Bikes should be allowed on board trains, but only in designated spaces. If there are no spaces left, then tough, get the next train.
A few rubbish train companies have that rule, but even there, the guard can allow more on if they deem it safe.
This is a big problem on Merseyrail where the 507's and 508's have designated cycle spaces. They also have designated wheelchair/pram spaces. But what you find is that people but their bikes in the wheelchair/pram space.
Really? Are they signed as wheelchair/pram (I didn't find the sign online) or are people putting prams in the wheelchair spaces?
And would both wheelchair and cycle spaces be marked by a small square by or on the carriage door, as in other Abellio-operated companies?
Then when someone gets on with a pram they end up having to stand in the door vestibule because the anonymous cyclist won't move his/her bike.
Do most of the passengers introduce themselves to you as they board, or is describing only the cyclist as "anonymous" just another part of alienating them?
And during rush hour, when the bike/wheelchair/pram spaces are all taken up, the guard allows more people with bikes on.
The guard is always right. Even when they're wrong, they're right until you can appeal it later.
On a couple of occasions I've seen up to three bikes in the door vestibules on already crowded trains, and the bikes must take up the space of 8 or 9 people who are forced to cram in like sardines with their noses in each others armpits.
So we started off with bikes taking up the space of three people, then another poster upped that to four, now it's "8 or 9 people"! Any more bids?
Three bikes will pack bars-saddle-bars into a space about 1.8m long by 0.65m wide. Try fitting 9 people in that. Even just on plain area, that's only 1.17sq.m and I remember complaints about the class 700s only allowing 0.25sq.m per standing person and 9 people in that space would be about half that!
Surely having so many bikes on board is a health and safety hazard and something that the guard should keep an eye on.
I remember on one occasion a particularly lazy cyclist got on with his bike at Brunswick and somehow managed to squeeze on, making the cattle wagon conditions even worse. He then got off 1 stop later at Liverpool Central! Okay, he might have been changing there to the Wirral Line, but seriously, next time cycle the 3/4 of a mile from Brunswick to Central!
Maybe the bike or rider was broken rather than lazy but in that case, I would secure the bike or wait for a quieter train. Or maybe they got off after one stop because they realised they should wait?