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Northern - is the bad PR unfair?

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Mountain Man

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One thing that doesn't help are local politicians.

All too regularly they do a soundbite and run about Northern. Yet when the media try and engage them in serious debate, they dodge it.

They are fanning the flames and not helping put forward solutions
 
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js1000

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But the "Lancashire" ones are a mess - Liverpool to Crewe via Oxford Road being one obvious example. Things could be a lot simpler but the desire for all of these cross-Manchester links means that if one bit of the network fails then everything else gets affected.

But is that Arriva's fault, or the fault of a franchise where the "Stakeholders" had a long list of through services that they wanted like Bradford to Liverpool/ Chester/ Manchester Airport (instead of a simple Calder Valley service which could have longer trains at a sensible frequency, instead of a lopsided timetable with big gaps in simple journeys like Halifax to Bradford)?

I know that the Liverpool/ Manchester Airport services haven't happened yet, of course, but that's an indication of the complicated franchise demands that anyone would inherit. Replacing Arriva wouldn't resolve things - it'd just give the job to another organisation who had to deal with squabbling "Stakeholders" each with their own unrealistic demands about how important their local station/line was.
I think the extension of the Crewe/Manchester Airport to Piccadilly stopper to Liverpool Lime Street has proven be one of the most short-sighted timetable changes in recent memory. The decision was pre-meditated on the premise that routing it through platforms 14 meant it did not have to cut across platform 13 which reduces Piccadilly's 'through' capacity. In reality it just made the capacity problem even worse by pushing the issue to Castlefield junction and Victoria!
 

ainsworth74

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I can't believe in the 1990s there weren't people paid to look 10-20 years ahead and plan for the future.

I'm sure there were and I'm sure there were in 2004 when the original Northern Rail franchise was let on a "no growth" basis. So clearly they did not win the argument when it came to thinking ahead about what might be required.

I sometimes think people occasionally forget that this is the first Northern franchise since 2004 where it was actually treated as a lot of other franchises have been in the interim with new rolling stock and large scale service improvements. Now it's not all come off anywhere near as well as we'd have liked but then there were a lot of years of stagnation to overcome.
 

Merseysider

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Is the bad PR unfair?
When I commuted within Greater Manchester (until July 2018) there was never a single week go by without a delay repay claim.

I’ve since moved away and now use Northern monthly, but I’ve still had to claim delay repay on almost every journey.

I advise friends and family to look at National Express instead as Northern are just too unreliable.

I certainly wouldn’t rely on them for an airport journey.

However, the on-train staff are always fantastic - not a dig at them.

Just my 2 cents.
 

johntea

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It really doesn't help matters when your train is regularly delayed longer than 15 minutes or cancelled, then delay repay taking up to a MONTH to come through, in my opinion a week is too long!

Then it gets declined by the automated system that Northern seem to have in place and you have to wait another several weeks to appeal, fantastic!
 

tpjm

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Equally the May 2018 timetable shambles was not the fault of Northern - they simply had to fit around new TPE services, the new poorly thought out infrastructure and their own franchise requirements, which inevitably led to delays and cancellations.
But Northern could only diagram units and traincrew to fit around both the TPE services and the franchise commitments they had to adhere to, so you could say they didn't have much choice in this aspect.

Let's be quite clear here... you can't blame the poor performance of a TOC with ~2800 daily services on a TOC with ~300 services. If you actually look at % of Northern's services that interact with TPE at any point on their journey, it's not that high. Performing crew changes at MCO without a relief crew and choking up central Manchester? Northern's fault. Failing to take action when running a late train and allowing the delay to build? Northern's fault.

TPE get a lot of stick for terminating short of destination, but the interesting point is that Network Rail are very interested in TPE and frequently insist on 'not to call' instructions and spinning short. For some reason (and I don't know if this is because of the complexity of Northern's unit and crew diagrams), they don't seem too bothered by Northern running a late service, nor do they insist on anything having stops removed. I'm not saying that TPE are perfect, but to blame an operator that has quite a simple network for Northern's May 18 TT woes is simply wrong.

