At FTW you aren’t allowed onto the platform until around 15 mins before departure. A member of staff checks your ticket and directs you to the correct coach as you enter the platform. If you are connecting from the Mallaig train then you’d bypass the ticket check.
When I did my journey the seated coach was almost fully booked, never seen it so full (and I’ve done the journey several times before).
They've never been used on the Inverness portion. Will need two 73/9s and there aren't sufficient while the rest get Dellners fitted.
All 73/9s have Dellners and CAF mods now - keep up at the back!! (73970 last to be done and emerged from Brush in May.)They've never been used on the Inverness portion. Will need two 73/9s and there aren't sufficient while the rest get Dellners fitted.
The 66 + 73/9 combinations were mostly used in the early days of the 73/9s on the beds when they had alternator issues (now rectified). The 66s were used to provide the traction, but as they don't have ETH the 73/9s were there to provide the power to the stock.Ok thanks that explains it. I thought I’d seen some time ago they had started working in pairs or with a 66. Must have been a test run.
No checking when we boarded at Waverley in June, no reservations honoured, just first come first served. Got packed by Glasgow and standing before FW. Squashed into sharing four seater tables not want you want during 12 and a half hour journey!
Why don't they put labels on the seats? It would avoid a lot of these problems and make everyone's journey a bit more relaxing and less prone to conflict.
I don't disagree in principle - I do think the guard should check that no one is sitting in someone else's seat, and that ideally passengers shouldn't be put in the position of having to ask each other to move (I feel similarly about enforcement of quiet coach quietness as it happens).Why doesn't everyone just sit in their booked seat? It's not like there isn't a seat selector that you are encouraged to use (unlike VTWC's which is a bit hidden at the end of the purchase process), and ticket offices should be able to do specific seats, so if you don't have a satisfactory seat and it was available at the time of booking that's your loss.
In my view the guard should enforce use of the correct seats on reservations compulsory trains. If I board en-route I should not have to ask anyone to move, nor take a less favourable seat than I have agreed at the time of booking unless a change of rolling stock was necessary.
Funnily enough i was only thinking today where 92044 has been not seen it about for ages take it had been stuck down at the tunnel for a while.92 044 let out to play on the Down Highlander tonight (1S25)
Yup, agreed that would be reasonable. If you can find them, which is not impossible but they are often somewhere else on the train.Presumably the staff know which seats are spare, so would not a reasonable way to deal with that be just to say to the guard you're not happy with your seat and ask if another is free? That's how things work on a plane.
044 and 032 have been spending most of their days at the tunnel lately.Funnily enough i was only thinking today where 92044 has been not seen it about for ages take it had been stuck down at the tunnel for a while.
Why doesn't everyone just sit in their booked seat? It's not like there isn't a seat selector that you are encouraged to use ...
They're also the last two yet to receive the full "reliability mods" hence they're generally allocated to the tunnel and only used occasionally on the beds these days.044 and 032 have been spending most of their days at the tunnel lately.
Just out of interest, from YouTube videos I've seen, people seem to film a lot of the trip when most people would be sleeping, quite often out of the door windows. Have any of you done this and seen the Sleeper passing in the opposite direction?
It has done for the last two or three summers yes. An encouraging sign - I hope - of its increasing popularity (and maybe even validation for those of us who said the proposal to axe it back in the 90s was short sighted).Interesting that the Aberdeen sleeper only has 4 coaches, would’ve expected more to be on this portion. So does the FW portion have 6 coaches in summer? I know in winter it’s down to 4 (or it was last time I travelled on it).
It has done for the last two or three summers yes. An encouraging sign - I hope - of its increasing popularity (and maybe even validation for those of us who said the proposal to axe it back in the 90s was short sighted).
Of course it may also indicate dwindling demand on the Aberdeen run.
There's more to the Aberdeen section than Aberdeen and there's already signs that they're promoting more to the tourist market with, for example, transport provided between Leuchars and St Andrews. We can only hope that this will grow when the new trains arrive.I wondered if at some point there may be an argument for running the Fort William seated/lounge coaches through, and demoting the Aberdeen ones to be the ones that are attached/detached at Edinburgh (sorry Aberdonians).
I wondered if at some point there may be an argument for running the Fort William seated/lounge coaches through, and demoting the Aberdeen ones to be the ones that are attached/detached at Edinburgh (sorry Aberdonians).