May 2022 Timetable Changes

[Bikeman78]

Ayr still gets a poor service with a majority of trains stopping all stations west of Paisley Gilmour Street. During the class 318 era, the Ayr trains were the fastest out to Kilwinning.

The Fife circle is no longer a circle. Nearly all trains terminate at Glenrothes with no way to get to Kirkcaldy or Markinch.

The Cathcart circle only runs a few peak trips. Bizarrely four off peak trips run empty in the paths of the passengers trains. This leaves the Shawlands half of the circle with just an hourly service. First Glasgow will be very happy about this.

 

[jamieintercity]

The arbroath to Edinburgh services now only go as far as dundee from May

 

[Acton1991]

Although it's only in the last couple timetable changes the Acton Main Line call changed from the Hayes terminators to the Heathrow trains. Same time as Hanwell went to 4tph (as previously that was mostly served by Heathrow trains with the Hayes terminators skipping).

It will be interesting if 4tph gives Acton Main Line a boost of passenger numbers.

I believe it will. Even now, since the new station has opened and TfL Rail are serving the station, I have noticed a bigger uptake in usage (all anecdotal though).
But in my experience, 4 trains per hour will mean you can just turn up at the station and go, whereas now you have to plan your journey, and because of that apps like Citymapper exclude AML from their results.

 

[Kite159]

The arbroath to Edinburgh services now only go as far as dundee from May

I guess with the Aberdeen - Edinburgh services picking up all the stops which would have been on the semifast (Cupar, Ladybank etc)?

 

[hexagon789]

I guess with the Aberdeen - Edinburgh services picking up all the stops which would have been on the semifast (Cupar, Ladybank etc)?

No, the Aberdeen-Edinburgh service is still fast Leuchars to Haymarket

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I guess with the Aberdeen - Edinburgh services picking up all the stops which would have been on the semifast (Cupar, Ladybank etc)?

Not according to RTT, it appears to be an Arbroath Dundee stopping shuttle and a Dundee Edinburgh stopping service calling at all stations

 

[hexagon789]

Not according to RTT, it appears to be an Arbroath Dundee stopping shuttle and a Dundee Edinburgh stopping service calling at all stations

It's a bizarre arrangement - they've essentially split the Arbroath-Edinburgh stopper at Dundee and turned it into two separate services. To add insult to injury they don't even connect into the new Dundee-Glasgow stopper, missing it by about 9-10 mins on average.

It's no Tartan Taktfahrplan!

 

[hooky3]

so the Dundee services will call at almost all Fife stations?

 

[hexagon789]

so the Dundee services will call at almost all Fife stations?

The Dundee-Edinburgh stoppers? Yes, all stations though Springfield is still limited calls.

 

[43055]

Transport for Wales is now showing. The Manchester to North Wales services are back.

 

[Kite159]

At least the Scotrail plan to send the Perth - Edinburgh trains via the inner fife circle doesn't seem to have happened, they are mostly all stops via Kirkcaldy [from a brief glance]

I bet some of the bus companies in Glasgow/Edinburgh area will be loving the new Scotrail timetable for all the potential extra customers.

 

[Ex-controller]

Hourly on the western half of the Cathcart Circle is a really awful offering for an inner suburban service in a major city. Worst service provided on the route since electrification 60 years ago. Effectively given up competing with car transport - that’s what will be the outcome in those areas, especially half the stations have no bus route close by.

Given the loss of peak commuter times, to weight additional services towards these periods and leave the daytime service so short is pretty scandalous. The best case scenario here is that little thought has went into it.

 

[Voyager lad]

One of the things I personally like about the ScotRail changes is the introduction of a proper peak service between Bishopbriggs/Lenzie & Edinburgh, alleviating the current 20-25 min wait at Croy. Would love it to be all day (ideally E&G back to every 15 mins) but something I’ll personally benefit from hugely.

Alloa also now gets a fully half hourly service with Dunblane and Bridge of Allan getting their Glasgow trains through the new hourly Dundee stopper, so again an improvement over their 2 hourly link presently.

 

[Llandudno]

Transport for Wales is now showing. The Manchester to North Wales services are back.

Is the Conwy Valley line returning to six round trips per day, by train or bus?

 

[setdown]

London Northwestern still running the reduced frequency of hourly into Liverpool. No surprise really, yesterday morning I commuted into Lime Street for the first time in two years, and the train was mostly empty, I had my own carriage! Different world to how it used to be, even allowing for a longer train. It actually felt quite sad.

 

[freddiem]

The Dundee-Edinburgh stoppers? Yes, all stations though Springfield is still limited calls.

All stations north of Inverkeithing, North Queensferry and Dalmeny not receiving any extra calls, still just 2tph during the day however the peak service at Dalmeny is considerably better planned with trains leaving EDB at 1708, 1711, 1719 and 1736 when at least one of these used to go straight through in the days of the class 68 hauled train.

 

[splashoutradio]

Is the Conwy Valley line returning to six round trips per day, by train or bus?

The Conwy Valley line is currently showing as having 6 trains a day, with the first early morning journey, between Llandudno Junction and Blaenau Ffestiniog, calling only at Tal-y-cafn, Llanrwst and Betws-y-coed.

