Summer Saturdays to Paignton

[Paignton train]

Hi all, I am Adam only just joined the forum yesterday, I am very impressed with it !
Anyhow i was wondering how many trains did run to Paignton on a Saturday in the summer when Virgin/Intercity did it and also does anyone remember the Diesel Gala days on the Paignton and Dartmouth ?
Have a good day !

 

[4SRKT]

In BR days there were loads. This is the Summer Saturday timetable from 1987 from Paignton:

06:03 Newton Abbot DMU
07:30 Exmouth DMU
08:15 Manchester Piccadilly loco-hauled
08:58 Exeter St Davids DMU
09:13 Liverpool Lime St loco-hauled
09:30 London Paddington loco-hauled
09:55 Brighton loco-hauled
10:15 Glasgow/Edinburgh loco-hauled
10:32 London Paddington HST
11:00 Newcastle loco-hauled
11:45 Manchester Piccadilly loco-hauled
12:00 London Paddington HST
14:05 London Paddington HST
14:18 Cardiff Central loco-hauled
14:33 Newcastle HST
15:00 Newcastle HST
15:15 London Paddington HST
15:30 Bradford Interchange HST
15:50 Liverpool Lime Street loco-hauled
16:20 Nottingham HST
17:13 Exeter St Davids DMU
18:25 Leeds HST
18:55 Newton Abbot loco-hauled
20:04 Newton Abbot DMU
21:24 Newton Abbot DMU
22:12 Newton Abbot DMU
22:52 Exeter St Davids DMU.

Those were the days!

 

[HST Power]

Now that's encyclopedia style knowledge if I ever saw it!

 

[junglejames]

How many times did you have to read that timetable in order to remember it this long?!!! lol

Your next task, what time were they all due to arrive at their destination?! No looking at the timetable now!!!!

 

[4SRKT]

I could pretend I remembered it, but actually I still have the book! We spent a family holiday at Dawlish Warren (in the railway camping coaches) that year, and it was one long procession of 50s, 33s, HSTs ad 1st gen DMUs. With a few peaks and duffs thrown in on NESW workings.

 

[junglejames]

Youve spoilt it now. There was me thought youd been sleeping with the timetable under your pillow!!!!

 

[4SRKT]

Even during the week there was plenty of variety:

05:48 Newton Abbot DMU
06:50 Newton Abbot DMU
07:30 Exmouth DMU
08:17 Exeter St Davids loco-hauled
08:55 Newton Abbot loco-hauled
09:28 Exmouth DMU
09:55 London Paddington loco-hauled
10:30 Exeter St Davids loco-hauled
11:06 Exeter St Davids DMU
12:38 Leeds HST
13:45 Exmouth DMU
14:20 Newton Abbot loco-hauled
14:47 London Paddington HST
16:03 Exmouth DMU
16:40 Bristol TM loco-hauled
17:50 Exeter St Davids DMU
18:38 Edinburgh/Glasgow loco-hauled (sleeping cars conveyed)
19:17 Newton Abbot DMU
20:04 Newton Abbot DMU
22:12 Newton Abbot DMU
22:52 Exeter St Davids DMU

 

[Paignton train]

Many thanks, love the workings

 

[159jim]

Does anyone have the post-privitisation summary times?

 

[4SRKT]

I would guess that the first couple of years after privatisation the workings would have been very similar, except more HSTs as loco-hauleds were replaced with sets displaced from ECML electrification, and short distance loco-hauleds formed of class 33s and 5-6 mk Is would have gone over to DMU operation. The sleeper would have disappeared as well.