Having said that, the firm really doesn't help itself. Just over a week back, I was at Leeds waiting for a service across the Calder Valley. The train which forms the 08.18 ex Leeds (the 07.46 terminator from Manchester Victoria) was cancelled, so I suspected my train wouldn't run. It turned out this was correct, but it was 'on time' according to the screens and the cancellation wasn't announced to intending passengers until 08.20. Then when I sent a message to their Twitter team about it, it was claimed by them that it was running and 2 minutes late. I despair sometimes at how these rail firms shoot themselves in the foot.

The Northern control team seem to be really struggling at the moment with getting through and processing canx services. A few months ago when there was serious disruption at Leeds, I saw the 0903, 1003, 1103 and 1203 to Castleford still showing as delayed at 1500! Safe to say they weren't coming.

- That said... I don't think they deserve the political stick they're currently being subject to.
 

Greybeard33

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I think the extension of the Crewe/Manchester Airport to Piccadilly stopper to Liverpool Lime Street has proven be one of the most short-sighted timetable changes in recent memory. The decision was pre-meditated on the premise that routing it through platforms 14 meant it did not have to cut across platform 13 which reduces Piccadilly's 'through' capacity. In reality it just made the capacity problem even worse by pushing the issue to Castlefield junction and Victoria!
I believe the reason that Crewe/Manchester Airport stopper was extended to Liverpool was because the franchise TSR specified 18 through services per day from the Airport to Newton-le-Willows and Lime Street. Presumably the DfT/Rail North considered this necessary because the Airport to Liverpool semi-fast was diverted from the Chat Moss line to the CLC line as a swap with the TPE Scarborough service, in the May 2018 timetable change.

For two hours in the evening the stopper is split at Manchester (1717 and 1817 Lime Street to Victoria; 1827 and 1927 Victoria to Lime Street). So there appears to be no timetabling reason why it could not be split all day, improving punctuality and reducing congestion in the Castlefield corridor.
 

jkkne

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It’s disappointing to hear how poorly Northern are thought of in the Pennines area. I don’t quite recognise that company.

I commute Hexham to Newcastle daily and I can’t speak highly enough. We’ve just about seen off pacers aside the odd one. The refurbished units are clean, well presented, good ride quality and a breath of fresh air from what we had. Very rarely do you struggle for a seat since the frequency increases. The fares are low (cheaper then the bus on the same journey) and of course the staff are lovely.

Being rural we get disruption but I’ve found Northern to be proactive and communicative arranging road travel. Admittedly we don’t have the line capacity issues and we’re in a relatively less populated area in the North East but still...

maybe us true Northerners can show you Southern Northerners how to run a railway (jesting)
 

Starmill

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I go by my personal experiences, not the press view, and my personal experiences of them have been very poor, and significantly below average. In particular they've refused to pay me money I say they owe me for delaying me, sometimes significantly, with tickets I bought for journeys that became disrupted later by strikes. Recovery of my money has been a protracted and difficult process. The company certainly take the view that they can ignore the law on these cases, and on similar ones where long delays have been incurred for other reasons, using particular types of tickets such as West Yorkshire Day Rangers, and they won't pay. I've had letters from 'customer solutions' which are not telling the truth and aren't even properly spell-checked. Some changes to fares have been unjustified, even within the terms of the franchise agreement which calls for more of the cost of the railway to be paid by travellers than taxpayers. We've seen some further evidence of this through lost custom and a much higher public subsidy than billed. Some routes still lack Off Peak fares even, which the company is at liberty to organise of their own choice. Enforcement of revenue matters has almost certainly broken the law time and again by bullying people into being overcharged or issued with a Penalty Fare, failure to comply with the Penalty Fare Rules and the GDPR.

There are minority of positives to look at too, which consist mainly of particular individual members of their staff who resolutely choose to do what they think is the right thing all the time. They also executed an 'additional compensation scheme' which I was eligible for as a result of severe disruption in mid-2018. This doesn't offset bills they've refused to pay me for other things, nor would it be of sufficient value to clear their debts even if it did, but it was better than nothing.