However, it's best not to rely too much on what is appearing online at the moment, as timings are very much subject to change before May 15th.

 

[kingston_toon]

Ayr still gets a poor service with a majority of trains stopping all stations west of Paisley Gilmour Street. During the class 318 era, the Ayr trains were the fastest out to Kilwinning.

The Fife circle is no longer a circle. Nearly all trains terminate at Glenrothes with no way to get to Kirkcaldy or Markinch.

The Cathcart circle only runs a few peak trips. Bizarrely four off peak trips run empty in the paths of the passengers trains. This leaves the Shawlands half of the circle with just an hourly service. First Glasgow will be very happy about this.

The Gourock line timetable remains a mess as well - broadly 2tph all stations during the day, 1tph in the evening and the odd random fast train every 90-120 minutes. This is worse than the timetable which applied almost entirely unchanged during the late 80s, 90s and into the 2000s of 2tph slow and 1tph fast, with one of each in the evening. Pre-Covid, it was 4tph (two of each).

 

[DDB]

Still no trains to Spondon if RTT is accurate. That will be for a year if it lasts untill June.

 

[Bikeman78]

The Gourock line timetable remains a mess as well - broadly 2tph all stations during the day, 1tph in the evening and the odd random fast train every 90-120 minutes. This is worse than the timetable which applied almost entirely unchanged during the late 80s, 90s and into the 2000s of 2tph slow and 1tph fast, with one of each in the evening. Pre-Covid, it was 4tph (two of each).

Yes it was two stoppers to Gourock and one faster train to Wemyss Bay and one to Gourock each hour back in the days of the class 303s. One fast train every two hours is pointless, especially two minutes ahead of the Wemyss Bay train. Either run it hourly, on the opposite side of the hour to the Weymss Bay train, or don't bother at all. I've no idea why they are persisting with this folly.

 

[james60059]

Transport for Wales is now showing. The Manchester to North Wales services are back.

Fishguard Harbour get's it's extra services back too (6tpd). Using Monday 16th May.

 

[swissrailpassion]

Northern are in.

 

[Halish Railway]

Regarding Northern, I was under the impression that this was when the MRTF timetable would be implemented, but I can’t find any evidence of it.

 

[splashoutradio]

Regarding Northern, I was under the impression that this was when the MRTF timetable would be implemented, but I can’t find any evidence of it.

The Manchester Recovery Task Force timetable is currently due to be implemented in December. Draft timetables for this, are available on the Northern website, here: https://www.northernrailway.co.uk/manchester2022

 

[ChrisC]

Still no trains to Spondon if RTT is accurate. That will be for a year if it lasts untill June.

Looking exactly the same for the Robin Hood Line with only an hourly service between Nottingham and Mansfield continuing. I had a feeling when the half hourly service wasn’t restored last September or in December that this could become permanent. As I’ve pointed out previously, the reduction in the service to hourly is inconvenient, but the lack of decent connections at Nottingham with waits of up to an hour for many destinations is unacceptable.

 

[LowLevel]

Looking exactly the same for the Robin Hood Line with only an hourly service between Nottingham and Mansfield continuing. I had a feeling when the half hourly service wasn’t restored last September or in December that this could become permanent. As I’ve pointed out previously, the reduction in the service to hourly is inconvenient, but the lack of decent connections at Nottingham with waits of up to an hour for many destinations is unacceptable.

My suspicion is that the Mansfields may return in December, if not before that.

They're trialling a new way of working the RHL with seemingly more use of Bestwood Park loop and the peak time Mansfield shorts run semi fast - if that looks to be robust then they might just put them back in at some point. The 0725 down from Nottingham also regains it's Hucknall stop, though the first train north appears to be retimed to 0509 and run via Pinxton, which is a bit odd.

I imagine they're drip feeding a rebuild of services into Nottingham as what the traincrew shortages sort of hid last May was that the station couldn't cope with things like all the Matlocks shunting, it was very resource heavy. I still think Matlock to Nottingham in some form will reappear at some point.

Getting Nottingham working reliably is a pretty major project.

 

[tommy2215]

TransPennine Express are now showing. Shows the Dec 21 timetable except Scarborough trains now running all the way to/from Liverpool and Newcastle-Liverpool has been split into Newcastle-Man Vic and Liverpool-York services.

 

[Halish Railway]

It’s good to see a half-hourly York to Liverpool service back without the long dwell times at Manchester Victoria.

Also half-hourly between Rochdale and Blackburn with hourly extensions to Clitheroe is back.

 

[387star]

Looks like GWR Brighton weekend services are STILL not back in full with just one on Saturday instead of two and one on Sunday instead of four despite 11 new drivers since 2019 at Fratton and counting and barely enough Brighton work as it is. Ironically new drivers are learning Brighton before Eastleigh which is a core route diversion.

 

[HamworthyGoods]

Looks like GWR Brighton weekend services are STILL not back in full with just one on Saturday instead of two and one on Sunday instead of four despite 11 new drivers since 2019 at Fratton and counting and barely enough Brighton work as it is. Ironically new drivers are learning Brighton before Eastleigh which is a core route diversion.

Some of the Sunday Brighton workings were diverted to fill the two hour gaps that previously existed in the core Portsmouth to Cardiff Sunday service.