Great to finally see a clock face and direct Nottingham service on the Grimsby to Lincoln line. The later services are also a big plus to allow people to stay for food / drinks in Lincoln / Cleethorpes which should hopefully boost both economies. The Sunday service is also improved with the first service travelling from Nottingham at around 10, rather than 3 currently, which makes day trips to Cleethorpes possible.
Unfortunately, there are still issues that the timetable hasn't solved. Connections are pretty awful throughout. As already mentioned, the service does not connect well with London trains at Lincoln. Another glaring connection issue is at Barnetby where people travelling to from Lincoln from Scunthorpe just miss the connection in both directions so have 50 minute waits. I wonder if extending the Doncaster to Scunthorpe stopper to Barnetby could rectify this. It would only leave a 5 minute turnaround at either end though if using 2 units. I doubt retiming of the East Midlands service will ever happen with the Newark flat crossing so it might just be something we have to live with.
Finally, it's a bit disappointing that calls at Stallingborough, Healing and Great Coates couldn't have been added to the Lincoln service at peak times and during the late evening. Perhaps this could be added in the future. After all, it wouldn't be a lincolnshire railway if there wasn't something to complain about. Still it really is a welcome improvement.
Agreed
@Grimsby town.
Lincolnshire does pretty well from the May timetable changes. Once the full changes come in (December?) both the Lincoln-Doncaster and Lincoln-Grimsby will have their hourly services. Just a shame that no Sunday service is planned for the Lincoln-Sleaford-Peterborough line.
More agreement here it's great to see the start of some big improvements in Lincolnshire!
However, there are some problems locally which unfortunately are difficult or impossible to solve, when we put all the companies services together.
Those who travel between Habrough and Grimsby Town will be blessed with more services, when the hourly EMR timetable comes fully into effect, 2 fasts an hour plus a stopper every 2 hours. However they're not at all evenly spaced! This is somewhat exaggerated with the first EMR introductions being in the same hours as the Barton stopper!
Taking the up direction for example, the result is such that in most even numbered hours, Habough to Grimsby Town has 3 trains in the space of roughly 15 minutes, then nothing for another hour!
However, because 2 of these 3 are long distance services which have to be finely timed in very busy areas further afield, the chances of more evenly spaced services in the future is minimal at best!
But this niggle aside, it is great to see improvements to services in this part of the world, with more direct journeys possible and much improvement early morning and late evening.