Grand Central - how are they doing? Future plans?

[70014IronDuke]

The thread on the failed KX - Sunderland evening service on Friday has prompted me to ask: how is the company doing?

Are these Sunderland and Bradford services a success? Who uses them? (I say that knowing that a friend of mine, a businessman, uses the Bradford trains once a week from Mirfield or somewhere like that- he seems happy enough. He works on the train, so doesn't mind the slow bit to Doncaster.)

How much have they carved out a new market, and how much abstracted from Virgin East Coast?

And what is the deal when they fail? VTEC seem to have to take up the slack. Is there any payback for VTEC? Can they put passengers on GC when the wires come down between Donny and Peterborough?

Finally, as someone mentioned on the failed-train thread, it is a bit of a small operator. About eight or ten trains per day, something like that?Difficult to avoid high overheads relative to the trains run, I'd have thought. Do they have plans for further expansion, either on the current routes or on new ones?

 

[swt class 450]

The thread on the failed KX - Sunderland evening service on Friday has prompted me to ask: how is the company doing?

Are these Sunderland and Bradford services a success? Who uses them? (I say that knowing that a friend of mine, a businessman, uses the Bradford trains once a week from Mirfield or somewhere like that- he seems happy enough. He works on the train, so doesn't mind the slow bit to Doncaster.)

How much have they carved out a new market, and how much abstracted from Virgin East Coast?

And what is the deal when they fail? VTEC seem to have to take up the slack. Is there any payback for VTEC? Can they put passengers on GC when the wires come down between Donny and Peterborough?

Finally, as someone mentioned on the failed-train thread, it is a bit of a small operator. About eight or ten trains per day, something like that?Difficult to avoid high overheads relative to the trains run, I'd have thought. Do they have plans for further expansion, either on the current routes or on new ones?

There are planning on taking the Great Western Railway 180s when the 800 / 801 / 802 get introduced (to replace their HSTs) and from what i have heard possibly the First Hull Trains 180s as well. So its possible they might run an increased frequency on both their Bradford Interchange and Sunderland routes in the future. I know they have had plans in the past for five or six other routes but nothing has happened so far.

 

[Bungle965]

There are planning on taking the Great Western Railway 180s when the 800 / 801 / 802 get introduced (to replace their HSTs) and from what i have heard possibly the First Hull Trains 180s as well. So its possible they might run an increased frequency on both their Bradford Interchange and Sunderland routes in the future. I know they have had plans in the past for five or six other routes but nothing has happened so far.

But does the Bradford service need more capacity?
I always thought of that service as the lesser profitable one compared to the Sunderland service.
Is there enough capacity for Grand Central to run more trains on the ECML?
The other option would be doubling up the 180s on the busy services to make them 10 car, however again you encounter a problem, this time being that 180s don`t like working in multiple.
Sam

 

[IanXC]

It will be interesting to see how the new VTEC services to Middlesbrough and Bradford Forster Square impact on GC.

It's also worth remembering that the rejected GC application for extra Bradford services, and to start a service to Cleethorpes. Amongst all the other discussion the ORR were positive about Cleethorpes....

 

[swt class 450]

But does the Bradford service need more capacity?
I always thought of that service as the lesser profitable one compared to the Sunderland service.
Is there enough capacity for Grand Central to run more trains on the ECML?
The other option would be doubling up the 180s on the busy services to make them 10 car, however again you encounter a problem, this time being that 180s don`t like working in multiple.
Sam

From what i have seen both their Bradford Interchange and Sunderland routes can get very overcrowded at times. If you look on Twitter there are always people complaining and posting photos of very overcrowded Grand Central trains with people sitting and standing in the aisles.

Coupling up the 180s to run them as 10 coach trains would be a good idea. Out of interest what happens when they get coupled up? I didn't realise they had problems operating in multiple?

Also do 180s have SDO? I presume that the GWR ones need it for Combe / Finstock / Ascott Under Wychwood / Shipton (and possibly a few others) stations? I don't think all stations that GC serve can hold 10 coaches so they would need to use SDO.

 

[yorksrob]

Evening trains back from London always seem busy, so the must be filling a niche.

 

[Robertj21a]

National Express coaches seem very busy in/out of Bradford so there's plenty of market (in total) to aim for.

 

[Andyh82]

It will be interesting to see how the new VTEC services to Middlesbrough and Bradford Forster Square impact on GC.

I might be wrong but I bet the Grand Central traffic from Bradford itself isn't that great as unless you are adamant about not changing, it will take an absolute age to get to London with GC from there, so the extra VTEC services may make little impact. The market from Halifax, Brighouse etc would be unchanged.

