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Could the railways handle storm disruption better?

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Horizon22

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It can indeed be difficult to reach people via regular TV scheduling. However a lot of people use social media channels, so a more coordinated approach would be for National Rail / TOCs to use sponsored posts across the most popular ones to get the message out further.

Twitter - the social media tool most TOCs use for service updates - is about to stop paid advertising so that may not be possible. News bulletins already include a lot about "road and rail journeys likely to be effected", but people often just turn up anyway. I'm not sure if that is a good or bad omen for the railway!
 
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Bletchleyite

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Twitter - the social media tool most TOCs use for service updates - is about to stop paid advertising so that may not be possible. News bulletins already include a lot about "road and rail journeys likely to be effected", but people often just turn up anyway. I'm not sure if that is a good or bad omen for the railway!

I very much doubt it is going to stop paid advertising as it would then have no business model. I believe it was going to stop political advertising.
 

LAX54

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The problem with this is that these storms which have paralysed the railways have not, in 90% of the country, had the same effect on the trunk road network or the rest of the economy, or only done so for a very short period of time. It isn't like a hurricane in the US where no one would expect to travel, ordinary life is still going on everywhere around, why should employers be accommodating to people who've been foolish enough to rely on a niche and notably unreliable mode of transport?

I am not so sure of that, over the past two weeks, my email inbox has been over flowing with emails from Highways England advising of road closure after road closure, and lost count of the Bridge closures !
 

Dai Corner

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I am not so sure of that, over the past two weeks, my email inbox has been over flowing with emails from Highways England advising of road closure after road closure, and lost count of the Bridge closures !

Or take a look at Google Maps and see all the road closures around the Severn, Wye and Usk
 

al78

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The road network is a lot more dense than the rail network, so more ways of getting around flooding, even if it means going a long way round and/or taking non-trunk roads. I've heard numbers of the order of hundreds of properties flooded, so the flooding can't be that widespread given a large part of England and Wales was affected by high rainfall. The problem with the railway is that in the past, it was deemed desirable to close a third of it, which had the unfortunate side effect of eliminating alternative routes if one line gets closed. A23 closed? Use the A24 or the A22. Brighton main line closed? Sorry, no trains, you'll have get on a bus, which if you are unlucky, will be a proper clatterbanger. People have to do that much of the time there are engineering works.
 

Robertj21a

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The road network is a lot more dense than the rail network, so more ways of getting around flooding, even if it means going a long way round and/or taking non-trunk roads. I've heard numbers of the order of hundreds of properties flooded, so the flooding can't be that widespread given a large part of England and Wales was affected by high rainfall. The problem with the railway is that in the past, it was deemed desirable to close a third of it, which had the unfortunate side effect of eliminating alternative routes if one line gets closed. A23 closed? Use the A24 or the A22. Brighton main line closed? Sorry, no trains, you'll have get on a bus, which if you are unlucky, will be a proper clatterbanger. People have to do that much of the time there are engineering works.

The number of properties flooded is not very relevant. If the A23 is closed there may be very few properties affected as it goes through many rural areas (as do the A22 and A24 too) - so flooding can well be much the same as the railways.
 

PartyOperator

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It also shows the importance of building modern, high-spec infrastructure. The M50 is in many ways over-specified and should probably never have been a motorway, but it's currently the only passable road crossing over the Severn between Bristol and (I think) Stourport.
 

Llanigraham

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One of the biggest problems causing flooding now is the loss of space for the water to go - because so many flood plains have been built on. Flood defences are then built up to stop those new houses from flooding, which quickly channels the water further downstream - causing other places to flood which didn't before, simply because more water turns up more quickly, instead of sitting on the flood plain and channelling through slowly.

Another issue is that so much more of the country is paved over - most front gardens are now driveways for example, which means there's less soil available for the water to soak into.

None of which applies to the Upper Severn Valley and yet it resembles a lake.
 