 

[flymo]

Quick bit of info from Summer 1998:

0625 Newton Abbot (WW)
0723 Exmouth (WW)
0755 Exmouth (WW)
0817 Newcastle (VT)
0859 Glasgow C (VT)
0940 Paddington (GW)
0950 Waterloo (SW)
1000 Newcastle (VT)
1014 Plymouth (WW)
1137 Paddington (GW)
1147 Brighton (SW)
1202 Liverpool (VT)
1242 Paddington (GW)
1300 Manchester (VT)
1337 Cardiff (WW)
1400 Paddington (GW)
1428 Newcastle (VT)
1505 Preston (VT)
1525 Waterloo (SW)
1539 Paddington (GW)
1605 Southampton (SW)
1617 Manchester (VT)
1648 Exmouth (WW)
1722 Paddington (GW)
1807 Exeter St. D (WW)
1844 Birmingham (VT)
1907 Plymouth (VT)
2008 Exeter St. D (WW)
2140 Newton Abbot (WW)
2217 Newton Abbot (WW)
2305 Exeter St. D (WW)

WW= Wales & West, VT = Virgin Trains, GW = Great Western, SW = South West Trains

And for a bit of added fun, the summer 1975 times

0640 Newton Abbot
0710 Newton Abbot
0730 Exeter St. D
0753 Paddington
0900 Newcastle
0915 Nottingham
0930 Liverpool
0945 Derby
1000 Paddington
1015 Manchester (via Hereford & Shrewsbury)
1030 Leeds
1055 Bradford Exchange
1115 Paddington
1140 Weston SM
1200 Paddington
1215 Nottingham
1235 Birmingham
1315 Oxford (via Bath & Swindon)
1345 Swansea
1400 Paddington
1505 Birmingham
1535 Bristol TM
1555 Paddington
1610 Leeds
1625 Paddington
1638 Newton Abbot
1655 Plymouth
1740 Ealing Broadway (!!!)
1755 Newton Abbot
1905 Exeter St. D
2110 Newton Abbot
2155 Newton Abbot
2250 Newton Abbot

Note the Ealing Broadway terminator.

Marvellous

 

[159jim]

I remember when SWT had two trains, on from Paignton, and one from Penzance, thyd both couple at Exeter St Davids, then they would travel the Yeovil Junction line upto Salisbury, then down the Wessex mainline into Southampton Central, where they would of divided. One portion went to Brighton, and the other went to Portsmouth! Ah the good old days!
Sadly, this stopped along with all SWT's other Brighton services in 2007....

 

[Masbroughlad]

I think that XC should introduce some services to the West Country from Nottingham.

At the moment I think there is one Southbound only service from Nottingham to Bournemouth.

Let's have some Nottingham to Paignton, Plymouth of Penzance trains.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I remember when SWT had two trains, on from Paignton, and one from Penzance, thyd both couple at Exeter St Davids, then they would travel the Yeovil Junction line upto Salisbury, then down the Wessex mainline into Southampton Central, where they would of divided. One portion went to Brighton, and the other went to Portsmouth! Ah the good old days!
Sadly, this stopped along with all SWT's other Brighton services in 2007....

More needless DfT meddling no doubt!

 

[Zoe]

Privatization didn't kill off the extra Summer Saturday services to Paignton as I remember these running at least until the mid 2000s. It may well have been that in line with an EU directive, the railway moved to a single annual principal timetable change in December with the subsidary change in May. If you had extra Summer Saturday services then you'd need to publish two timetables in May as September is not a change date. It could also be that the SRA/dft no longer saw these services as value for money and decided they should not be included in the new franchises. It could be argued that there was no need to run these extra services as people for Dawlish/Teignmouth/Torquay/Paignton could easily change onto a local DMU service at Exeter or Newton Abbot.

 

[me123]

But surely that's not much of an excuse? The additional services do continue to this day to a limited extent. And there are some Summer-only trains up and down the UK (one that comes to mind straight away is an extra Summer-only service to Oban, for example). Even though they're only allowed one principal timetable change (and, in all fairness, this is a very sensible measure), surely they must be able to alter their timetables for Summer services. They do it anyway, although to a lesser extent nowadays.

 

[flymo]

Single timetables for the whole year worked fine in the 80's when there was a fair number of summer Saturday services. There was just a note in the header saying something like "until 29 September" or "8 May to 29 September" or things like that. Worked perfectly well I thought. Certainly the way it worked in the May 84 - May 85 timetable I have.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Single timetables for the whole year worked fine in the 80's when there was a fair number of summer Saturday services. There was just a note in the header saying something like "until 29 September" or "8 May to 29 September" or things like that. Worked perfectly well I thought. Certainly the way it worked in the May 84 - May 85 timetable I have.

