SWR consultation on late night services

I have responded to the consultation. My suggestions included:

* Bustituting rather than withdrawing late-night services. If they don't wish to run buses, perhaps they should arrange ticket acceptance on relevant National Express coaches.
* Introducing an 0005 on Sunday evenings, because the last train for Basingstoke being the 2335 is just a joke.
* Upon the next resignalling, implementing bidirectional signalling on the up slow to allow the 0105 to be reinstated in the long term (except when all four tracks need closing).

I have read the proposals with interest. I think it would really help if they supplied figures on how popular the trains are and perhaps even the estimate of numbers getting off at each station.

It appears from first glance that most suburban last trains run at the same time on a Sunday night compared to during the week but this isn't the case for mainline services. I hadn't realised suburban ones did that.

I wonder if the 23:30 Waterloo to Portsmouth on a Sunday night could be retimed to be 23:45 or do they need a longer maintenance window between Sunday night and Monday morning than Tuesday to Thursday?

I see that the 0:50 Mondays only train, mandated in the franchise for the benefit of the Royal Navy personal in Portsmouth will be removed. Would that need approval from the DfT?

I personally thought it would benefit more people if such a train ran on Friday and Saturday nights as well but I see it won't. All there will be is a 0:16 to Guildford.

I will be suggesting they run a train all the way to Portsmouth on both nights and not just Guildford. I don't know off hand if 0:16 is good or weather 0:30 would be a better departure time.

I have found a train at 0:50 to be useful. Especially when coming back from the O2 Arena. It maybe that 0:16 is good enough. It wouldn't be though if I needed to head south of Guildford, unlike the 0:50. I admit that didn't stop everywhere.

I see that currently the last train to Berrylands is 0:27. In future, Sunday to Thursday, it will be 23:36. That is quite a cut in time. I don't know how popular the station is.

Currently the last train from Berrylands to Waterloo is the 0:14. I'm not aware of that being cut. So it will have a later train into London than out of it.

I am surprised that the 0:09 Waterloo to Guildford has not been retimed or retired. That leaves Woking at 1am. Under the proposals it will still be the last train to Guildford every night of the week, save Monday mornings when currently it's the 01:35.

Also I'd have expected the 04:24 Guildford to Waterloo to perhaps be removed.

I see there are no later Friday or Saturday night trains from Guildford to Waterloo via Woking proposed. Currently the last one is at 23:44. However a later one to Waterloo via Cobham will run, as well as one to Wimbledon, again via Cobham.

Interestingly there is no survey to fill out, just an e-mail address to use and the responses go to Network Rail rather than South Western Railway.

I know this is about late night services but does anyone know if theire are further major changes to day time services still due? I mean the gap between fast services stopping at Clapham Junction had been due to increase. There was meant to be no stopping trains from Waterloo to Woking, stopping at Clapham Junction in the evening peak. These haven't been introduced. I'm not complaining, just wondering.

The big one for me is the 0105 to Southampton not running on Friday nights. Very well used in my, limited, experience.

FenMan said:

The big one for me is the 0105 to Southampton not running on Friday nights. Very well used in my, limited, experience.

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It will run on Friday nights - they refer to Friday night as Saturday morning.

It won't run on Friday morning - ie end of service on Thursday.

The reason the last trains are busy is because.... they are the last train.

If the ‘new’ last train is 15/30/60 minutes earlier, then that simply becomes busy instead. In practice a large proportion of people on the old last train will simply shift to the new last train. Sure, there will be some people disadvantaged, and some people will decide not to travel. But these will be the minority.

JonathanH said:

It will run on Friday nights - they refer to Friday night as Saturday morning.

It won't run on Friday morning - ie end of service on Thursday.

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Of course! Thanks for pointing this out.

Good to see some fairly modest improvements on the Windsor side, with a last train to Staines / Windsor after midnight.

