East Midlands short notice disruption 27th Oct

[LowLevel]

Just a heads up for anyone planning journeys on EMT Local 15x services tomorrow, short notice alterations are that all Nottingham to Mansfield Woodhouse 'short' services (except the 2305 from Nottingham) are cancelled leaving just the hourly Worksop trains and many other services except Liverpool will operate with fewer carriages with standby buses being in place and particular issues being expected Nottingham - Grantham - Skegness and Newark - Matlock with it being half term.

Apparently a critical need not to short form Liverpool services due to public order issues with the Northern strike combined with leaf fall wheel set damage has left the fleet beyond even the usual shaky state with insufficient units available for traffic to run the planned service.

Further alterations may appear during the day and passengers are bring asked not to travel unless necessary between Nottingham and Liverpool.

Further info below. Another delightful Saturday no doubt awaits.

https://www.eastmidlandstrains.co.u.../?hootPostID=251323efac866f2fdb5ea93b2700f4c3

 

[sheff1]

This is now the tenth (I think) consecutive Saturday of Northern strikes. Have there been problems on the Sheffield - Manchester-Liverpool section in previous weeks ?

 

[Starmill]

Problems to put it mildly. Many trains were too busy for people to board, resulting in some issues with those left behind.

 

[Mark Webster]

Should say northern services between leeds- nottingham

 

[nottsnurse]

So EMT's core area and customers (in the East Midlands, funnily enough) will potentially have their services disrupted due to Northern Rail being a dumpster fire?

Seems fair!

 

[Qwerty133]

If Northern passengers can't behave take their trains not someone elses. Liverpool to Nottingham should be cut back to Sheffield for the day to allow everything else to run at full strength.

 

[185143]

If Northern passengers can't behave take their trains not someone elses. Liverpool to Nottingham should be cut back to Sheffield for the day to allow everything else to run at full strength.

Should be cut back to Manchester. The issues have been at the Manchester stations heading towards Liverpool. On at least one occasion trains have been delayed due to the conductor being physically unable to board, passengers refusing to get off and Police attendance being required as a result.

The Manchester-Scotland TPE services are even worse.

 

[yorksrob]

So EMT's core area and customers (in the East Midlands, funnily enough) will potentially have their services disrupted due to Northern Rail being a dumpster fire?

Seems fair!

If Northern passengers can't behave take their trains not someone elses. Liverpool to Nottingham should be cut back to Sheffield for the day to allow everything else to run at full strength.

They can't take their trains because there aren't any.

Liverpool to Sheffield is pretty much a lifeline now, and having used the service several times over the past few weeks, I have seen it full and standing on the Liverpool - Sheffield section but have not yet seen anyone left behind (unlike on my morning commute, where poor Woddlesford passengers are left behind regularly due to short forms).

Also, we can argue till the cows come home what constitutes EMT's "core" service, but for the timebeing anyway Liverpool - Sheffield is as much a franchise requirement as anywhere else.

That said, this has been going on for several weeks now. Surely Northern could have come to some arrangement to lend EMT a couple of 158's on Saturdays.

 

[Edders23]

So EMT's core area and customers (in the East Midlands, funnily enough) will potentially have their services disrupted due to Northern Rail being a dumpster fire?

Seems fair!

probably due more to wheelflats than the disruption of the strikes it's a regular occurence for the Peterborough to Nottingham pseudo depot runs to come banging along the track this time of year

 

[Killingworth]

Given the shortage of capacity west of Nottingham due to the Northern strike I was very surprised to see a 4 car 158 heading west at Ely last Saturday morning. I'm sure there was a good reason, perhaps stock out of position from the previous day.

The hourly Nottingham-Sheffield section is shared with an hourly Nottingham-Leeds to provide 2 tph. No Northern service on Saturdays over that section. Between Sheffield-Piccadilly the hourly stopper is missing so today only 2 tph instead of 3. Then it seems to be bedlam to Liverpool!

Add wheel flats for all operators to shortage of rolling stock of all types and this is what we get No wonder roads are so often grid locked.