Dai Corner

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It also shows the importance of building modern, high-spec infrastructure. The M50 is in many ways over-specified and should probably never have been a motorway, but it's currently the only passable road crossing over the Severn between Bristol and (I think) Stourport.

The A40 appears to be open, but that's a modern high-spec road too. I take your general point.
 

gray1404

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As far as the railway goes I was in Lancaster (would have been at Windermere had I not got a lift as far as the former). First time it has ever happened in my life, though.

I could have used the Stagecoach 40 to get to Preston from where services were running, but I decided given the low cost to book into the Travelodge and add a city break onto my trip, given that I'm a big fan of Lancaster. However the railway did not offer any service that would have got me home on Sunday 9th, nor did it offer to arrange or pay for accommodation, the staff were telling people to get lost (politely).

They should have been arranging accommodation for stranded passengers
 

philthetube

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NRCOT should be suspended during Storm periods.

If people want to risk travelling then fine, however everything possible should be done to discourage it, for everyone's safety.

It is not possible to always provide RRB's or hotel accommodation at short notice. How many pendolinos worth of passengers does it take to fill all the hotels within walking distance of Preston Station for example.

It should be borne in mind that risks involved in travelling by train do not exclusively apply when on the train but also on stations and roads during other parts of the journey, 7 people were killed by these storms, all of who would still be alive had they stayed at home. (as far as I am aware).
 
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Robertj21a

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Nircot should be suspended during Storm periods.

If people want to risk travelling then fine, however everything possible should be done to discourage it, for everyone's safety.

It is not possible to always provide RRB's or hotel accommodation at short notice. How many pendolinos worth of passengers does it take to fill all the hotels within walking distance of Preston Station for example.

It should be borne in mind that risks involved in travelling by train do not exclusively apply when on the train but also on stations and roads during other parts of the journey, 7 people were killed by these storms, all of who would still be alive had they stayed at home. (as far as I am aware).


Nircot ???
 

Mcr Warrior

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NRCOT should be suspended during Storm periods.

Hope this doesn't result in TOCs attempting to absolve themselves of all responsibility to passengers in a similar way that airlines have sometimes done in the past by (misleadingly) claiming that they have been impacted by "extraordinary circumstances" when the reason for cancellation of a particular service was, in fact, within their control.
 

Bletchleyite

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It is not possible to always provide RRB's or hotel accommodation at short notice. How many pendolinos worth of passengers does it take to fill all the hotels within walking distance of Preston Station for example.

They should clearly take the rooms they can get until there are none left, of course.

It should be borne in mind that risks involved in travelling by train do not exclusively apply when on the train but also on stations and roads during other parts of the journey, 7 people were killed by these storms, all of who would still be alive had they stayed at home. (as far as I am aware).

Not everyone is that risk-averse.
 

Bantamzen

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Not everyone is that risk-averse.

Indeed. This reminds me of the time I was once enjoying a post-walk drink in Malham, talking to a couple of guys that volunteered for Mountain Rescue. I asked what their worst peeves where doing this, and they responded that it was people who went out into the Dales wearing no more than tee-shirts & carrying a mobile device with Google Maps, and people who thought they knew better than the official advice and went out thinking they were prepared but got caught out.

There are levels of risk assessment. If a storm is coming in, and both the Met Office & NR/TOCs say there is serious risk of disruption, then you ought to take that into account. And no matter how good or bad the contingency plans that exist are, there will be occasions when they cannot be stuck to because of unfolding events. So in the case of recent storms, my advice to anyone no matter how experienced they thought they were would be simple. Do you need to make the journey at that time? Are you unable to rearrange / alter your journey? If the answer to both is yes, then one simple piece of advice would be expect the unexpected, and prepare to be stuck somewhere & potentially needing to make your own arrangements. You can sort out the repayment / compensation later.

Too often people simply don't apply common sense, ignore advice or just think they know best. And it is often these people that get caught out.
 

