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TfL's timetable: confusing and pointless as it doesn't show the GWR services along the same route

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kevin_roche

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The TfL timetable linked in the first post does now include the remaining GW stopping services between Paddington and Reading... Can anyone confirm that is a change since this thread was first created?

Yes it was updated on Friday. I have both versions downloaded.
 
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kevin_roche

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I posted that it had been updated on Wednesday, but that’s only when I first noticed it. So has it changed again on Friday?
I meant that I noticed that google had it as being updated on Friday. Sometime google doesn't notice staright away. :)
 

MarlowDonkey

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I haven't time to read it all the way through to compare right now.

It remains misleading for Maidenhead and Twyford passengers by not showing the peak Maidenhead fasts. I don't think it shows all the services with first or last stop Slough either.
 

transmanche

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It remains misleading for Maidenhead and Twyford passengers by not showing the peak Maidenhead fasts.
I'm still bemused by this claim of the timetable being 'misleading'.
Elsewhere, if I glance through the TPE North route timetable, it doesn't tell me about LNER and XC trains between Leeds/York and Edinburgh - even when they are faster. It only tells me about TPE services.

So why would you expect a TfL Rail timetable to include GWR services?

[*]OK, with one odd exception: a M-F pre-06:00 Southeastern service between Wandsworth Rd & Clapham High St, earlier than the first LO service.
 

Non Multi

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I'm still bemused by this claim of the timetable being 'misleading'.
Elsewhere, if I glance through the TPE North route timetable, it doesn't tell me about LNER and XC trains between Leeds/York and Edinburgh - even when they are faster. It only tells me about TPE services.

So why would you expect a TfL Rail timetable to include GWR services?

[*]OK, with one odd exception: a M-F pre-06:00 Southeastern service between Wandsworth Rd & Clapham High St, earlier than the first LO service.
It would be a half complete timetable for the GW slow (relief) lines, if it only showed TfL rail's Reading - Paddington services. Outside the peaks the slow lines are shared with GWR services to Didcot. It's rather academic anyway, TfL's timetable is PDF download only, GWR's T10 timetable is the only one that's printed.
 

transmanche

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It would be a half complete timetable for the GW slow (relief) lines, if it only showed TfL rail's Reading - Paddington services.
But, as I demonstrated, many other operators publish timetables which only include their own services.

I'm struggling to see why TfL West is a 'special case'.
 

MarlowDonkey

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I'm struggling to see why TfL West is a 'special case'.


For as long as anyone can remember, all the trains that stop at any stations between Paddington and Reading have been on a single timetable. So they've broken the historical continuity as to how the timetables are presented.
 

transmanche

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For as long as anyone can remember, all the trains that stop at any stations between Paddington and Reading have been on a single timetable. So they've broken the historical continuity as to how the timetables are presented.
Therefore passengers on that route will just have to get used to the new way of doing things - as passengers on the rest of the network have already.

The TfL Rail timetable is not 'confusing' or 'pointless', merely 'different to what we're used to'.
 

transmanche

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That doesn't mean it should be accepted without complaint and expression of opinion that it's incomplete.
Yes it does: you don't see similar complaints from passengers on the eastern side of TfL Rail. Being brutally honest, the 'complaints' sound more like a toddler's tantrum.
 

Non Multi

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Yes it does: you don't see similar complaints from passengers on the eastern side of TfL Rail. Being brutally honest, the 'complaints' sound more like a toddler's tantrum.
The Shenfield Metro is self contained on its own lines AIUI. If the western side was the same, then fair enough.

You're arguing that train operators should only print timetables for their own services, even where they share a common route and run alternating services! This isn't the bus industry.

TPE's Cleethorpes-Manchester timetable also shows Northern and EMT's Sheffield-Manchester Piccadilly services. SWR's Reading-Waterloo timetable shows GWR's Gatwick trains that call at Wokingham.
 

Beemax

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I suspect the complaints about timetables will be overtaken by complaints about using metro-style stock instead of 387s for 45 minute journeys between, say, Reading and Ealing Broadway. During some parts of the day a GWR alternative will be available, but during rush hours it will either be TfL or TfL .
 

Scottychoo

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There will be GWR services all day between rdg and Ealing Broadway (the Didcot services)
 

Beemax

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There will be GWR services all day between rdg and Ealing Broadway (the Didcot services)
So how many of these will run between 07.00 -09.00 (Reading to Ealing) or between 16.00 -18.00 (Ealing to Reading) ?
 

cactustwirly

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So how many of these will run between 07.00 -09.00 (Reading to Ealing) or between 16.00 -18.00 (Ealing to Reading) ?

None
But there will still be faster GWR services to Slough, Burnham, Maidenhead and Twyford
 

JonathanH

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transmanche

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The Shenfield Metro is self contained on its own lines AIUI. If the western side was the same, then fair enough.
Really? You're basing it on the tracks used? Everyone who might possibly use TfL Rail East knows that GA services don't use the 'electric lines' and everyone who might possibly use TfL Rail West knows that some GWR services use the 'relief lines'? Seriously..?

I can see the argument that you can claim the timetables would be improved by including other operators' services - but to claim they are 'confusing' and 'pointless' is simply nonsense.
 

swt_passenger

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Haven’t we already found that the main operator GWR’s paper timetable DOES include the whole service including TfL? And TfL don’t produce a physical paper timetable?
 

JonathanH

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Exactly. So people are going to have to pay more (and fight through the Paddington crowds) to maintain the current level of comfort.

Or travel with Contactless and hope that they arrive and depart in the same bit of Paddington - e.g. within the platform 10-14 section, there being nothing in the rules other than a maximum journey time to restrict doubling back.
 
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