Severe weather Saturday 7th October, some ScotRail services suspended.

[Huntergreed]

Circumstances change, weather changes from the time AWC took the decision to cancel north of Preston. It all seems rather odd but today was a crazy day and I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. They have come on leaps and bounds from the dark days of the last chance saloon.

But so should their advice.

I agree weather changes, but if they decide to run services, they should at least have the decency to tell their customers this…

 

[1D54]

People will have cancelled plans and are not going to turn up at stations for long journeys at a whim. AWC made some rather strange decisions today and i look forward to hearing what they have to say.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

I’ve managed to capture both speedometers (front and rear cab) which clearly show us stuck at 40

View attachment 144395

View attachment 144396

(both photos show the speedometer on the train at 40)

I’m actively challenging them on twitter but so far all I’ve been given is “safety reasons” (which seems nonsensical for down here).

Problem is it was appropriate across many parts of the network but NR control and mtce dont have the resources to manage this dynamically on a line by line basis which is what is expected now post Carmont so they have to take a draconian decision like this which is understandable in light of the RAIB report and fine. The challenge needs to come from politicians, operators and media about what it will take to approach it differently but suspect that will take many more weather events like today before that happens.

 

[30907]

Absolutely.

This is where it’s slightly annoying that we aren’t able to FOI Avanti to find out what’s going on here and to see if passengers are being deliberately misled.

I do believe there’s a growing anger towards Avanti from everyone living North of Preston who uses them semi-regularly. I know there certainly is with me!!

So Avanti's message last night should have been? "We advise against travel but if it doesn't rain too much some trains will run with delays though we can't guarantee to convey you"? More accurate, perhaps, but more helpful?!

Ridiculously, a blanket 40mph ESR seems to have been imposed across the entirety of Scotland.

Looking at RTT that is not the case - it applies South of Kilmarnock but not North thereof, for example.

Was sat at Lancaster station today.

All other train companies managed to put their services in.

Northern did (strangely enough, they don't run into Scotland), but TP only ran about half theirs. Avanti was more like 1/4.

I have friends who changed their plans coming to Lancaster from the South when there was no justification for the lack of train services.

Shame, given that plenty of trains ran Preston-Lancaster

Avanti clearly has questions to answer.

Certainly about customer communication, I agree!

But so should their advice.

I agree weather changes, but if they decide to run services, they should at least have the decency to tell their customers this…

As NRE/Scotrail say there are no trains South of Kilmarnock, how did you find out they were running as a matter of interest?

 

[yorksrob]

Problem is it was appropriate across many parts of the network but NR control and mtce dont have the resources to manage this dynamically on a line by line basis which is what is expected now post Carmont so they have to take a draconian decision like this which is understandable in light of the RAIB report and fine. The challenge needs to come from politicians, operators and media about what it will take to approach it differently but suspect that will take many more weather events like today before that happens.

That's absolutely understandable in Scotland where there was a severe weather decision to close the network.

More explanation will be needed for the WCML south of Carlisle where no such warning was in operation.

 

[1D54]

TPE ran to Carlisle today and SR were running a service from Carlisle to Kilmarnock and you could have picked up a train there to Glasgow Central. People were not being advised of this at Manchester , probably because of the hassle involved, but it would have been a damn site better than what they were being told.

 

[Huntergreed]

So Avanti's message last night should have been? "We advise against travel but if it doesn't rain too much some trains will run with delays though we can't guarantee to convey you"? More accurate, perhaps, but more helpful?!

No - but when they realised they were able to run services the advice should’ve been changed to reflect this.

Looking at RTT that is not the case - it applies South of Kilmarnock but not North thereof, for example.

If anything, logically it should have been the opposite. There’s absolutely no risk here. Been quite a pleasant day!

Northern did (strangely enough, they don't run into Scotland), but TP only ran about half theirs. Avanti was more like 1/4.

Agreed, a clear area needing improvement from TPE and AWC

Shame, given that plenty of trains ran Preston-Lancaster

Likewise north of Carlisle, i had to replan my day on the basis that no trains would run. To find this out (and not be informed of it) was infuriating to say the least

Certainly about customer communication, I agree!

A clear weakness at AWC which must be improved

As NRE/Scotrail say there are no trains South of Kilmarnock, how did you find out they were running as a matter of interest?

There’s nothing saying no trains south of Kilmarnock, just that trains from Carlisle will terminate at Kilmarnock, where local services will take us to Glasgow. Luckily, I only needed as far as Dumfries

 

[philosopher]

Absolutely.

