London to Brighton bike ride stock to get the bikes back

[adamedwards]

Reading that because of the London to Brighton bike ride, no bikes on trains from Brighton on Sunday. So the bike riders are hiring coaches. Now surely we can do better?
Could Class 325s be used for the bikes? Or something? I'm sure there is a creative solution out there!

 

[30907]

It just needs a couple of 73s and a load of parcels vans (which I vaguely recall was the solution a generation ago), but I think there's a slight problem there.

I'm not sure even the various German operators could cope with that sort of demand, maybe in the Czech Republic?

Seriously, even if the 325s were available, with drivers passed for the Brighton main line, I wonder if GTR could cope with the passengers?

 

[a_c_skinner]

It does seem a marvellous way of shooting yourself in the foot, PR wise. Though now bikes cost as much as a decent car riders won't be keen to let them out of sight.

 

[Smitham]

Remember seeing EPBs stuffed with bikes coming back from Brighton back in the late 70s early 80s.

 

[swt_passenger]

Been a few years since this thread was a regular annual occurrence, what’s new?

 

[mallard]

It probably wouldn't be impossible to charter a loco-hauled train with some form of NPCS to carry bikes, but it's unlikely to be cost-effective (which would be why they don't do it). There are apparently still some freight "vans" around the network, not (officially) withdrawn, and if they really wanted to, some stored or preserved vans of various types could be refurbished and fitted with bike racks... All this is pure fantasy of course.

 

[HSTEd]

If I'm honest, this latest PR disaster is merely symptomatic of the... arrogance? of the railway in recent years.
It has grown used to chronic overcrowding and constant massive passenger growth that it no longer believes it has to do anything to gain or retain traffic. Or to justify the public subsidies provided to it.

With the latest passenger number figures not looking so rosy.... this will have to change.

 

[jopsuk]

ok, maths time
For the Dunwich Dynamo GA accommodate, with pre-booking, 50 bikes in a DVT.

So let#'s take 50 bikes as a reasonable number to accommodate in a van type carriage.

Approximately 25000 people take part in the London-Brighton. Let's say ~1/3 of those, 8000, want to take a train back to London.

That's 160 carriages. Which at 12 carriages per train would be 13.33333 trains.

Which are just carrying bikes

a typical 12 carriage passenger train seats (and that's important) say 800 people. So that's another 10 trains.

So, we want to run 22 trains to carry all these people and their bikes.

That's 22 EXTRA trains, above the existing service, which is very busy all day at weekends.

That's a lot of extra trains to path.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Probably easier to hire a fleet of lorries from Mr Stobart etc.

 

[a_c_skinner]

That's a lot of extra trains to path

Ah. Well done, a logical approach we'd forgotten to apply.

 

[jopsuk]

Ah. Well done, a logical approach we'd forgotten to apply.

To add to this, there are 36 trains timetabled for Brighton to Victoria on a typical Sunday (eg tommorrow). There's 34 currently timetabled to London Bridge tommorrow

And this would be 22 extra services in just the afternoon

 

[Mordac]

It does seem a marvellous way of shooting yourself in the foot, PR wise. Though now bikes cost as much as a decent car riders won't be keen to let them out of sight.

It's amazing, isn't it? My motorbike cost me a grand, uses internal combustion and can get to 70mph without my help. But, you know, exercise is good too.

 

[swt_passenger]

Jopsuk has highlighted what has been said regularly over the last ten years or so. The event has completely outgrown the capacity of the trains...

I’m struggling to see what the “PR disaster” is this year especially, given that the status quo seems to have been accepted by the organisers for quite a few years.

 

[a_c_skinner]

Of course there are a lot more services on a weekday afternoon, so there are paths and rolling stock for a good deal more trains.

 

[takno]

Of course there are a lot more services on a weekday afternoon, so there are paths and rolling stock for a good deal more trains.

Network Rail are working through a significant programme of works on the line, so there's a good chance they are using the slight reduction in traffic to get these done. GTR may well not be able to schedule as much stock out if they are using Sundays to catch up with a maintenance backlog, and the drivers who have been working flat out to cover issues for the last few weeks may well not appreciate the extra rest-day working. None of their actual customers - the ones that give them a huge pile of money to travel day in and day out and don't demand to carry a massive piece of luggage for free - would particularly thank them for further messing up next week's service to support this.

 

[Rail Blues]

It's amazing, isn't it? My motorbike cost me a grand, uses internal combustion and can get to 70mph without my help. But, you know, exercise is good too.

My best bicycle cost what your motorbike did and is still considered a budget machine. Beyond a certain point you encounter the law of diminishing returns though and you're spending mega money for a marginal improvement. But one of the most regular comments is, 'why spend 1000s on a bike when you can buy one in Asda for £80' ?

Since I'm powering the bike myself I want it to be as light and comfortable as possible and bought the best I could afford. I spent half that figure on my car. I love cycling and hate driving. With basic care, the bike will last a lifetime though, the car will be scrap within a few years so to my mind its a good investment.

