Highlandspring
Established Member
- Joined
- 14 Oct 2017
- Messages
- 2,777
It’s leaving at 2050.
Actually I'd disagree, for the West Highland line the fact that it brings in so many tourists it is a lifeline and its kind of an indication that London does care and does regard particularly Lochaber as something that belongs to the UK and is worth supporting. Id think that would be the case for all the Highlander services to one degree or another and probably so to a lessor extent for the lowlanders.
1B16 likely to be cancelled tonight due to a derailment at Stonehaven.
*edit* I’m told 1B16 will divert via Inverness...
A line blockage at #Stonehaven means our Aberdeen to Euston service tonight is cancelled. Guests are advised to utilise Rail Replacement buses to Edinburgh, with ticket acceptance granted with @scotrail and @CrossCountryUK at stations south of Dundee.
I suspect more would use it if Serco did a re-pricing exercise - just now it's nearly bleeding as much cash as RBS of years past. The last set of accounts don't make for pleasant reading…Certainly the subsidy is very weakly justified if it is not used as a “lifeline” service by Scots.
It's more the Lowlanders I'd see as a concern - there are plenty of day trains and flights. The West Highland, despite BR's attempt to kill it off, is probably the most important one as it is the only way for a Londoner (a huge market) to have a weekend away in the area with no time off work at all - all the other options are likely to at least involve leaving a bit early to get a flight to pick up a hire car to arrive at a reasonable hour when your accommodation is still checking people in - or to get to FW on day trains a generous half day holiday and a long Sunday on trains having had to take a bus due to the lack of a morning train on the line.
I guess that when they discovered that the line wouldn't reopen until tomorrow evening, they realised there was no point. It will mean that the Aberdeen vehicles will swap from one set to the other, assuming things run tomorrow night.
On the main topic, I remain puzzled by the poor performance of the Aberdeen portion. Is it airline competition - but Inverness also has early flights to London?
Is it the frequent stops which must make it difficult to get a good sleep after Edinburgh?
I wonder whether they should make a big bid for the Dundee market, since the city is on the up, and anyone needing to get an early flight to London has a really early start to get to Edinburgh airport.
I admire Bald Rick's energy and ability to find any way other than the sleeper, but the reality is that the Fort William and Inverness sections do have a more dominant position in their markets, and people do want to go to those places.
The other point that occurs is that one of the strengths of the Inverness section is that it does good trade from intermediate stations, particularly Aviemore, Kingussie, Pitlochry and Dunkeld. It's very difficult for another mode to compete with a direct overnight link from a rural railhead like Pitlochry to London.
You're quite right, but I said 'more dominant' not 'dominant', and I base that only on the knowledge that Fort William and Inverness load well versus low populations within their catchments, and Aberdeen doesn't when it serves a prosperous medium sized city.I’m not sure about a dominant position. Almost 10,000 people a week fly between London and Inverness. I don’t know the sleeper numbers on the same city pair, but would be surprised if it was more than a quarter of that. I’d also be willing to bet that there are more people doing London to Inverness by day train than sleeper.
I agree the intermediate highland stations have a better competitive position. But still, I think more will take day train options than the sleeper, and fly/drive will be higher yet. No evidence, just a hunch.
Fort William and the West Highland is also a different market, and the sleeper will have a good share. But I still wouldn’t say dominant.
If I was a smart business type living in Banchory for example (and there will be a lot of those) then I should be in no doubt that the easiest way for me to get to London is to drive to Stonehaven in the late evening and jump on the sleeper, and not mess around getting up at 4am to be at Aberdeen Airport at 6am. I'm not saying that I'd take the bait, but I'll bet you that 80% of that market doesn't even know that the sleeper exists.
I can't see how anyone thought that seats which recline to a fully flat position would have anything to offer; when you start looking at the geometry of it, they take up about as much space as beds that don't turn into seats. They only make sense on airliners because passengers need to be in an upright seat for takeoff, and converting it to a bed saves having separate facilities.I still think they will regret not seeking out a workable option for the flatbeds or some form of couchettes.
Anecdotes aren't data - but I know there are a fair few people between Inverness and Aberdeen who'd consider using the sleeper if it ran through their local station. Might well be logistically challenging to fit two sleepers in to Inverness.At the risk of repeating myself, if only they could get the Aberdeen to start out from Inverness around 730pm they would open up a load of potential business and tourism marketing opportunities.
1B26 was cancelled because 1S26 was only running with one brakevan. I think this actually goes back to the failure of 47749 in Aberdeen earlier this week, as it had been intended to run its set from Aberdeen to Carstairs to attach to 1B26 on Tuesday but it had to run to Polmadie instead because the sidings at Carstairs were blocked by a grinder. Things have been out of position ever since.1B26 caped this morning.
1S26 has worked through to Glasgow, with 90047 running light engine in the wee hours back to Polmadie as 0B26 VSTP.
Presumably linked to the knock-on disruption caused by the Stonehaven derailment and need to run the extra ECS.
I guess that when they discovered that the line wouldn't reopen until tomorrow evening, they realised there was no point. It will mean that the Aberdeen vehicles will swap from one set to the other, assuming things run tomorrow night.
On the main topic, I remain puzzled by the poor performance of the Aberdeen portion. Is it airline competition - but Inverness also has early flights to London?
Is it the frequent stops which must make it difficult to get a good sleep after Edinburgh?
I wonder whether they should make a big bid for the Dundee market, since the city is on the up, and anyone needing to get an early flight to London has a really early start to get to Edinburgh airport.
2x 73s for extra traction in leaf fall season.The Ft Bill portion yesterday morning had a pair of 73's and 3xMK3 sleepers, is that due to the extra sleeper or did they need it in Ft William. Also with the continued hire in of the skip and occasional use of a 47 is this an indication that there arnt enough 73's to reliably handle the diagrams or are they still tying one or more up doing MK5 testing?, will tge December timetable change mean anything sleeper changes or will it be as now,timing and motive power wise I know the new coaches are delayed,thanks
If you couldn't get a room in Aberdeen for under £100 you were clearly checking the wrong sites.
HOW much?
I still think they will regret not seeking out a workable option for the flatbeds or some form of couchettes.
Does anyone have the diagrams for which loco hauls the sleepers out of Euston? I am interested in seeing 87002 and 86s. Also do the 86s or the 87s haul the sleeper into Euston in the evening?
Of the Highlanders Aberdeen is probably the biggest concern, and I could see, if it keeps getting such low numbers (wasn't it the oil workers who used to bolster it?), it being removed in favour of connections and a much simpler arrangement of two half-trains, one to FW and one to Inverness - which would if nothing else hugely simplify the shunt.