Just a word of warning to you all to prepare for meltdown towards the end of March. FGW currentley has local resource managers in place at Bristol, Exeter, Par, Westbury, Fratton etc. The duties of these managers include supervising train crew as they book on, notifying them of any changes to their jobs, units etc. They also are on hand locally to sort out any problems quickly. ie: failure of units, train crew not available to work a service etc. Because they are LOCAL they can often sort out problems very quickly by using spare train crew or units, or by creative use of the resources available to them. An example is splitting 2 153's that are already in service, to use one to replace a failed unit. This would otherwise result in a cancellation. This system was what Wessex used.

Because FGW can save money by getting rid of these jobs, from some time at the end of March, this is all going to be controlled centrally from FGW control in Swindon, by someone with possibly no local knowledge of certain routes. FGW have been warned repeatedly that this system will not work, and result in many, many cancellations, but with their usual head in the sand attitude are continuing with this anyway.

A footnote to this subject is that this was supposed to happen at the end of last year, but because they realise what a good job the resource managers do, it has been put off til this point, and i hope the reason is that they have a better system in place. I don't think so some how........ Be warned!