In me experience GC is only overcrowded from Doncaster due to the cheaper walk up fares, never on the part of the route that is unique to GC, unless there is a special event going on or a particularly busy time of year.

The 'small company' thing when things go wrong is the main issue for me, with no next service coming along behind anytime soon, cancellations always have to rely on your main competitor who understandably don't bend over backwards to go out of their way, or long winded connecting Northern services, buses etc which end up with a much later arrival time at your destination.

 

[yorksrob]

I might be wrong but I bet the Grand Central traffic from Bradford itself isn't that great as unless you are adamant about not changing, it will take an absolute age to get to London with GC from there, so the extra VTEC services may make little impact. The market from Halifax, Brighouse etc would be unchanged.

In me experience GC is only overcrowded from Doncaster due to the cheaper walk up fares, never on the part of the route that is unique to GC, unless there is a special event going on or a particularly busy time of year.

The 'small company' thing when things go wrong is the main issue for me, with no next service coming along behind anytime soon, cancellations always have to rely on your main competitor who understandably don't bend over backwards to go out of their way, or long winded connecting Northern services, buses etc which end up with a much later arrival time at your destination.

Me and a friend caught the evening GC from Doncaster to Wakefield a couple of weeks ago. We had to walk through a couple of carriages to get a table to ourselves.

 

[Grimsby town]

Do they have plans for further expansion, either on the current routes or on new ones?

According to a 'Friends of the Barton Line' Facebook post the other day, they plan to run a service from Cleethorpes by 2018. I don't know how true or realistic that is but it would make sense with them gaining extra 180's and it could be run by simply splitting 10 cars trains at Doncaster.

 

[Failed Unit]

According to a 'Friends of the Barton Line' Facebook post the other day, they plan to run a service from Cleethorpes by 2018. I don't know how true or realistic that is but it would make sense with them gaining extra 180's and it could be run by simply splitting 10 cars trains at Doncaster.

I bet if the do - East coasts Lincoln service will soon be extended to compete.

 

[ainsworth74]

I think it will be interesting to see what happens once VTECs full time table is up and running around 2021 with extra services to Bradford, Huddersfield, Sunderland and Middlesbrough I think GC will have some serious competition on their hands. Which could prove to be a bit of a show stopper for them. They certainly will become even more reliant on York/Doncaster - London flows to prop themselves up financially (particularly the Bradford route, to be fair the Sunderland route does a decent trade even north of York).

I'm not even sure that adding Cleethorpes would be a massive help for them because I can easily see VTEC deciding to bid to extend some of their Lincolns to Cleethorpes to compete. It's not that far after all from Lincoln.

Me and a friend caught the evening GC from Doncaster to Wakefield a couple of weeks ago. We had to walk through a couple of carriages to get a table to ourselves.

Could you have got two airline seats together? To me not being able to find a table isn't necessarily a sign that a service is busy!

 

[yorksrob]

Could you have got two airline seats together? To me not being able to find a table isn't necessarily a sign that a service is busy!

I don't recall there being a double seat, although our preference was for a table, so we may have ignored some. That said, if the train had substantially emptied out at Donny we would have found it easy to get a table.

 

[Doctor Fegg]

Also do 180s have SDO?

Yes, they do.

 

[47271]

I use them a lot to and from Sunderland, but fortunately my travel times always work so that I'm on an HST and not a horrible 180.

They're okay, the staff are very pleasant and there's always plenty of space to stretch out, either in First, or the declassfied FO that runs at the London end of the HST.

Loadings can be light north of York, but all of the intermediate stations from Thirsk onwards generate a fair bit of traffic.

Sadly I'll be an ex-user when they go over to all 180 operation, I'd rather go via Newcastle than sit on one of those tatty vibrating rattletraps at top speed.

 

[nlogax]

Sadly I'll be an ex-user when they go over to all 180 operation, I'd rather go via Newcastle than sit on one of those tatty vibrating rattletraps at top speed.

Finally used a GC service today from Wakefield to KX as there was precious little running direct all the way down the EC from Leeds. I upgraded myself to first class for fifteen quid and spent a very nice two or three hours in a clean, quiet and comfy 180. Very friendly staff and a rather decent service. Maybe I'm missing something about the 180s but I didn't find a thing wrong with the one I was on..if anything it seemed a much nicer ride than the Mk 4s I've used over the years. Hardly a rattle, squeak or bounce.

That said, Kirkgate is Westgate's much poorer, sparser cousin. Hardly an inviting place to wait for a train in freezing mizzle.

