Fair point. I thought you meant se4vices badged GN.
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Thameslink Services / Timetable from 18 May 2019
- Thread starter gingerheid
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Fair point. I thought you meant se4vices badged GN.
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Yes, I'd say it is probably fair that only having 18 minutes from leaving Ely to leaving CBG with a CMB stop does feel very tight - especially as going into platforms 7 or 8 at CBG, as the 'expresses' tend to do nowadays, is rather slow. And once you go to 19 minutes or above you do, unfortunately, clash with the XC
Also, as mentioned above, every other hour there is the Ipswich->Peterborough train, due to arrive Ely at xx57, which therefore also clashes.
Given that though, it is rather odd that the consultation timetable had it down as 16 minutes, which isn't just a bit out but quite considerably wrong. Doesn't say much for the use of consultation timetables if they are going to have such fiction in them
Ok, so I guess this isn't going to work unless you can rejig the paths over Welwyn (looks like you theoretically could a little, but goodness knows what knock-on effects would result) or change the XC timings (ditto).
So, instead, how about switching around those that start at Kings Lynn and those that start at Ely? The Kings Lynn could take the xx47 path from Ely, and it doesn't matter if it has to wait a while at CBG as it needs to attach more carriages there anyway (at least until they finally extend the platforms north of CBG). And the Ely starter could take the current xx17 path south of CBG, therefore starting from Ely at say xx24, restoring sub-70 minute journeys ELY->KGX.
As a useful side-effect, this would reduce overcrowding on the xx17. Currently there's been a 24 minute gap in services to CBG by when this arrives, and is only 4 carriages, already loaded with people from the Kings Lynn branch. If that arrived at xx47 instead, only 9 minutes after the GA Norwich, there would be fewer people trying to get on it at Ely and CMB. An empty 8-car starter would be significantly more comfortable to be the first service out after the southbound 'gap' (whereas currently at xx47 it tends to be rather lightly loaded, and a bit of a waste of capacity that would be much better at a different point in the hour).
Downside is that doing this extends the southbound 'gap' by another 7-8 minutes, and bunches the 4tph Ely->Cambridge closer than now.
I don't see any obvious infrastructure/timetabling issues with doing this, but I'm probably missing something
There's a thread somewhere that talked about the proposed re-timing of the Greater Anglia Norwich to Cambridge service when it's extended to Stansted. I can't find the thread (edit: found it now, it's here), but I know I posted this analysis of non-peak departure times from Ely to Cambridge:
Before May 2018: xx25 (GN), xx38 (GA), xx52 (XC), xx58 (GN). Longest gap = 27 minutes
Current: xx17 (GN), xx38 (GA), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 24 minutes
With re-timed Greater Anglia service: xx02 (GA), xx17 (GN), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 30 minutes
If we were to combine this re-timed Greater Anglia service with your proposal, we'd get: xx02 (GA), xx24 (GN), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 23 minutes.
So you get the shortest "longest gap" between southbound trains in recent years, a restored "fast" service to London, and more direct trains to Stansted. Everyone's a winner!
Before May 2018: xx25 (GN), xx38 (GA), xx52 (XC), xx58 (GN). Longest gap = 27 minutes
Current: xx17 (GN), xx38 (GA), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 24 minutes
With re-timed Greater Anglia service: xx02 (GA), xx17 (GN), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 30 minutes
If we were to combine this re-timed Greater Anglia service with your proposal, we'd get: xx02 (GA), xx24 (GN), xx47 (GN), xx53 (XC). Longest gap = 23 minutes.
So you get the shortest "longest gap" between southbound trains in recent years, a restored "fast" service to London, and more direct trains to Stansted. Everyone's a winner!
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I don't see how MikeWM's proposal slows the King's Lynn service even further? It does nothing to help restore it to the journey times that existed before May 2018, but it doesn't make it worse than today. The King's Lynn trains still get 27 minutes from departing Ely (xx:47) to departing Cambridge (xx:14), exactly the same amount of time as they take today, just shifted by half an hour.
That said, is there a problem with the proposal and Ely North Junction? If I've read RealTimeTrains correctly, the hourly East Midlands train from Norwich comes through the junction towards Ely at xx:42, and the proposed time for the train from King's Lynn would see it coming through at xx:43.
That said, is there a problem with the proposal and Ely North Junction? If I've read RealTimeTrains correctly, the hourly East Midlands train from Norwich comes through the junction towards Ely at xx:42, and the proposed time for the train from King's Lynn would see it coming through at xx:43.
Yes, though it seems fairly easy to solve - make the EMT leave Norwich one minute earlier, and have the GN from KLN leave Ely at xx48. This is exactly what already happens with the 0948 M-F from Ely now that it starts back at KLN, it gets the 1014 path from CBG. Doing this doesn't appear to make the EMT clash with anything obvious at Norwich/Trowse, or anything else at Ely North.
ashkeba
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Today they sit 6-11 minutes at Cambridge. I thought the suggestion was to make everything sit at least 9 minutes to let XC pass.
