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Trivia: Large towns which deserve more trains per hour

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alistairlees

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Lincoln is probably a candidate here. 95,000 people in the city and four or five departures each hour. One each to:
Nottingham
Newark north gate
Sheffield
Doncaster (not every hour but will improve in December)
Peterborough (as above)
Grimsby (roughly every two hours)
 
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NorthOxonian

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Sunderland only sees one train an hour in each direction (barring Grand Central). The Metro does mitigate this somewhat, but not entirely.

Weston-super-Mare has a fairly poor off-peak services - two trains an hour towards Bristol, one going south west, and some hours an intercity train too.

Corby is ever expanding and only has an hourly service, but clearly an improvement on the

A lot of fairly big places also lose out due to isolation - Barrow-in-Furness, Barnstaple, and Scarborough spring to mind as towns which probably could do with a better service. I suppose a similar effect applies to Liverpool and Hull, which seem to have noticeably worse intercity service than other major cities.
 
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swt_passenger

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Llandudno

Llandudno

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Knutsford
Hartlepool
Barnstaple
Whitby
Dore & Totley
Conwy (a request stop!)



But perhaps more importantly there are towns adjacent to passenger railway lines that do not have a railway station at all even though there are numerous trains passing through such as:

Garstang
Soham
Wellington, Somerset
Clay Cross/North Wingfield
Desborough
Holywell (Ex Junction)
 
Old Yard Dog

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Widnes, Shotton and Nuneaton all deserve more stops by express trains.
 
Wilts Wanderer

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Scarborough, population 62,000 has only an hourly service to York and beyond, and an hourly service to Bridlington and Hull. Very poor by most comparisons.

Edit - amended Yorkshire Coast frequency to hourly as-per May 2019 improved timetable (up from 9tpd.)
 
Kendalian

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Burnley. Especially before the Todmorden curve enabled direct services to Manchester Vic.
 
PTR 444

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Not really large towns as such but Bitterne and Woolston on the Southampton - Portsmouth Line could do with more than one train per hour as they serve quite a populated suburban area.

And a honourable mention goes to Totton, which is about ten times the size of Brockenhurst yet has 80% fewer trains per hour calling there.
 
tbtc

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Some questionable definitions of "large towns" on here... but I'd suggest Rotherham (three trains per hour to Sheffield, one slow train per hour to Leeds and two slow trains per hour towards Doncaster), since having a station in the town centre with a few departures was more important than having one on the edge of town with more departures, hence the "loop" (and all of the problems that the single track Holmes Chord and crossing at flat junctions causes).

I'd also consider some of the "places that end up with a poor service because they are on a main line and the fast services mean there's little scope to stop much there (Cramlington, Chester le Street, Batley... not all of which are *large* towns but certainly get poorer services as a result of being on lines where the speed of long distance services is more important).

And Cwmbran, which is bigger than Wrexham IIRC but Cwmbran passengers get a much poorer service than towns at the heads of the valleys, instead they have to fight for seats with longer distance passengers

Peter0124 said:
East Kilbride? Might need a new line entirely.
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route101 said:
2nd biggest town in Scotland . Half hourly service
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I'd be in favour of improved services to East Kilbride but it's only the "second biggest town" because Stirling/ Perth/ Inverness are cities in Scotland but wouldn't be if south of the border
 
MalaiseForever

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Nantwich, very busy town and expanding considerably at the minute. As is the surrounding area. Far too many services pass through non-stop, and some are only request stops which is disappointing for such a busy town. I have no doubt usage would improve if the service levels did.
 
satisnek

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I can recall mentioning this before, but Hinckley (pop. 45,000, the third largest settlement in the historic county of Leicestershire) gets only an hourly local service plus a couple of peak-time long distance stoppers.
 
chefchenko

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Congleton on the Manchester spur of WCML , growing town and big commuter town also, just an hourly stoke - manc stopper with 4 xcountry passing through each hour too aswell as the pendolinos. ( obvs don’t expect those to stop)
 
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swt_passenger

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PTR 444 said:
Not really large towns as such but Bitterne and Woolston on the Southampton - Portsmouth Line could do with more than one train per hour as they serve quite a populated suburban area.