This is where it’s slightly annoying that we aren’t able to FOI Avanti to find out what’s going on here and to see if passengers are being deliberately misled.

I do believe there’s a growing anger towards Avanti from everyone living North of Preston who uses them semi-regularly. I know there certainly is with me!!

I was caught up in this today and had to be picked up from Preston. I originally intended to travel from London to Oxenholme. I did leave a pretty negative review in the ‘tell us what you thought about the journey’ email survey Avanti send to those who have prebooked their ticket. In the survey I basically said that I thought they should have at least made some effort to run services between Preston and Carlisle, given all the poor weather was in Scotland. Though I am not sure what train operators do with with these surveys.

 

[dexter156]

156485 3270

 

[wilbers]

I've had my day trip to Blackpool (by car rather than train[+tram])

Looking at what ran the last train back would have been the 1841 from Preston, which given where I was at didn't finish until 6pm and would have been at least 20 minutes to get to Blackpool North that would have been too early (3 scheduled after that all cancelled).

I got as far as walking round to the train station this morning as it was showing a delayed train at 0845, which I think was this one https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:L34403/2023-10-07/detailed - by the time I got to the station it was showing as delayed to about 0922 and a waiting room full of people so I gave up on it then without waiting. Confusingly it shows that one as cancelled between Edinburgh and Preston - could it have set off and given up partway?

The only Avanti train that did run anywhere near that time was this one https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:00822/2023-10-07/detailed
Given the disruption why wouldn't they have given it a stop order for Penrith? Half of that waiting room of passengers wouldn't have been stuck until the first southbound Transpennine turned up. Is it just a case of busy planners reworking the timetable and not enough time to think of things like that, or could it have been because the train was already full?

 

[D6130]

156485 3270

Welcome to the Forums! Not quite sure what this means...is it some sort of secret code?

 

[1D54]

AWC employee??

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

That's absolutely understandable in Scotland where there was a severe weather decision to close the network.

Not disputing that but the weather alert was not across the whole of Scotland is the issue and a yellow alert shouldn't necessitate a system wide response but ought to be targeted to areas of know risk. An amber risk is a fair trigger for a closures and a red warning for a wider geographic response. I'm surmising that as one of the concerns from Carmont was control being overloaded and potentially losing sight of all the incidents that one way to mitigate that risk was to impose a network wide restriction. ie dont wait for incident to occur to decide on response preempt that they might occur anywhere. I guess it depends whether we see more network wide restrictions in response to weather alerts as to whether there is a challenge from others outside the industry over a different approach.

 

[josh-j]

That would make a lot of sense if that's the reason. And it must be difficult to know precisely what the risk of a similar "control overload" situation happening is for any particular weather event.

 

[yorksrob]

Not disputing that but the weather alert was not across the whole of Scotland is the issue and a yellow alert shouldn't necessitate a system wide response but ought to be targeted to areas of know risk. An amber risk is a fair trigger for a closures and a red warning for a wider geographic response. I'm surmising that as one of the concerns from Carmont was control being overloaded and potentially losing sight of all the incidents that one way to mitigate that risk was to impose a network wide restriction. ie dont wait for incident to occur to decide on response preempt that they might occur anywhere. I guess it depends whether we see more network wide restrictions in response to weather alerts as to whether there is a challenge from others outside the industry over a different approach.

I'm not arguing the decision in Scotland.

The atrocious weather conditions clearly justified it.

My concern is more about the WCMl where there were no such weather warnings.

 

[muz379]

Yet again, you’re making the wrong assumption.

People are not criticising the fact that services have been canned where essential.

Most of the anger is directed at Preston - Carlisle and other, unaffected (or lesser affected) parts of Scotland which do not at all justify the level of service cuts seen.

You have repeated this a few times in the thread , and whilst from what I gather this is your primary concern , some posters did and continue to question the decision in areas that have faced extremely challenging conditions today . Some even made laughable comments about front line staff being in the wrong job if they cant go out in a bit of extreme weather .


As for Avanti and to a lesser extent TPE . I totally agree that they need a better contingency when things like this happen . Although TPE at least did run about half of their services to Carlisle not sure on their capacity to run much more than this without their glasgow traincrew

For Avanti their traincrew route knowledge situation is more restrictive so I think a sensible contingency would be to split the trains and turn back everything at Preston . Then running whatever they can North as a shuttle .

