Dorking To Horsham - No Weekday Evening Or New Years Day Service

[Capvermell]

As I currently have no access to a car and am completely reliant on Southern train services from Ockley Station I am writing this post to ask firstly why Southern did not run any train services at all from Dorking to Horsham on New Year's Day (Saturday 1st January), when they do normally provide a Saturday service on Bank Holidays other than Christmas Day, and why this week from Tuesday 4th January to Friday 7th January they are only operating a Saturday timetable service instead of a normal Monday to Friday service (which includes weekday evening trains unlike their Saturday timetable service) as they clearly should be doing from 4th January onwards under the franchise agreement they have to operate services on this line from the Department of Transport.

Even during the special lockdown timetable through the main COVID period from March 2020 to Spring 2021 weekday evening services were retained between Dorking and Horsham (via Holmowood and Warnham) and we also for the first time gained a Saturday evening train service as the train service pattern was the same six days a week from Monday to Saturday rather there being the separate Monday to Friday, Saturday and Sunday timetables pre the COVID lockdown timetable of March 2020 onwards.

But now on the excuse of Omicron and/or perhaps in reality because of whatever alleged major signalling work is preventing any services at all for over 2 weeks in to and out of London Victoria until January 10th Southern/GoVia is behaving like January 4th to January 9th is still part of the main Christmas period and simply leaving those of us who use Holmwood, Ockley and Warnham stations with no evening weekday service between Dorking and Horsham as though we had got in to a time machine and traveled back to pre December 2003 when there were no weekday services south of Dorking, although even those services ran until two hours later than those that Southern is operating this week that terminate just after 6pm in the evening in both directions.

Since we only have an hourly weekday evening service anyway between Dorking and Horsham Southern resisted cutting that service any further in terms of frequency all through Main COVID lockdown period (although services between Dorking and Horsham did become a separate hourly shuttle service) so why should Southern think they have an excuse to cut out our weekday evening services completely this week and so not have to offer to pay for a replacement taxi service or pay compensation for delay or cancellation as they would have done if they had timetabled the services but then axed some or all of them at the last moment on the excuse of insufficient train crews.

It seems that deleting services completely is a way for Southern/GoVia to axe services without having to appropriately compensate customers for the inconvenience caused in any way.

Also I can't even go to a Meet The Managers session at London Bridge or London Victoria to take up this issue since Southern and/or GoVia Thameslink have not run any Meet The Manager sessions in person since March 2020 and disgracefully they have also not held them on Zoom or Microsoft Teams either as they so easily could have done if their senior management did not seemingly utterly hate and despise their customers with the consequence that they think the great COVID emergency is therefore an excuse to never ever have to account to them again in person.

Lastly I should also say that raising any of these issues with the Southern Contact Centre is a complete and utter waste of time as the outsourced workers at Teleperformance never have any explanation themselves of why changes such as this are made and if you ask the call centre staff for a written reply providing an explanation from management at Southern/GoVia on any issue no such reply is ever provided by the company. I have previously asked for a written response from Southern's contact centre in the last three months on separate occasions on the issue of why Meet The Manager Sessions have not resumed, why a rail replacement bus service did not call at the designated stop at Ockley Station causing me to miss it and why Southern forgot to run a diverted rail replacement train service from London Bridge via Epsom to Horsham to cover the cancelled (due to engineering works) London Victoria to Horsham (via Epsom) service and in each case I have had no further response on or closure of my complaint from Southern. This seems to be because either Teleperformance who take the calls fail to pass the complaint on to Southern or because Southern think they are entitled to ignore complaints from customers due to being so insulated from the outside world by the Teleperformance contact centre.

Just cancelling evening services from Dorking to Horsham this week without explanation is a totally despicable and dastardly action on Southern/GoVia's part.

 

[yorksrob]

It is the crumbling edge of quality to leave stations without a service for long periods.

I would complain and follow up with a letter to your M.P, lest what has happenned to Brigg and Snaith up here is allowed to take place on the mid-Sussex route.

 

[Capvermell]

It is the crumbling edge of quality to leave stations without a service for long periods.

I would complain and follow up with a letter to your M.P, lest what has happenned to Brigg and Snaith up here is allowed to take place on the mid-Sussex route.

It is only due to a considerable amount of lobbying effort that I put in first while a local district councillor and then afterwards as an ordinary rail user that we gained first a late evening train service from Dorking to Horsham in December 2003 (a train that already ran every night anyway but absurdly terminated at Dorking and then ran through empty to Horsham) and then after attending quite a few more Meet The Manager sessions over the years three more hourly train services were added in the intervening three hours on weekday evenings in spring 2018. Then during COVID lockdown in 2020 that timetable ran a Saturday evening shuttle service from Dorking to Horsham for the first time but when Southern then reverted half way to the preceding timetable (they have never restored the half hourly evening weekday services even though they did restore the half hourly morning ones) they axed a Saturday evening service again despite my having lobbied their senior management on this point by email before it took place.

Now they need to cut out a few trains here due to both COVID positive tests and due to the ridiculous two week long service blockade in to Victoria so some train planner thinks we can make do without any weekday evening services at all that so we can be forced in to the hands of the licensed taxi trade bandits operating out of Dorking station with a fare cost of around £25 for 7 miles, 10 minutes or just two train stops before 11pm and £37.50 or so after 11pm. Of course for this very reason I never patronise the Dorking Licensed Taxi Bandits and if I am travelling when there are no trains from Ockley I either travel to Horsham (almost the same distance south of my home as Dorking is to the north) where the licensed taxi fare is only £15 exactly until 11pm and this even applies on a Sunday whereas the Dorking taxi bandits have a 50% surcharge all day long on Sunday. Or if I need to come back really late then Uber (who don't operate in Dorking and Horsham) will get me back the 11 miles from Horley station but now at a cost of circa £22 compared to the only £16 it used to be until a couple of months ago.

Bottom line is travelling by taxi is still way more expensive than walking the 0.75 miles from Ockley when a train service is running.

Latest developments suggest that there are those involved in train planning at Southern who think that Dorking to Horsham is a Cinderella service that they can easily dispense with at a moment's notice.

