Killingworth
Established Member
This is an under cover route, both through the long tunnels and because the service has become unpredictable, particularly at weekends. That's ironic because weekend leisure use seems to be recovering very well and is up to pre-Covid levels on nice days.
After the Northern strikes 2 or 3 years ago traffic returned very quickly. Despite EMR not running west of Sheffield for some time passengers numbers have held up well, albeit crammed into packed Northern's 195 stoppers. Now we're contending with EMR short forms and industrial action at Northern and TPE. Weather and engineering work disrupt further.
Advance disruption notices appear frequently. However on Saturday 15th January EMR laid on buses from Chesterfield and Sheffield to Stockport citing engineering work. TPE and Northern were timetabled as normal. TPE were running a 2 hourly service and one of them got blocked near Scunthorpe. Consequently Northern had 3 of their hourly trains in a row going west where some passengers were unable to board at Sheffield, and only 1 got on at Dore to two of them in a row despite well over 40 waiting.
This coming weekend is another mystery to explain. No Northern stoppers east of Edale on Saturday or Sunday. Engineering work they say in answer to a tweet. TPE and EMR seem to be running the route as normal - as normally as anything ever gets on this route. The Pennine Wayfarer is even running out and back via the Hope Valley on Saturday; https://www.pathfindertours.co.uk/events/the-pennine-wayfarer/
What's going on this time? Shortage of available crews? Cut back to Edale so it probably needs only 2 2 car units rather than 3 at 3 cars for the full length? Possibly not. Another suggestion is point renewal at Sheffield. Anyway, it's 90 minutes by bus from Sheffield to Chinley instead of 40 by train. The bus timetable has yet to appear on page N23 of Northern's website.
The record of service on this line is dire. Hope Valley stations all consistently feature in the worst 500, often 250, in the country out of over 2,600 for punctuality. See On Time Trains based on Hathersage; https://www.ontimetrains.co.uk/stations/HSG
This before the blockades necessary for the forthcoming Hope Valley Capacity Scheme. It doesn't count trains removed from the timetable altogether. Not too encouraging to get travellers out of their cars.
After the Northern strikes 2 or 3 years ago traffic returned very quickly. Despite EMR not running west of Sheffield for some time passengers numbers have held up well, albeit crammed into packed Northern's 195 stoppers. Now we're contending with EMR short forms and industrial action at Northern and TPE. Weather and engineering work disrupt further.
Advance disruption notices appear frequently. However on Saturday 15th January EMR laid on buses from Chesterfield and Sheffield to Stockport citing engineering work. TPE and Northern were timetabled as normal. TPE were running a 2 hourly service and one of them got blocked near Scunthorpe. Consequently Northern had 3 of their hourly trains in a row going west where some passengers were unable to board at Sheffield, and only 1 got on at Dore to two of them in a row despite well over 40 waiting.
This coming weekend is another mystery to explain. No Northern stoppers east of Edale on Saturday or Sunday. Engineering work they say in answer to a tweet. TPE and EMR seem to be running the route as normal - as normally as anything ever gets on this route. The Pennine Wayfarer is even running out and back via the Hope Valley on Saturday; https://www.pathfindertours.co.uk/events/the-pennine-wayfarer/
What's going on this time? Shortage of available crews? Cut back to Edale so it probably needs only 2 2 car units rather than 3 at 3 cars for the full length? Possibly not. Another suggestion is point renewal at Sheffield. Anyway, it's 90 minutes by bus from Sheffield to Chinley instead of 40 by train. The bus timetable has yet to appear on page N23 of Northern's website.
The record of service on this line is dire. Hope Valley stations all consistently feature in the worst 500, often 250, in the country out of over 2,600 for punctuality. See On Time Trains based on Hathersage; https://www.ontimetrains.co.uk/stations/HSG
This before the blockades necessary for the forthcoming Hope Valley Capacity Scheme. It doesn't count trains removed from the timetable altogether. Not too encouraging to get travellers out of their cars.