Bletchleyite

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There are levels of risk assessment. If a storm is coming in, and both the Met Office & NR/TOCs say there is serious risk of disruption, then you ought to take that into account. And no matter how good or bad the contingency plans that exist are, there will be occasions when they cannot be stuck to because of unfolding events. So in the case of recent storms, my advice to anyone no matter how experienced they thought they were would be simple. Do you need to make the journey at that time? Are you unable to rearrange / alter your journey? If the answer to both is yes, then one simple piece of advice would be expect the unexpected, and prepare to be stuck somewhere & potentially needing to make your own arrangements. You can sort out the repayment / compensation later.

And in the Lancaster case I did in fact pay for the hotel myself.

But away from that, the thing that annoyed me was that there had been, quite openly stated by the station staff and pretty much confirmed elsewhere, a deliberate decision to provide nothing at all. It wasn't, seemingly, that they'd called round all the local coach companies and Stagecoach (for acceptance) and been told no. It wasn't, seemingly, that they'd called the Travelodge (who were nearly empty and charging I think £29 for that night flexible rate) and asked for rooms, as they hadn't, because I mentioned it all to them and it was the first they'd heard of it (indeed one of their staff who'd come in from Barrow was once I mentioned the mess a bit concerned about getting home and started talking about going early - though I'd imagine a hotel with empty rooms is not the worst place to get stranded at work!) They simply gave up and went home as soon as they found they couldn't get any trains through.

I do wonder, bringing this along to another thread, if this excuse is being used more because it absolves them of any risk of legal action over non-PSVAR compliant RRBs. Because on other similar occasions prior to that announcement there has been rail replacement.
 

al78

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Too often people simply don't apply common sense, ignore advice or just think they know best. And it is often these people that get caught out.

It's possibly the thinking that it is Britain, a temperate climate, we don't get extremes, it won't be that bad, just carry on as normal, media overhype everything. A bit like that group who recently decided to climb Ben Nevis in atrocious weather totally unprepared, and needed rescuing (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-51447226).
 

Bletchleyite

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It's possibly the thinking that it is Britain, a temperate climate, we don't get extremes, it won't be that bad, just carry on as normal, media overhype everything. A bit like that group who recently decided to climb Ben Nevis in atrocious weather totally unprepared, and needed rescuing (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-51447226).

And I went (a short way) into the Welsh mountains at the weekend, and as I was properly prepared, as were the others with me, nothing "exciting" happened. We were not the only ones there, and those who were were being sensible in terms of what they did (I doubt for instance anyone was on Crib Goch as the risk of being blown off it would be unacceptable to all but the terminally stupid).

Those who don't do this kind of thing (in better weather or otherwise) tend to have rather different risk perception, I suspect. If we were to have a vote on "should I have stayed at home last weekend" with a secondary question of "are you an outdoorsy person" I think there would be a fair correlation in the results between no/yes and yes/no.

And as for overhyping, this was a classic example. The railway was not providing transport between Lancaster and Preston when cars and buses were doing so without issues. And people may have seen "Lancaster flooding" on the news and seen pictures of it without actually knowing that it was relatively self-contained and affected only a few houses down by the river. Bad for them of course, but not catastrophic and in fact most people in town probably never even noticed it.
 

LAX54

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And I went (a short way) into the Welsh mountains at the weekend, and as I was properly prepared, as were the others with me, nothing "exciting" happened. We were not the only ones there, and those who were were being sensible in terms of what they did (I doubt for instance anyone was on Crib Goch as the risk of being blown off it would be unacceptable to all but the terminally stupid).

Those who don't do this kind of thing (in better weather or otherwise) tend to have rather different risk perception, I suspect. If we were to have a vote on "should I have stayed at home last weekend" with a secondary question of "are you an outdoorsy person" I think there would be a fair correlation in the results between no/yes and yes/no.