I pick these points out because they're essentially the things most within the control of senior management. They can't try and blame the Government or Network Rail for refusing to pay me what they owe me. They can't blame anyone but themselves for making mistakes at the customer relations level or for even one single error on a Penalty Fare. Nor does anyone genuinely take the credit for the actions of many of their staff but those people and their line managers.

Complaints about the structure of the timetable and the cycling in of new rolling stock are much more a shared responsibility between the company, their contractors including Network Rail, train builders and rolling stock owners and the government.
 
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Starmill

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Let's be fair, airlines have ordered new planes which have turned out to be unreliable and have crashed and killed people, and this has happened a few times in history.
Probably one of the biggest achievements is that they share in the benefits of industry-wide safety culture, yes. There can be no doubt about it. Not to put it in too crass a way, but no matter what justified criticisms there are of the company, they haven't caused any deaths or serious injuries. We've seen deaths in this country caused by tramways and rollercoasters, but not by Northern.
 

Bantamzen

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I think it is broadly justified in the east side. I commute on the Airedale line into Leeds on a daily basis. Despite the big marketing campaign about the introduction of the 331s, there seem to be very few in service. Reliability has also taken a nose dive since the alleged 331 induction with regular morning and evening peak cancellations, leaving people unable to board rammed, aging class 321s.

I wouldn't say it has taken a nose dive, it isn't as good as it's been but then this happens every year on the Aire & Wharfe lines which seem to suffer quite badly with the Autumn conditions. It also hasn't helped that the line treatment train that often plies it's way around the triangle not long before services start has been running as late as 45 minutes. In fact twice in the last 7 days its held up the first two services through Baildon and passed me whilst I've been waiting for my train. At most there have been only 2 331s working on the triangle, and even if the teething problems might have caused some issues, I've been on a few 321 and more particular 322s that have had all sorts of problems, sit-downs. So I don't think the drop in reliability is just down to the new stock. And its nothing compared to the problems in the North West.

There is also a perception around broken promises, the big franchise promise was more capacity and 6 car trains - these have been delayed by 2 years due to network rail not completing platform 0 at Leeds on time. The bigger own goal however is specifying the 331s with a low density layout so they have fewer seats (as a 4 car) than the outgoing 321s they will replace. This has not gone unnoticed by commuters

It isn't just P0 holding things up, most platforms along the triangle cannot hold 6 car 331 formations. So even when they can be introduced, there will need to be crew training on using SDO and of course the time it will take for passengers to get used to sitting in certain cars for certain stations. But none of this is the fault of Northern, no matter what the perception is. The platform lengthening should have been a priority for Network Rail, but as usual if it's not mega urgent it gets kicked down the road.

As for the 331 capacity, remember they replace the 321/322s and lose only a couple of dozen seats in comparison, and have much more standing capacity than the aforementioned classes.

The main observation, especially around Leeds where I have been commuting for almost 30 years, is there appears to have been little consideration of how the use of rail in 'Northern land' has increased, especially in the last ten years which has seen Leeds grow massively.

In terms of actual infrastructure this may be partly true, although there are new stations like Apperley Bridge which are tipping a lot more passengers onto the network. And some of the busiest lines in the area got wired in that 30 years, as well as a large capacity increase at Leeds.

Whilst I agree it can feel like there has been underinvestment in the area, especially compared to the North West, there still has been a lot of work done.

I can't believe in the 1990s there weren't people paid to look 10-20 years ahead and plan for the future.

30 years ago I was travelling on 2 car Pacers between Leeds and Bradford/Halifax. I still am. Then came the two car 158s. I'm still on those.

Unfortunately rolling stock isn't usually procured with a 10-20 year view. The Pacers came in as a low cost solution to replace older stick, and had they not done so many lines would likely have closed or have much reduced services. And subsequent governments have imposed zero growth on the Northern franchise, something only finally broken in 2016.