 

[Bungle965]

Finally used a GC service today from Wakefield to KX as there was precious little running direct all the way down the EC from Leeds. I upgraded myself to first class for fifteen quid and spent a very nice two or three hours in a clean, quiet and comfy 180. Very friendly staff and a rather decent service. Maybe I'm missing something about the 180s but I didn't find a thing wrong with the one I was on..if anything it seemed a much nicer ride than the Mk 4s I've used over the years. Hardly a rattle, squeak or bounce.

That said, Kirkgate is Westgate's much poorer, sparser cousin. Hardly an inviting place to wait for a train in freezing mizzle.

I don`t mind 180s I think they are decent units when they work, however the problem with them is that they have and still to some extent having problems with their reliability, they might well have been built by Ansaldobreda.
Sam

 

[Alan2603]

I travel twice, sometimes three times per week from London upto York or occasionally Northallerton (and return of course) on business. I seem to split myself roughly 70%/30% between VTEC and Grand Central (mainly because VTEC have more services at the times I wish to travel).

From my perspective, the plus points of Grand Central seem to be:

Friendlier on board staff
More comfier seats, particularly on the HST's.
Cheaper walk on or short notice fares
More frequent coffee and biscuits served in first class than on VTEC.

The negative points are:

No free food in First Class (unlike VTEC)
Cheaper/ more available Advance 1st class fares on VTEC
A lot fewer services than VTEC
When things go wrong they can go horribly wrong, with very little information given to passengers. Trying to find a Grand Central member of staff at Kings Cross is more or less impossible (Is there really one there?).

I think a lot more ‘leisure’ passengers travel with Grand Central, in proportion with the number/size of their trains than pure ‘Business’ passengers.

But overall I like to travel with both GC and VTEC.

Alan

 

[47271]

Finally used a GC service today from Wakefield to KX as there was precious little running direct all the way down the EC from Leeds. I upgraded myself to first class for fifteen quid and spent a very nice two or three hours in a clean, quiet and comfy 180. Very friendly staff and a rather decent service. Maybe I'm missing something about the 180s but I didn't find a thing wrong with the one I was on..if anything it seemed a much nicer ride than the Mk 4s I've used over the years. Hardly a rattle, squeak or bounce.

That said, Kirkgate is Westgate's much poorer, sparser cousin. Hardly an inviting place to wait for a train in freezing mizzle.

It's a personal thing on the 180s, their underfloor engine vibration at speed makes me queasy. I have the same problem on Voyagers. At least Voyager tables are attached to the wall, my laptop juddering in front of me for hours puts the tin lid on the 180 for me.

 

[Chrisgr31]

I have invariably found I cannot actually get booked on a Grand Central train as they have no service at the time I happen to want to go! I did manage to get booked on them coming back from York once, however on the day the overhead lines were down, so the chaos meant ticket acceptance on VTEC and there was a VTEC train about to leave.

I went to York via Rotherham, had great fun trying to book that as wanted to try a Hull Trains service but could only find a way of doing that by booking Kings Cross to Doncaster, on Kings Cross then Doncaster to Rotherham with Northern. The Hulls train option would not come up on any search London-Rotherham even with need to change at Doncaster. Mind you the split ticket saved about £50

 

[NorthernSpirit]

The problem with running 2x 180's on the Bradford route means that the rear five coaches won't be platformed at Mirfield and at Brighouse (not sure about Halifax or Kirkgate) as I have seen this happen in the past which meant the rear five coaches after Doncaster were for Bradford only not good if someone wants to bail out mid route. I don't suppose that the 180's could be reformed into a nine car unit which would mean using SDO on certain parts of the route, better than being stuck on the wrong unit.

 

[plarailfan]

Grand Central were looking to operate a Blackpool North to Euston service, but I haven't followed their news releases for some time and am not sure how this is progressing.
They do seem to be looking at "open access" opportunities, but the franchise system probably has the potential, to conflict with some of the route options that have been considered in the past.

 

[anti-pacer]

GC trains pass the back of my flat. They're so close I can clearly see the passengers on them, so I can tell you they're well loaded. Also at Wakefield Kirkgate the mid-morning train to London always has plenty getting on it.

They are cheaper generally than VTEC but my two journeys on them haven't been great. I had drunk football fans on to Doncaster coming back from London one Saturday evening. It was a dry train but one bloke near me got past security with his Jack Daniels bottle. Him and his mate just sang the whole way which annoyed a few of us. The staff seemed disinterested in him drinking and generally annoying others.