And as for overhyping, this was a classic example. The railway was not providing transport between Lancaster and Preston when cars and buses were doing so without issues. And people may have seen "Lancaster flooding" on the news and seen pictures of it without actually knowing that it was relatively self-contained and affected only a few houses down by the river. Bad for them of course, but not catastrophic and in fact most people in town probably never even noticed it.

But the Railway has to plan ahead, and by some considerable margin, a road, can be closed at a whim, and Drivers simply told, 'find another way' even if they have been told not to travel, they will ignore it, then come upon a closed road, be then a case of getting a map out, and finding another route, possibly finding that closed too when they get there !
 

Bantamzen

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And in the Lancaster case I did in fact pay for the hotel myself.

But away from that, the thing that annoyed me was that there had been, quite openly stated by the station staff and pretty much confirmed elsewhere, a deliberate decision to provide nothing at all. It wasn't, seemingly, that they'd called round all the local coach companies and Stagecoach (for acceptance) and been told no. It wasn't, seemingly, that they'd called the Travelodge (who were nearly empty and charging I think £29 for that night flexible rate) and asked for rooms, as they hadn't, because I mentioned it all to them and it was the first they'd heard of it (indeed one of their staff who'd come in from Barrow was once I mentioned the mess a bit concerned about getting home and started talking about going early - though I'd imagine a hotel with empty rooms is not the worst place to get stranded at work!) They simply gave up and went home as soon as they found they couldn't get any trains through.

I do wonder, bringing this along to another thread, if this excuse is being used more because it absolves them of any risk of legal action over non-PSVAR compliant RRBs. Because on other similar occasions prior to that announcement there has been rail replacement.

But you knew that there was a risk to your journey before making it. The storm's track was well documented, however storms are by their very nature unpredictable, and sometimes can trigger other unexpected weather events. I don't care how experienced a walkers you & your group were, you chose to be in the area where serious disruption was expected. Personally if I had a trip up there planned, and that storm was due in I'd review the possibility of it causing problems, plan alternative dates & enjoy a pint down at the Winchester* until it all blew over. It would certainly mean less hassle.

(* There isn't actually a pub in Baildon called the Winchester, but most people wouldn't understand the reference if I said The Malt ;))

I'm not doubting that things went wrong on the day, and frankly when the weather causes problems they often do go wrong. That is the whole point, because no contingency plan no matter how good will always work out. Maybe the conditions change, maybe there are misunderstandings, maybe the staff will just up sticks & leave. But that is what you have to consider before starting a journey that you know may be affected. Too often on these forums (and beyond to be fair) do people expect that every circumstance will automatically be covered one way or another, and that things won't just completely met down leaving you to sort out your own situation. But sometimes stuff just happens.....

It's possibly the thinking that it is Britain, a temperate climate, we don't get extremes, it won't be that bad, just carry on as normal, media overhype everything. A bit like that group who recently decided to climb Ben Nevis in atrocious weather totally unprepared, and needed rescuing (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-51447226).

It is true that many people don't imagine things will go wrong for them, no matter what the warnings given in advance, but climbing Ben Nevis in trainers is an extra kind of special, deserving of at least a nomination for the Darwin Awards.....
 

Bletchleyite

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But the Railway has to plan ahead, and by some considerable margin, a road, can be closed at a whim, and Drivers simply told, 'find another way' even if they have been told not to travel, they will ignore it, then come upon a closed road, be then a case of getting a map out, and finding another route, possibly finding that closed too when they get there !

Agreed, this is far harder with a RRB than a car. But (back to Lancaster) the M6 wasn't closed nor was there any real likelihood of it being, barring things like crashes that can happen on any day, and the roads from Lancaster to the M6 (going south via the A6 first) are quite high-lying and unlikely to flood. So a Preston-Lancaster bus would have done fine (as indeed the 40 did), and trains were operating from Preston south for most of the day.
 