The timetable hadn't changed much until 2018, then Calder Valley times were totally messed with. 4 trains between Leeds and Bradford in half an hour or so, then nothing for almost half an hour. Is it any surprise with such tight timetabling knock on delays occur?

Station management has fallen apart since Carillion's demise. Full bins and no sign of gritting on cold mornings.

TVMs issues are covered elsewhere, but how can a connected system have a clock which is three minutes slow?

No more on platform announcements and on train PIS which hardly ever works.

I can't comment most of your experience there, but most stations do still seem to have announcements for trains arriving surely? Even at my wee little station Baildon we get them.

I agree about the 331s. On a service which has a max running time of about 40 minutes from Leeds to Skipton why order trains with tables? Its a high density commuter route!

Thats a few random thoughts and whilst I accept Northern were dealt a lot of the cards before they won the bid, they knew what they were bidding for and the management simply haven't stepped up to the mark.

The 331s were not bought just for the triangle routes, and as discussed above the plan was to run the busiest services as 6 car formations. As for the tables, from the ones I've used all I say is that they are very popular with business folk commuting. Laptops that previous were balanced on knees for a 45 minute or less commute are now quickly deployed onto them!
 

SteveM70

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I can't comment most of your experience there, but most stations do still seem to have announcements for trains arriving surely? Even at my wee little station Baildon we get them.

They seem to have stopped at Littleborough in recent weeks
 

nedchester

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The unions would see that as a potential assault on bargaining power, which would’ve likley produced the same outcome as trying to introduce DOO did, & as others have stated previously there appears no consensus either within the industry or its political paymasters on how to address those kinda problems otherwise they’d have been specified as a franchise commitment years ago.

They can see it how they like but introducing new contracts for new entrants is the norm in other industries. As long as they promise to keep their current staff on existing contracts (with the option of moving onto one of the new contracts should they wish) then legally there shouldn't be an issue.

I have worked in a unionised non-railway field of work (as a union rep) and seen this happen.

I find it sad to say that as a former union rep that the unions in the rail industry are so intransigent when it comes to this kind of thing.

I know one thing that should Johnson get in on Dec 12th then you can guarantee that he will want to take on the rail unions. That will not be good for anyone on the railway or other industries for that matter.
 
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quantinghome

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I wouldn't say it has taken a nose dive, it isn't as good as it's been but then this happens every year on the Aire & Wharfe lines which seem to suffer quite badly with the Autumn conditions. It also hasn't helped that the line treatment train that often plies it's way around the triangle not long before services start has been running as late as 45 minutes. In fact twice in the last 7 days its held up the first two services through Baildon and passed me whilst I've been waiting for my train. At most there have been only 2 331s working on the triangle, and even if the teething problems might have caused some issues, I've been on a few 321 and more particular 322s that have had all sorts of problems, sit-downs. So I don't think the drop in reliability is just down to the new stock. And its nothing compared to the problems in the North West.

Yes, performance always dips in Autumn, but since Arriva took on the franchise there has been a persistent declining trend, as the performance charts show below. The comparison between autumn 2016 to autumn 2019 is shocking.

Northern overall performance:
upload_2019-11-13_9-20-37.png

West and North Yorkshire Local performance:
upload_2019-11-13_9-23-38.png
(Green = on time, Yellow - 10-30 mins late, Red = >30 mins late or cancelled)

http://trains.im/ppmhistorical/NT/monthly
 

Bantamzen

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Yes, performance always dips in Autumn, but since Arriva took on the franchise there has been a persistent declining trend, as the performance charts show below. The comparison between autumn 2016 to autumn 2019 is shocking.

Northern overall performance:
View attachment 70394

West and North Yorkshire Local performance:
View attachment 70395
(Green = on time, Yellow - 10-30 mins late, Red = >30 mins late or cancelled)

http://trains.im/ppmhistorical/NT/monthly

That's the overall performance, not just the Aire / Wharfe services that I was referring to.