 

[yorksrob]

It is only due to a considerable amount of lobbying effort that I put in first while a local district councillor and then afterwards as an ordinary rail user that we gained first a late evening train service from Dorking to Horsham in December 2003 (a train that already ran every night anyway but absurdly terminated at Dorking and then ran through empty to Horsham) and then after attending quite a few more Meet The Manager sessions over the years three more hourly train services were added in the intervening three hours on weekday evenings in spring 2018. Then during COVID lockdown in 2020 that timetable ran a Saturday evening shuttle service from Dorking to Horsham for the first time but when Southern then reverted half way to the preceding timetable (they have never restored the half hourly evening weekday services even though they did restore the half hourly morning ones) they axed a Saturday evening service again despite my having lobbied their senior management on this point by email before it took place.

Now they need to cut out a few trains here due to both COVID positive tests and due to the ridiculous two week long service blockade in to Victoria so some train planner thinks we can make do without any weekday evening services at all that so we can be forced in to the hands of the licensed taxi trade bandits operating out of Dorking station with a fare cost of around £25 for 7 miles, 10 minutes or just two train stops before 11pm and £37.50 or so after 11pm. Of course for this very reason I never patronise the Dorking Licensed Taxi Bandits and if I am travelling when there are no trains from Ockley I either travel to Horsham (almost the same distance south of my home as Dorking is to the north) where the licensed taxi fare is only £15 exactly until 11pm and this even applies on a Sunday whereas the Dorking taxi bandits have a 50% surcharge all day long on Sunday. Or if I need to come back really late then Uber (who don't operate in Dorking and Horsham) will get me back the 11 miles from Horley station but now at a cost of circa £22 compared to the only £16 it used to be until a couple of months ago.

Bottom line is travelling by taxi is still way more expensive than walking the 0.75 miles from Ockley when a train service is running.

Latest developments suggest that there are those involved in train planning at Southern who think that Dorking to Horsham is a Cinderella service that they can easily dispense with at a moment's notice.

Well done for your efforts to date.

I know from experience up here that services are liable to be cut back at the drop of a hat, then take a lot longer to be reinstated once the reason for the initial cutback has subsided.

The train companies also have their routes where they're inclined to take liberties with passengers good will.

 

[Peregrine 4903]

As I currently have no access to a car and am completely reliant on Southern train services from Ockley Station I am writing this post to ask firstly why Southern did not run any train services at all from Dorking to Horsham on New Year's Day (Saturday 1st January), when they do normally provide a Saturday service on Bank Holidays other than Christmas Day, and why this week from Tuesday 4th January to Friday 7th January they are only operating a Saturday timetable service instead of a normal Monday to Friday service (which includes weekday evening trains unlike their Saturday timetable service) as they clearly should be doing from 4th January onwards under the franchise agreement they have to operate services on this line from the Department of Transport.

Even during the special lockdown timetable through the main COVID period from March 2020 to Spring 2021 weekday evening services were retained between Dorking and Horsham (via Holmowood and Warnham) and we also for the first time gained a Saturday evening train service as the train service pattern was the same six days a week from Monday to Saturday rather there being the separate Monday to Friday, Saturday and Sunday timetables pre the COVID lockdown timetable of March 2020 onwards.

But now on the excuse of Omicron and/or perhaps in reality because of whatever alleged major signalling work is preventing any services at all for over 2 weeks in to and out of London Victoria until January 10th Southern/GoVia is behaving like January 4th to January 9th is still part of the main Christmas period and simply leaving those of us who use Holmwood, Ockley and Warnham stations with no evening weekday service between Dorking and Horsham as though we had got in to a time machine and traveled back to pre December 2003 when there were no weekday services south of Dorking, although even those services ran until two hours later than those that Southern is operating this week that terminate just after 6pm in the evening in both directions.

Since we only have an hourly weekday evening service anyway between Dorking and Horsham Southern resisted cutting that service any further in terms of frequency all through Main COVID lockdown period (although services between Dorking and Horsham did become a separate hourly shuttle service) so why should Southern think they have an excuse to cut out our weekday evening services completely this week and so not have to offer to pay for a replacement taxi service or pay compensation for delay or cancellation as they would have done if they had timetabled the services but then axed some or all of them at the last moment on the excuse of insufficient train crews.

It seems that deleting services completely is a way for Southern/GoVia to axe services without having to appropriately compensate customers for the inconvenience caused in any way.

Also I can't even go to a Meet The Managers session at London Bridge or London Victoria to take up this issue since Southern and/or GoVia Thameslink have not run any Meet The Manager sessions in person since March 2020 and disgracefully they have also not held them on Zoom or Microsoft Teams either as they so easily could have done if their senior management did not seemingly utterly hate and despise their customers with the consequence that they think the great COVID emergency is therefore an excuse to never ever have to account to them again in person.

Lastly I should also say that raising any of these issues with the Southern Contact Centre is a complete and utter waste of time as the outsourced workers at Teleperformance never have any explanation themselves of why changes such as this are made and if you ask the call centre staff for a written reply providing an explanation from management at Southern/GoVia on any issue no such reply is ever provided by the company. I have previously asked for a written response from Southern's contact centre in the last three months on separate occasions on the issue of why Meet The Manager Sessions have not resumed, why a rail replacement bus service did not call at the designated stop at Ockley Station causing me to miss it and why Southern forgot to run a diverted rail replacement train service from London Bridge via Epsom to Horsham to cover the cancelled (due to engineering works) London Victoria to Horsham (via Epsom) service and in each case I have had no further response on or closure of my complaint from Southern. This seems to be because either Teleperformance who take the calls fail to pass the complaint on to Southern or because Southern think they are entitled to ignore complaints from customers due to being so insulated from the outside world by the Teleperformance contact centre.

Just cancelling evening services from Dorking to Horsham this week without explanation is a totally despicable and dastardly action on Southern/GoVia's part.

What's happened is they have rolled over the Saturday service which is booked to finish early normally, and then as a result they haven't had time add in the later services due to the immense workload right now on train planners and control staff.

 

[Capvermell]

What's happened is they have rolled over the Saturday service which is booked to finish early normally, and then as a result they haven't had time add in the later services due to the immense workload right now on train planners and control staff.

Just checked on www.railradar.co.uk and its showing an X48655 service from Horsham to London Bridge that departed Warnham at 18:29:28 and Holmwood at 18:19:28 (so would have left Ockley at the normally weekday scheduled 18:24 even though the time at Ockley is not logged by RailRadar) so what you say may well be right. However one thing that is persistently infuriating with railradar.co.uk is that the trains are not ever trackable live on the map between Dorking and Horsham at the time of transit. I have no idea why when there is a large train data radio mast just south of Ockley station.

