"First Great Western wins operator of year at ceremony" - Wales Online (13/2/10)

[Lee]

From Wales Online:

First Great Western wins ‘operator of year’ at ceremony

South Wales mainline operator First Great Western has been named Train Operator of the Year.

The company saw off competition from the likes of Chiltern Railways, London Underground and National Express to win the accolade at the Rail Business Awards on Thursday.

The company was bottom of the industry performance tables two years ago but has had a revival of fortunes over the past 18 months which has seen 92% of trains turn up on time and customer satisfaction scores rise 10 points to top 80%.

Mark Hopwood, managing director of First Great Western, said: “This is a really fantastic achievement – we have come a long way in providing a good service for our customers.

“There is still more to do, but I’m really proud of everyone and what we have achieved so far.”

Judges who gave First Great Western the award said: “The joint efforts of colleagues across the company have seen First Great Western move from bottom of the industry performance league table to seventh place out of more than 19 train operators.”

[Graham Ellis]

Good to see this .. though it must be stressed that the win was for "most improved" rather than for "best" ... and it was pointed out elsewhere that FGW had got themselves into such a dreadful pickle that the only way they had to go was up 

But that haven't sorted out the TransWilts service yet!   It's down to less that half of what it was when First took over - yet it links major and growing population centres.  And yesterday - again (I thing for the third or fourth day this year) - they cancelled all services via Melksham.  Get yer fingers out, everyone!