No-one is denying that the overall service hasn't been good in recent years. However those charts tell only the outcome, not causality. That's the trouble with stats like these, they can be used to tell whatever story you want. Yes Northern, particularly in the North West have made some poor decisions, reacted too slowly to timetable meltdowns, and of course had a very long period of industrial action. But add to that the issues with late engineering works, stock cascades & new unit deliveries, crew training programmes, plus this Autumns' challenging weather & a much more complex picture emerges. Of course this won't be high in the public perception, and that is understandable. But when it comes to the movers, shakers & deciders, they must look further than "Oh Northern are just crap", and actually deal with the myriad of issues that have beset not just Northern but many TOCs.

And this highlights part of the problem in this country, we look to blame then solve, rather than solve then blame. Many of the issues that have affected those charts may ease in time, finally settling the long running dispute with guards, sorting out the disparity between west & east operations, bedding in the new stock & crew familiarity, plus Network Rail actually getting on with the much needed upgrades (subject to a Transport Minister actually rubbing stamping them). Other, more fundamental issues such as stock reliability & timetabling need work for sure. But as I've said previously, given all the challenges thrown at the franchise, I seriously doubt any other operator could have improved much on the performance. Much of what we see today is as a result of decades of mild neglect by successive governments from both sides of the political spectrum.

What we really need is a government seriously committed to real infrastructural improvements in the region, and willing to commit funds from the Treasury & not just to the printers of their manifesto......
 

LowLevel

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They can see it how they like but introducing new contracts for new entrants is the norm in other industries. As long as they promise to keep their current staff on existing contracts (with the option of moving onto one of the new contracts should they wish) then legally there shouldn't be an issue.

I have worked in a unionised non-railway field of work (as a union rep) and seen this happen.

I find it sad to say that as a former union rep that the unions in the rail industry are so intransigent when it comes to this kind of thing.

I know one thing that should Johnson get in on Dec 12th then you can guarantee that he will want to take on the rail unions. That will not be good for anyone on the railway or other industries for that matter.

It is impossible to introduce new contracts into these grades without impacting the previous contract holders. East Midlands Trains tried introducing new contracts for new starters with altered terms (that conflicted with the agreed terms and conditions for the grade) and as a result had 10 years plus of disagreements, IT problems, payroll problems, rostering issues (one person in the grade can do duty X on Y day, the other can't so they can't cover each other's turns - a ham fisted approach to try and force traincrew to work a 5 day instead of a 4 day week resulted in some staff having 9 hour 15 min base working days and new starters having 7 hour 24 min with a roster with some balanced turns pushing 10 hours - the new starters just told them to stick anything above 7:24 where the sun doesn't shine so the older crews got the longer shifts and unbalanced their own hours in return).

There are historic differences in contractual entitlements in front line railway contracts - but mucking around with dates and hours of attendances is not one that's easy to reconcile within the remit of running a reliable train service as you just mess up the remaining 6 days a week as well.

It's not like you're manning a stationary building, it's moving trains with all the complexity that entails.

As a consequence East Midlands Railway are now working with the union in question to resolve the contractual issues - properly.
 

nedchester

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It is impossible to introduce new contracts into these grades without impacting the previous contract holders. East Midlands Trains tried introducing new contracts for new starters with altered terms (that conflicted with the agreed terms and conditions for the grade) and as a result had 10 years plus of disagreements, IT problems, payroll problems, rostering issues (one person in the grade can do duty X on Y day, the other can't so they can't cover each other's turns - a ham fisted approach to try and force traincrew to work a 5 day instead of a 4 day week resulted in some staff having 9 hour 15 min base working days and new starters having 7 hour 24 min with a roster with some balanced turns pushing 10 hours - the new starters just told them to stick anything above 7:24 where the sun doesn't shine so the older crews got the longer shifts and unbalanced their own hours in return).

There are historic differences in contractual entitlements in front line railway contracts - but mucking around with dates and hours of attendances is not one that's easy to reconcile within the remit of running a reliable train service as you just mess up the remaining 6 days a week as well.

It's not like you're manning a stationary building, it's moving trains with all the complexity that entails.

As a consequence East Midlands Railway are now working with the union in question to resolve the contractual issues - properly.

