Another train left Guildford early this morning. I was told by a member of staff it was 2 minutes early. It was quite that in real terms. http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/W12845/2014/09/19/advanced
Guards are humans and humans make mistakes. I wonder if there could ever be a system which alerts them as to when it's time to close the doors? I mean there are bleeps to tell people the doors are closing.
It's the third or fourth time it's happened to me since June 2013 and only ever on the Cobham line. I wonder how many times it happened to services I've not been travelling on? I travel on a variety of services at different times, not always on the Cobham line. I guess that is still a very small percentage compared to the number of services that run on that line across a year during peak morning rush hour.
I had particularly decided to catch the 8.36 because it has a loo on board. The 8.46, via Woking, to Surbiton, is very slow and doesn't. There are no other trains around this time that go to Surbiton with loos or connecting services with loos either.
The train should leave 8.36 but the guard closed the doors 8.34 and 30 seconds and it left just before 8.35. I arrived as I heard a whisle and thought it's for another platform. Then the doors closed. Someone else then joined me and the guard clearly saw us standing there. He boarded and the train pulled off as I was still pressing the door button, in the vain hope he might realise his mistake and reopened it. I guess I could have shouted out, nicely of course, it's leaving too early but it all seemed to happen before that thought occurred to me. He may not have heard me anyway as it was platform 1, which is a bay platform so he was half way down the bay platform and I was at the end of it.
By this time another bloke had joined us. He thought he had time to get a coffee before it left.
We were given complaint forms and told the guard is suppose to go by the clock on the platform. Interestingly I don't think the 8.07 has ever left early when I've been catching it, yet given all other peak services leave at 06, 16 or 36, you'd think it might. However it may be that another service coming in always stops the signal going green so early.
Guards are humans and humans make mistakes. I wonder if there could ever be a system which alerts them as to when it's time to close the doors? I mean there are bleeps to tell people the doors are closing.
It's the third or fourth time it's happened to me since June 2013 and only ever on the Cobham line. I wonder how many times it happened to services I've not been travelling on? I travel on a variety of services at different times, not always on the Cobham line. I guess that is still a very small percentage compared to the number of services that run on that line across a year during peak morning rush hour.
I had particularly decided to catch the 8.36 because it has a loo on board. The 8.46, via Woking, to Surbiton, is very slow and doesn't. There are no other trains around this time that go to Surbiton with loos or connecting services with loos either.
The train should leave 8.36 but the guard closed the doors 8.34 and 30 seconds and it left just before 8.35. I arrived as I heard a whisle and thought it's for another platform. Then the doors closed. Someone else then joined me and the guard clearly saw us standing there. He boarded and the train pulled off as I was still pressing the door button, in the vain hope he might realise his mistake and reopened it. I guess I could have shouted out, nicely of course, it's leaving too early but it all seemed to happen before that thought occurred to me. He may not have heard me anyway as it was platform 1, which is a bay platform so he was half way down the bay platform and I was at the end of it.
By this time another bloke had joined us. He thought he had time to get a coffee before it left.
We were given complaint forms and told the guard is suppose to go by the clock on the platform. Interestingly I don't think the 8.07 has ever left early when I've been catching it, yet given all other peak services leave at 06, 16 or 36, you'd think it might. However it may be that another service coming in always stops the signal going green so early.