Yep, from the first combined book in 1974 until the early-mid 80s there was just one book a year with many footnotes. It then became a May-October/October-May biannual production, then gradually became the May-December/December-May system that we had until 2007 (and still have now in all other booklets).

I'll do October 89-May 90 times in a mo.

 

[Zoe]

then gradually became the May-December/December-May system that we had until 2007 (and still have now in all other booklets).

It was not a gradual change. The EU directive for a single principal change was introduced in the UK in December 2004. Until then the May/September system had been in use for a few years. We do still have a subsidary change in May but as I say, there is now only allowed to be one principle change each year in December. At the start of the Greater Western franchise I remember FGW saying that they couldn't change anything after December 2006 due requirments that principial timetable changes be done only on an annual basis.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

It was not a gradual change. The EU directive for a single principal change was introduced in the UK in December 2004. Until then the May/September system had been in use for a few years. We do still have a subsidary change in May but as I say, there is now only allowed to be one principle change each year in December. At the start of the Greater Western franchise I remember FGW saying that they couldn't change anything after December 2006 due requirments that principial timetable changes be done only on an annual basis.

Heard you say that on here before. You're quite eager for telling us all about the EU aren't you?

 

[Zoe]

Heard you say that on here before. You're quite eager for telling us all about the EU aren't you?

If you don't believe me, you may want to read this: http://www.networkrail.co.uk/documents/3180_BusinessPlan2003OperationalPlanning.pdf

In addition we will implement the EU Directive requirements to move to a single annual timetable change each Decemeber.

 

[4SRKT]

Privatization didn't kill off the extra Summer Saturday services to Paignton as I remember these running at least until the mid 2000s. It may well have been that in line with an EU directive, the railway moved to a single annual principal timetable change in December with the subsidary change in May. If you had extra Summer Saturday services then you'd need to publish two timetables in May as September is not a change date. It could also be that the SRA/dft no longer saw these services as value for money and decided they should not be included in the new franchises. It could be argued that there was no need to run these extra services as people for Dawlish/Teignmouth/Torquay/Paignton could easily change onto a local DMU service at Exeter or Newton Abbot.

This isn't the reason at all as BR didn't used to issue separate summer timetables every year. They just had far more dated trains than exist now, although even now dated trains run within the published timetables. In the few years where BR did issue a separate summer timetable it was almost as full of dated trains as an all-year one as the peak summer period for extra trains was shorter than the duration of the timetable.

What's happened is people's behaviour has changed. Many more people now think nothing of driving hundreds of miles, and relatively speaking this has become cheaper, while taking a family on the train has become relatively dearer. Also the railway doesn't have rakes of stock hanging about to strengthen services to this extent one day a week three months of the year.

Bear in mind that these trains were packed in the 1980s. Loco-hauled jumbo trains with a pair of 50s and 13 mk IIs from Paddington were so popular that they had to be made reservations compulsory on summer Saturdays. Anyone who had seen this would not say that transferring to a DMU at Newton Abbot was any sort of option, not just because of the sheer numbers of people but the sheer amount of luggage to be lugged across. This is a lost world and the railway has simply moved with the times by not serving it.

 

[Zoe]

This is a lost world and the railway has simply moved with the times by not serving it.

But these services existed until the mid 2000s. We hear no end of the governemnt telling people they should get out of cars and use public transport so not running these services goes against that.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

INTERCITY PASSENGER SERViCES TO/FROM PAIGNTON
SATURDAYS, 2 OCTOBER 1989-13 MAY 1990 (WINTER):
Northbound:
1405 to London Paddington (1714) via Newbury
1422 to Newcasle (2234) via Bristol, Gloucester and Leeds

Southbound:
1257 from London Paddington (0950)
1341 from Leeds (0759) via Gloucester and Bristol

The above are from the winter timetable, just to give you an idea of how many extra InterCity services called during summer.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

If you don't believe me, you may want to read this: http://www.networkrail.co.uk/documents/3180_BusinessPlan2003OperationalPlanning.pdf

I didn't doubt you for a minute, but you do seem quite eager about such matters.

