More interesting train journeys this evening. The 18:09 arrival from Portsmouth Harbour into Waterloo was 8 minutes late into Waterloo. Despite this the 18:23 from Waterloo was only 3 minutes late, departing at 18:26. So unusual. Normally an 8 minute delay means a delay of the same length of time or even more!
The train journey on that was nothing much different to usual. It departed late got even later on its way to Surbtion.
At Woking I was planning to get the 18:58. This too was late but only by about 4 minutes.
So I'm on the platform. Stood around the 6 carriage mark and in should pull a 444 train. Oh I thought, due to disruption it must be 9 carriages or less likely, perhaps 10. The departure screen is referring to needing to be in the front 7 carriages due to short platforms.
However the train stopped short of me. That's surely not right I thought. Then I moved up and saw the vesuables were busy and there were people in the aisle. It must be people getting off. Woking is a popular stop.
However not enough got off and some got on but not everyone.
I managed to walk quickly down the platform to the next door at the end of the carriage and myself and another lady managed to squeeze on.
The train soon departed. No idea if everyone got on. By this time I was thinking something is wrong with the information on the department screens.
Soon enough the guard apologies for the short formation and says it is due to the earlier disruption.
Far enough. So I then checked Journey Check and no information provided. Only the 17:30 was showing as short formed. Therefore I decided to tweet South Western Railway to ask if someone could please update the information. I don't think there is any harm in asking politely.
I didn't get a response to my question.. Nor did I get one this morning. However I then spotted a Tweet from someone else asking why the train was short formed
They said it was their second tweet after getting no response last night.
The member of Twitter staff said it was due to be short formed throughout December. If true then this contradicted what the guard said. Also if it is true it would make sense in more so to update the screens with the corrsxt number of carriages.
I replied to this thread asking for information to be added on line. I was then asked which service was referring to. I don't know what kind of view staff get of Twitter or whether they see replies in context. They are no doubt extremely busy. I replied back and I await to see if they respond.
This also brings into questiom short formation information. If this train is booked to be 5 cars tgen it wouldn't be classed as being short formed but if not classed as being short formed then currently it won't appear on Journey Check and if it doesn't appear on there, how are people to know it's 5 carriages? It seems there is a gap in the system that could do with being plugged. They need a Journey Check section for trains booked to be short as standard.
As far as I can tell there was no timetable change posters put up for the winter timetable, listing the more important changes. I'm sure previous timetable changes on South Western Railway had such posters and if not South West Trains certainly did.
Then there is the issue of if the train is only 5 carriages shy is it stopping at Woking? I was told the reason the 18:18 Waterloo to Haslemere service never stopped at Clapham Junction was due to it only having 8 carriages. Once it got 12 it could stop there, departing Waterloo at 18:17.
Well if the 18:30 has only 5 carriages wouldn't thr same apply in that the first stop should be missed out?
Obviously I was personally glad it wasn't missed and it suited me. However if following the same logic as the 18:18, you'd think the stop would be cancelled due to there not being enough carriages.
Finally if they don't have enough rolling stock to strengthen this train, it's a good job the new timetable didn't come in. That includes more trains and there might not have been enough rolling stock to run it.
Thsy probably could do with better publicising that the 18:30 is now 7lobky 4 carriages as opposed to 12. Obviously 5 carriage 444 isn't the same as a 5 carriage 450, were such a formation on carriages possible.
The train journey on that was nothing much different to usual. It departed late got even later on its way to Surbtion.
At Woking I was planning to get the 18:58. This too was late but only by about 4 minutes.
So I'm on the platform. Stood around the 6 carriage mark and in should pull a 444 train. Oh I thought, due to disruption it must be 9 carriages or less likely, perhaps 10. The departure screen is referring to needing to be in the front 7 carriages due to short platforms.
However the train stopped short of me. That's surely not right I thought. Then I moved up and saw the vesuables were busy and there were people in the aisle. It must be people getting off. Woking is a popular stop.
However not enough got off and some got on but not everyone.
I managed to walk quickly down the platform to the next door at the end of the carriage and myself and another lady managed to squeeze on.
The train soon departed. No idea if everyone got on. By this time I was thinking something is wrong with the information on the department screens.
Soon enough the guard apologies for the short formation and says it is due to the earlier disruption.
Far enough. So I then checked Journey Check and no information provided. Only the 17:30 was showing as short formed. Therefore I decided to tweet South Western Railway to ask if someone could please update the information. I don't think there is any harm in asking politely.
I didn't get a response to my question.. Nor did I get one this morning. However I then spotted a Tweet from someone else asking why the train was short formed
They said it was their second tweet after getting no response last night.
The member of Twitter staff said it was due to be short formed throughout December. If true then this contradicted what the guard said. Also if it is true it would make sense in more so to update the screens with the corrsxt number of carriages.
I replied to this thread asking for information to be added on line. I was then asked which service was referring to. I don't know what kind of view staff get of Twitter or whether they see replies in context. They are no doubt extremely busy. I replied back and I await to see if they respond.
This also brings into questiom short formation information. If this train is booked to be 5 cars tgen it wouldn't be classed as being short formed but if not classed as being short formed then currently it won't appear on Journey Check and if it doesn't appear on there, how are people to know it's 5 carriages? It seems there is a gap in the system that could do with being plugged. They need a Journey Check section for trains booked to be short as standard.
As far as I can tell there was no timetable change posters put up for the winter timetable, listing the more important changes. I'm sure previous timetable changes on South Western Railway had such posters and if not South West Trains certainly did.
Then there is the issue of if the train is only 5 carriages shy is it stopping at Woking? I was told the reason the 18:18 Waterloo to Haslemere service never stopped at Clapham Junction was due to it only having 8 carriages. Once it got 12 it could stop there, departing Waterloo at 18:17.
Well if the 18:30 has only 5 carriages wouldn't thr same apply in that the first stop should be missed out?
Obviously I was personally glad it wasn't missed and it suited me. However if following the same logic as the 18:18, you'd think the stop would be cancelled due to there not being enough carriages.
Finally if they don't have enough rolling stock to strengthen this train, it's a good job the new timetable didn't come in. That includes more trains and there might not have been enough rolling stock to run it.
Thsy probably could do with better publicising that the 18:30 is now 7lobky 4 carriages as opposed to 12. Obviously 5 carriage 444 isn't the same as a 5 carriage 450, were such a formation on carriages possible.