My other time using them was travelling down to London last May. The buffet had run out of sandwiches by Wakefield as I found out when trying to purchase one. The journey itself wasn't too bad but not as good as VTEC, and the train was quite tatty. I think I actually posted about my journey whilst on that train.

Now when I travel to London, if it's for the day on a Saturday I get the first VTEC out of Wakefield and sit in Standard. It's lovely and quiet for most of the journey down. Coming back in the evening I will travel First Class. If I book in advance the fares are pretty good.

It's VTEC all the way for me.

 

[ainsworth74]

Grand Central were looking to operate a Blackpool North to Euston service, but I haven't followed their news releases for some time and am not sure how this is progressing.
They do seem to be looking at "open access" opportunities, but the franchise system probably has the potential, to conflict with some of the route options that have been considered in the past.

They've been given rights to run Blackpool to Queen's Park (just outside of Euston) and contingent rights into Euston itself (basically if Network Rail can find a path in amongst the Euston rebuild then GC can have it otherwise Queen's Park is their limit). I believe the delay currently is in acquiring suitable rolling stock.

 

[anti-pacer]

They've been given rights to run Blackpool to Queen's Park (just outside of Euston) and contingent rights into Euston itself (basically if Network Rail can find a path in amongst the Euston rebuild then GC can have it otherwise Queen's Park is their limit). I believe the delay currently is in acquiring suitable rolling stock.

In your opinion Ainsworth, would that put passengers off if it terminated at Queen's Park, even though it would give Blackpool another direct train to the capital?

Tube connections are there and let's face it, despite it having the eldest trains on the Underground, the Bakerloo Line is certainly one of the best in terms of where it serves, certainly for day trippers.

 

[Starmill]

Particularly on Saturdays the Bradford trains are very busy both going to London in the morning and returning in the evening. Unfortunately they are very unlikely to attract walk-up off-peak passengers from Doncaster or York because they are not much cheaper.

Using Queens Park would not put me off personally, but they are likely to be quite a bit slower with their odd calling pattern if they use HST.

I have said this a million times, but if they would offer cheaper tickets Bradford and West Yorkshire stations they would get more passengers on this section (and frankly probably passengers who would probably be content to stand). At £9.70 single for just Wakefield to Doncaster, £12.90 for Pontefract to Doncaster and £16.70 for Mirfield, Brighouse, Halifax or Bradford to Doncaster there is loads of room for Grand Central to compete on price here. I don't understand why they won't.

 

[Starmill]

Could you have got two airline seats together? To me not being able to find a table isn't necessarily a sign that a service is busy!

Probably 60% ish load. I tend to find there are not huge numbers of Doncaster passengers, but there are loads from Wakefield and plenty from Mirfield.

 

[anti-pacer]

Particularly on Saturdays the Bradford trains are very busy both going to London in the morning and returning in the evening. Unfortunately they are very unlikely to attract walk-up off-peak passengers from Doncaster or York because they are not much cheaper.

Using Queens Park would not put me off personally, but they are likely to be quite a bit slower with their odd calling pattern if they use HST.

I have said this a million times, but if they would offer cheaper tickets Bradford and West Yorkshire stations they would get more passengers on this section (and frankly probably passengers who would probably be content to stand). At £9.70 single for just Wakefield to Doncaster, £12.90 for Pontefract to Doncaster and £16.70 for Mirfield, Brighouse, Halifax or Bradford to Doncaster there is loads of room for Grand Central to compete on price here. I don't understand why they won't.

So it costs more to travel from Pontefract to Doncaster than it does from Wakefield?

 

[Doctor Fegg]

You don't understand why Arriva-owned Grand Central don't want to undercut Arriva-owned Northern? Really?

 

[Starmill]

You don't understand why Arriva-owned Grand Central don't want to undercut Arriva-owned Northern? Really?

Yeah, because it's been operated by Northern for all this time. And there are no other railway companies who run Doncaster to Wakefield trains. Especially not ones that are faster and more frequent than the Northern services.

Even a Doncaster to Bradford ticket, the vast majority of revenue from that is not going to Northern.

Of course, one can purchase an Advance ticket for the local commuter service from Wakefield to Doncaster for £3 almost all the time, even on all of the busy ones such as the 1710 (WKF - DON) but not for any of the Intercity services. Even the ones where there are free seats.

So it costs more to travel from Pontefract to Doncaster than it does from Wakefield?

That is what I said, yes.

But closer inspection reveals there is now a fare for Pontefract Monkhill to Doncaster But the point stands because there are none for anywhere else.

And at £8.80 for a single I'm not sure I would call it a bargain.