Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly

[Merseysider]

I need to make a journey from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly on Saturday:

1048 ERD - LTV 1114
1122 LTV - CRE 1151
1211 CRE - MAN 1246
(1h 58m)

(CRE = Crewe, LTV = Lichfield Trent Valley)

however travel via Lichfield is apparently not permitted, with journey planners (I tried XC and NRE) instead suggesting:

1047 ERD - BHM 1100
1115 BHM - CRE 1207
1228 CRE - MAN 1315
(2h 28m)

a full half hour slower.

As far as I can tell, the shortest (normal) route from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly is via Lichfield...

ERD - LTV 12m 41ch
LTV - MAN 67m 33ch
totalling 79.9 miles.

Birmingham to Manchester alone is 83.13 miles, so clearly going this way is longer.

Now apparently NFM64 fares disallow Lichfield Trent Valley as a routeing point for Erdington, but that shouldn’t matter where the journey takes the shortest route, so the route via Lichfield should be permitted.

And in any case, it’s an entirely reasonable route.

I don’t believe it has anything to do with the date as I’ve tried several.

Am I missing something?

 

[alistairlees]

I need to make a journey from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly on Saturday:

1048 ERD - LTV 1114
1122 LTV - CRE 1151
1211 CRE - MAN 1246
(1h 58m)

(CRE = Crewe, LTV = Lichfield Trent Valley)

however travel via Lichfield is apparently not permitted, with journey planners instead suggesting:

1047 ERD - BHM 1100
1115 BHM - CRE 1207
1228 CRE - MAN 1315
(2h 28m)

a full half hour slower.

As far as I can tell, the shortest (normal) route from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly is via Lichfield...

ERD - LTV 12m 41ch
LTV - MAN 67m 33ch
totalling 79.9 miles.

Birmingham to Manchester alone is 83.13 miles, so clearly going this way is longer.

Now apparently NFM64 fares disallow Lichfield Trent Valley as a routeing point for Erdington, but that shouldn’t matter where the journey takes the shortest route, so the route via Lichfield should be permitted.

And in any case, it’s an entirely reasonable route.

I don’t believe it has anything to do with the date as I’ve tried several.

Am I missing something?

The GWR one (Worldline) allows travel on the 10.48, though the only fare it offers is a £39.60 Off-Peak Single.

There's a 10.27 departure from Erdington that goes via Birmingham and is then just a single leg from Birmingham to Manchester on CrossCountry; there's an Advance fare available for £24.80 on that one.

 

[_toommm_]

It seems to not be allowing travel via LTV as it thinks the SOS (Anytime Day Single) for Erdington to Manchester undercuts the SOS for Lichfield to Manchester. The routeing point calculator seems to think the former is £16.90 vs. the latter being £18.00.

In reality, the SOS for LTV to MAN is £33.00 vs. ERD to MAN which is priced at £46.60. I’ve attached the screenshot below:

(This is my interpretation - if it is indeed wrong, please correct me and I’ll strike through the mid-information).

 

[Merseysider]

It seems to not be allowing travel via LTV as it thinks the SOS (Anytime Day Single) for Erdington to Manchester undercuts the SOS for Lichfield to Manchester. The routeing point calculator seems to think the former is £16.90 vs. the latter being £18.00.

In reality, the SOS for LTV to MAN is £33.00 vs. ERD to MAN which is priced at £46.60. I’ve attached the screenshot below:

(This is my interpretation - if it is indeed wrong, please correct me and I’ll strike through the mid-information).

View attachment 79685

You’re absolutely right with what you’ve found and I suspect that may be playing a part. It’s daft really.

The GWR one (Worldline) allows travel on the 10.48, though the only fare it offers is a £39.60 Off-Peak Single.

There's a 10.27 departure from Erdington that goes via Birmingham and is then just a single leg from Birmingham to Manchester on CrossCountry; there's an Advance fare available for £24.80 on that one.

Thanks - that’s great. I hadn’t thought to check GWR - I’ll probably buy the flexible ticket with them. Ideally I’d like to be able to buy with XC for their seat selector on the return leg but hey-ho.

 

[_toommm_]

You’re absolutely right with what you’ve found and I suspect that may be playing a part. It’s daft really.

