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East Midlands Railway short formed services

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Blurb

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Annoyingly EMR present routes as having a good service in their app (a green exclamation mark), but then list a number of cancellations if you click to see details / most blamed on lack of train crew. If you needed one of the local services between Nottm and Leicester you’d be very unhappy. On many routes the late trains are just cancelled. EMR really should explain what’s going on.
 
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Failed Unit

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Are they busy enough for that to cause real problems?
Probably not during the week now (for Skegness). But they really need to sort it for the school holidays.

From what I hear from EMR boys & girls, that’s still to be expected.
I don’t get why units are off lease. It is almost back to CT days when you were rammed in a 153 while the sub-leased other sets.
 

dk1

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Probably not during the week now (for Skegness). But they really need to sort it for the school holidays.
What about Mondays & Fridays? Don’t they suffer in the same way routes like Yarmouth do with midweek changeovers causing crowding issues?
 

Kite159

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Struggling to understand what the real problem is if most passengers aren't affected. Capacity issues are hardly relevant if the passengers are happy - the railways aren't run for spotters or enthusiasts!

Imagine you live at say in the area covered by either Kirkby in Ashfield or Sutton Parkway station. The service has been cut to hourly and the trains roll in quite full due to being a 2 coach unit so if you manage to board you will be standing.

Do you decide to give up on the train and use a bus to take you to Nottingham or jump in the car to drive to one of the tram P&R sites?

When the service levels return, does that passenger return to the railway or will they simply get used to using the bus, driving or tram?
 

Failed Unit

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What about Mondays & Fridays? Don’t they suffer in the same way routes like Yarmouth do with midweek changeovers causing crowding issues?
Not really in the school terms. Seeing them at Sleaford they are probably fuller than the paranoid would like, but everyone can get a seat. Come school holidays that will change. Saying that if tomorrow was 30oC and sunny they would be in trouble (just like other seaside towns are).

For some reason Cleethorpes doesn’t have the same attraction for people from Nottingham.
 

dk1

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Not really in the school terms. Seeing them at Sleaford they are probably fuller than the paranoid would like, but everyone can get a seat. Come school holidays that will change. Saying that if tomorrow was 30oC and sunny they would be in trouble (just like other seaside towns are).

For some reason Cleethorpes doesn’t have the same attraction for people from Nottingham.
I don’t think East London cares. Discounted holidays will always win :p
 

derbybusdepot

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In my view most regional passengers are impacted by this.

I live in Nottingham and can now no longer travel to Matlock line stations direct, Crewe services have been cut to every two hours and Robin Hood Lune to hourly. These have an impact on my ability to travel and no doubt many others as well.

To cap it off far from allowing what remains of the service to be reliable things are still bad. Skegness services are short formed making using them unpleasant whilst services to Liverpool and Norwich from Nottinghsm are still bring canceled and short formed.

I'm sorry to say that for me local rail travel has become a no go in the last few weeks and I suspect this applies for a lot of others in Nottingham
I was thinking of catching the train for a break in Wales this summer, but will drive now. Why would I want to risk getting the train? The timetable is reduced, and services still missed, and even after that, if the train does turn up it may be overcrowded.

It doesn't really matter what reasons or excuses there are for the poor service, at the end of the day it is unreliable, and that will push people away, be that regular, occasional, new or returning passengers.
 

dk1

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Any idea why? Surely less services running means more 156/158s for doubling up
I can only assume some are out of traffic awaiting repairs coupled with the CAF issues delaying transfer of 170s. At least training on them has started with a 3-car based at Crown Point.
 

RH Liner

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Imagine you live at say in the area covered by either Kirkby in Ashfield or Sutton Parkway station. The service has been cut to hourly and the trains roll in quite full due to being a 2 coach unit so if you manage to board you will be standing.

Do you decide to give up on the train and use a bus to take you to Nottingham or jump in the car to drive to one of the tram P&R sites?