But if so utterly shocking and dreadful when all trains are diverted to London Bridge anyway and so southbound journeys to Horsham via Dorking are 9 minutes later than usual time so if a Saturday service is wrongly shown by the timetable as the weekday service people will have ended up not travelling to London at all or coming back earlier than they have to or in my case I have placed a Sainsburys order for tomorrow (couldn't get any for 2 weeks over xmas) that I could have booked for a different day. And as calling Southern's official call centre with Teleperformance is about as useful as hitting your head repeatedly on a large piece of concrete of course no help from them whatsoever in solving the mystery. But I did notice when travelling from Ockley on New Year's Eve that all train departures on the station board were running 2 to 3 hours behind.

Bottom line is a mystery like this should be able to be solved by speaking to Southern Customer Services but isn't because Telepeformance are a completely unfit for purpose call centre targeting only staff who will take the lowest possible wages and put up with being treated like rubbish rather than people who regard interacting with train users as being a career.

But at least I now know the trains are running normally tomorrow and won't assume that no evening services are running until the start of next week..........

It would also be useful to have your thoughts on why Southern seems to think New Year's Day can be treated as a no trains day between Dorking and Horsham just like Boxing Day and New Years Day, unless trains were actually running that day but the timetable was not appropriately updated.........

 

[MotCO]

This thread https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...ria-until-10th-jan.226551/page-7#post-5474831 explains some of the staffing and scheduing issues due to Omicron. In essence, there are fewer drivers and guards than the normal Monday to Friday service requires, and alternative schedules cannot be run at the drop of a hat.

[It may sound simple, running a train from a - b - a - b etc, but trains often interwork routes, and both staff and trains have to end up at the right place at the right time, for example for staff changeovers etc. Add in there are insufficient staff to compile new rosters for staff and trains to match the available number of drivers, and the only solution was to use an existing Saturday timetable. Even suggestions such as running East Croydon to Victoria shuttles are difficult to compile due to pathing and platforming issues. I agree it is not ideal, but needs must as they say. @Surreytraveller has set out the issuesquite clearly in that thread.]

Leaving you without a sufficient service is obviously very unfortunate, but I cannot see any way round it.

 

[Capvermell]

[It may sound simple, running a train from a - b - a - b etc, but trains often interwork routes, and both staff and trains have to end up at the right place at the right time, for example for staff changeovers etc. Add in there are insufficient staff to compile new rosters for staff and trains to match the available number of drivers, and the only solution was to use an existing Saturday timetable. Even suggestions such as running East Croydon to Victoria shuttles are difficult to compile due to pathing and platforming issues. I agree it is not ideal, but needs must as they say. @Surreytraveller has set out the issuesquite clearly in that thread.]

Leaving you without a sufficient service is obviously very unfortunate, but I cannot see any way round it.

They may be short of a certain number of train crews but I can't see how this possibly justifies completely mothballing all services in to London Victoria for another week beyond the planned shut down for signalling work that happened over Christmas Week and I especially don't understand why a reduced number of trains cannot be operated in to both London Victoria and London Bridge if the train paths to London Victoria on Southern services are no longer blockaded by planned signalling work by men on the track.

Ditto this week is a normal business week other than the Monday Bank Holiday so what possible excuse does Southern have to think that those of us living between Dorking and Horsham can be left with an already unacceptable daytime only Saturday service and prevented from affordably leaving our homes to go elsewhere in the weekday evening.

Contrary to what forum member Peregrine 4903 wrongly claimed in his post above the schedulers have not simply forgotten to revert the timetable information in the system for Dorking to Horsham from a Saturday only service to a Monday to a Friday service on weekdays this week due to the amount of timetable changing work they have to do and instead the cynical management of Southern have actually decided that they can try to get away with what they never tried to get away with during the whole of the main Pandemic lockdown period in 2020 by leaving the Dorking to Horsham Mid Sussex line with no train service at all on weekday evenings. Surely they should have done what they did during the main pandemic period and given us a shuttle service between Dorking and Horsham during off peak periods including the weekday evening instead of leaving us with no train service at all in the evening and either having to stay at home or pay every expensive taxi fares that Southern does not have to cover by dint of having eliminated our normal weekday evening scheduled train services.

Southern senior management have behaved quite despicably by trying to falsely give passengers and their ordinary front line staff the impression the continued shutdown of London Victoria station this weeks is perhaps due an over run on the Christmas period signal work when all that is actually happening is a deliberate attempt by Southern to improve its bank balances by not having to pay for normal weekday train crews running in to and attendant staff at London Victoria this week by running Saturday timetable train services for another whole week. But perhaps with declining passenger numbers this is a sign of the future and Southern/GoVia do not believe they have enough passengers left travelling to keep London Victoria going and they are now trying out whether they can get away with operating out of London Bridge only before telling the DfT they no longer require London Victoria station and want to hand it back to them........................

But what we can expect from rail operators so cynical and contemptuous of the travelling public that they have used COVID as an excuse to shut down and not hold any Meet The Managers sessions (the only place where they could be directly held to account by passengers) for almost two years now.......

 

[XAM2175]

Southern senior management have behaved quite despicably by trying to falsely give passengers and their ordinary front line staff the impression the continued shutdown of London Victoria station this weeks is perhaps due an over run on the Christmas period signal work when all that is actually happening is a deliberate attempt by Southern to improve its bank balances by not having to pay for normal weekday train crews running in to and attendant staff at London Victoria this week by running Saturday timetable train services for another whole week. But perhaps with declining passenger numbers this is a sign of the future and Southern/GoVia do not believe they have enough passengers left travelling to keep London Victoria going and they are now trying out whether they can get away with operating out of London Bridge only before telling the DfT they no longer require London Victoria station and want to hand it back to them........................

The reason for the extension of the Victoria shutdown is explained quite clearly - and repeatedly - in the thread linked by @MotCO above, but don't let that get in the way of your ridiculous hyperbole

 

[Class 466]

Just checked on www.railradar.co.uk and its showing an X48655 service from Horsham to London Bridge that departed Warnham at 18:29:28 and Holmwood at 18:19:28 (so would have left Ockley at the normally weekday scheduled 18:24 even though the time at Ockley is not logged by RailRadar) so what you say may well be right. However one thing that is persistently infuriating with railradar.co.uk is that the trains are not ever trackable live on the map between Dorking and Horsham at the time of transit. I have no idea why when there is a large train data radio mast just south of Ockley station.