 

[NickBucks]

The company which runs the hire scheme for bikes in London has a fleet of vehicles specially adapted to move the bikes around the various hire locations in the capital and to the maintenance base. I would have thought that arranging to hire a number of these through TfL would be more cost effective than the trains.

 

[Clip]

The company which runs the hire scheme for bikes in London has a fleet of vehicles specially adapted to move the bikes around the various hire locations in the capital and to the maintenance base. I would have thought that arranging to hire a number of these through TfL would be more cost effective than the trains.

And what does the operator of Boris bikes use instead then?

 

[a_c_skinner]

Network Rail are working through a significant programme of works on the line, so there's a good chance they are using the slight reduction in traffic to get these done. GTR may well not be able to schedule as much stock out if they are using Sundays to catch up with a maintenance backlog, and the drivers who have been working flat out to cover issues for the last few weeks may well not appreciate the extra rest-day working. None of their actual customers - the ones that give them a huge pile of money to travel day in and day out and don't demand to carry a massive piece of luggage for free - would particularly thank them for further messing up next week's service to support this.

OF course, but all that could have been planned for (allowing for the fact they don't plan anything well). As it is the railway is badly run (for whatever reason, and laid at whoever's door) but in principle the Sunday service is capable of a more than 50% increase, closer to doubling.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

"Deeply Inefficient BR" , used to run 12 x EPB (6 of the coaches had the bottom seat bases reversed) for bikes every 30 mins to Victoria and later London Bridge. Then they used 455's.

The bike loaders were volunteers . I did the run twice , and it was a great day out , provided you started early enough before it got too hot.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

You could fit rather a lot of bikes into a 12 car 700...?

 

[Class 170101]

Of course there are a lot more services on a weekday afternoon, so there are paths and rolling stock for a good deal more trains.

But the trains don't move themselves. Extra trains need drivers but with training and I assume an RDW ban good luck with that.

 

[jopsuk]

other thoughts, in addtion to the maths above, seeing as people still don't seem to appreciate the sheer numbers and that in BR days the numbers were much, much smaller:
with so many bikes, if you're loading nothing but bikes into some trains/some carriages with the riders (who really, really need to have seats, not standing) then given that people will be on bikes from £300 to £3000 or more, you really need a check in/check out system. Which means sealing off/dedicating a platform at each end (maybe a single island, with the bike carrying service on one side and the passengers on the other), it means more staff, probably needing staff to help with loading too, long platform occupation, etc, etc

As far as I understand with the lorries and buses, this is roughly what happens. But then they're using a field, not a busy railway station.

 

[D7666]

people have very short memories

this is not railway arrogance

is is good common business sense

when EPB and towards the end Vep Were used to transport bikes, come the following days and even weeks numerous units were out of service with damaged grease smeared seat cushions and seat backs and fittings even when they did displace the cushions in alternate bays.

that was the bike specials themselves

then there were all the other ordinary trains that people flooded dirty bikes on to

that resulted in days of cancellations and weeks of short formations

you can't do that these days

apart from that where are you going to put more than about 2 full size bikes per modern emu and leave free access

if you look at seperate van trains how many do you think you need? one is no good for an event like this, you'd need them at least every half hour, thats six sets minimum to allow loading and unloading

so where are you going to find 60 vans and 12 locos (top and tail) and crews and paths and platforms and all through engineering work and so on

but who pays

bikes go free

so there no revenue in it just a total loss

its not railway arrogance but plain common business sense allowing us daily commuters to have fewer cancellations than otherwise for the days and weeks af t er the event

--
Nick

 

[a_c_skinner]

That is a much better reason to ban bikes and not attempt to cater for them. It is a clincher.

 

[squizzler]

Off topic perhaps, but with all the Mk3's being made redundant in the next few years might there be an opportunity for an enterprising charter operator to convert some into a dedicated bicycle rake? Bike cars, buffet, and first class coaches for comfortable seating? If they really did it properly they might install roller shutter doors on the sides of the bike wagons!

Granted this is not a solution for the sheer quantity of riders on something like the London to Brighton, but maybe there is a gap in the market to get people to some of the many sportive around the country, or even for the charter operator to set their own guided tours? As noted, many riders are people with real disposable income and they might consider a sufficiently high quality rail product?

 

[yorksrob]

Oh for a fleet of MLV's !

 

[87015]

Elsewhere...

https://mobile.twitter.com/paulSW15/status/891515095565697024

 

[Mag_seven]

Can't the riders just cycle back?

 

[43096]

Off topic perhaps, but with all the Mk3's being made redundant in the next few years might there be an opportunity for an enterprising charter operator to convert some into a dedicated bicycle rake? Bike cars, buffet, and first class coaches for comfortable seating? If they really did it properly they might install roller shutter doors on the sides of the bike wagons!

Granted this is not a solution for the sheer quantity of riders on something like the London to Brighton, but maybe there is a gap in the market to get people to some of the many sportive around the country, or even for the charter operator to set their own guided tours? As noted, many riders are people with real disposable income and they might consider a sufficiently high quality rail product?

Really? How much do you think converting that lot would cost? And how do you get the investment back?