Contingency plans are however also not a catch all , every situation is going to be different , prime example if the line is properly shut they might have units stranded and so ability to run the above mentioned plan is impacted. What is a better siuation is to have adequate skillful controllers working in well staffed control centres backed by competent on call management to support when necessary in situations like this .

These situations are often fluid and those in control charged with making those decisions have to react dynamically to the situation on the ground as it develops . In my experience at a few TOC's as well I know that currently staff shortages in those control functions are just as acute as with traincrew and can severely impact the ability to make these decisions and have them communicated out (internally let alone externally) . The same Morale issues effecting traincrew goodwill are also present in the back office functions at many TOC's including control , planning even some management to a degree .

The other problem is the difficulty recruiting road transport if the train plan falls to pieces .This evidenced and subject of discussion in a long thread on this forum , obviously getting road transport in the area experiencing the severe weather is a non starter , but road transport is often recruited from such wide areas these days as well meaning many of the usual options might be in areas effected by severe weather .

 

[Strathclyder]

This ScotRail photo at Dalmarnock is pretty worrying. Water should not be seeping through a retaining wall. The works done to the station for the Commonwealth Games didn't really address the long term issues there.

I was going to bring Dalmarnock up in my eariler post, but decided not to given the Commonwealth Games works done to address the chronic flooding issue. Clearly not enough was done here and no doubt NR will be keeping a close eye on that retaining wall. What doesn't help is that housing has been built on the land above that wall on that side of the station in recent years, but whether that has anything at all to do with water leaking out of it like that, I can't, and therefore won't, speculate on.

It looks like the pumps at Dalmuir are overwhelmed:

https://twitter.com/NetworkRailSCOT/status/1710641120286233019

This is very local to me (this is between Clydebank and Dalmuir stations, those tunnels take the line under the Forth & Clyde Canal and their trackwork was recently renewed as part of a £1m project literally at the tail end of last month) and I've never seen flooding that bad here. Nothing will be getting through there for a few days at the very least.

 

[Megafuss]

The Preston/Carlisle thing is something Avanti need to reflect on. However, it's easy to say that from an armchair, without all the facts at hand.....

HOWEVER, I think they were 100% right to discourage people from travelling, even if they did manage a couple of services to and from Scotland. I imagine a crush loaded 390 would not be fun to be on if it become stranded at Abington.....

 

[Falcon1200]

It is an underfunded public service. The railway as a whole is not a business. The way to adapt it is to fund it properly. It won't just happen by itself. That's why I say the government needs to fund it properly.

No realistic level of funding could ever protect the railway from yesterday's biblical rainfall.

Shock news; sometimes it rains a bit in the autumn in Scotland!

There's a worrying precedent being set here - the idea that trains might be cancelled not because of severe weather but because of predicted severe weather.

(Note; Referring to Scotrail, not the WCML situation!)
The railway has in the past effectively promised to run a normal service during forecast extreme weather, ie to get people out and home again, only for the railway to collapse with passengers stranded on trains stuck in the middle of nowhere and services withdrawn at zero notice. Better to tell people in advance that their journey will not be possible. And it did rain 'more than a bit', just as was predicted, yesterday.

 

[gazzaa2]

The Preston/Carlisle thing is something Avanti need to reflect on. However, it's easy to say that from an armchair, without all the facts at hand.....

HOWEVER, I think they were 100% right to discourage people from travelling, even if they did manage a couple of services to and from Scotland. I imagine a crush loaded 390 would not be fun to be on if it become stranded at Abington.....

It'd be like the ECML shutting everything north of Leeds when there's bad weather in Scotland, at least they generally get to Newcastle.

Either Avanti just aren't bothered or Carlisle isn't considered as important as Newcastle. If it was a major city, I suspect they'd make the effort to at least get services to and from there, rather than stopping everything at Preston. Something which often happens on good weather days as well.

 

[MadCommuter]

Even if Avanti terminated everything at Preston to keep to diagrams a d schedules, but then ran a shuttle service to / from Carlisle. Yes, they might need to move a set from Polmadie, but it's far better than what they did.

 

[muz379]

It'd be like the ECML shutting everything north of Leeds when there's bad weather in Scotland, at least they generally get to Newcastle.

Either Avanti just aren't bothered or Carlisle isn't considered as important as Newcastle. If it was a major city, I suspect they'd make the effort to at least get services to and from there, rather than stopping everything at Preston. Something which often happens on good weather days as well.

Difference being of course for LNER all their other drivers depots sign to newcastle and as I understand it edinburgh drivers do not sign south of Newcastle . So its easy to cut out the portion crewed by Scottish crews .

