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Trains across Britain missed stops 160 times a day, BBC reports

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3141

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The BBC has used a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain statistics about the number of trains that miss scheduled stops. The link is below. I know I'm supposed to post the article itself, but it includes several photos and a video, and I don't know if I should include them as well.

I think the most interesting bit is the bar chart showing that Heathrow Express didn't miss out any stops. I suspect the BBC journalists don't realise how unlikely it is that they would.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-43701210

Trains in Britain missed scheduled stops at stations on average 160 times a day, the BBC has learned.

More than 52,500 services out of a planned six million had one or more "failure to stop" (FTS) events in the financial year up to 23 February.

Govia Thameslink (GTR) - which runs Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern - accounted for 16,000 of those.

A spokesman said skipping stops was a "last resort when a train running late would otherwise prolong disruption".

From April 2017 to February 2018, 17 in every 1,000 planned GTR trains missed one or more stops - about 50 per day. This is more than double the national average for train operators...
 
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pdeaves

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With the 'shock, horror' feel of the article, I thought it would be something to worry about. There are two types of 'fail to call', the more concerning of which is driver error. The other is where control instigates a non-stop for 'keeping things moving' reasons. In many cases, it is not possible to call at all stations during disruption.

I am sure the BBC would moan if, for example, a London-Bristol Temple Meads train sits blocking the junction at Wootton Bassett so it can call at Chippenham at some unknown time, rather than taking the diversion via Bristol Parkway to clear the line and get as many passengers as possible to their destination as close to time as possible.

Equally, I am sure they would moan if trains disgorge their passengers right next to a fatality clean-up! Skipping the stop is the fairest course of action to the majority.
 

Dr_Paul

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I also saw that mention of the Heathrow Express and thought it amusing.

It's not that uncommon for all-station services that are running late to and from Waterloo, such as the Kingston loop, to run non-stop to make up time. It's rather nice if travelling to Kingston to go non-stop, usually down the fast line to New Malden then across to the slow and then off towards Norbiton, or non-stop from Kingston to Waterloo, but not so much fun if one has boarded for a station in between and has to alight and wait for the next one which will stop. I have noticed each time this has happened to me, that the guard and station tannoy have clearly and repeatedly notified passengers on the train and on the platform respectively that the service will be running fast.
 

Tunnel Bore

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It must be a no-news day.........

Skipping stops is a real problem and I see it often as a GTR commuter. Sometimes the train is not hugely late, sometimes 15 minutes, but will have all stops removed between Gatwick and Brighton. Lots of people planning to alight at the 7 intermediate stations have to get off at Gatwick and wait for a following service that will stop. For some of us that is one hour later. In that event we get the platform staff to call control to add a stop to another service which just means a following train has a longer journey so that the skip-stop train makes up a little time. It is a hassle for passengers, platform staff and drivers and leaves passengers angry and frustrated.
 

rebmcr

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I would much rather have skip stops on the District line, where the recovery strategy is instead to divert to "shorter" termini.

All too often (once or twice in a fortnight of 10 working days) I'll let two or more Wimbledon-bound trains go past, then board the Ealing/Richmond behind, only for it to also be redirected to Wimbledon — leaving a 20+ minute gap on the western branches in the morning peak, just to recover the off-peak service a little bit quicker!

Turfing out at Earl's Court leaves the poor choice between now-overcrowded Piccadilly line passageways, or an indeterminate wait for the next District to escape the controller's axe... A much more passenger-friendly solution would be to run the service on the right line and call at principal stations only.
 

RichJF

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Skipping stops is a real problem and I see it often as a GTR commuter. Sometimes the train is not hugely late, sometimes 15 minutes, but will have all stops removed between Gatwick and Brighton. Lots of people planning to alight at the 7 intermediate stations have to get off at Gatwick and wait for a following service that will stop. For some of us that is one hour later. In that event we get the platform staff to call control to add a stop to another service which just means a following train has a longer journey so that the skip-stop train makes up a little time. It is a hassle for passengers, platform staff and drivers and leaves passengers angry and frustrated.

When I used to commute on Southern, I've known a train to be as little as 4-5 mins late & skip stop every intermediate station between Horsham/Croydon/Norwood Jnc & London Bridge. This results in the train sitting in the platform early, blocking the paths of other trains that are on time!
I've also been on a Thameslink 377 & many Southern trains that skipped stations with no notice on the platforms or onboard causing mass consternation.