I am also very disappointed about these changes. On Sunday nights the last train from London to Woking will be at 23:40 compared to 01:05 now. That's a huge difference. I can't be the only one that goes away for the weekend and sometimes depends on these late night trains to get home? Sometimes not intentionally, so late, but having to use this train because my journey into London (usually Euston or Kings Cross) has been heavily delayed due to disruption. I can see a lot more cases when taxis or hotels are going to have to be provided by TOCs when delays into Euston or Kings Cross (for example) mean passengers miss the 23:40 and there will then be no later train to get them home. There are no other alternative public transport to get home other than a taxi, which will be very costly for this distance, or a hotel (also expensive).

As others have commented this service has run for very many years with work still able to be carried out so I don't see why suddenly this is no longer possible. I would have thought with improvements in technology over the last 20 years it should be possible to carry out work in less time now rather than more. The minor improvement of one extra train between midnight and 01:05 to Woking on a Friday/Saturday night is not worth the loss of these trains on all other nights.

Finally the need to carry out work shouldn't be a reason to cancel trains. Replacement buses or taxis should operate when the trains can't, exactly as happens now.

This smacks as nothing more than a cost-cutting exercise to me.

joncombe said:

As others have commented this service has run for very many years with work still able to be carried out so I don't see why suddenly this is no longer possible. I would have thought with improvements in technology over the last 20 years it should be possible to carry out work in less time now rather than more.

Finally the need to carry out work shouldn't be a reason to cancel trains. Replacement buses or taxis should operate when the trains can't, exactly as happens now.

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AIUI the SWML is not sufficiently well maintained at present, which is why extra time is needed.

The 0105 Soton is an oddity in terms of the overall SW timetable, running later than pretty much any suburban service. An 0005 MO should be easy to add to the proposed timetable, without requiring the line to be kept open a further hour.

If there is real demand for an 0105 Mon-Fri service, then a RRB might be a solution. Obviously, living where I do, I have no idea of the number of passengers who use this train, or the trend over recent years.

Whenever I have used it (not that often these days) the 01:05 is very busy, and a curious mix of the excitable and the subdued!
It’s the last train to some pretty big places and there is a big gap before it (in Waterloo terms)

Unfortunately the lines do need more maintenance time. I was 20 mins late home to Farnborough yesterday due to defective track and 30 mins late in this morning due to overrunning engineering works (was this to fix the defective track?) We already have engineering work for about 6 Autumn weekends in the Woking area limiting my weekend travel.
Would the extra hour provided by this change prevented this morning's overrun?

30907 said:

AIUI the SWML is not sufficiently well maintained at present, which is why extra time is needed.

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I go back to what I said previously. There has been a train somewhere between 1 and 1:15am for at least 20 years. If it used to be possible to maintain the line well enough with that train running. Why isn't it possible now?

In any case as others have said on the nights the train can't run, run a replacement bus, exactly as now. This is why I think it is just a cost-cutting exercise.

joncombe said:

I go back to what I said previously. There has been a train somewhere between 1 and 1:15am for at least 20 years. If it used to be possible to maintain the line well enough with that train running. Why isn't it possible now?

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Maintenance backlog - e.g. all the time they have been running the late night services they haven't been doing enough maintenance.

It does seem that the point is that they need more time for emergency repairs that could be anywhere on the route than routine repairs which could be planned for a different location each night.

The former needs the trains to be cancelled. The latter could be dealt with by bus substitutions on a planned and advertised basis.

I sympathise with SW passengers, but NR has form in this area.

The current Northern franchise has a commitment (and indeed went as far as publishing in a timetable a year or so back) a 23:30 Saturday night service from Leeds to Doncaster, to match similar departures through the rest of the week. NR declined permission to run this service and the timetable had to be republished.

JonathanH said:

Maintenance backlog - e.g. all the time they have been running the late night services they haven't been doing enough maintenance.

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For 20 years (and probably longer)? Sorry, don't believe it

Bald Rick said:

The reason the last trains are busy is because.... they are the last train.

