Northern's Problems in the North West

Red Devil · 4 May 2018

More chaos today. The 06.03 Warrington Central to Liverpool hasn't run all week.
This will carry on for the foreseeable future as people seem to assume that all those drivers on "essential driver training " will return and everything will be ok. Well it won't,the drivers out training can be counted in single figures.
The worrying thing about this is that Arriva don't seem bothered.

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B&I · 4 May 2018

Red Devil said:
More chaos today. The 06.03 Warrington Central to Liverpool hasn't run all week.
This will carry on for the foreseeable future as people seem to assume that all those drivers on "essential driver training " will return and everything will be ok. Well it won't,the drivers out training can be counted in single figures.
The worrying thing about this is that Arriva don't seem bothered.

The really worrying thing is that there does not appear to be any way of doing anything about this. A supposed public service has been outsourced to a private company which appears to be beyond anyone's control.

Red Devil · 4 May 2018

A temporary solution is return of a rest day working agreement. This will enable the company to release drivers to train and road learn and cover the jobs with rest day men.
But there's no progress on that front at the moment. Hence the continuation of this mess for the foreseeable future.

Audioguy · 4 May 2018

But return of the Rest Day Working will cost Northern money and I don't think there is any pressure on the company to do that. As B&I says above there doesn't seem to be any come-back at all on Northern other than their customers hating them. I don't get the feeling it costs them anything extra above the costs of running a train to not run a train. So how can Northern be held to account?

mpthomson · 4 May 2018

B&I said:
The really worrying thing is that there doea not appear to be any way of doing anything about this. A aupposed public service has been outsourced to a private company which appears to be beyond anyone's control.

Instead of your normal hard left rhetoric about public = good, private = bad, what do you suggest they do?

dave87016 · 4 May 2018

Apologies if this has already been mentioned but from the May Timetable change Blackpool Sth - Colne all start/terminate Preston, the Blackpool Nth - York start/terminate Preston and Leeds resulting in no direct trains Blackpool - York except Sundays

Bletchleyite · 4 May 2018

dave87016 said:
Apologies if this has already been mentioned but from the May Timetable change Blackpool Sth - Colne all start/terminate Preston

Don't forget the benefit this one brings - the best local service Ormskirk-Preston has ever enjoyed in its 160+ years of existence - pure clockface hourly from about 7am to 10pm. (I think the Network Northwest 1990s hourly service had an earlier finish, and the local service was infrequent in the days of expresses going that way). And by rejigging it with Blackpool and Colne it doesn't even require an extra unit or crew to do it.

30907 · 4 May 2018

dave87016 said:
Apologies if this has already been mentioned but from the May Timetable change Blackpool Sth - Colne all start/terminate Preston, the Blackpool Nth - York start/terminate Preston and Leeds resulting in no direct trains Blackpool - York except Sundays

South is planned, North is temporary.

Matt_pool · 4 May 2018

I'm getting the train to Liverpool Lime Street later and thought I'd better check now to see what the trains are up to.

10.44 from Manchester Oxford Road delayed by 15 mins (fault on the train) and the 11.15 was cancelled (no reason given).

So far everything else is showing as on time, but I expect that to change.

Just another normal day for Northern then!

trainophile · 4 May 2018

Stuck in Southport waiting for a driver for the 1157 to Man Vic. Been told about 10 minutes delay, better not be much longer as I need to get a 1300 connection at Wigan NW. At least it’s a Class 150, there’s a Pacer behind us on the platform and my heart sank!

Matt_pool · 4 May 2018

And now the 11.44 departure from Manchester Oxford Road: "This train has been delayed by a shortage of train drivers"

As I said, just another normal day for Northern.

Sod the people who rely on the trains to get to work, college, or in my case, an important appointment!

Edit: the 1.44departed Oxford Road on time. But it departed Urmston 3 mins late (nothing out of the ordinary there!), so why are they blaming a shortage of train drivers for the delay!!??

trainophile · 4 May 2018

Phew we’re off. Dead right about the 10 minutes.

trainophile · 4 May 2018

Good luck Matt, hope you get there in time. Chaotic isn’t it?