But if so utterly shocking and dreadful when all trains are diverted to London Bridge anyway and so southbound journeys to Horsham via Dorking are 9 minutes later than usual time so if a Saturday service is wrongly shown by the timetable as the weekday service people will have ended up not travelling to London at all or coming back earlier than they have to or in my case I have placed a Sainsburys order for tomorrow (couldn't get any for 2 weeks over xmas) that I could have booked for a different day. And as calling Southern's official call centre with Teleperformance is about as useful as hitting your head repeatedly on a large piece of concrete of course no help from them whatsoever in solving the mystery. But I did notice when travelling from Ockley on New Year's Eve that all train departures on the station board were running 2 to 3 hours behind.

Bottom line is a mystery like this should be able to be solved by speaking to Southern Customer Services but isn't because Telepeformance are a completely unfit for purpose call centre targeting only staff who will take the lowest possible wages and put up with being treated like rubbish rather than people who regard interacting with train users as being a career.

But at least I now know the trains are running normally tomorrow and won't assume that no evening services are running until the start of next week..........

It would also be useful to have your thoughts on why Southern seems to think New Year's Day can be treated as a no trains day between Dorking and Horsham just like Boxing Day and New Years Day, unless trains were actually running that day but the timetable was not appropriately updated.........

New Years Day is always a Sunday service across most operators in the UK - this will have happened every year on your line. Same goes for Grove Park - Bromley North or Crystal Palace to Beckenham Junction which haven't seen a new years day service. It's just standard for the rail industry with passenger numbers far reduced on NYD.

 

[Capvermell]

New Years Day is always a Sunday service across most operators in the UK - this will have happened every year on your line. Same goes for Grove Park - Bromley North or Crystal Palace to Beckenham Junction which haven't seen a new years day service. It's just standard for the rail industry with passenger numbers far reduced on NYD.

Because Sunday Service mean No Service on the line from Dorking to Horsham we therefore get a Saturday service on the Easter, May Day and August Bank Holiday days.

As New Years Day is not a special rail day unlike Christmas Day and Boxing Day (where no one has yet managed to challenge the extremely militant rail unions, especially in respect of the continued clear unreasonableness of no Boxing Day train services at all when we are now far from a country only populated by god fearing Christians) then I think it is not unreasonable to expect that Southern should have also run a Saturday only service between Dorking and Horsham on New Years Day but it is not reasonable to expect that they should be allowed to get away with running that Saturday only service with no evening train services on a regular weekday as they are now trying to do................

Re New Years Day I think you will find that rather a lot of people who actually wish to travel that day until around 3am but that the militant and excessively powerful rail unions of this country simply refuse to provide a service for which there is in fact plenty of demand (a demand which is met in Greater London by TfL). Also if New Year's Day is the last before a normal working day the next day then there is again a fairly large amount of demand to travel on that day by long distance travellers wishing to return to their permanent home addresses after a Christmas Break away with family or friends.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 5 Jan 2022 ==

The reason for the extension of the Victoria shutdown is explained quite clearly - and repeatedly - in the thread linked by @MotCO above, but don't let that get in the way of your ridiculous hyperbole

And the reason is that rail managers clearly did whatever was easiest for them and their staff without a second thought for passengers and their need to travel on what are in fact normal weekdays outside the xmas period.

As long as they suffer no financial penalty for behaving this way and don't have to compensate customers for the additional travel costs that they transfer on to them then no doubt they will continue to behave in this selfish and inconsiderate manner towards the travelling public.

I think the point is when you already only have an hourly train service anyway you don't expect it to be reduced further. If you normally enjoy 2 or 4 trains an hour then you may expect the service to be somewhat less when COVID means staff availability and passenger numbers are lower.

 

[ComUtoR]

As New Years Day is not a special rail day unlike Christmas Day and Boxing Day (where no one has yet managed to challenge the extremely militant rail unions, especially in respect of the continued clear unreasonableness of no Boxing Day train services at all when we are now far from a country only populated by god fearing Christians)

New Years day, Christmas day, and Boxing day are all considered to be the same by ASLEF; I am unaware of their paramilitary wing. All Bank Holidays are treated equally. If a TOC decided to run a service on Christmas day or Boxing day then staff would be expected to work.

If you are unhappy with your Bank Holiday provision; may I strongly suggest you speak to a local MP. Sir Paul Breseford MP can be contacted HERE and HERE and other MPs can be contacted via this link https://members.parliament.uk/members/Commons

 

[Capvermell]

New Years day, Christmas day, and Boxing day are all considered to be the same by ASLEF; I am unaware of their paramilitary wing. All Bank Holidays are treated equally. If a TOC decided to run a service on Christmas day or Boxing day then staff would be expected to work.

Then how come there are New Years Day services of one sort or another operated on most other train lines but just not between Dorking and Horsham, even though it does enjoy a Saturday service on the other five regular Bank Holidays in the year outside the main xmas period.

I think your above statement is wrong and that only Christmas Day and Boxing Day are considered to be sacrosanct by ASLEF members, even though I am sure in their membership they have plenty of older train drivers without any children and without surviving parents who would not have major issues working on Xmas Day or Boxing Day in return for a few extra quid above the regular weekday rate for driving a train............

There is absolutely no point in petitioning Sir Paul Beresford who only travels by car and does not show any interest whatsoever in the rail user and hence his failure to in any way challenge or lobby against the proposals of South Western Railway to reduce its train services from London Waterloo to Dorking from 2 services an hour to only 1 service an hour...........................

 

[ComUtoR]

I think your above statement is wrong and that only Christmas Day and Boxing Day are considered to be sacrosanct by ASLEF members,

I know its correct because my terms and conditions treat all bank holidays the same. Bank holiday is generally decided by rotation irrespective of which bank holiday it is. As there are no services on Christmas day, no rotation is applied. Drivers wouldn't have a choice because it is already in their T&Cs.

My TOC used to have a Boxing day service and was run by volunteers. This is because a local decision was made due to the minimal number of Drivers required. However, the TOC could have just as easily applied the rotation.

even though I am sure in their membership they have plenty of older train drivers without any children and without surviving parents who would not have major issues working on Xmas Day or Boxing Day in return for a few extra quid above the regular weekday rate for driving a train............

