How to deal with a TOC that won't engage with you? - Platform alterations at Leyland station

[Horizon22]

For example Northern could insist on the booked route through Leyland for calling trains, unless they're advised in good time to manually announce or update the platform numbers.

That will never happen succesfully. You could aim for it, but you are effectively telling the signaller what to do and restricting their operations.

I've seen such things done with best intentions and it always falls down.

 

[Starmill]

Yes, I said essentially "all CIS software has the potential to lead to short-notice platform alterations". Where "2-5 minutes is provided" that is often because there is manual intervention. Places like Sheffield and Doncaster have control rooms to manage platform changes and direct communication with the signaller.

There are places all over the country where it is just a few seconds too. This is all down to railway geography and there are a number of routes into Leyland for which the platform may not be known until the last signal, leaving little time. And yes, I know the OP is arguing about the routes into the station where it is 100% certain that there will be a platform alteration based on the route taken.

Everywhere has a variable risk dependent on the following (non-exhaustive) reasons: railway geography, signaller communications, dwell times, infrastructure constraints, station staffing levels, station infrastructure. Of course the more time provided, the better and working towards giving people as much notice as possible is obviously a good thing.

I think you're doing a lot of distracting from the real point here, which is that the OP is trying to secure a greater awareness of the choice made not to give the required notice. You're entitled to split hairs about precisely the way in which they've raised it or the precise details of the problem if you wish, and I am not going to be drawn into any more discussion about that. It's a choice not to provide information sooner, or to otherwise mitigate the risks associated with not doing so.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Tuesday at 00:34 ==

That will never happen succesfully. You could aim for it, but you are effectively telling the signaller what to do and restricting their operations.

Restrictions like that exist in loads of places.

I've seen such things done with best intentions and it always falls down.

I'm sure it would be inconvenient for someone. Perhaps that means it's worth mitigating in some other way that costs more money. Your implied position that we do nothing however isn't one a reasonable person would accept if they knew the facts.

 

[ruaival]

Northern have always been very responsive on Facebook Messenger, in my experience.

 

[AutoUnder]

Northern have always been very responsive on Facebook Messenger, in my experience.

That's just their social media team. They can't do a lot regarding operational issues unfortunately

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Tuesday at 08:56 ==

There are lots of solutions that would work, and honestly it's embarrassingly amateur that apparently nobody has considered them. For example Northern could insist on the booked route through Leyland for calling trains, unless they're advised in good time to manually announce or update the platform numbers. Or if that's going to result in too many delays then clearly another look at the business case for new equipment would be the best outcome. As a last resort asking the conductor to check the footbridge and accepting the station overtime is also an easy way out. In practice most conductors are actually already doing that anyway so it would just be formalising a pro-safety policy that everyone can agree is a good idea.

The current mitigation measure in place is for the signaller to phone station staff in advance of an alteration and for the staff to announce it manually. However this isn't adequate. There have been several instances of the signaller forgetting to call or putting a train on the wrong platform by mistake. Also, when station staff put out a manual announcement, the departure screens still show the original platform until the service arrives and the CIS announcements will continue announcing the original platform; this ends up confusing passengers.

As I've stated many times, there is a solution to get the CIS to change in advance automatically but Northern have so far refused to provide any sort of comment on this solution

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Tuesday at 09:11 ==

That will never happen succesfully. You could aim for it, but you are effectively telling the signaller what to do and restricting their operations.

I've seen such things done with best intentions and it always falls down.

I agree. With how busy the WCML is, any kind of disruption will make to necessary to make alterations somewhere

 

[Lytham Local]

Northern have been good when I've contacted them on twitter (or whatever it is called this week). Most companies generally are.

If I want to go full Karen, I'll write directly to the CEO which usually gets things moving in the right direction. https://www.ceoemail.com/

 

[Moonshot]

3 trains an hour in each direction.....over 4 platforms. Clearly 4 platforms not needed. Platform 3 appears not to have any trains booked to stop there at all by the looks of it. In theory , the fast lines platforms should be closed down. However, as pointed out there is a significant flow of other traffic through the station, so how practical it is just using the slow platforms I m not sure. The problem of incorrect screen information is not unique to Leyland....it exists all over the place.