 

[dk1]

Given the shortage of capacity west of Nottingham due to the Northern strike I was very surprised to see a 4 car 158 heading west at Ely last Saturday morning. I'm sure there was a good reason, perhaps stock out of position from the previous day.

Was it the 06:51 departure? If so that is booked to be a 4-car throughout.

 

[LowLevel]

It's the 0550 that's a 4 car. Last weekend's additional one was due to Norwich playing away at Notts Forest.

 

[yorksrob]

I believe that TPE are running a Manchester - Liverpool service today, so there may be fewer issues than a couple of weeks ago when they weren't running due to engineering works.

 

[dk1]

It's the 0550 that's a 4 car. Last weekend's additional one was due to Norwich playing away at Notts Forest.

Yeah 06:51 from Ely.

 

[Killingworth]

Was it the 06:51 departure? If so that is booked to be a 4-car throughout.

Pictured at 10.51 at Ely, a couple of minutes late. The football explanation sounds most likely. It didn't seem over full, though.

 

[dk1]

Pictured at 10.51 at Ely, a couple of minutes late. The football explanation sounds most likely. It didn't seem over full, though.

View attachment 54390

EMT can come up trumps on the East of the route sometimes. The 13:13 arrival into Norwich can be a double when the Canaries are at home to a Northern club. The additional unit gets left in platform 3B then is reattached to the 17:50 departure. POSH home games also see strengthening.

 

[SC43090]

They can't take their trains because there aren't any.

Liverpool to Sheffield is pretty much a lifeline now, and having used the service several times over the past few weeks, I have seen it full and standing on the Liverpool - Sheffield section but have not yet seen anyone left behind (unlike on my morning commute, where poor Woddlesford passengers are left behind regularly due to short forms).

Also, we can argue till the cows come home what constitutes EMT's "core" service, but for the timebeing anyway Liverpool - Sheffield is as much a franchise requirement as anywhere else.

That said, this has been going on for several weeks now. Surely Northern could have come to some arrangement to lend EMT a couple of 158's on Saturdays.

What services Northern do run on strike days are quiet often pairs of class 158s usually on Sheffield Hull / Sheffield Leeds via Dearne services.... Even when i was at Carlisle the other week covering the East Coast diversions Northern used a 2 x different pairs of class 158 units on Leeds Carlisle Skipton services..... So i would have thought hiring a few sets out to EMT would be impossible......

SC43090

 

[DanTrain]

What services Northern do run on strike days are quiet often pairs of class 158s usually on Sheffield Hull / Sheffield Leeds via Dearne services.... Even when i was at Carlisle the other week covering the East Coast diversions Northern used a 2 x different pairs of class 158 units on Leeds Carlisle Skipton services..... So i would have thought hiring a few sets out to EMT would be impossible......

That would seem logical, Northern seem to have hoardes of spare pacers/sprinters on strike days, so why not run a few more 144s in Yorkshire to allow their 158s to be loaned to EMT? Or would EMT crews need extra training to operate Northern 158s?

 

[dk1]

That would seem logical, Northern seem to have hoardes of spare pacers/sprinters on strike days, so why not run a few more 144s in Yorkshire to allow their 158s to be loaned to EMT? Or would EMT crews need extra training to operate Northern 158s?

Even in the unlikely event of hiring in, youve also got the problem of collecting/returning of these Northern units. Who does that? It's all far to complicated.

 

[craigybagel]

Similar issues at TfW, with security now being put on Saturday night trains out of Manchester after numerous problems in the past few weeks. It's only going to get worse if, as seems likely, the strikes are still going on when the Xmas markets open in a few weeks.

 

[yorksrob]

What services Northern do run on strike days are quiet often pairs of class 158s usually on Sheffield Hull / Sheffield Leeds via Dearne services.... Even when i was at Carlisle the other week covering the East Coast diversions Northern used a 2 x different pairs of class 158 units on Leeds Carlisle Skipton services..... So i would have thought hiring a few sets out to EMT would be impossible......

SC43090

Perhaps Northern could use some of their lowlier units instead. Would 158/150 be so much worse for the Hallam line than 158/158, I wonder.

The TPE's seem to be busier than usual today (not that that's saying much).