The best example I've ever seen was a couple of months ago:
Delayed Victoria-East Grinstead train arrives at Croydon, on time London Bridge-East Grinstead arrives into subsequent platform. 1st train advised fast to Oxted. 2nd train gets ready to depart so everyone dashes across to 2nd train which leaves first. This proceeds to stop at every station on the line.
Following train still fast to Oxted but then has to pause at each station platform, not opening the doors behind the other train. This made it even later than it was before. This train was then terminated at Oxted, sent to Hurst Green, then sat blocking the line while it waited for the return slot to London, which was then delayed & skipped a couple of stations again!
You may as well have stopped both trains in this instance.
 

Clip

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It's basically train cancellations. It's not really something I expected to see on the homepage of the BBC News website.
Why not? It is news and can impact large amounts of people so why shouldnt it be news when people pay a lot of money to travel?

Yes, we all know why it happens and im sure a large number of the public do too but many dont and probably are nto aware of the scale of the problem.
 

AlterEgo

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Why not? It is news and can impact large amounts of people so why shouldnt it be news when people pay a lot of money to travel?

Yes, we all know why it happens and im sure a large number of the public do too but many dont and probably are nto aware of the scale of the problem.

That doesn't in itself make it a news story worthy of the front page of the national broadcaster. People unaffected by this are not likely to be interested, as the fact that it is no longer on the homepage, and not on the Most Popular page, would testify.

As another poster said, it must be a slow news day.
 

Moonshot

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I'd be interested to know the number of additional station stops made.

Indeed....this is often forgotten about. The other day we ( Northern ) had to skip a number of stops out of Vic to Leeds for disruption....but the omitted stops were actually inserted on a service 5 mins behind. As always, its a one sided story.
 

Clip

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That doesn't in itself make it a news story worthy of the front page of the national broadcaster. People unaffected by this are not likely to be interested, as the fact that it is no longer on the homepage, and not on the Most Popular page, would testify.

As another poster said, it must be a slow news day.

I'm not affected by the bombing in Syria right now so why should i be interested or it being on the front page?

Whether or not people read a story is irrelevant in whether it should be on the front page of the beebs website. It was something they investigated so of course they're going to push it.
 
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Ianno87

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I'd be interested to know the number of additional station stops made.

...and the total number of planned station stops every day across the country. Which will make 160 seem very tiny indeed.
 

WelshBluebird

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I am sure the BBC would moan if, for example, a London-Bristol Temple Meads train sits blocking the junction at Wootton Bassett so it can call at Chippenham at some unknown time, rather than taking the diversion via Bristol Parkway to clear the line and get as many passengers as possible to their destination as close to time as possible.

I'd say it would depend on what arrangements (if any!) were made for passengers waiting to alight or board at Chippenham! Far too often, at least in my experience, arrangements aren't made, and passengers are left to wait for whenever the next service may turn up (if at all).
 

matt_world2004

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Indeed....this is often forgotten about. The other day we ( Northern ) had to skip a number of stops out of Vic to Leeds for disruption....but the omitted stops were actually inserted on a service 5 mins behind. As always, its a one sided story.
Thats not much good if you are already on the train though
 

Taunton

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A principal reason for skipping intermediate stops is unrealistically short turnround times which give little scope for recovering delays. Bedford to Brighton on Thameslink is one with notably short times at the terminus before starting the return, a lengthy and complex journey, and seems particularly prone to this. When Thameslink first opened (and this issue didn't seem to happen) there were reasonable turnround times, which have been steadily whittled down.

Those writing here about "hey ho get the next one" or "slow news day for the media" really have no concept of customer service.
 

matt_world2004

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Announcement: "Would passengers for x, y and z please alight here and join the next service". Simple.
Usually that does not happen on the trains that I have been on that skips stops. Most of the time they announce they are skipping stops after leaving the last non skipped stop. Or if they do make an announcement, it does not inform the passengers the next service they can get on.
 

James James

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Meanwhile in Switzerland, I remember seeing a headline the one time a few years back where a train driver forgot to stop their train at an intermediate station. There's one IC that travels between 2 major cities non-stop, and there's an IR that does the same route but stops at a major junction half-way, followed by a few more regional stops. Driver on the former thought he was on the latter, had a green signal at the junction station, didn't stop, and later got a call from the conductor explaining the passengers were a bit surprised.

(Not that trains never get cancelled or delayed here, but removing stops ain't normal.)
 