If the ‘new’ last train is 15/30/60 minutes earlier, then that simply becomes busy instead. In practice a large proportion of people on the old last train will simply shift to the new last train. Sure, there will be some people disadvantaged, and some people will decide not to travel. But these will be the minority.

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Well the last train from Waterloo to Portsmouth on a Friday night, 23:45, is only 5 carriages. Based on the numbers using it last night that was more than enough space.

However I have seen it much busier before. I wonder how many carriages they would plan to use for the 0:16 to Guildford.

joncombe said:

For 20 years (and probably longer)? Sorry, don't believe it

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Changes in Health and Safety in the workplace requirements has reduced serious injury and death to track workers and such incidents are very rare now and cause considerable alarm when they do happen however on the flip side this very much reduces the work that can be done with running lines open, that’s why you have far less single line working than you used to, not because people don’t want to do it but because it’s no longer feasible which makes routine maintenance harder than say 30 years ago.

With the additional time, will it allow the SWML to be better maintained, so less emergency repairs are needed or will it just allow the more time to do emergency repairs everytime they crop up?

Would I be right in thinking that the reason so many emergency repairs are needed are because so many trains use the lines during the day.

The engineering works overrun was interesting as at first they wee only referring to it when replying to people who tweeted them to ask why they were being delayed. Eventually, once the engineering works had been completed, they put out a Tweet saying there was disruption but the engineering works were now finished. That was over an hour or more after the delays started. That then linked to their disruption pages.

How popular might a regular 1:05 bus to Southampton be? Not very due to the length of time it would take I imagine.

Is it popular when there is engineering works?

infobleep said:

How popular might a regular 1:05 bus to Southampton be? Not very due to the length of time it would take I imagine.

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National Express already run a 0100 coach from Victoria to Southampton, Ringwood and Bournemouth but it isn't much good for intermediate locations. Presumably it pays its way, probably with passengers from Heathrow Airport rather than London.

There are nights when the 0105 doesn't get to Southampton and a bus substitution applies for part of the journey. For example, this midweek the 0105 goes via Chertsey and there is a bus replacement for Wimbledon and Surbiton, next week it terminates at Winchester for a bus connection to Southampton and the following week it terminates at Basingstoke.

When your on the last train and a bit ‘merry’ it can cause a bit of a panic when you look out the window and see the Thames below as it goes the Chertsey way....

HamworthyGoods said:

Changes in Health and Safety in the workplace requirements has reduced serious injury and death to track workers and such incidents are very rare now and cause considerable alarm when they do happen however on the flip side this very much reduces the work that can be done with running lines open, that’s why you have far less single line working than you used to, not because people don’t want to do it but because it’s no longer feasible which makes routine maintenance harder than say 30 years ago.

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It would be feasible if people didn't want such a safe railway for staff but I can't imagine staff would want that and I know I wouldn't.

It's a sensible approach - you can also alternate days and services. Southeastern do this (albeit they've got another terminal to work with) by closing Charing Cross early on a Mon/Tue and Cannon Street early on Wed/Thu.

It will cause some annoyance to some passengers but most people aren't regular users of a service >2300, but obviously affects the London event crowd. I would have thought a 0005 MTWThO to Southampton might be better than just removing the 0105 but depends on inward stock of course.

infobleep said:

I have read the proposals with interest. I think it would really help if they supplied figures on how popular the trains are and perhaps even the estimate of numbers getting off at each station.

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Their consultation states: "The number of journeys directly impacted by the removal of some late night services, represents fewer than 400 of the over 600,000 passenger journeys on our network every day and all of which would all benefit from a more reliable railway."

Horizon22 said:

I would have thought a 0005 MTWThO to Southampton might be better than just removing the 0105 but depends on inward stock of course.

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The 0005 already runs TWThFO, and could presumably be added MO.

Will The last Portsmouth train be the 2339 Monday -thursday ? And Sunday?

Still better than southern. Last off Victoria the 2239 only going as far as Chichester. One before that 2209 only goes as far as Chichester/bognor Regis

30907 said:

The 0005 already runs TWThFO, and could presumably be added MO.

