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Topic: And more cancellations .... (Read 2679 times)
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Graham Ellis
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I don't know whether to laugh or cry ....
Two customers leaving on the 17:02, so I checked on line. Cancelled say the web site. And for the following train too. Phoned the National Rail Enquiry line who confirmed that it was indeed cancelled and told me that they didn't know of any alternative plans. Advise was for my customers to wait for the 21:33.
In the post this morning, a long waited answer from my MP with a copy of a letter from Derek Twigg. Not a great deal new - still a statement that traffic levels are low and no answer to my questions that asks what they (DfT) actually mean by "low" - at what point they would consider the service to be in a more supportable category. If the advise in the event of a cancelled train is for passengers to wait four and a half hours for the next one, I'm not surprised that ticket sales are only 27000 a year. Frankly, I'm surprised they're than high!
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Graham Ellis
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an update on this thread ...
We had customers commuting by train to Melksham on Thursday and Friday last week for a course - or so they (and we) had hoped.
On Thursday, they travelled on the 08:30 Bristol to London express to Chippenham, changed into the Melksham train there, and arrived on time. A good journey - how it should be.
Thursday evening and the 17:02 from Melksham was cancelled. I telephone National Rail Enquiries to ask about alternative arrangements and was told that they knew of none and that the next train was at 21:33. I put my customers on the bus to Bath!
Friday morning, and I got a phone call from Bath. The Bristol express was being diverted and after Bath it wasn't stopping until Reading; no-one at Bath could tell them when the next service to Chippenham would be, and in any case the connection would have long gone. They got the bus again and arrived with us about an hour late and not in the best of spirits / moods.
On Friday evening, they didn't even try for the train ... and who can blame them?
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Sion Bretton
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Train was cancelled again tonight from Chippenham 17.59
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Graham Ellis
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 I was going to automatically monitor the live train site to see what they say about every train five minutes before it leaves (since I've not got any statistics for our individual line on cancellations) but it's got a file there that tells me that automated "spider" programs are unwelcome. The line manager tells us (most recently at the West Wilts user group meeting at Melksham Town Hall in November) that we suffer no more that the other lines in terms of cancellations. A newsletter recently from Wessex Trains tells that 99.2% of their trains ran in the last four week period - which would work out as just 3 trains cancelled in the whole of November. The information really doesn't add up - perhaps a train doesn't count as a cancellation unless it fails to reach its destination and I did notice the evening Swindon to Southampton train last Thursday ... starting at Westbury and heading South.
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Graham Ellis
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Perhaps the 17:02 didn't count as a cancellation then ...
The Melksham line was shut for planned engineering work, thus ...... Once the line was reopened the first train would have been the 2133.
So that's the line closed for engineering works not only on Saturdays and Sundays, but also at peak hours during the week.
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