I have 2 young(ish) children and I'm a virile young male in my middle years. I would work Christmas day in a heart beat. Sadly I wouldn't have a choice because I am already required to work it.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 5 Jan 2022 ==

Then how come there are New Years Day services of one sort or another operated on most other train lines but just not between Dorking and Horsham, even though it does enjoy a Saturday service on the other five regular Bank Holidays in the year outside the main xmas period.

ASLEF do not dictate the service provision.

There is absolutely no point in petitioning Sir Paul Beresford who only travels by car and does not show any interest whatsoever in the rail user and hence his failure to in any way challenge or lobby against the proposals of South Western Railway to reduce its train services from London Waterloo to Dorking from 2 services an hour to only 1 service an hour...........................

Feel free to vote for a more rail supporting candidate at the next election.

 

[Capvermell]

I have 2 young(ish) children and I'm a virile young male in my middle years. I would work Christmas day in a heart beat. Sadly I wouldn't have a choice because I am already required to work it.

Does that mean you drive a train to or from Gatwick or Stansted Airport on Christmas Day.

 

[Surreytraveller]

You don't get

They may be short of a certain number of train crews but I can't see how this possibly justifies completely mothballing all services in to London Victoria for another week beyond the planned shut down for signalling work that happened over Christmas Week and I especially don't understand why a reduced number of trains cannot be operated in to both London Victoria and London Bridge if the train paths to London Victoria on Southern services are no longer blockaded by planned signalling work by men on the track.

Ditto this week is a normal business week other than the Monday Bank Holiday so what possible excuse does Southern have to think that those of us living between Dorking and Horsham can be left with an already unacceptable daytime only Saturday service and prevented from affordably leaving our homes to go elsewhere in the weekday evening.

Contrary to what forum member Peregrine 4903 wrongly claimed in his post above the schedulers have not simply forgotten to revert the timetable information in the system for Dorking to Horsham from a Saturday only service to a Monday to a Friday service on weekdays this week due to the amount of timetable changing work they have to do and instead the cynical management of Southern have actually decided that they can try to get away with what they never tried to get away with during the whole of the main Pandemic lockdown period in 2020 by leaving the Dorking to Horsham Mid Sussex line with no train service at all on weekday evenings. Surely they should have done what they did during the main pandemic period and given us a shuttle service between Dorking and Horsham during off peak periods including the weekday evening instead of leaving us with no train service at all in the evening and either having to stay at home or pay every expensive taxi fares that Southern does not have to cover by dint of having eliminated our normal weekday evening scheduled train services.

Southern senior management have behaved quite despicably by trying to falsely give passengers and their ordinary front line staff the impression the continued shutdown of London Victoria station this weeks is perhaps due an over run on the Christmas period signal work when all that is actually happening is a deliberate attempt by Southern to improve its bank balances by not having to pay for normal weekday train crews running in to and attendant staff at London Victoria this week by running Saturday timetable train services for another whole week. But perhaps with declining passenger numbers this is a sign of the future and Southern/GoVia do not believe they have enough passengers left travelling to keep London Victoria going and they are now trying out whether they can get away with operating out of London Bridge only before telling the DfT they no longer require London Victoria station and want to hand it back to them........................

But what we can expect from rail operators so cynical and contemptuous of the travelling public that they have used COVID as an excuse to shut down and not hold any Meet The Managers sessions (the only place

They may be short of a certain number of train crews but I can't see how this possibly justifies completely mothballing all services in to London Victoria for another week beyond the planned shut down for signalling work that happened over Christmas Week and I especially don't understand why a reduced number of trains cannot be operated in to both London Victoria and London Bridge if the train paths to London Victoria on Southern services are no longer blockaded by planned signalling work by men on the track.

Ditto this week is a normal business week other than the Monday Bank Holiday so what possible excuse does Southern have to think that those of us living between Dorking and Horsham can be left with an already unacceptable daytime only Saturday service and prevented from affordably leaving our homes to go elsewhere in the weekday evening.

Contrary to what forum member Peregrine 4903 wrongly claimed in his post above the schedulers have not simply forgotten to revert the timetable information in the system for Dorking to Horsham from a Saturday only service to a Monday to a Friday service on weekdays this week due to the amount of timetable changing work they have to do and instead the cynical management of Southern have actually decided that they can try to get away with what they never tried to get away with during the whole of the main Pandemic lockdown period in 2020 by leaving the Dorking to Horsham Mid Sussex line with no train service at all on weekday evenings. Surely they should have done what they did during the main pandemic period and given us a shuttle service between Dorking and Horsham during off peak periods including the weekday evening instead of leaving us with no train service at all in the evening and either having to stay at home or pay every expensive taxi fares that Southern does not have to cover by dint of having eliminated our normal weekday evening scheduled train services.

Southern senior management have behaved quite despicably by trying to falsely give passengers and their ordinary front line staff the impression the continued shutdown of London Victoria station this weeks is perhaps due an over run on the Christmas period signal work when all that is actually happening is a deliberate attempt by Southern to improve its bank balances by not having to pay for normal weekday train crews running in to and attendant staff at London Victoria this week by running Saturday timetable train services for another whole week. But perhaps with declining passenger numbers this is a sign of the future and Southern/GoVia do not believe they have enough passengers left travelling to keep London Victoria going and they are now trying out whether they can get away with operating out of London Bridge only before telling the DfT they no longer require London Victoria station and want to hand it back to them........................

But what we can expect from rail operators so cynical and contemptuous of the travelling public that they have used COVID as an excuse to shut down and not hold any Meet The Managers sessions (the only place where they could be directly held to account by passengers) for almost two years now.......

They may be short of a certain number of train crews but I can't see how this possibly justifies completely mothballing all services in to London Victoria for another week beyond the planned shut down for signalling work that happened over Christmas Week and I especially don't understand why a reduced number of trains cannot be operated in to both London Victoria and London Bridge if the train paths to London Victoria on Southern services are no longer blockaded by planned signalling work by men on the track.

Ditto this week is a normal business week other than the Monday Bank Holiday so what possible excuse does Southern have to think that those of us living between Dorking and Horsham can be left with an already unacceptable daytime only Saturday service and prevented from affordably leaving our homes to go elsewhere in the weekday evening.