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Sorry I did mean this - not much point it running 'Sunday' night unless there's some demand? My experience of Sunday nights/Monday morning is that its dead, even on London terminals. It would be a MSuX service then if I get my notations correct.

387star said:

Will The last Portsmouth train be the 2339 Monday -thursday ? And Sunday?

Still better than southern. Last off Victoria the 2239 only going as far as Chichester. One before that 2209 only goes as far as Chichester/bognor Regis

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Iirc there's no plan to remove the 2345 Waterloo to Pompey

Horizon22 said:

It's a sensible approach - you can also alternate days and services. Southeastern do this (albeit they've got another terminal to work with) by closing Charing Cross early on a Mon/Tue and Cannon Street early on Wed/Thu.

It will cause some annoyance to some passengers but most people aren't regular users of a service >2300, but obviously affects the London event crowd. I would have thought a 0005 MTWThO to Southampton might be better than just removing the 0105 but depends on inward stock of course.



Their consultation states: "The number of journeys directly impacted by the removal of some late night services, represents fewer than 400 of the over 600,000 passenger journeys on our network every day and all of which would all benefit from a more reliable railway."

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I was thinking more of individual services rather than collectively.

I mean it was the Department for Transport that put in the franchise tender document that some of these services should run. For example the 0:50 Mondays only Waterloo to Portsmouth, run for the Royal Navy personal.

I do appreciate that more time is needed to do works but by seeing how popular each service is, maybe one can make a more informed choice over what they think should happen.

theironroad said:

Iirc there's no plan to remove the 2345 Waterloo to Pompey

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However on Sundays the last train is 23:30. If that could be moved back 15 minutes to 23:45 it might help people who might have gone to a concert,for example at the O2.

One might argue why should TOCs run a timetable to suit live artists who don't want to finish at a reasonable time on a Sunday.

I fear for the 21:20 Yeovil Junction beyond Gillingham - as a frequent late long distance traveller this train is so useful but very often on weekdays I am the sole occupant at YJ - I am sure SWR are just looking for an opportunity to curtail it M-T. The F-Su Exeter student traffic justifies its weekend extension to ESD but that doesn't help me out midweek.
I feel SWR would rather not run anything west of Salisbury after 22:30-23:00 on midweek nights.
My issue with the whole idea of extended possession times is that given the considerable investment on the SWML over the last 15 years in track renewals both PL & S&C- improvements in stressing and welding techniques - new rail steels to combat RCF - improved tamping & stoneblower outputs - wholesale new access point installation & existing upgrades and the advance in taking traction current isolations & general efficiencies in maintenance techniques, etc, etc ........ what are NR needing extended times for when the infrastructure should be requiring less and less need for maintenance due to such engineering improvements - for example, PL patrolling timescales were already being extended for this reason 10 years ago due the volume of CWT installation - what has happened ........................... ??

SouthernUser said:

I fear for the 21:20 Yeovil Junction beyond Gillingham - as a frequent late long distance traveller this train is so useful but very often on weekdays I am the sole occupant at YJ - I am sure SWR are just looking for an opportunity to curtail it M-T. The F-Su Exeter student traffic justifies its weekend extension to ESD but that doesn't help me out midweek.
I feel SWR would rather not run anything west of Salisbury after 22:30-23:00 on midweek nights.
My issue with the whole idea of extended possession times is that given the considerable investment on the SWML over the last 15 years in track renewals both PL & S&C- improvements in stressing and welding techniques - new rail steels to combat RCF - improved tamping & stoneblower outputs - wholesale new access point installation & existing upgrades and the advance in taking traction current isolations & general efficiencies in maintenance techniques, etc, etc ........ what are NR needing extended times for when the infrastructure should be requiring less and less need for maintenance due to such engineering improvements - for example, PL patrolling timescales were already being extended for this reason 10 years ago due the volume of CWT installation - what has happened ........................... ??

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The 21.20 runs to Exeter daily from the Dec timetable change.