 

[AutoUnder]

3 trains an hour in each direction.....over 4 platforms. Clearly 4 platforms not needed. Platform 3 appears not to have any trains booked to stop there at all by the looks of it. In theory , the fast lines platforms should be closed down. However, as pointed out there is a significant flow of other traffic through the station, so how practical it is just using the slow platforms I m not sure. The problem of incorrect screen information is not unique to Leyland....it exists all over the place.

Trains are timetabled to use platform 4 so they don't get stuck behind services going towards Blackburn or Ormskirk. Services due on 2 have had to change to 4 in the past because of this. Services due on 1 have also had to change to 3 because of freight services on the slow line or because two services going to Blackpool are arriving at the same time (services from Manchester and Liverpool are due within 5 minutes of each other so if the Manchester one is delayed, they sometimes have to change it).

Basically, closing platforms 3 and 4 would reduce operational flexibility significantly and would likely cause more issues than resolve

 

[Moonshot]

Trains are timetabled to use platform 4 so they don't get stuck behind services going towards Blackburn or Ormskirk. Services due on 2 have had to change to 4 in the past because of this. Services due on 1 have also had to change to 3 because of freight services on the slow line or because two services going to Blackpool are arriving at the same time (services from Manchester and Liverpool are due within 5 minutes of each other so if the Manchester one is delayed, they sometimes have to change it).

Basically, closing platforms 3 and 4 would reduce operational flexibility significantly and would likely cause more issues than resolve

I'm well aware of that.....but you cannot hide from the fact that 4 platforms are servicing just 6 trains an hour.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Platform 3 appears not to have any trains booked to stop there at all by the looks of it.

Not that many, but a small number of late night / early morning services do actually call there (i.e. platform 3 at Leyland station).

 

[Horizon22]

3 trains an hour in each direction.....over 4 platforms. Clearly 4 platforms not needed. Platform 3 appears not to have any trains booked to stop there at all by the looks of it. In theory , the fast lines platforms should be closed down. However, as pointed out there is a significant flow of other traffic through the station, so how practical it is just using the slow platforms I m not sure. The problem of incorrect screen information is not unique to Leyland....it exists all over the place.

Well yes they could have gates and barriers to prevent access to the fast lines as is common in many areas.

It seems the only trains routinely booked to use Platform 4 is Manchester Airport services (and even then they sometimes use Platform
2). Really you’d think it shouldn’t be to tricky to timetable everything stopping on P1/2 and would seem to be a planning constraint of some sort but I don’t know the area well enough to know why.

Simplifying the service pattern normally results in few platform alterations (outside of disruption / engineering works).

 

[AutoUnder]

It seems the only trains routinely booked to use Platform 4 is Manchester Airport services (and even then they sometimes use Platform
2). Really you’d think it shouldn’t be to tricky to timetable everything stopping on P1/2 and would seem to be a planning constraint of some sort but I don’t know the area well enough to know why.

It's because of the Colne service from Preston which leaves the WCML at Farington Curve junction. It's scheduled to depart only a couple of minutes after the Manchester Airport service

 

[Moonshot]

How many trains a day are affected by this issue?

 

[bleeder4]

Well the the FOI response I have submitted has come in and I am honestly disgusted by the attitude Northern has! They seem to be branding me as a nuisance and not bothering to investigate it properly.
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/short_notice_platform_alteration#incoming-3052025

KeTech, who supply the customer information software for Northern, seem interested in trying to resolve this issue as well but as the contract lies with Northern and not me, any requests to implement changes has to come from them. The last response in the email thread says the following:

What on earth kind of an attitude is this?! I have tried to be as reasonable as possible with Northern and have only chased it to this degree because it seemed to me that they weren't providing any kind of meaningful response. Turns out they weren't even trying to do anything!

I am very angry with Northern about this. Clearly all this 'passenger charter' stuff means nothing to them if they don't implement accessibility improvements. I contacted my MP about this issue at the same time as I opened this thread.

Also just to clarify, I have nothing against either Network Rail or KeTech regarding this problem. They have both been very reasonable to deal with and are just simply unable to do anything about it.