Contrary to what forum member Peregrine 4903 wrongly claimed in his post above the schedulers have not simply forgotten to revert the timetable information in the system for Dorking to Horsham from a Saturday only service to a Monday to a Friday service on weekdays this week due to the amount of timetable changing work they have to do and instead the cynical management of Southern have actually decided that they can try to get away with what they never tried to get away with during the whole of the main Pandemic lockdown period in 2020 by leaving the Dorking to Horsham Mid Sussex line with no train service at all on weekday evenings. Surely they should have done what they did during the main pandemic period and given us a shuttle service between Dorking and Horsham during off peak periods including the weekday evening instead of leaving us with no train service at all in the evening and either having to stay at home or pay every expensive taxi fares that Southern does not have to cover by dint of having eliminated our normal weekday evening scheduled train services.

Southern senior management have behaved quite despicably by trying to falsely give passengers and their ordinary front line staff the impression the continued shutdown of London Victoria station this weeks is perhaps due an over run on the Christmas period signal work when all that is actually happening is a deliberate attempt by Southern to improve its bank balances by not having to pay for normal weekday train crews running in to and attendant staff at London Victoria this week by running Saturday timetable train services for another whole week. But perhaps with declining passenger numbers this is a sign of the future and Southern/GoVia do not believe they have enough passengers left travelling to keep London Victoria going and they are now trying out whether they can get away with operating out of London Bridge only before telling the DfT they no longer require London Victoria station and want to hand it back to them........................

But what we can expect from rail operators so cynical and contemptuous of the travelling public that they have used COVID as an excuse to shut down and not hold any Meet The Managers sessions (the only place where they could be directly held to account by passengers) for almost two years now.......

You don't understand. Schedulers haven't forgotten to do anything. There are no schedulers.

 

[ComUtoR]

Does that mean you drive a train to or from Gatwick or Stansted Airport on Christmas Day.

That isn't on my route card but if my TOC had a service on Christmas day and there was a diagram at my depot and IF I was booked to work because of the rotation; I would 100% be expected to work it.

Many Drivers work bank holidays because they prefer to save a leave day. There are always plenty of opportunity to swap if you didn't want to work it but that isn't exclusive to Christmas.

 

[Capvermell]

Many Drivers work bank holidays because they prefer to save a leave day. There are always plenty of opportunity to swap if you didn't want to work it but that isn't exclusive to Christmas.

OK but I think its still pretty darned hard to manage to work as a train driver on Christmas Day or Boxing Day even if you are absolutely champing at the bit to do so.

Re Unions one excuse always given by GoVia at its Meet The Manager sessions not to run Sunday Services or Saturday evening services from Dorking to Horsham is because it would be so hard to get the train drivers and their unions to agree to this because there is allegedly already a shortage of drivers willing to work at the weekend........

 

[ComUtoR]

OK but I think its still pretty darned hard to manage to work as a train driver on Christmas Day or Boxing Day even if you are absolutely champing at the bit to do so.

The point isn't about the diffculty in working. The point was that the union don't see a difference in any bank holiday and there wouldn't be any issue covering the work due to the existing T&Cs

Re Unions one excuse always given by GoVia at its Meet The Manager sessions not to run Sunday Services or Saturday evening services from Dorking to Horsham is because it would be so hard to get the train drivers and their unions to agree to this because there is allegedly already a shortage of drivers willing to work at the weekend........

Potentially this is because some Sunday working at some TOCS is still voluntary or deemed 'outside' of the normal working week. I will reitterate that the TOC doesn't need the Unions permission to introduce any services. They would struggle and need Union co-operation if Sundays were 'outside' but any TOC with Sundays 'inside' wouldn't have a single issue. My TOC has Sundays inside and runs a Sunday service without staffing issues.

 

[Horizon22]

OK but I think its still pretty darned hard to manage to work as a train driver on Christmas Day or Boxing Day even if you are absolutely champing at the bit to do so.

Re Unions one excuse always given by GoVia at its Meet The Manager sessions not to run Sunday Services or Saturday evening services from Dorking to Horsham is because it would be so hard to get the train drivers and their unions to agree to this because there is allegedly already a shortage of drivers willing to work at the weekend........

Depends what sort of driver you are. Freight drivers will be out in force on those days because of the requirement for tampers and other engineering vehicles. Most routes have substantial engineering works on bank holidays but the passenger demand is understandably substantially lower, so even if passenger services did run, they'd be quite heavily constrained anyway.

Yes the industry in specific areas has issues with some weekend but that can easily be explained. At the moment due to various shortages caused by a) a backlog of trainee drivers "passing out" due to delays in training caused by Covid and social distancing, b) a shortage of driver instructors, c) train drivers are not superhuman and can also get Covid and are isolating etc. d) delays to new traction training being completed. This has impacted each operator to varying degrees.

Therefore this is extra reliance on overtime and rest day work (RDW) to get the numbers under to the number of drivers needed for how many driver diagrams there are that day. Now this has been going on for years, but is especially acute at present. On a weekday, there is normally a higher take up of people willing to work their RDs because if your friends and family are also at work and you have nothing planned, why not? Obviously there's some fatigue if you keep having to do it but generally a decent % of drivers will say "Yes". Now on a weekend - especially around Xmas time - understandably these drivers may want to spend their RDs not working and spending time with friends & family. So a lesser percentage will say "Yes" to RDW. And they are perfectly entitiled to do so of course and noobody should shame them - its voluntary overtime after all. As it stands, I've also found late shifts amongst train crew to be 'less popular' than an early shift for RDW, hence more problems in the evening.

Ultimately these means that weekends can often be more problematic. An element of implementing a proper 7-day week including Sundays will help reduce the issue on that day, but weekends may continue to be challenging in some places without additional incentive or simply boosting the driver depots to their recommended establishement level - which as I mentioned above is slower than usual.

 

[Capvermell]

On checking further it turns out that the timetable implemented this week for Horsham to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton and vica versa is not precisely the same timetable as a normal Saturday timetable but slightly amended with a 9 minute shorter return service platform dwell time on Platform 1 at Horsham to allow for the longer transit time for the journey from London Bridge to Horsham.