Also, services used to take only 4-5 minutes at Cambridge. It was lengthened when the Electro stars were introduced and they had many coupling failures. It should be reduced again as part of giving Lynn its peak time expresses back and leaving the stoppers South of Cambridge to Cambridge starters.
Quite disgraceful really.
GTR have spent the last 4 years telling us that they're running the largest driver recruitment programme in railway history so where are they?
bramling
Veteran Member
And I notice there’s at least one RLU out and about on a Cambridge/Brighton FLU diagram today. We’ve heard all about all that extra capacity, so where is it?
They have been recruited and are now in training.
bramling
Veteran Member
How any years (decades) to plan for this?!
Mikey C
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It takes time to train a Driver. Potentially, from recruitment to Driver is around 2+yrs. Add a massive recruitment campaign, a huge influx of Trainees, new stock, new depots, new signalling.. etc. You can understand why it takes so long.
In Madrid for the Champions League final?
Or at one of their barbecues...
But GTR told us 4 years ago, when they won the franchise, that they were on the case. If it takes 2 years to train a driver whey are we still seeing shortages 4 years later.
It's not exactly a profession where there's a shortage of applicants.
Because its not just about the Driver training. Taking the training in isolation is just naive. They would of had to plan the number needed at each depot location, plan what work each depot is doing, advertise the jobs, interview and assess each applicant.. How fast do you really believe just that part should take ?
All have to be sifted, assessed, interviewed and have medicals. Even then, just because you have thousands of applicants only a small number have the aptitude to actually pass. Even those who pass the assessment process still don't make it past interview or even meet the basic criteria of the application. Some have multiple applications and turn down the job for another TOC.
Chuck the various, and well discussed, spanners into the works and then you begin to understand why it is STILL taking time to resolve.
It's got better and will continue to improve. It is just taking time.
bramling
Veteran Member
I can understand all that, but we’re talking about a project which has been very many years in the making.
If it’s the case, as some have suggested, that FCC left things in a mess then again that’s understandable, but why are they (and in this I mean the combination of GTR and DFT) trying to deliver something which is apparently undeliverable with the resources they have?
The GN side has been a complete mess pretty much every day this week, and since the most recent timetable we seem to be back to it not being possible to get the departure board up for my local station without seeing multiple cancellations, on top of the usual Thameslink patchy random late running, and of course complete chaos when there’s a whiff of something having gone wrong somewhere and taking about four times as long to recover than pre-Thameslink.
It all seems to be too much change in too shorter period of time, and this is with things already having been rescheduled and pared back from their original delivery dates.
Still, I can’t contain my excitement at all the new destinations on offer. I like the idea of a day out to exciting Ifield, might even have a two-hour wait on the platform when ready to come back home!
Aictos
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I'm sure there are facilities to avail yourself of in the area should you wait 2 hours.... #pub
Yes, I'd say it is probably fair that only having 18 minutes from leaving Ely to leaving CBG with a CMB stop does feel very tight - especially as going into platforms 7 or 8 at CBG, as the 'expresses' tend to do nowadays, is rather slow. And once you go to 19 minutes or above you do, unfortunately, clash with the XC
Here is a train from today that took 19 minutes between departing Ely and departing Cambridge. It left Ely 9 minutes late, at 11:56 (so three minutes after the Cross Country is timetabled), called at Cambridge North, and then departed Cambridge just one minute late. By the time it reached Hitchin and joined the ECML, it was actually early (only by 15 seconds, but still early).
Yes, I know the relevant CrossCountry at 11:53 was late itself. But had it been on time, a planned 11:56 departure from Ely would still have hit its slot at Digswell. (Assuming that 3 minutes between departures at Ely is sufficient?)
Yes, I know it probably wouldn't work at all in peak commuting hours at Cambridge. But the timetable has many tweaks in it for peak-time.
Yes, I know that in general, even off-peak, this would tight and liable to be delayed. But is a delay at Hitchin, even, say, 50% of the time, better than a planned 9 minute wait at Cambridge 100% of the time? I'd favour the former, but I appreciate that whoever plans this is stuck between a rock and a hard place, and I'm glad it's not me that has to make the call!
It seems there's a backlog in the training for some reason - I can only guess due to the volume of other training needed for existing drivers. We have some internal staff who have been sat in the talent pool waiting to start for over a year, some now approaching two years, who are still looking unlikely to start their training before 2020.I can understand all that, but we’re talking about a project which has been very many years in the making.
If it’s the case, as some have suggested, that FCC left things in a mess then again that’s understandable, but why are they (and in this I mean the combination of GTR and DFT) trying to deliver something which is apparently undeliverable with the resources they have?