I'm sure that lesson will have been learned by EMR but that does not mean that it shouldn't be done. It is done in other transport industries with no problems and it's a matter of getting the IT right. That's one for the TOCs

The railway needs to move forward. You cannot have a 7-day service that has one day volunteering, it's not sustainable especially when you have a situation on Northern (and many other TOCs) where the number of Sunday services is on the increase.
 

LowLevel

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I'm sure that lesson will have been learned by EMR but that does not mean that it shouldn't be done. It is done in other transport industries with no problems and it's a matter of getting the IT right. That's one for the TOCs

The railway needs to move forward. You cannot have a 7-day service that has one day volunteering, it's not sustainable especially when you have a situation on Northern (and many other TOCs) where the number of Sunday services is on the increase.

Of course it needs sorting out. It's just going to inevitably cost a wedge of cash to do it that many TOCs seem reluctant to part with - probably because their benefit is restricted to the length of their franchise. My booked Sundays alone are worth nearly £2,500 to me per year, every year. I won't accept a paycut to achieve that so x however many crew members that's a huge amount of extra money every year on base pay.
 

DarloRich

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I can't believe in the 1990s there weren't people paid to look 10-20 years ahead and plan for the future.

I'm sure there were and I'm sure there were in 2004 when the original Northern Rail franchise was let on a "no growth" basis. So clearly they did not win the argument when it came to thinking ahead about what might be required.

I sometimes think people occasionally forget that this is the first Northern franchise since 2004 where it was actually treated as a lot of other franchises have been in the interim with new rolling stock and large scale service improvements. Now it's not all come off anywhere near as well as we'd have liked but then there were a lot of years of stagnation to overcome.

I am sure there were. Sadly they weren't granted the skill of 20/20 foresight!

I go by my personal experiences, not the press view, and my personal experiences of them have been very poor, and significantly below average. In particular they've refused to pay me money I say they owe me for delaying me, sometimes significantly, with tickets I bought for journeys that became disrupted later by strikes. Recovery of my money has been a protracted and difficult process. The company certainly take the view that they can ignore the law on these cases, and on similar ones where long delays have been incurred for other reasons, using particular types of tickets such as West Yorkshire Day Rangers, and they won't pay. I've had letters from 'customer solutions' which are not telling the truth and aren't even properly spell-checked. Some changes to fares have been unjustified, even within the terms of the franchise agreement which calls for more of the cost of the railway to be paid by travellers than taxpayers. We've seen some further evidence of this through lost custom and a much higher public subsidy than billed. Some routes still lack Off Peak fares even, which the company is at liberty to organise of their own choice. Enforcement of revenue matters has almost certainly broken the law time and again by bullying people into being overcharged or issued with a Penalty Fare, failure to comply with the Penalty Fare Rules and the GDPR.

Is this view representative of the general passenger or particular to the "expert" passenger found on these boards?
 

Eccles1983

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I'm sure that lesson will have been learned by EMR but that does not mean that it shouldn't be done. It is done in other transport industries with no problems and it's a matter of getting the IT right. That's one for the TOCs

The railway needs to move forward. You cannot have a 7-day service that has one day volunteering, it's not sustainable especially when you have a situation on Northern (and many other TOCs) where the number of Sunday services is on the increase.


This is not very accurate or helpful.

You've a magnitude of variances with the railway compared to other transport industries. Route knowledge, traction knowledge, training and medical requirements, fatigue index, link structures, and chronic under-manning for a start.

That's without any involvement from the unions.

Despite the tendency of those on here to pour scorn on the unions the fact is that without them the railway wouldn't work.

The sheer amount of time and knowledge from local level reps to make the diagrams work is immense. The TOC's have tried to go to a computer based system and it goes wrong the second something out if course occurs.

But yeah, beat on the unions.

If they want Sundays, fine. Ensure that they pay for them appropriately and enhance the establishment figures.

That's the issue - not the train crew but the management balking at the sums when presented them.