I’m by no means a Fares Expert (obviously ), but I really can’t foresee any problems using it that way as it’s not really an ‘out-of-the-way’ nor an unreasonable route. On top of that, youre highly unlikely to experience any sort of revenue protection whether that be from dedicated RPIs or the guards/TMs.

 

[alistairlees]

It seems to not be allowing travel via LTV as it thinks the SOS (Anytime Day Single) for Erdington to Manchester undercuts the SOS for Lichfield to Manchester. The routeing point calculator seems to think the former is £16.90 vs. the latter being £18.00.

In reality, the SOS for LTV to MAN is £33.00 vs. ERD to MAN which is priced at £46.60. I’ve attached the screenshot below:

(This is my interpretation - if it is indeed wrong, please correct me and I’ll strike through the mid-information).

View attachment 79685

Yes, but it's the fares at the time of NFM64 that matter when determining whether a routeing point may be used, not the fares today.

 

[JB_B]

I need to make a journey from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly on Saturday:

1048 ERD - LTV 1114
1122 LTV - CRE 1151
1211 CRE - MAN 1246
(1h 58m)

(CRE = Crewe, LTV = Lichfield Trent Valley)

however travel via Lichfield is apparently not permitted, with journey planners (I tried XC and NRE) instead suggesting:

1047 ERD - BHM 1100
1115 BHM - CRE 1207
1228 CRE - MAN 1315
(2h 28m)

a full half hour slower.

As far as I can tell, the shortest (normal) route from Erdington to Manchester Piccadilly is via Lichfield...

ERD - LTV 12m 41ch
LTV - MAN 67m 33ch
totalling 79.9 miles.

Birmingham to Manchester alone is 83.13 miles, so clearly going this way is longer.

Now apparently NFM64 fares disallow Lichfield Trent Valley as a routeing point for Erdington, but that shouldn’t matter where the journey takes the shortest route, so the route via Lichfield should be permitted.

And in any case, it’s an entirely reasonable route.

I don’t believe it has anything to do with the date as I’ve tried several.

Am I missing something?

This reply is just looking at the narrow point of why some journey planners may not be picking up the route you want. As you say, it's a completely reasonable route.

1) You're correct that the shortest-route rule takes priority and the shortest route goes via Lichfield - as long as you follow that route (or a route within +3 miles) you can ignore the maps and fares-check.

2) However, the shortest route doesn't pass through Crewe - it goes via Stone (at least according to the routeing guide data which journey planners work from) and going via Crewe is just over three miles longer. (I know, given the actual service pattern, that this isn't very helpful.)

3) There are errors in the routeing guide data and some links exist in the distance data over which no regular passenger service runs (as required by the public-facing routeing guide instructions). My understanding is that to mitigate errors, journey planners can flex the 3m margin - I don't know how this works and it's possible that they don't flex in a consistent fashion.

 

[yorkie]

....My understanding is that to mitigate errors, journey planners can flex the 3m margin - I don't know how this works and it's possible that they don't flex in a consistent fashion.

The official documentation given to journey planners refers to "...within a specified margin of the length of the shortest route..." without stipulating what that distance should be. However the public Routeing Guide in Detail documentation refers to "no more than 3 miles longer".

It could, in my opinion, be deemed reasonable for a journey planner to apply a greater margin than 3 miles, to take into account the differing methods of calculating the shortest route (ie. the electronic data in the electronic routeing guide vs the National Rail Timetable in the PDF public routeing guide).

Arguably some fares have contractually permitted routes which are not permitted according to the data; increasing the allowance would enable more of those routes to be correctly validated by journey planners (albeit at the risk of allowing additional routes that are not intended to be valid; however this can be rectified with the addition of "negative" easements).

(If anyone is still following this, well done )

 

[Merseysider]

However, the shortest route doesn't pass through Crewe - it goes via Stone (at least according to the routeing guide data which journey planners work from) and going via Crewe is just over three miles longer. (I know, given the actual service pattern, that this isn't very helpful.)

Well spotted - I hadn’t considered the difference between the routes via Stone/Crewe!

 

[_toommm_]

Yes, but it's the fares at the time of NFM64 that matter when determining whether a routeing point may be used, not the fares today.

Ahh I wasn't aware of that - thank you!