 

[4SRKT]

But these services existed until the mid 2000s. We hear no end of the governemnt telling people they should get out of cars and use public transport so not running these services goes against that.

The fact that they existed until the mid-2000s doesn't make them any less part of a lost world. Do you consider faxes or other cutting edge technology of 7-8 years ago part of an equally lost world or not? The world changes much faster now than it used to.

The railway is a commercial enterprise not an arm of the Government. Even during the 1980s Inter City was required to make a profit, and most of the services listed in my post upthread were operated by the Inter City Sector. If the services aren't remunerative why should the TOCs run them, unless government is prepared directly to subsidise them?

It's more than just cost anyway. If you're taking the family on holiday most people will want the car with them when they're there. Once this traffic has slipped away from the railway it's very hard to get it back. You can bring more stuff, pack it less carefully, stop where you like, not have to control bored children on trains or platforms, get directly from home to hotel, and you can use the car for trips out when you get there. I'm very pro-rail, but never take my family away by train. It's just not rail's core competence in the modern transport world.

 

[Zoe]

It's more than just cost anyway. If you're taking the family on holiday most people will want the car with them. Once this traffic has slipped away from the railway it's very hard to get it back. I'm very pro-rail, but never take my family away by train. It's just not rail's core competence in the modern transport world.

But people are quite happy to go away on holiday by air. If you stop running the rail servivces then you are never going to get people to use them.

 

[4SRKT]

But people are quite happy to go away on holiday by air. If you stop running the rail servivces then you are never going to get people to use them.

That's different. There's usually sea to be crossed there and the time penalty and expense of driving is much greater when going to Spain or wherever.

It was OK to run services like these when BR had huge amounts of depreciated stock that was just used during Monday-Friday peaks, or even just on summer Saturdays. Also, lots of freight locos to haul them with. Now that there aren't lots of peak time sets hanging about, and the freight is a six or seven days a week operation, you can't seriously be suggesting that large numbers of DMUs be built just for this, or hauled stock and locos introduced to cover it? When these workings could be costed at the margin they would have been highly remunerative, but once you don't need them for their core operation you might as well forget about it.

 

[Zoe]

So was it really a case that the extra Summer Saturday services to the Westcountry were not getting used or did the railway simply decide that it didn't want to provide a service to them as it was an operational inconvenience? I remember back in 2000 it was still relatively busy.

 

[4SRKT]

So was it really a case that the extra Summer Saturday services to the Westcountry were not getting used or did the railway simply decide that it didn't want to provide a service to them as it was an operational inconvenience? I remember back in 2000 it was still relatively busy.

Probably a little of both. The railways didn't 'simply decide' not to provide them: had it wanted to do so it would have had to justify the expenditure on new stock to cover it, rather than the relatively free ride it had been getting up until then. They would have been only too aware of how such a suggestion would have gone down with shareholders, government and fare-paying passengers (who would ultimately have had to pay for it) alike. They probably correctly saw the way the wind was blowing in terms of the way people use their cars, and decided that the point at which the stock needed to be replaced was the time to get out of this market.

I don't doubt that the railways removing themselves from the market place speeded up the rate at which cars took over this traffic, but it would have happened anyway, and cars are just, well, better at some things anyway. Much as the railways were quite correct to get out of the sundries business in the 1960s and 1970s, in the face of competition from a much more suited mode of transport, so they called this correctly as well.

 

[Zoe]

They probably correctly saw the way the wind was blowing in terms of the way people use their cars

By the mid 2000s though things were starting to change back in favour of the railways.

 

[4SRKT]

By the mid 2000s though things were starting to change back in favour of the railways.

True, but not in this market. Clearly. If the cost of providing new stock for this were to be borne by the passengers using them, the fares would be ridiculously high, many, many times the normal cost of rail travel. This is where cars score very highly. Seasonal workings, using millions of units of marginal capacity sitting on drives throughout the land. No transparent accounting system could possibly hide this.

I'm not talking about the leisure market, where rail *has* seen an increase (although whether this increase is real in proportion to overall increases in travel is another matter), but specifically the going away to the seaside for a week market. Which if not dead can be accomodated on existing trains without the need for large numbers of dated workings and reliefs.