And a honourable mention goes to Totton, which is about ten times the size of Brockenhurst yet has 80% fewer trains per hour calling there.
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Woolston (and Netley?) might well be covered by the additional SWR Portsmouth to Southampton semifast when it starts. I’m having difficulty tracking down the draft timetables but it’s possible Totton gets 2 tph when the through Bournemouth - Portsmouth trains start? (Wouldn’t like to guess when any new services start, it’s all gone pretty quiet...)
 
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PTR 444

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chefchenko said:
Congleton on the Manchester spur of WCML , growing town and big commuter town also, just an hourly stoke - manc stopper with 4 xcountry passing through each hour too aswell as the pendolinos. ( obvs don’t expect those to stop)
Click to expand...

Didn’t Cross Country trains call there in the past?
 
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ElectroSoldier

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Considering its size I would say Liverpool Lime street is under served.
While it seems to see a lot it could benefit from more
 
xotGD

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Stockton and Hartlepool. Especially the former; not even a direct service to Darlo to connect with intercity services.
 
deltic

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chefchenko said:
Congleton on the Manchester spur of WCML , growing town and big commuter town also, just an hourly stoke - manc stopper with 4 xcountry passing through each hour too aswell as the pendolinos. ( obvs don’t expect those to stop)
Click to expand...

Congleton used to have a London train stop in each direction in the not too distant past
 
Wilts Wanderer

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PTR 444 said:
Didn’t Cross Country trains call there in the past?
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The Manchester stopping service used to terminate at Macclesfield except during peak periods when it ran through to Stoke, therefore Congleton was generally served by every other Manchester-Birmingham intercity service (i.e. every 2 hours.) Kidsgrove and Longport had the hourly Nottingham-Crewe so didn’t receive similar calls, Etruria was peak-hours only.

Don’t recall any London trains calling at Congleton, is there evidence of that?
 
deltic

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yorkie said:
Not sure about that. When was this?
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Just pulling out a timetable at random, in 1989 (not to distant when you are my age!) 08.00 ex Man Picc stopped Congleton 08.29 arrived London 10.34 - return was 19.00 ex Euston, stopped Congleton 21.02.

It had gone by 1996 but there were about 4 cross country trains calling then.
 
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scrapy

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deltic said:
Just pulling out a timetable at random, in 1989 (not to distant when you are my age!) 08.00 ex Man Picc stopped Congleton 08.29 arrived London 10.34 - return was 19.00 ex Euston, stopped Congleton 21.02.

It had gone by 1996 but there were about 4 cross country trains calling then.
Click to expand...
I remember in the mid 80's a Manchester Piccadilly to London Paddington (extension of the hourly Birmingham ) stopping there at about 09.30. Don't recall any to Euston though.
 
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CheshireCrusty

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deltic said:
Congleton used to have a London train stop in each direction in the not too distant past
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yorkie said:
Not sure about that. When was this?
Click to expand...

It may not qualify as the "not too distant past" but I do remember at least one London train stopping at Congleton pre Virgin. Perhaps it was because I tended to travel at the same time of day - but it seemed that every train I was on (between Stockport and London) stopped at Congleton in each direction. I also seem to recall that there was an issue with platform length and I also seem to recall a level crossing (no longer there) being blocked by the stopped train.

Locally, I think the OP perhaps should have asked which stations deserve more trains per hour - in which case Knutsford with 1 tph (each direction) with over 500,000 pax p.a. must be up there!

Edit - Just seen Deltic's second post - these were likely to be the trains I used.

Edit 2 - Out of interest I looked at Wikipedia and it says "The line from Stoke to Congleton was opened on 9 October 1848, with Congleton station opening on the same day and owned by the North Staffordshire Railway.
In early privatisation, Virgin Trains served the station every two hours during the day, Monday to Saturday, as was agreed by Virgin Trains to prevent increased use of the line by stopping services. " If it was early privatisation, it would be more likely to be VTWC rather than VTXC, but I stand to be corrected.
 
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