Bovverboy · 4 May 2018

dave87016 said: ↑
Apologies if this has already been mentioned but from the May Timetable change Blackpool Sth - Colne all start/terminate Preston

Bletchleyite said:
Don't forget the benefit this one brings - the best local service Ormskirk-Preston has ever enjoyed in its 160+ years of existence - pure clockface hourly from about 7am to 10pm. (I think the Network Northwest 1990s hourly service had an earlier finish, and the local service was infrequent in the days of expresses going that way). And by rejigging it with Blackpool and Colne it doesn't even require an extra unit or crew to do it.

The 'circuit' is going to be as follows (Mondays to Fridays, approximately).
Blackpool South xx.14 Preston xx.52/xx.57 Colne (xx+2).07/(xx+2).11 Preston (xx+3).20/(xx+3).26 Ormskirk (xx+3).56/(xx+4).01 Preston (xx+4).32/(xx+4).35 Blackpool South (xx+5).10

I can't see that passengers will be booted off at Preston (unless there is a need to, say, change a unit), so there will effectively be hourly services Blackpool South - Colne, Colne - Ormskirk, and Ormskirk - Blackpool South. So the through link from Colne to Blackpool South is going to be broken (but not vice-versa), but it's only going to be a 15-minute wait for the connection, which isn't a disaster unless you're going to be doing it every day.
Conversely there are going to be new through services between Ormskirk and Blackpool South, and Colne and Ormskirk. People are going to use those through services, perhaps as much as they use the existing through services, I don't know. There will always be a natural resistance to existing links being broken.

My one worry about all this is how punctually the new services will prove to be. The existing Colne to Blackpool South service isn't the most punctual as it is, and on the new timetable the units are going to be doing in 3h50m (approx) what they have 4 hrs to do now.

LNW-GW Joint · 4 May 2018

Audioguy said:
But return of the Rest Day Working will cost Northern money and I don't think there is any pressure on the company to do that. As B&I says above there doesn't seem to be any come-back at all on Northern other than their customers hating them. I don't get the feeling it costs them anything extra above the costs of running a train to not run a train. So how can Northern be held to account?

Cancellations do cost the TOC money, and continued poor performance will trigger penalties from DfT and rebates to passengers.

Loop & Link · 4 May 2018

Matt_pool said:
And now the 11.44 departure from Manchester Oxford Road: "This train has been delayed by a shortage of train drivers"

As I said, just another normal day for Northern.

Sod the people who rely on the trains to get to work, college, or in my case, an important appointment!

Edit: the 1.44departed Oxford Road on time. But it departed Urmston 3 mins late (nothing out of the ordinary there!), so why are they blaming a shortage of train drivers for the delay!!??

The reason for the loss in running between Oxford Road & Urmston was because it called additionally at Trafford Park & Humphrey Park, due to the previous cancellation.

The additional stops would have been paged out via Tyrell/JourneyCheck with the root cause reason “Due to shortage of train drivers” which would have shown the delay reason on NRE app for example and the automated announcer.

Red Devil · 4 May 2018

Audioguy said:
But return of the Rest Day Working will cost Northern money and I don't think there is any pressure on the company to do that. As B&I says above there doesn't seem to be any come-back at all on Northern other than their customers hating them. I don't get the feeling it costs them anything extra above the costs of running a train to not run a train. So how can Northern be held to account?

Well the alternative to the non return of RDW is the past fortnights debacle being continued EVERY weekday until the end of September and I mean everyday! Because there aren't simply the drivers to cover the work.
Increased services after May timetable change only exacerbate the problem.

WCMLaddict · 4 May 2018

LNW-GW Joint said:
Cancellations do cost the TOC money, and continued poor performance will trigger penalties from DfT and rebates to passengers.

Rumour has it that Northern negotiated penalty cap that is lower to the cost of what they would have to pay drivers if RDWs were agreed. If true, even less incentive to the company to sort things out.