When the service levels return, does that passenger return to the railway or will they simply get used to using the bus, driving or tram?
Plus of course if you are resident in Nottinghamshire and have a bus pass it’s valid on the tram but not on the train as it used to be.
 

Skymonster

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Another pretty disastrous day on EMR with:
  • Short forms on Skegness
  • Short forms on Worksop
  • Several Peterborough-Doncaster services cancelled or ending / starting short
  • Same for Nottingham-Lincoln-Grimsby
  • Several Liverpool-Norwich cancelled or starting / ending short
  • Last Derby-Crewe each way cancelled
  • Late Derby-Nottingham-Derby cancelled
It seems to becoming obvious that EMR cannot even run the reduced Regional timetable with any degree of reliability at the moment - quite how anyone can rely on the service is beyond me.
 

Killingworth

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Another pretty disastrous day on EMR with:
  • Short forms on Skegness
  • Short forms on Worksop
  • Several Peterborough-Doncaster services cancelled or ending / starting short
  • Same for Nottingham-Lincoln-Grimsby
  • Several Liverpool-Norwich cancelled or starting / ending short
  • Last Derby-Crewe each way cancelled
  • Late Derby-Nottingham-Derby cancelled
It seems to becoming obvious that EMR cannot even run the reduced Regional timetable with any degree of reliability at the moment - quite how anyone can rely on the service is beyond me.
At least TPE, XC and Northern trains through Sheffield can be viewed on RTT so it's clear which are short formed or cancelled. EMR train formation details are not yet available.

Unfortunately there is no easy co-ordination between them. Northern only operate 2 coaches on Nottingham-Sheffield-Leeds (platform availability at Leeds) so a short formed Liverpool-Nottingham-Norwich reduces capacity by 33%.

Between Sheffield and Manchester TPE had been running all but empty 6 car trains so understandably have reduced most off peak journeys to 3. 2 car EMR services are only part of the issue for travellers.

On the Sheffield-Piccadilly section this morning the scheduled 11.43 EMR from Norwich to Liverpool left Sheffield at 12.03. TPE's 12.11 left at 12.19 and Northern's 12.14 was cancelled.

Of the three the cancelled Northern stopper will have inconvenienced most. However every cancelled, late or over crowded train makes car owners think again about using the railway.
 

dk1

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12:57 ex-Norwich cancelled anyway & now the 13:56 has been cancelled due to crew issues. Thorpe Station is not a happy place right now.
 

STINT47

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I wonder if another timetable will be issued with further reductions? The one introduced earlier this month isn't working.

Hopefully the DFT is looking at what's gone wrong and putting pressure on Abellio to get this sorted asap.
 

londonmidland

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The 14:40 Nottingham to Norwich is a rail replacement bus, taking around 3 hours and 40 minutes to reach Norwich.
 

ChrisC

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I was thinking of catching the train for a break in Wales this summer, but will drive now. Why would I want to risk getting the train? The timetable is reduced, and services still missed, and even after that, if the train does turn up it may be overcrowded.

It doesn't really matter what reasons or excuses there are for the poor service, at the end of the day it is unreliable, and that will push people away, be that regular, occasional, new or returning passengers.
I may be wrong but it seems that most trains between Nottingham and Liverpool have been cancelled for this afternoon. The East Midlands Railway Website lists this as minor disruption. Something needs to be done about this and soon before the school holidays begin.

I had planned to do a 7 Day East Midlands Rover some time during the next few weeks before the school holidays begin. I’ve used regional rovers all over the country but never done the one in my own area.

I’ve cancelled the idea and I’ve decided to do some days out using my car or bus using Trent Barton or Stagecoach Day Tickets.
 
