

Woolwich is still open, however.

 

[Mojo]

Woolwich is still open, however.

I am quite lucky in that I have one a 10 Min walk away and another two high streets over which is less than 10 Min drive. Our local one has just been refurbished as well!

 

[Scotrail314209]

Glasgow Subway yesterday between Partick and St Enoch, about 75% full between Hillhead and Buchanan Street.

 

[seaviewer]

Croydon did once have one reason for visit, namely that a couple of times of day it was possible to board a class 205 there for a through journey to Uckfield! There's also a rather nice former railway pumping station there. That's, er, about it...

Whilst Horsham-Peterborough may win the award for most boring places Thameslink has connected, the most dubious combination has to be Luton-Rainham. It's a matter of conjecture which of those is the more displeasant.

hands off Horsham please! it has been modernised well, IMHO, and has a very pleasant, centrally-located Park. Disclosure: I lived there for 30 years!

 

[Hadders]

16:30 LNER service from Kings Cross to Bradford Forster Square this afternoon (Thurs 31 Dec) had just 19 passengers in stanards class between Kings Cross and Stevenage.

 

[Jamesrob637]

I wonder how busy they'll be over January. Happy New Year everybody.

 

[route101]

16:30 LNER service from Kings Cross to Bradford Forster Square this afternoon (Thurs 31 Dec) had just 19 passengers in 1st class between Kings Cross and Stevenage.

Id say thats decent for current circumstances! Could be 19 for whole train.

 

[Killingworth]

In the last 2 weeks Hope Valley Northern stopping services appear to have been loading well. The allocation of 195s instead of Pacers is being very well received. I forecast that leisure loadings might exceed 2019-20 levels within 2 years once Tiers are released. (I doubt such figures will become available to check.)

Sadly the same can't be said for the fast TPE/EMR services that rely on commuter and airport traffic. Loadings there continue to look very light!

 

[Hadders]

Id say thats decent for current circumstances! Could be 19 for whole train.

Oops! No idea why I said 1st class, meant 19 in Standard - original post updated.

 

[trainophile]

Yesterday 1217 Northern Southport to Man Picc, 4-coach (2x150s), probably no more than ten in each coach, very easy to leave several rows between us the entire way.

1431 TfW Picc to Hereford 2-coach 158 (my heart sank but it was a nicely refurbed one, albeit the charging sockets didn't work in either coach), probably about 20% of full capacity.

I've cancelled my return trip HFD-SOP for 4th-9th Jan, seems a bit risky the way they are ramming the scare stories at us, but I wouldn't mind betting those trains will be lightly loaded too.

 

[infobleep]

When I boarded 11.11 Haywards Heath to London Victoira there was only 2 people in my carriage, including myself.

By the time we departed East Croydon it was 8 including myself. This was probably the 3rd carriage from the front

I then walked through two carriages to be nearer the stairs at Clapham Junction and found the next two carriages to busier with a family and others dotted about.

There was only 2 platforms operating at Gatwick Airport and we had been slightly delayed by 2 minutes. I was using an unofficial 5 minute connection at Clapham Junction. Fine as its only platform 12 to 9, so one island to the next island but I didn't want to far to walk along the platform. As it was my train just arrived on time into Clapham Junction and the 11:54 to Guildford was running 1 minute late.

When I boarded the 11:54 I could see no one in the carriage, 3rd from the front. 3 of us including myself boarded.

Maybe all the passengers from Waterloo were at the back. There was definitely some demand from Clapham Junction but then there is only 1 fast train an hour stopping there towards Portsmouth via Guildford.

 

[DannyMich2018]

Yesterday I seen a lunchtime Sheffield to St Pancras leave Leicester with no kidding only one or two passengers on!! These often lightly loaded as they run non stop south of Leicester.

 

[cactustwirly]

Yesterday I seen a lunchtime Sheffield to St Pancras leave Leicester with no kidding only one or two passengers on!! These often lightly loaded as they run non stop south of Leicester.

Normally these are really busy south of Leicester.
The Leicester to London market is a lot bigger than to Bedford or Kettering

 

[DannyMich2018]

Normally these are really busy south of Leicester.
The Leicester to London market is a lot bigger than to Bedford or Kettering

Yes, to be fair pre Covid, loadings throughout the day on all services was generally good on this busy route. I don't wanna drift off topic but with most of England in Tier 4 with 4 tph between Leicester and London is too much.

 

[route101]

1530 ex Glasgow to London Euston. Seen this board, quite a few in the Queuing system at P1.

 

[greyman42]

1358 York to London had 11 passengers.
1407 York to London had 13 passengers.

 

[bramling]

1358 York to London had 11 passengers.
1407 York to London had 13 passengers.

I went for a walk this evening, and saw some pretty empty LNER services passing the field where we were. Certainly down to single figures on some I’d think.

By contrast the GTR services were quiet, but still not ghost trains. A handful per carriage, which would tie in with my experiences earlier in the week. Naturally people seem happy to make use of the declassified first on the 700s so that can be seen at times to be disproportionately busy.