Many different problems this week on my rail journeys

[MikeWM]

I think I must have been rather unlucky this last week - either that or the railway system really isn’t doing very well, which doesn’t bode well for the future.

On five of the last seven days I’ve had multiple cancellations, delays and/or speed restrictions due to windy weather. It seems we’re going to have to be able to cope with this sort of thing better as we’ll probably be getting more of this sort of thing as time goes on.

In addition to that, I’ve also had a missed connection due to a broken down train blocking a platform, a delay of an hour due to someone throwing a bicycle on the track, and an emergency stop due to a signalling fault.

As a snapshot of a week on the railway, it really isn’t terribly encouraging. Hopefully it really is just a case of having continually been in the wrong place at the wrong time...

 

[800001]

I think I must have been rather unlucky this last week - either that or the railway system really isn’t doing very well, which doesn’t bode well for the future.

On five of the last seven days I’ve had multiple cancellations, delays and/or speed restrictions due to windy weather. It seems we’re going to have to be able to cope with this sort of thing better as we’ll probably be getting more of this sort of thing as time goes on.

In addition to that, I’ve also had a missed connection due to a broken down train blocking a platform, a delay of an hour due to someone throwing a bicycle on the track, and an emergency stop due to a signalling fault.

As a snapshot of a week on the railway, it really isn’t terribly encouraging. Hopefully it really is just a case of having continually been in the wrong place at the wrong time...

Not a lot we can do about the weather, especially when on Twitter this week I have seen, sheds, tents, trampolines, many large pieces of plastic and the usual trees all blown onto the line and overhead wires.

 

[Highlandspring]

Thousands of different incidents happen every week on the railway. That’s the nature of running a complex interconnected network.

 

[AndrewE]

Thousands of different incidents happen every week on the railway. That’s the nature of running a complex interconnected network.

Yes, and especially as the railway offers a connected / integrated national travel option, in a way it's a handicap too.
There needs to be a lot of strategic joined-up thinking to minimise the effects of our destabilised and increasingly erratic and extreme climate. I suggest that it's yet another reason to abandon the current structure and go back to something like BR. It's too important to have dozens of sets of managements all trying to look after their own objectives when there is really only one deliverable: passenger satisfaction.

 

[MikeWM]

To cap it off, just had a train arrive on a different platform to that advertised. Lots of people get on thinking it is going in one direction (all the screens were still saying so) when actually it was going in the other. I walked through the train and told people what was actually happening, a number quickly got off.

Will be glad to see the back of this week

 

[Master29]

To cap it off, just had a train arrive on a different platform to that advertised. Lots of people get on thinking it is going in one direction (all the screens were still saying so) when actually it was going in the other. I walked through the train and told people what was actually happening, a number quickly got off.

Will be glad to see the back of this week

So because you had a few bad trips in as many days the whole network is going to ground to a halt due to conditions outside the control of the rail infrastructure. How exactly does that "not bode well for the future"?

 

[MikeWM]

So because you had a few bad trips in as many days the whole network is going to ground to a halt due to conditions outside the control of the rail infrastructure. How exactly does that "not bode well for the future"?

I’m not convinced that signal failures or broken-down trains are ‘outside the control’ of the railway.

Yes, the week of wind was unusual, but my point was that such events are becoming more frequent and are likely to continue to do so, and seem to require better planning therefore.

On a more positive note, I’ve just done a week-long Heart Of England Rover, and almost everything went very smoothly, bar a broken-down train this morning. But then the weather this week wasn’t cold, hot, windy, snowy...