For Avanti on the WCML that cut off for is Preston . Perhaps that makes the argument for London crews to have route knowledge to Carlisle and for Avanti to use Carlisle as a relieving point instead , ofc you would have to convince the DFT to fund such extension of route learning . And carry the cost of the dead time that will then be introduced on some diagrams for Preston Drivers to travel up to Carlisle to relieve . And it still won't be a catch all because it might still be decided to turn stuff back at Preston to keep to time if sets are trapped elsewhere on the network .

Its nothing to do with it being considered more of less important . It is simply what they can quickly put plans in place to deliver as a base contingency plan in a short space of time . Yesterday it turned out they could deliver more but did not communicate that externally which clearly needs reviewing although I still think some caution over how that is communicated is needed .

 

[dk1]

Difference being of course for LNER all their other drivers depots sign to newcastle and as I understand it edinburgh drivers do not sign south of Newcastle . So its easy to cut out the portion crewed by Scottish crews .

For Avanti on the WCML that cut off for is Preston . Perhaps that makes the argument for London crews to have route knowledge to Carlisle and for Avanti to use Carlisle as a relieving point instead , ofc you would have to convince the DFT to fund such extension of route learning . And carry the cost of the dead time that will then be introduced on some diagrams for Preston Drivers to travel up to Carlisle to relieve . And it still won't be a catch all because it might still be decided to turn stuff back at Preston to keep to time if sets are trapped elsewhere on the network .

Its nothing to do with it being considered more of less important . It is simply what they can quickly put plans in place to deliver as a base contingency plan in a short space of time . Yesterday it turned out they could deliver more but did not communicate that externally which clearly needs reviewing although I still think some caution over how that is communicated is needed .

It would be ASLEF that need convincing rather than DfT. Differing depots route learning other depots routes/work is very controversial indeed.

 

[gazzaa2]

Difference being of course for LNER all their other drivers depots sign to newcastle and as I understand it edinburgh drivers do not sign south of Newcastle . So its easy to cut out the portion crewed by Scottish crews .

For Avanti on the WCML that cut off for is Preston . Perhaps that makes the argument for London crews to have route knowledge to Carlisle and for Avanti to use Carlisle as a relieving point instead , ofc you would have to convince the DFT to fund such extension of route learning . And carry the cost of the dead time that will then be introduced on some diagrams for Preston Drivers to travel up to Carlisle to relieve . And it still won't be a catch all because it might still be decided to turn stuff back at Preston to keep to time if sets are trapped elsewhere on the network .

Its nothing to do with it being considered more of less important . It is simply what they can quickly put plans in place to deliver as a base contingency plan in a short space of time . Yesterday it turned out they could deliver more but did not communicate that externally which clearly needs reviewing although I still think some caution over how that is communicated is needed .

Avanti should only have the West Coast contract Preston to London, if they were getting renewed. Anything north of Preston may as well go to Scot Rail or another franchise.

 

[dk1]

Avanti should only have the West Coast contract Preston to London, if they were getting renewed. Anything north of Preston may as well go to Scot Rail or another franchise.

How would that work as a through service from London-Glasgow?

 

[gazzaa2]

How would that work as a through service from London-Glasgow?

The point being, Avanti shouldn't have the contract if they can't be relied on to run the full route, you may as well split it in 2.

 

[Wallsendmag]

It'd be like the ECML shutting everything north of Leeds when there's bad weather in Scotland, at least they generally get to Newcastle.

Either Avanti just aren't bothered or Carlisle isn't considered as important as Newcastle. If it was a major city, I suspect they'd make the effort to at least get services to and from there, rather than stopping everything at Preston. Something which often happens on good weather days as well.

No it wouldn't because KGX crews work to Newcastle.

How would that work as a through service from London-Glasgow?

There are through services worked by two TOCs NCL-GLC via Carlisle

 

[dk1]

No it wouldn't because KGX crews work to Newcastle.


There are through services worked by two TOCs NCL-GLC via Carlisle

I know of that service well as have used it many times. It was just for operational convenience more than anything else. Does that still exist though?

The point being, Avanti shouldn't have the contract if they can't be relied on to run the full route, you may as well split it in 2.

I cannot imagine that Scotrail would run it any better.

 

[swt_passenger]

There are through services worked by two TOCs NCL-GLC via Carlisle

Not since May 2022, I think it was discussed here at the time.

 

[dk1]

Not since May 2022, I think it was discussed here at the time.

I thought that was the case.