The GN side has been a complete mess pretty much every day this week, and since the most recent timetable we seem to be back to it not being possible to get the departure board up for my local station without seeing multiple cancellations, on top of the usual Thameslink patchy random late running, and of course complete chaos when there’s a whiff of something having gone wrong somewhere and taking about four times as long to recover than pre-Thameslink.
It all seems to be too much change in too shorter period of time, and this is with things already having been rescheduled and pared back from their original delivery dates.
Still, I can’t contain my excitement at all the new destinations on offer. I like the idea of a day out to exciting Ifield, might even have a two-hour wait on the platform when ready to come back home!
We've been told that at the moment it's around 10 diagrams a day on GN/TL that are uncovered, although in my experience it appears to be more than that, certainly at weekends. This is apparently due to training and Annual Leave... It has been emphasised repeatedly and very strongly that this is only a temporary situation, and most definitely not a repeat of last year.
I wonder why they don't use the reduced level of drivers they have to run an emergency timetable with pretty much all station services to Peterborough and Cambridge. There must be ample paths on a Saturday and journey times will go up, but everyone can get to and from where they want - albeit slowly.
The ridiculously low number of buses running are going to be a lot slower, and that's when the buses actually go where they're supposed to!
The ridiculously low number of buses running are going to be a lot slower, and that's when the buses actually go where they're supposed to!
Aictos
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But that would make too much sense!
tsr
Established Member
In theory, yes.
But part of the problem is that it’s not been easy to forecast driver availability, even a couple of hours before the day begins. The documentation process is so dynamic (and GTR Control is so utterly swamped in “paperwork” in general) that accurately working out if the next day needs a reduced timetable is not actually possible by the usual deadline of 2200 the previous evening. And given the GN runs a service quite early in the morning, ideally everything would need to be decided about 12 hours before this point anyway. Which, sadly, is currently “even more” impossible.
I’m not convinced that it would be practical to change drivers’ duties to allow a totally different timetable at such short notice, either. The resource managers don’t even know if some of them will even turn up for duty, and trying to play a game of amending jobs and hours will only go one way, and that’s badly.
The only real workaround I can see is to use more historic data to make a weekly decision about the upcoming driver cover levels, and use that data to make a decision by an earlier fixed deadline on whether or not to run a reduced timetable on whichever days are affected. The political and press coverage ramifications would probably be quite harsh, but it might help people plan journeys rather better. But I don’t think the system of looking at the “no cover” levels really allows this accuracy yet, as the “look ahead” forecasts for just a couple of days ahead require a fair amount of manpower as it is. To some degree this really shows where the issues lie, and probably have done for some years, between the worlds of longer-term and shorter-term planning, and the amount of additional planning required to make the short-term picture work - aside from the actual numbers of drivers in training or available.
bramling
Veteran Member
To bring in an emergency timetable someone has to make a decision, that’s quite often the first hurdle, especially if there’s the likelihood of a big nasty inquest if an emergency timetable is brought in and it turns out not to have been needed!
The other problem with an ET is that it’s relatively easy to bring in (in general all you do is wait for trains to arrive at your crew depot, then stick your own driver on the train for one or more “out and back” trips, and put the surplus trains away). But the arse is getting the ET out again, especially when considering the need to protect last services - not that GTR is very good at doing that anyway - and getting the stock in the right place for the morning. This takes us back to how much the industry and TPTB care about running weekend services relative to weekday. Anecdotal evidence seems to suggest “not much” is the answer to that!
The sheer amount of stop orders being issued today, and the need for various stations to issue them, must put a massive load of pressure on control with the chance of stop orders not being successful (or forgotten) so that's why I think it is perhaps easier to change the timetable and maintain some consistency. Look at the changes made today!
Ultimately, the standard timetable isn't running so you may as well have planned in advance than as you go.
Ultimately, the standard timetable isn't running so you may as well have planned in advance than as you go.
Thankfully I'm not travelling today but the number of cancellations to and from Stevenage looks worse than we had this time last year.
It really isn't acceptable and I dread to think what tomorrow's going to bring.
It really isn't acceptable and I dread to think what tomorrow's going to bring.
bramling
Veteran Member
Well I was originally planning to take the 1746 home (365s), but looking ahead it was clear it wasn’t going to run, so managed to get to KX a bit earlier than planned and got the 1716, full length undesiro but never mind. Announced that it would be calling additionally at Potters Bar and Welwyn, but neglected to advise anyone that they’d need to be in the front 8 carriages until after leaving Finsbury. Then on the approach to Welwyn it was announced the points had failed (hot weather?!) so the unlucky Welwyn punters have got some free extra mileage, although it looks like a train is being held for them on the up side at Stevenage so at least some hint of control trying their best.
Another completely shambolic day - the departure board for Hitchin currently shows 10x cancellations in the next two hours.
Blimey, that's awful. This isn't an odd driver going sick, or someone going AWOL. I know it's half term, nice weather, Champions League Final, Premiership Rugby Final, the Derby etc but GTR really should've seen this coming and planned accordingly.
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