Never catering on that train, used to catch it myself when I lived in Oakham. First one to leave Birmingham without it in the evenings.
Once she's left Leicester there are no toilets at any stations, melton, Oakham or Stamford, to peterborough. By the sounds of it the train would have had a delay at Peteborough (where the disabled toilets are plentiful on most platforms) but if they weren't going to get that far then as far as I can see the guard then had three options:
1. Open the disabled loo and allow it to be used even if it was knackered (probably what should have happened).
2. Use ramp to move passenger to the coach with the cupboard style toilet.
3. De train the passenger at an intermediate stop using the on-board ramp. Local knowledge would then be to direct the passenger to a nearby facility (eg several pubs near Oakham station). This would however probably have incurred as much bad PR as the story has anyway.
With regard to these options:
1) This would assume that the toilet could actually be used, we don't quite know the nature of the fault. If the loo was full to overflowing, allowing this lady to use it would potentially have caused equal distress and bad publicity, as well as potentially exposing the rest of the carriage to the contents.
2) As mentioned by another poster, the train could well have been at capacity, so whilst this might have been an option getting enough people to clear the corridors to the cubicle & having the people to assist her could have been an issue. Not just because it would invariably have caused problems with the standees losing their "spot" but unless the guard had adequate assistance from another member of crew or passenger, he could have found him/herself in hot water if the lady got injured moving through the carriage.
3) This assumes local knowledge of the area. What if the guard detrained her at a station with no facilities for some distance?
eastdyke said:
I agree with you, sadly there was a fourth way - to carry on regardless?
The three stations that you mention are all managed by EMT (who run only a token service) and seem to have 'modest' ney few facilities. Is there a disconnect here? I know that XC manage no stations, perhaps this should be looked at with respect to this route and future Franchises (but perhaps also on another thread).
This sadly is the nature of a privatised network. Not only do you have a disconnection as you suggest, but providing facilities at stations costs money, and in this day and age that doesn't just mean the cost of installing facilities. You are required to maintain these during the day to a certain standard, there has to be a level of security in case of attempted attacks etc. It just isn't as simple as saying more stations need them, cost is a key factor in these. It is exactly the same reason why so many councils close their public facilities either for later in the day or completely, because they simply don't have the funds to keep them serviceable and safe 24/7.