And if everyone is agreed with an enhanced Sunday service then they surely will agree that Sunday prices should be enhanced. Let's say all day is peak.

Sounds fair?
 

Djgr

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So in summary, Northern were dealt a poor hand, which they in turn have played very poorly.
 
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It really doesn't help matters when your train is regularly delayed longer than 15 minutes or cancelled, then delay repay taking up to a MONTH to come through, in my opinion a week is too long!

Then it gets declined by the automated system that Northern seem to have in place and you have to wait another several weeks to appeal, fantastic!

That's disappointing to hear as I submitted my first ever DR claim to Northern on Saturday after they cancelled two consecutive trains early that morning giving just 10 minutes notice of each and using the "...due to the train being late from the depot" line. Ah, so that makes it clear that I should be blaming the train for not getting itself out of the depot on time. A bit similar to the airline favorite of "...due to the late arrival of the inbound aircraft". I mean really … when are these tardy trains and planes going to sort themselves out? Is there a depot 10 minutes from Saltburn?

So yes, the negative PR is fair IMHO.

Staff - the few that I've had dealings with on the trains have always been cheery, polite and helpful.
 

NoMorePacers

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Alright.
Good things Northern have done: made Yorkshire Coast/Goole Line services consistent (Sheffield-Bridlington, Hull-Scarborough, Hull-Sheffield); made Bridlington-Scarborough hourly instead of the irregular mish mash workings with Goole Line trains there was under Serco-Abellio; introduced 170s to the area (although that wasn’t the plan originally IIRC). The staff are pleasant and helpful.

Not so good things: they cannot clean trains to save their lives (newly refurbished trains having mucky floors for one); their stock diagramming is awful (put a 158 on a stopping Hull-Doncaster and a 2 car 144 on a fast Sheffield-Scarborough - which is meant to be a 170. Meanwhile a 170 is sat in Doncaster P2 doing bugger all); the old Serco-Abellio franchise used to almost exclusively use 158s around Hull with maybe the odd Pacer or 150. Arriva have completely randomised the stock, so anything from a 142 to a 170 can turn up on a Northern service. I have seen more Pacers under ARN than I ever did in NR.

Overall a fairly mixed bag really. I would hesitate to call Northern good, but looking at it objectively they aren’t quite as bad as it may seem. TransPennine Express aren’t good either but that’s another story for another time.
 

Carlisle

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Extending the poker game analogy, it was Arriva's own choice to bid for the franchise!
I wonder how many involved in that bid genuinely believed it was likley to be delivered almost as planned?
My money would be on very few, if any .
 
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Matt_pool

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One of the few Northern services you could rely on the west side was 2F94, the 7.40am departure from Warrington Central to Lime Street.

It was always on time and always a 2 carriage 156 which provided enough seats for anyone.

But for the past 2 months the "random unit generator" has been in force meaning you often get a 150 or a bleedin' Pacer, neither of which have enough seats.

And also over the past 2 months the reliability of the same service has taken a nose dive. Delays and cancellations of this service are very common, like today departing Warrington Central 32 minutes late and arriving into Lime Street 36 minutes late!

By which time you have already had to make alternative arrangements so you aren't late for work, again!
 

northernchris

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Let's be quite clear here... you can't blame the poor performance of a TOC with ~2800 daily services on a TOC with ~300 services. If you actually look at % of Northern's services that interact with TPE at any point on their journey, it's not that high. Performing crew changes at MCO without a relief crew and choking up central Manchester? Northern's fault. Failing to take action when running a late train and allowing the delay to build? Northern's fault.

Whilst it's true TPE's issues won't impact Northern's performance too much it's true that Northern services are regularly held for late TPE services. The Liverpool - Scarborough seems notorious for causing a late start on the Leeds - York stopper which is due out 3 minutes after. Problem is, by the time the stopper is allowed out the TPE Newcastle can catch it up, so both operators delay each other.

It's interesting that Network Rail are keen for TPE to skip stops or turn short but permit Northern to run late trains especially as stoppers have the ability to allow delays to ripple quicker. Perhaps Network Rail's service recovery policy needs looking at here? Having no crew at Oxford Road might not necessarily be Northern's fault, it depends if they have been caught up in disruption outside of their control.