Ultimately, you are just one single complaint. I've not looked at station usage figures but I assume it's in the thousands per year. Out of all those thousands of passengers you may be the only one who has complained. The only way to get any real traction on this is to start a campaign and get other passengers involved. No company, in any industry, is going to invest time and resources into resolving an issue that only one person out of thousands has complained about.

 

[MikeWM]

I was caught out by a last-minute platform alteration at Leyland in (I think) the summer of 2015 - I clearly recall having a bit of a (probably unfair) moan about it to the person in the ticket office. I remember this one because I believe that's the only time I've ever missed a train due to a platform being changed at the last minute (as opposed to waiting on the wrong platform due to being an idiot, as I managed to do at Tamworth a few years back!) - and I think it is the only time I've been to Leyland, that's the main thing I remember about the place.

I've not been back to Leyland since, but it isn't good to hear there are similar issues happening 10 years on - have they been happening all this time?

 

[talldave]

Ultimately, you are just one single complaint. I've not looked at station usage figures but I assume it's in the thousands per year. Out of all those thousands of passengers you may be the only one who has complained. The only way to get any real traction on this is to start a campaign and get other passengers involved. No company, in any industry, is going to invest time and resources into resolving an issue that only one person out of thousands has complained about.

That depends on how customer focused that industry is. The problem with the rail industry is that it has the mindset that passengers are an irritating inconvenience that get in the way of the running of its train set where pointless statistics take precedence over pissing off paying customers. The reason being, none of the employees has an invested interest in customer satisfaction, so why should they care? This mentality will get even worse with "nationalisation" and in no time we'll be comfortably back in "but we've always done it that way" territory. Depressing.

What happens at Leyland is clearly stupid whether 1 person or 1000 people point it out.

 

[AutoUnder]

Ultimately, you are just one single complaint. I've not looked at station usage figures but I assume it's in the thousands per year. Out of all those thousands of passengers you may be the only one who has complained. The only way to get any real traction on this is to start a campaign and get other passengers involved. No company, in any industry, is going to invest time and resources into resolving an issue that only one person out of thousands has complained about.

A quick search on X will show that many people (including myself) have complained to Northern over the years about this. I have also seen many people in person complaining about this issue but not all of them will choose to submit a written complaint to Northern

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Thursday at 12:03 ==

I was caught out by a last-minute platform alteration at Leyland in (I think) the summer of 2015 - I clearly recall having a bit of a (probably unfair) moan about it to the person in the ticket office. I remember this one because I believe that's the only time I've ever missed a train due to a platform being changed at the last minute (as opposed to waiting on the wrong platform due to being an idiot, as I managed to do at Tamworth a few years back!) - and I think it is the only time I've been to Leyland, that's the main thing I remember about the place.

I've not been back to Leyland since, but it isn't good to hear there are similar issues happening 10 years on - have they been happening all this time?

Yes it has. If anything it's worse now because we have automated PA announcements. Whist a good idea in theory and works well most of the time, it will still announce the original platform, even after ticket office staff have made a manual announcement. Quite a few people end up crossing back over

 

[The Planner]

Well yes they could have gates and barriers to prevent access to the fast lines as is common in many areas.

It seems the only trains routinely booked to use Platform 4 is Manchester Airport services (and even then they sometimes use Platform
2). Really you’d think it shouldn’t be to tricky to timetable everything stopping on P1/2 and would seem to be a planning constraint of some sort but I don’t know the area well enough to know why.

Simplifying the service pattern normally results in few platform alterations (outside of disruption / engineering works).

Cursory glance, the Manchester Airport Blackpool can't use the fast lines as it has the TPE Scotland up its backside. Same goes for the Liverpool Blackpool, that has the Airport Barrow behind it.

 

[Horizon22]

A quick search on X will show that many people (including myself) have complained to Northern over the years about this. I have also seen many people in person complaining about this issue but not all of them will choose to submit a written complaint to Northern

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Thursday at 12:03 ==


Yes it has. If anything it's worse now because we have automated PA announcements. Whist a good idea in theory and works well most of the time, it will still announce the original platform, even after ticket office staff have made a manual announcement. Quite a few people end up crossing back over

Sounds to me that Northern should invest in giving Leyland station staff a machine which has some limited CIS local control for platform changes and train them up on it. If the station has a suitable staffing level to manage it.