No this service is sort of the same as the normal Saturday timetable but with amended timings to allow for the longer journey time but in addition there is a completely new early morning train (that does not exist on the regular Saturday timetable where the first London Victoria train from Ockley is at 0824) leaving Horsham at 0550, calling at Ockley at 0600 and London Bridge 0711. This train does not run on a Saturday but the rest of the timetable this week to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton is otherwise exactly identical on all days (Mon-Sat)

So if the train planning or line control departments can manage to amend what is basically a Saturday timetable from Horsham to London Victoria via Dorking to both accommodate the extra journey time and to fit in a very early morning service to suit the needs of the office larks then why can they also not fit in a return train some time after 11pm to provide for the needs of people who aren't larks and who want to go up to London for an evening out. Also I would suggest that a last train back from London Bridge at 17.25 is far too early by at least an hour if not two hours to cover the needs of all commuters going up to London to work (the regular Saturday service on the line is only focused on the needs of Oxford St shoppers) When there were no evening services south of Dorking on a weekday prior to 2004 the last train back out of London Victoria to Horsham and Epsom was at 19.20 So a last train back from London at 17.25 is simply ridiculous so how come they can go to all the trouble of managing to amend this basically Saturday service to accommodate the very early morning train and yet they can't fit in a later evening one?

So very confused thinking indeed it seems as to whether this emergency post xmas Omicron timetable from London Bridge to Horsham (via Dorking) is aimed at Oxford St shoppers or office workers.

Anyway bottom line is that its not the regular Saturday timetable just amended to go to London Bridge but actually a hybridised version of the normal Saturday timetable that does cater for the needs of very early morning commuters but doesn't want to cover the needs of anyone who finishes work much after 4.40pm or anyone who wants to go out to anything in London for the evening.

To my mind this simply doesn't make sense and the timetable should have contained at least two or three more evening train services.

 

[Surreytraveller]

On checking further it turns out that the timetable implemented this week for Horsham to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton and vica versa is not precisely the same timetable as a normal Saturday timetable but slightly amended with a 9 minute shorter return service platform dwell time on Platform 1 at Horsham to allow for the longer transit time for the journey from London Bridge to Horsham.

No this service is sort of the same as the normal Saturday timetable but with amended timings to allow for the longer journey time but in addition there is a completely new early morning train (that does not exist on the regular Saturday timetable where the first London Victoria train is at 0824) leaving Horsham at 0550, calling at Ockley at 0600 and London Bridge 0711. This train does not run on a Saturday but the rest of the timetable this week to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton is otherwise exactly identical on all days (Mon-Sat)

So if the train planning or line control departments can manage to amend what is basically a Saturday timetable from Horsham to London Victoria via Dorking to both accommodate the extra journey time and to fit in a very early morning service to suit the needs of the office larks then why can they also not fit in a return train some time after 11pm to provide for the needs of people who aren't larks and who want to go up to London for an evening out. Also I would suggest that a last train back from London Bridge at 17.25 is far too early by at least an hour if not two hours to cover the needs of all commuters going up to London to work (the regular Saturday service on the line is only focused on the needs of Oxford St shoppers) When there were no evening services south of Dorking on a weekday prior to 2004 the last train back out of London Victoria to Horsham and Epsom was at 19.20 So a last train back from London at 17.25 is simply ridiculous so how come they can go to all the trouble of managing to amend this basically Saturday service to accommodate the very early morning train and yet they can't fit in a later evening one?

So very confused thinking indeed it seems as to whether this emergency post xmas Omicron timetable from London Bridge to Horsham (via Dorking) is aimed at Oxford St shoppers or office workers.

Anyway bottom line is that its not the regular Saturday timetable just amended to go to London Bridge but actually a hybridised version of the normal Saturday timetable that does cater for the needs of very early morning commuters but doesn't want to cover the needs of anyone who finishes work much after 4.40pm or anyone who wants to go out to anything in London for the evening.

To my mind this simply doesn't make sense and the timetable should have contained at least two or three more evening train services.

This week's timetable is literally a rollover of last week's timetable, which is based on a Saturday timetable but altered to take into account Victoria being shut due to engineering works.
The additional early train out of Horsham you mention was a set of empties which has been planned to run last week and therefore this week, which has been arranged to run as a passenger train. So the only alteration required is asking the driver to run as a passenger instead of empties.

 

[Capvermell]

The additional early train out of Horsham you mention was a set of empties which has been planned to run last week and therefore this week, which has been arranged to run as a passenger train. So the only alteration required is asking the driver to run as a passenger instead of empties.

Thinking of the 2326 from London Victoria (changed to the 2325 when the 2025, 2125 and 2225 were added to the service in 2018) that used to terminate at Dorking and then run empty to Horsham but that my lobbying changed in to a passenger carrying train south of Dorking in December 2003 are we sure there aren't also empties that run back to Horsham late in the evening (quite possibly terminating as a passenger service at Dorking) under this timetable that could easily be run as a late evening return passenger service.............

Of course at the moment we are supposed to revert to a normal weekday timetable on Monday 17th January but I am concerned that will not actually happen and that we will be stuck with this Christmas Week amended Saturday only timetable (although probably fairly soon running in to Victoria rather than London Bridge) for quite some more weeks to come until the Omicron infection level substantially falls.

 

[Surreytraveller]

Thinking of the 2326 from London Victoria (changed to the 2325 when the 2025, 2125 and 2225 were added to the service in 2018) that used to terminate at Dorking and then run empty to Horsham but that my lobbying changed in to a passenger carrying train south of Dorking in December 2003 are we sure there aren't also empties that run back to Horsham late in the evening (quite possibly terminating as a passenger service at Dorking) under this timetable that could easily be run as a late evening return passenger service.............

Of course at the moment we are supposed to revert to a normal weekday timetable on Monday 17th January but I am concerned that will not actually happen and that we will be stuck with this Christmas Week amended Saturday only timetable (although probably fairly soon running in to Victoria rather than London Bridge) for quite some more weeks to come until the Omicron infection level substantially falls.

There's one. I suspect they would be difficulty sourcing an OBS.
The last train berths at Dorking for the morning, the second to last goes empties to Horsham, and all the previous ones form passenger trains back north

 

[Capvermell]

There's one. I suspect they would be difficulty sourcing an OBS.
The last train berths at Dorking for the morning, the second to last goes empties to Horsham, and all the previous ones form passenger trains back north

So this second last train that goes empty to Horsham on the Saturday timetable and this Christmas Week timetable is presumably more or less the same 2325 train that runs in passenger service to Horsham from Monday to Friday? Although I see that its timetabled at 2327 out of London Bridge on this timetable and gets to Dorking at 0030 rather than 0026 as it does on the regular weekday timetable from London Victoria.