Whilst I agree it can feel like there has been underinvestment in the area, especially compared to the North West, there still has been a lot of work done.

Indeed, every West Yorkshire line has seen some improvement since May 2018, with the exception of the Castleford line. Whether it's Knottingley and Pontefract gaining a second service to Leeds each hour, or 170s being introduced on the Harrogate line things in theory are better.
 

LittleAH

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Joined
24 Oct 2018
Messages
176
Whilst it's true TPE's issues won't impact Northern's performance too much it's true that Northern services are regularly held for late TPE services. The Liverpool - Scarborough seems notorious for causing a late start on the Leeds - York stopper which is due out 3 minutes after. Problem is, by the time the stopper is allowed out the TPE Newcastle can catch it up, so both operators delay each other.

It's interesting that Network Rail are keen for TPE to skip stops or turn short but permit Northern to run late trains especially as stoppers have the ability to allow delays to ripple quicker. Perhaps Network Rail's service recovery policy needs looking at here? Having no crew at Oxford Road might not necessarily be Northern's fault, it depends if they have been caught up in disruption outside of their control.
.

While a Leeds-York stopper might be held for a late running TPE service, why is the TPE running late? My last two trips from Liverpool have both been delayed due to late running Northern services and the TPE catching them up by Patricroft. Swings and roundabouts.
 

Greybeard33

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Joined
18 Feb 2012
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Location
Greater Manchester
While a Leeds-York stopper might be held for a late running TPE service, why is the TPE running late? My last two trips from Liverpool have both been delayed due to late running Northern services and the TPE catching them up by Patricroft. Swings and roundabouts.
But those Northern stoppers are often delayed leaving Lime Street because the preceding TPE Newcastle service departs late. Which came first, the chicken or the egg...? ;)
 

js1000

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14 Jun 2014
Messages
1,011
I believe the reason that Crewe/Manchester Airport stopper was extended to Liverpool was because the franchise TSR specified 18 through services per day from the Airport to Newton-le-Willows and Lime Street. Presumably the DfT/Rail North considered this necessary because the Airport to Liverpool semi-fast was diverted from the Chat Moss line to the CLC line as a swap with the TPE Scarborough service, in the May 2018 timetable change.
To get from Liverpool to the Airport on the stopping service would take 1 hour 25 minutes. The May 2018 timetable debacle simply underlined that the DfT and Transport for the North approach TSRs as a tick boxing exercise rather than "is that a logical service that is in passengers' interests and to make a case for?"

For two hours in the evening the stopper is split at Manchester (1717 and 1817 Lime Street to Victoria; 1827 and 1927 Victoria to Lime Street). So there appears to be no timetabling reason why it could not be split all day, improving punctuality and reducing congestion in the Castlefield corridor.
Agreed. Stated on here before if there was any way to make the Crewe to Liverpool service every 2 hours this would preferable. Every other hour there would be a service between Victoria/Liverpool and a reinstatement of the shuttle service from Picc to Crewe via the Airport.

If Network Rail are looking to cull a couple of services to increased resilience through congested Castlefield corridor then surely this would be the one to go (given this also stops at Deansgate). Funnily enough the 331s now operating to Crewe could be able to potentially bring this journey time down from 2 hrs 15 minute to, let's say 1 hr 45 minutes, so potentially doable with one unit. The stopping service too frequently causes collateral damage to TPE services to/from the Airport.

So in summary, Northern were dealt a poor hand, which they in turn have played very poorly.
Extending the poker game analogy, it was Arriva's own choice to bid for the franchise!
The DfT reneged on infrastructure upgrades that aspects of the Franchise Agreement was dependent on. At the same time, the clamour from politicians for more city to city train links in the North has adversely affected Northern commuter services - creating more irregular calling patterns which are unattractive to passengers and increased level of 'stop skipping' cancellations. The 2016 franchise agreement is almost irrelevant.
 
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