Clearly the ticket office is aware a platform change is coming from somebody (presumably the signaller). Either that or they are straight onto Northern control to make the edits.

 

[AutoUnder]

Sounds to me that Northern should invest in giving Leyland station staff a machine which has some limited CIS local control for platform changes and train them up on it. If the station has a suitable staffing level to manage it.

Clearly the ticket office is aware a platform change is coming from somebody (presumably the signaller). Either that or they are straight onto Northern control to make the edits.

Yes the signaller does call in advance but there's been many instances of the signaller either forgetting to phone or putting the train on the wrong platform by mistake. There has also been many occasions recently of the ticket office being closed due to staff shortages. This is why I've been pressing for an automated solution to be implemented

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Thursday at 16:49 ==

Cursory glance, the Manchester Airport Blackpool can't use the fast lines as it has the TPE Scotland up its backside. Same goes for the Liverpool Blackpool, that has the Airport Barrow behind it.

All Liverpool services stop at Euxton Balshaw Lane and these have to use slow line as Euxton only has slow platforms and there's no slow to fast crossover between Leyland and Euxton. There have been instances in the past though of services going to Liverpool using the fast line and skipping Euxton because of line blockages.

All Blackpool bound services are scheduled to use slow line (except a couple of midnight services) but depending on which platforms at Preston are occupied and whether there's a slow freight in front of the service on slow line, they have to use fast.

This isn't a point about preventing alterations. Yes they should be minimised as much as possible but you can't completely prevent them. Doing so would probably create delays and congestion issues

 

[Moonshot]

Yes the signaller does call in advance but there's been many instances of the signaller either forgetting to phone or putting the train on the wrong platform by mistake. There has also been many occasions recently of the ticket office being closed due to staff shortages. This is why I've been pressing for an automated solution to be implemented

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Thursday at 16:49 ==


All Liverpool services stop at Euxton Balshaw Lane and these have to use slow line as Euxton only has slow platforms and there's no slow to fast crossover between Leyland and Euxton. There have been instances in the past though of services going to Liverpool using the fast line and skipping Euxton because of line blockages.

All Blackpool bound services are scheduled to use slow line (except a couple of midnight services) but depending on which platforms at Preston are occupied and whether there's a slow freight in front of the service on slow line, they have to use fast.

This isn't a point about preventing alterations. Yes they should be minimised as much as possible but you can't completely prevent them. Doing so would probably create delays and congestion issues

As others have pointed out, you are getting yourself worked up about what is a relatively minor issue. As I work for them , I can assure you that the issue will be in someone's pending tray somewhere as a item to look at at a later date. You don't actually know just how many trains this affects but from my experience it's very rare when there is a platform swap. Some of the services have a bit of standing time as well. The fast lines have a line speed of 100mph, the slower ones 75. As I have said earlier, just 3 trains an hour call at Leyland in either direction. The biggest passenger flow is to Preston. In effect it's just 2 trains per hour to Preston because of the very close timings of a pair of services. Nothing is going to change for now.

 

[AutoUnder]

As others have pointed out, you are getting yourself worked up about what is a relatively minor issue. As I work for them , I can assure you that the issue will be in someone's pending tray somewhere as a item to look at at a later date. You don't actually know just how many trains this affects but from my experience it's very rare when there is a platform swap. Some of the services have a bit of standing time as well. The fast lines have a line speed of 100mph, the slower ones 75. As I have said earlier, just 3 trains an hour call at Leyland in either direction. The biggest passenger flow is to Preston. In effect it's just 2 trains per hour to Preston because of the very close timings of a pair of services. Nothing is going to change for now.

If your company engaged with me and properly fed back to me what they are currently doing (or not doing) to try and solve this issue, then I would accept that. The simple fact is they aren't. I first formally raised this issue to Northern nearly a year ago now, when I completed my university project to demonstrate that such an issue is fixable. They just said they would pass it on at first and then said there was nothing they could do to fix it, which is obviously incorrect. They then repeated the same incorrect response after I passed on the details on how it can be fixed. I also received a comment from someone who worked in a different TOC stating that their company had successfully implemented the same type of fix at some of their stations; this was a comment on a blog post I wrote for Enroute about this specific issue: https://enroutecic.com/blog/the-quest-to-solve-last-minute-platform-alterations-at-leyland/

The point I am trying to make is if Northern aren't providing any kind of proper response to my issue, then how should I trust that it is being (or going to be) investigated?