Bletchleyite

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It is true that many people don't imagine things will go wrong for them, no matter what the warnings given in advance, but climbing Ben Nevis in trainers is an extra kind of special, deserving of at least a nomination for the Darwin Awards.....

Up the tourist path? Have you been up there yourself? Not really, it's a long series of zig zags and generally good underfoot, you could easily walk it in brogues[1]. It's not having enough layers if the weather came in that would kill people up there, or losing the path on the summit and not having map/compass or the skill to find it again in a whiteout, then ending up on the Carn Mor Dearg Arete (or worse one of the rock climbs) which are an entirely different game and quite dangerous for the ill-equipped and ill-trained.

Snowdon would be similar, as long as it hadn't snowed the Llanberis path would be fine in trainers, but stray onto Crib Goch and you are not unlikely to die (and I'm not overstating that).

There is a certain "thou shalt have dry feet and ankle support" prejudice in the hillwalking community, which does carry some weight but as someone who is also an occasional fell-runner there is a totally different view on kit there, and in any case my fell-running shoes are actually far grippier than my hiking boots, so on very poor ground, wet feet aside, I'd probably rather be in those! And they just look like a pair of regular trainers other than the brand. My other pair of trainers are actually approach shoes and are identical to my hiking boots (both Merrell MOAB 2, just the two ankle height variants) apart from the low ankle.

[1] Which might be seen as a formal shoe these days but are actually the traditional Scottish country walking shoe for rich landowners!
 

Bantamzen

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Up the tourist path? Have you been up there yourself? Not really, it's a long series of zig zags and generally good underfoot, you could easily walk it in brogues[1]. It's not having enough layers if the weather came in that would kill people up there, or losing the path on the summit and not having map/compass or the skill to find it again in a whiteout, then ending up on the Carn Mor Dearg Arete (or worse one of the rock climbs) which are an entirely different game and quite dangerous for the ill-equipped and ill-trained.

Snowdon would be similar, as long as it hadn't snowed the Llanberis path would be fine in trainers, but stray onto Crib Goch and you are not unlikely to die (and I'm not overstating that).

There is a certain "thou shalt have dry feet and ankle support" prejudice in the hillwalking community, which does carry some weight but as someone who is also an occasional fell-runner there is a totally different view on kit there, and in any case my fell-running shoes are actually far grippier than my hiking boots, so on very poor ground, wet feet aside, I'd probably rather be in those! And they just look like a pair of regular trainers other than the brand.

[1] Which might be seen as a formal shoe these days but are actually the traditional Scottish country walking shoe for rich landowners!

No, I haven't been up Ben Nevis, although I have walked up Snowdon. However it being fine for causal footwear doesn't mean that is being prepared. You could easily do the same across the moors above my house over to Ilkley and have no problems, or the weather could drop and you'd be in trouble. Even on the most balmy of days, a rarity in Yorkshire, a decent pair of walking boots is the order of the day.
 

Belperpete

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My last trip up Snowdon brought it home to me just how quickly and dramatically the weather can change on mountains. One minute it was a perfect summer day, balmy, blue skies and sunshine without a cloud in sight. The next minute we were in thick cloud, visibility down to about 20 feet or so, and decidedly chilly. The most dramatic thing was how suddenly it changed, almost like someone throwing a switch.

If you are on one side of a mountain, you can't see what is approaching on the other side until it hits.
 

Llanigraham

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And as for overhyping, this was a classic example. The railway was not providing transport between Lancaster and Preston when cars and buses were doing so without issues. And people may have seen "Lancaster flooding" on the news and seen pictures of it without actually knowing that it was relatively self-contained and affected only a few houses down by the river. Bad for them of course, but not catastrophic and in fact most people in town probably never even noticed it.

And as you keep being told, the railway can only ask bus operators to run a RRB service, and if those operators refuse due to percieved risk or lack of staff, what are the ToC's supposed to do. There is no magic bus tree!
 
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