Although its notable the journey time is only 63 minutes rather than 73 minutes but may be it doesn't stop at as many of the intermediate stops?

 

[Class 466]

On checking further it turns out that the timetable implemented this week for Horsham to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton and vica versa is not precisely the same timetable as a normal Saturday timetable but slightly amended with a 9 minute shorter return service platform dwell time on Platform 1 at Horsham to allow for the longer transit time for the journey from London Bridge to Horsham.

No this service is sort of the same as the normal Saturday timetable but with amended timings to allow for the longer journey time but in addition there is a completely new early morning train (that does not exist on the regular Saturday timetable where the first London Victoria train from Ockley is at 0824) leaving Horsham at 0550, calling at Ockley at 0600 and London Bridge 0711. This train does not run on a Saturday but the rest of the timetable this week to London Bridge via Dorking and Sutton is otherwise exactly identical on all days (Mon-Sat)

So if the train planning or line control departments can manage to amend what is basically a Saturday timetable from Horsham to London Victoria via Dorking to both accommodate the extra journey time and to fit in a very early morning service to suit the needs of the office larks then why can they also not fit in a return train some time after 11pm to provide for the needs of people who aren't larks and who want to go up to London for an evening out. Also I would suggest that a last train back from London Bridge at 17.25 is far too early by at least an hour if not two hours to cover the needs of all commuters going up to London to work (the regular Saturday service on the line is only focused on the needs of Oxford St shoppers) When there were no evening services south of Dorking on a weekday prior to 2004 the last train back out of London Victoria to Horsham and Epsom was at 19.20 So a last train back from London at 17.25 is simply ridiculous so how come they can go to all the trouble of managing to amend this basically Saturday service to accommodate the very early morning train and yet they can't fit in a later evening one?

So very confused thinking indeed it seems as to whether this emergency post xmas Omicron timetable from London Bridge to Horsham (via Dorking) is aimed at Oxford St shoppers or office workers.

Anyway bottom line is that its not the regular Saturday timetable just amended to go to London Bridge but actually a hybridised version of the normal Saturday timetable that does cater for the needs of very early morning commuters but doesn't want to cover the needs of anyone who finishes work much after 4.40pm or anyone who wants to go out to anything in London for the evening.

To my mind this simply doesn't make sense and the timetable should have contained at least two or three more evening train services.

You may have also noticed that the trains stop more enroute so therefore run to slightly different times. It is still a Saturday base service though.

the fact is, anyone from Horsham that wants London isn’t going to get on a train via Dorking and the passenger numbers at intermediate stations between Horsham & Dorking are quite low.

Everyone wants a better train service on their local line - but you can’t justify running loads of extra trains if the demand isn’t ever going to be there.

 

[Capvermell]

Everyone wants a better train service on their local line - but you can’t justify running loads of extra trains if the demand isn’t ever going to be there.

I'm just asking for Southern to run the trains they are normally scheduled to run rather than extending a Christmas week timetable based on a Saturday service across all normal weekdays. For most other lines a Saturday service on a weekday just means less frequent trains in the evening but on my section of line it means we don't have any trains at all, which is a very different thing and hence why I think I'm more entitled to kick up a fuss about it.

Re the weekend Southern's service is actually illogical with 11 trains hourly in the daytime on Saturday and then nothing on Saturday evening or on Sunday. This is a completely outdated 1930s style model of customer demand when people didn't travel on Sunday as they were going to church.

It would be far more logical and bring in more revenue to run a once every 2 hour service on both days and/or take whatever minor extra steps are needed to allow DOO operation at Holmwood, Ockley and Warnham. As Boxhill allows DOO and so do a load of unmanned south coast stations there can't be much needed to make this possible between Dorking and Horsham. Since the stations are unmanned there is no substantial cost in running additional trains other than the time of the train crew involved. We aren't talking about somewhere like Horsham where about 8 members of staff seem to be deployed to wave around manual bats when trains are attached and despatched...........

 

[Surreytraveller]

I'm just asking for Southern to run the trains they are normally scheduled to run rather than extending a Christmas week timetable based on a Saturday service across all normal weekdays. For most other lines a Saturday service on a weekday just means less frequent trains in the evening but on my section of line it means we don't have any trains at all, which is a very different thing and hence why I think I'm more entitled to kick up a fuss about it.

Re the weekend Southern's service is actually illogical with 11 trains hourly in the daytime on Saturday and then nothing on Saturday evening or on Sunday. This is a completely outdated 1930s style model of customer demand when people didn't travel on Sunday as they were going to church.

It would be far more logical and bring in more revenue to run a once every 2 hour service on both days and/or take whatever minor extra steps are needed to allow DOO operation at Holmwood, Ockley and Warnham. As Boxhill allows DOO and so do a load of unmanned south coast stations there can't be much needed to make this possible between Dorking and Horsham. Since the stations are unmanned there is no substantial cost in running additional trains other than the time of the train crew involved. We aren't talking about somewhere like Horsham where about 8 members of staff seem to be deployed to wave around manual bats when trains are attached and despatched...........

Its has been explained umpteen times that it is not possible to run the normal service, and there was not the time or resources to plan an alternative.
Not sure what you do for work, but presumably the pandemic has passed you by?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 6 Jan 2022 ==

Its has been explained umpteen times that it is not possible to run the normal service, and there was not the time or resources to plan an alternative.
Not sure what you do for work, but presumably the pandemic has passed you by?

It is DOO south of Dorking. Has been for nearly six years.
Unfortunately, there are bigger priorities than the one passenger who wants to go to Ockley. Kicking up a fuss isn't going to change the priorities during a pandemic when the Department for Transport hasn't got any money anyway

 

[Capvermell]

It is DOO south of Dorking. Has been for nearly six years.
Unfortunately, there are bigger priorities than the one passenger who wants to go to Ockley. Kicking up a fuss isn't going to change the priorities during a pandemic when the Department for Transport hasn't got any money anyway

If its already been DOO south of Dorking for the last six years then why does a train supervisor or guard always board the train at Epsom and Horsham for most of the day or at Dorking and Horsham (in the evening) in order to operate the doors of the train at Holmwood, Ockley and Warnham stations when even if that Train Supervisor or Guard is still on board en route up to Epsom (which is where they swap round and travel back the other way during the day) at Boxhill & Westhumble they don't ever operate the doors at that also totally unmanned station?.................................

 

[backontrack]

Polite as ever on here, isn't it?