If it is so 'regular' then could you, or anyone else, tell us what the average percentage of GWR HSS services being short-formed on a daily basis is?
I won't be holding my breath, because all we have ever got, before the IETs were introduced and since they entered service, is lots of predictions and assertions and precious little by way of actual evidence/figures/statistics from any of you.
As Clarence Yard puts it, there is no sign of an epidemic - and following the diagrams through some days, it is clear that where a 5-car is running on its own, some are deliberately placed on diagrams that involves contra-peak workings to keep them away from Paddington at the busiest times of the day.
For the umpteenth time, short-forming happened in the good old days when the supply of HSTs ran out at Paddington and Thames Valley/Oxford/Cotswold trains ended up with whatever else could be begged, borrowed or short-formed to plug the gaps, including a Hull Trains 180 getting a run out to Worcester on one occasion, or two-car 165s to Hereford instead of HSTs.
I didn't say it was regular at all. I said it was more regular than what was promised by GWR and assured by various people on this forum. I'll remind you what that was - that all peak IEP services out of Paddington would be 9 or 10 car. That is clearly not happening. It doesn't matter if it isn't daily, it is clearly happening more than it should based on the reports here (hell, even people like Clarence Yard are admitting it is happening more than planned!).
I will repeat. If you don’t put the right units into Laira, Long Rock or Maliphant in the evening, you won’t get the right ones out in the morning. That’s the overriding reason for short forms on both the the West of England’s and South Wales routes since December. It isn’t an epidemic but it is more than is desirable, usually about 2 diagrams a day, today was 5 diagrams at start of play.
Spare units off maintenance or repair tend to come off North Pole or Stoke Gifford so the normal procedure is to short form from the first up working and then add or swap to booked formation later in the diagram, if a unit is available.
When the infrastructure gives out and the service goes to pot, it gets very difficult for Control to juggle the service with the contractual matrix because if you have to put the “wrong” sets into the country depots or stabling points at night, then you are chasing your tail again the following day.
Thanks to all the infrastructure problems, the past few days have been very trying for everyone.
So this is more of a byproduct of the contracts? That doesn't exactly sound great! I appreciate that infrastructure issues can be a nightmare, and it is right that GWR don't get unfair blame there.
But if we are seeing more disruption and short forms than what there should be just because of the way the contracts for the units have been done, then that is a joke (and yes, I realise that GWR aren't the main people to blame there either - but it doesn't make it less of a joke).
First we had 'regular', now it is 'consistently' - words hinting at exactly the same thing. That short-forming is happening day in, day out, on lots of IET services. Where are your figures then?
Tally on Journeycheck* so far today is a single working - 06.04 Penzance to Paddington, due to what looks like lack of a second set to couple on at Plymouth - perhaps indicating that a lot of hard work was put in behind the scenes late yesterday and overnight by people at GWR and Hitachi to unscramble the effects of all the disruption there was in various places, due to the weather over the past couple of days.
*Before anyone says it, yes, there there may be others missing from the list, but then there have also been times when it has been showing five vice 10 when this was not the case, or a nine-car was working the diagram instead.
Frankly, the Portsmouth-Cardiff services seem to suffer far more consistently from short-forming at the moment - the sooner some 769s reach GWR the better, so that Bristol gets the extra Turbos it clearly needs.
Again, nobody is saying the "short-forming is happening day in, day out, on lots of IET services". What we are saying is that it is happening more than what were were assured, despite our thoughts at the time suggesting what has happened would happen.
And yes, we realise there are infrastructure issues and weather issues etc. But given it was GWR who were assuring us that all IEP services out of Paddington in the peak would be 9/10 car, surely it should be them explaining why that sometimes is not happening? Especially if people like Clarence Yard are right when saying its partly things like contracts that are to blame too.
As for Portsmouth - Cardiff, I kind of agree. It is defo getting better since before Xmas though, at least in my experience. There was a period around November - December where I could pretty much guarantee a few of the trains I got would be a 2 car 158 or 165, rather than the 5 car 165+166 they were booked for. That is less regular now, and if it does happen a 3 car 166 usually is used rather than a 2 car unit.
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*gets coat*