 

[Moonshot]

If your company engaged with me and properly fed back to me what they are currently doing (or not doing) to try and solve this issue, then I would accept that. The simple fact is they aren't. I first formally raised this issue to Northern nearly a year ago now, when I completed my university project to demonstrate that such an issue is fixable. They just said they would pass it on at first and then said there was nothing they could do to fix it, which is obviously incorrect. They then repeated the same incorrect response after I passed on the details on how it can be fixed. I also received a comment from someone who worked in a different TOC stating that their company had successfully implemented the same type of fix at some of their stations; this was a comment on a blog post I wrote for Enroute about this specific issue: https://enroutecic.com/blog/the-quest-to-solve-last-minute-platform-alterations-at-leyland/

The point I am trying to make is if Northern aren't providing any kind of proper response to my issue, then how should I trust that it is being (or going to be) investigated?

I'm afraid you are wasting your time. There will be an ongoing project somewhere within the bowels of Northern which will be working on generally improving this sort of thing, but it will be working at it's own pace.

 

[punxsutawny]

I'm afraid you are wasting your time. There will be an ongoing project somewhere within the bowels of Northern which will be working on generally improving this sort of thing, but it will be working at it's own pace.

But the point being made is why is that acceptable once an issue has been repeatedly raised? Even if the long-term solution isn't found immediately, there should be more short-term measures to mitigate.

 

[Moonshot]

But the point being made is why is that acceptable once an issue has been repeatedly raised? Even if the long-term solution isn't found immediately, there should be more short-term measures to mitigate.

There are already mitigation measures in place. This issue affects a very small number of trains at Leyland.

 

[AutoUnder]

There are already mitigation measures in place. This issue affects a very small number of trains at Leyland.

The current mitigation measures have been in place for as long as I remember and are significantly flawed. It results in confusing information for passengers and is subject to human error

 

[CyrusWuff]

But the point being made is why is that acceptable once an issue has been repeatedly raised? Even if the long-term solution isn't found immediately, there should be more short-term measures to mitigate.

I suspect a key reason is one of funding. If the DfT won't allow Northern to pay for the required software development to get KeTech to change which berth triggers a platform alteration being registered, it won't happen.

My assumption being that it would be a generic solution rather than a site-specific one just for Leyland.

 

[L+Y]

I've just witnessed a manual announcement at Leyland station, advising passengers to move from platform 4 to 2, and to disregard any automated announcements. So something is happening!

 

[GordonT]

I've just witnessed a manual announcement at Leyland station, advising passengers to move from platform 4 to 2, and to disregard any automated announcements. So something is happening!

Surely with the technological advances of recent times it should not be beyond the wit of man to enable an unwanted automated announcement to be suppressed by those making ad hoc manual interventions?

 

[AutoUnder]

Surely with the technological advances of recent times it should not be beyond the wit of man to enable an unwanted automated announcement to be suppressed by those making ad hoc manual interventions?

It is possible and some staff do that but you need to remember that these are ticket office staff who are often busy serving customers. It's often not practical to keep going to the mic to surpress the automated announcements. Another point is that you can't hear the announcements very well from within the ticket office. There is a speaker within the mic itself but the staff leave it turned off as they find it really annoying when it's on.

 

[RAPC]

The point I am trying to make is if Northern aren't providing any kind of proper response to my issue, then how should I trust that it is being (or going to be) investigated?

Having looked at the FOI email chain, they have responded with what you had requested, namely all emails in the time period specified.

They have chosen not to engage any more with you based on your original direct email exchanges with them, which is mentioned in the FOI response.

You have raised your issue and told them what you perceive the issues to be. I don't believe they owe you anything else and I can also see why they have chosen not to engage further based on your communications with them. A different approach to how it was originally raised, may well have yielded a more positive response, but sadly that horse will have bolted now.