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Andyh82

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Very tabloid clickbait headline, makes it sound like the trains didn’t stop because the driver forgot. I’d expect better from the BBC.
 

jfisher21

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Forest Hill and other stations between Brockey and Anerley get skipped a lot on London Bridge - Victoria / Caterham services. Train may only be 5 minutes late leaving London Bridge!
 

Dr Hoo

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Can someone who is familiar with current rail industry processes clarify whether 'failure to call' is solely related to 'skipped' intermediate calls (with the train still completing its full diagram)?

To my mind a train that is terminated short also 'fails to call' albeit this is commonly described as 'part cancelled'.

In my own experience, typically on well over 1,000 train journeys per year, I have hardly ever experienced skip stopping purely for the purposes of service recovery. There have been more cases of services being diverted to avoid a problem suffering the side effect of having to miss a call. For example a Hull Trains journey diverted via Lincoln and thus missing Retford because of a line blockage near Retford. I have been on quite a few services that have been terminated short either for service recovery or line blocked ahead and can well believe an overall figure of around 1% of calls missed (besides full cancellations).
 

Wombat

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Usually that does not happen on the trains that I have been on that skips stops. Most of the time they announce they are skipping stops after leaving the last non skipped stop. Or if they do make an announcement, it does not inform the passengers the next service they can get on.
Perhaps it depends on the TOC and/or the line. In my experience SWR, despite my current (and possibly unreasonable) disgruntlement with them, are good at frequently reiterating the fact that stops will be skipped while there's still a chance to disembark.
 

Bevan Price

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Announcement: "Would passengers for x, y and z please alight here and join the next service". Simple.

That's OK if the P/A is working clearly in every coach (which it sometimes doesn't), and isn't being drowned by a group of screaming brats - or the staff member does not make announcements when the train is in a tunnel and you are on a noisy dmu....(All of which I have encountered repeatedly - fortunately not announcements about about skipping stops.)
 

TheEdge

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Forest Hill and other stations between Brockey and Anerley get skipped a lot on London Bridge - Victoria / Caterham services. Train may only be 5 minutes late leaving London Bridge!

5 minutes from London Bridge? Bearing in mind that trains are timetabled to the 30 seconds that, at a scheduling level, its a fairly decent delay, and plenty enough to cause clashes at junctions and the like. So a train leaving or arriving into a really busy location, like say, London Bridge, has the chance to snowball into much bigger delays very fast.
 

sbt

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In my own experience, typically on well over 1,000 train journeys per year, I have hardly ever experienced skip stopping purely for the purposes of service recovery.

I think that this may be part of a hidden aspect of the problem. The problem is not evenly spread. There are certain services that are more prone to 'Skip Stopping' than others. Both my previous and current commute home (outward seems OK) are prone to it. Just last week 45 minutes was added to a 50 minute commute due to 'skip stopping'. This is routine, I know my commute will probably be nearly doubled, at a minimum, several times a month, sometimes several times a week.

These days the operator (just changed but no noticeable change in approach between SWT and SWR yet) is much better than c. 10 years ago. Last decade being stranded with no service to my destination, whilst services ran past it, for two hours plus happened two to three times a year. These days operators do seem much more willing to add extra stops to other services to get you home or even to run Taxis for the few of us heading for minor stations. Gone are the days when we could be dumped out and left in sub-zero temperatures with no information or warm shelter for 40 minutes whilst train after train ran past without stopping. At least I hope so.
 

infobleep

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With the 'shock, horror' feel of the article, I thought it would be something to worry about. There are two types of 'fail to call', the more concerning of which is driver error. The other is where control instigates a non-stop for 'keeping things moving' reasons. In many cases, it is not possible to call at all stations during disruption.

I am sure the BBC would moan if, for example, a London-Bristol Temple Meads train sits blocking the junction at Wootton Bassett so it can call at Chippenham at some unknown time, rather than taking the diversion via Bristol Parkway to clear the line and get as many passengers as possible to their destination as close to time as possible.

Equally, I am sure they would moan if trains disgorge their passengers right next to a fatality clean-up! Skipping the stop is the fairest course of action to the majority.
The thing is. Sometimes they skip stations and other times they delay trains to make additional stops. Both are valid but I suspect many don't unseeunder the reasons for it and think if one happens why is the other happening. Insert of course which ever course of action a passenger wants.
 

FOH

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I love how it says skip stops are a last resort. On Southern Metro it’s seemingly a first resort.
 
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