Red Devil:
Talks have moved on. RDW haven’t been extended because NR didn’t fulfill two promises that extended the agreement previously. One of them has been agreed week or two ago. The big one still to go..

cuccir · 4 May 2018

I'm amazed that there's not greater press reporting on this. To have significant frequent cancellations of services over an extended period of time is quite shocking

Robertj21a · 4 May 2018

cuccir said:
I'm amazed that there's not greater press reporting on this. To have significant frequent cancellations of services over an extended period of time is quite shocking

But just how many are being cancelled most days ?

Red Devil · 4 May 2018

WCMLaddict said:
Rumour has it that Northern negotiated penalty cap that is lower to the cost of what they would have to pay drivers if RDWs were agreed. If true, even less incentive to the company to sort things out.

Red Devil:
Talks have moved on. RDW haven’t been extended because NR didn’t fulfill two promises that extended the agreement previously. One of them has been agreed week or two ago. The big one still to go..

Yes I'm aware as to why they finished RDW, I'm a northern ASLEF member, but it's reinstatement is the only short term way of ending this mess.
The weight of public and eventual political pressure will force Arrivas hand irrespective of their fiscal concerns.

uww11x · 4 May 2018

Robertj21a said:
But just how many are being cancelled most days ?

Too many ......

philthetube · 4 May 2018

B&I said:
The really worrying thing is that there doea not appear to be any way of doing anything about this. A aupposed public service has been outsourced to a private company which appears to be beyond anyone's control.

mpthomson said:
Instead of your normal hard left rhetoric about public = good, private = bad, what do you suggest they do?

I cannot understand how you find this hard left, a company is failing to provide what was promised, a public service is being paid for by the DFT and is not happening, reasons are irrelevant as far as passengers are concerned.

It is not up to passengers to tell a company how to run its business it is up to the people being paid to do it who should be doing their jobs.

I am not blaming Arriva Network rail or the DFT, and to be honest I don't care, I just want my train to Colne to arrive when it should.

trainophile · 4 May 2018

It must be costing them a fortune in delay repay claims too, for people who miss connections due to cancelled or severely delayed trains.

BlueFox · 4 May 2018

trainophile said:
It must be costing them a fortune in delay repay claims too

That's assuming they bother to deal with the claims. I've been waiting over two months for one.

Carlisle · 4 May 2018

philthetube said:
I cannot understand how you find this hard left,

Perhaps because ASLEFs withdrawing the RDW agreement amounts more or less to an overtime ban in all but name, just not sanctioned by a ballot, but it’s probably the industry’s more than the drivers fault for signing these flimsy agreements in the first place that are so easily withdrawn .

The_Engineer · 4 May 2018

Carlisle said:
Perhaps because ASLEFs withdrawing the RDW agreement amounts more or less to an overtime ban in all but name, just not sanctioned by a ballot, but it’s probably the industry’s more than the drivers fault for signing these flimsy agreements in the first place that are so easily withdrawn .

Please refer up thread, where people who are directly involved said the Rest Day Working Agreement was allowed to lapse, it had an end date. ASLEF withdrew nothing, Northern appear to not be treating the establishment of a new RDWA as a priority.

Robertj21a · 4 May 2018

uww11x said:
Too many ......

So, hundreds ?

philthetube · 4 May 2018

Carlisle said:
Perhaps because ASLEFs withdrawing the RDW agreement amounts more or less to an overtime ban in all but name, just not sanctioned by a ballot, but it’s probably the industry’s more than the drivers fault for signing these flimsy agreements in the first place that are so easily withdrawn .

please reread the post I commented on

cuccir · 4 May 2018

Robertj21a said:
But just how many are being cancelled most days ?

On some lines - particularly Oxenholme to Windermere - the majority of trains and/or all trains for several hours.

Elsewhere in North Lancashire, a smaller but significant proportion. It's certianly in the hundreds over the week which in a small area is a lot.

Northern's Problems in the North West

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