 

[MichaelAMW]

Even in the unlikely event of hiring in, youve also got the problem of collecting/returning of these Northern units. Who does that? It's all far to complicated.

How is it "far too complicated", apart from the usual "can't do" attitude on this forum? See, e.g. passengers can just sit there for three hours while their train is broken down because it's all too difficult to organise anything quickly. Sounds like you need a driver last thing on Friday night and another one last thing Saturday or sometime Sunday. I expect replies to list all sorts of obstacles to this but with no sense that the challenge of these may be met with a bit of customer-focussed effort.

 

[yorksrob]

Christ alone knows whats going on in Liverpool today. Hellish on TPE (a TOC whom I normally go out of my way to avoid at all costs).

 

[dk1]

How is it "far too complicated", apart from the usual "can't do" attitude on this forum? See, e.g. passengers can just sit there for three hours while their train is broken down because it's all too difficult to organise anything quickly. Sounds like you need a driver last thing on Friday night and another one last thing Saturday or sometime Sunday. I expect replies to list all sorts of obstacles to this but with no sense that the challenge of these may be met with a bit of customer-focussed effort.

Probably because it's not a toy train set.

 

[talltim]

Even on a Friday I saw about 20-30 people left behind at Sheffield on the EMT service to Liverpool at about 18:00 because it was a two car

 

[yorksrob]

Probably because it's not a toy train set.

Or more likely because one company can't be bothered to talk to another one.

 

[MichaelAMW]

Probably because it's not a toy train set.

Do you have a non-patronising answer? Either say something sensible or don't say anything at all, and try going against the railway way of sticking it all in the "that's all too difficult" pile. I asked a reasonable question. If, as has been suggested, spare Northern 158s are available then the basics are that a Northern driver - plenty available as they are not on strike - needs to deliver a pair of 158s, say, to some location, e.g. Manchester Piccadilly, that is within the EMT route knowledge. EMT need to do their best to find a driver, which might not be possible I realise, and the two companies need to communicate.

It's clearly not trivial but it also not beyond the realms of possibility. The railway can do really well in a difficult situation when it manages to avoid the all-too-common paralysis that comes from being frightened of making a decision; this is one of those occasions when a bit of effort could actually achieve something. After all, it's ultimately just a train going from a depot into passenger service, which is not an unknown process. You can pretend it's all too hard and just dismiss views that you find too challenging but it's still something that could be done.

As for train sets, the average passenger frequently suffers from those in overall charge treating it all like a train set and failing to remember the hundreds of fare-paying people inconvenienced when decisions are made for operational and not customer-service reasons.

 

[_toommm_]

Single 153 on the 11:28 from Grimsby to Newark. Absolute havoc by Barnetby where I boarded, and not helped by all the drunkards on board

 

[Class 170101]

There are lessons to be learnt from this.

It is possible for one company to hire resources from another. GA hires a Class 158 daily for a service from Norwich to Lowestoft and return. GA has also been known to hire Class 158s at short notice from EMT which would be stabled in the Norwich area should the route between Norwich and Ely / Peterborough be closed for engineering works.

East Coast have been borrowing HSTs from EMT on both a planned and short notice basis.

In terms of moving the stock to the right places needed by EMT the Northern drivers aren't on strike.

Where there is a will there is a way.

 

[dk1]

There are lessons to be learnt from this.

It is possible for one company to hire resources from another. GA hires a Class 158 daily for a service from Norwich to Lowestoft and return. GA has also been known to hire Class 158s at short notice from EMT which would be stabled in the Norwich area should the route between Norwich and Ely / Peterborough be closed for engineering works.

East Coast have been borrowing HSTs from EMT on both a planned and short notice basis.

In terms of moving the stock to the right places needed by EMT the Northern drivers aren't on strike.

Where there is a will there is a way.

The EMT/GA trade off is much easier as it's part of the original franchise to allow GA to work the last up/first down Cambridge service which wasn't possible after the Central Trains break up. It also helps that four 158s are stabled overnight at Norwich & certain drivers links sign them for the 05:36 Lowestoft & depot movements & these can be used to hire in marginal time.