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Failed Unit

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It does show that for a risk free bid you should order new stock. If it is late you get to keep what you have previously (Anglia and West Midlands) and it whoever the old stock gets cascaded to that loses out. It also shows the perhaps forcing the 153s away hasn’t help. A 153 is better than no train(but not much) or a bus.
 

dk1

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The 14:40 Nottingham to Norwich is a rail replacement bus, taking around 3 hours and 40 minutes to reach Norwich.
Deep joy. Think I'd just hop on hop off via Grantham, Leicester, Peterborough & Ely or wait for the next one. Pubs are open.
 

sjm77

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Sounds totally hopeless. Maybe the mis-management Team that ran TPEX in Autumn 2019 have ended up at EMR in 2021!
 

STINT47

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To add insult to injury EMR have rejected my delay repay claim for a Glasgow to Nottingham via Crewe journey

Despite having an advance ticket, an itinerary to travel on the 15:08 from Crewe and booking in April the 15:08 was not actually cancelled but removed.

As this was a pre planned change to the timetable. I was therefore not delayed and as they allowed me to get the next service no compensation is due.

What a way to treat your customers.
 

Scott1

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To add insult to injury EMR have rejected my delay repay claim for a Glasgow to Nottingham via Crewe journey

Despite having an advance ticket, an itinerary to travel on the 15:08 from Crewe and booking in April the 15:08 was not actually cancelled but removed.

As this was a pre planned change to the timetable. I was therefore not delayed and as they allowed me to get the next service no compensation is due.

What a way to treat your customers.
Maybe worth making a complaint with the Rail Ombudsman, a preplanned timetable train involves providing reasonable notice to passengers. I wouldn't consider it appropriate to reject under the circumstances.
 

Bald Rick

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Football on this afternoon. Any TOC stretched for resource was going to suffer covering gaps in late turn today that would normally be covered by rest days etc.

Saturday will be the same.
 

Watershed

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To add insult to injury EMR have rejected my delay repay claim for a Glasgow to Nottingham via Crewe journey

Despite having an advance ticket, an itinerary to travel on the 15:08 from Crewe and booking in April the 15:08 was not actually cancelled but removed.

As this was a pre planned change to the timetable. I was therefore not delayed and as they allowed me to get the next service no compensation is due.

What a way to treat your customers.
I imagine you were delayed by at least an hour. If so, you are undoubtedly entitled to a minimum of 50% compensation under Condition 33.3 of the National Rail Conditions of Travel (NRCoT).

Many TOCs claim that entitlement to compensation under their more generous Delay Repay schemes can be removed if the timetable is changed, even without notice. Under NRCoT 33.4, unless the underlying reason for the timetable change was "entirely outside the rail industry’s control", I would posit that any attempt at making such exclusions is ineffective, but you'd probably have to take it to Court to get anywhere on that one.

Football on this afternoon. Any TOC stretched for resource was going to suffer covering gaps in late turn today that would normally be covered by rest days etc.

Saturday will be the same.
It's worrying that they can't even resource the current, heavily reduced timetable. You'd like to think that it represented a level of service that didn't involve any reliance on RDW.
 

Bald Rick

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It's worrying that they can't even resource the current, heavily reduced timetable. You'd like to think that it represented a level of service that didn't involve any reliance on RDW.

Very few timetables, reduced or otherwise, don’t rely on Rest Day Working. No doubt had EMR tried to avoid it, the service reductions would have been higher. They presumably elected to run the level of service they could resource given expected levels of rest day working availability. Some TOCs are really struggling with the number of staff off work due to Covid (mostly through test and trace), and then the football was on...
 

Failed Unit

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Of course.
For interest how many crew does the training take. I assume the members on the course are out for the whole shift(s). But would the instructor(s) also be in the general pool. So if we are talking drivers we are 2 drivers down each training day?
 

dk1

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For interest how many crew does the training take. I assume the members on the course are out for the whole shift(s). But would the instructor(s) also be in the general pool. So if we are talking drivers we are 2 drivers down each training day?
There is a driver and DI working all week at Norwich together. They would need to be in a bubble I would assume. Cant speak for other EM depots.
 
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