Ticketing & journey planning advice during SWR strike action

[Goldfish62]

https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/rmt-announces-27-days-of-strike-action-on-swr/

According to the RMT's own website, it's 27 days "in December" (in paragraph 1), though the page title and URL simply state "27 days". The RMT article then repeats "27 days" (with mentioning December) further down.

The instructions to members are to strike on the days listed at the bottom of the page. They are:
2nd to 11th December inclusive (10 days)
13th to 24th December inclusive (12 days)
27th December to 1st January inclusive (6 days).

Adding these up I get to the total of 28 days.

It's amazing we're even having to debate this!

And yes, it's 28 days.

 

[TrainTube]

If I Bought an off peak return from Woking to Exeter St Davids, would I have to go to Basingstoke, Reading and then Exeter or would I be able to go from London. SWR states that tickets are accepted on GWR on this route.

 

[[.n]]

https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/rmt-announces-27-days-of-strike-action-on-swr/

According to the RMT's own website, it's 27 days "in December" (in paragraph 1), though the page title and URL simply state "27 days". The RMT article then repeats "27 days" (with mentioning December) further down.

The instructions to members are to strike on the days listed at the bottom of the page. They are:
2nd to 11th December inclusive (10 days)
13th to 24th December inclusive (12 days)
27th December to 1st January inclusive (6 days).

Adding these up I get to the total of 28 days.

Haha - my fault, I had fallen into the trap of only counting the December strike days, I hadn't noticed the one day in January

 

[[.n]]

It's amazing we're even having to debate this!

And yes, it's 28 days.

Not really - we often have to debate the meaning of days in a railway context when talking about ticket validity etc, and if memory serves me correctly its different for TFL and NR. I'm sure there's probably some argument to made that the strike is 27 "railway booking onto shift" days or something similar!

 

[maxbarnish]

If I Bought an off peak return from Woking to Exeter St Davids, would I have to go to Basingstoke, Reading and then Exeter or would I be able to go from London. SWR states that tickets are accepted on GWR on this route.

If you're going to Exeter from Woking, I would expect it wouldn't be advantageous to re-route via GWR as there is a train service from Woking to Exeter with one change at Salisbury - however the train will terminate at Exeter Central. If St Davids is important, then GWR connecting services can be used. I know for sure the GWR route that you state via Basingstoke and Reading is authorised. I cannot see why backtracking via London would be permissable, but depends what others think

 

[TrainTube]

If you're going to Exeter from Woking, I would expect it wouldn't be advantageous to re-route via GWR as there is a train service from Woking to Exeter with one change at Salisbury - however the train will terminate at Exeter Central. If St Davids is important, then GWR connecting services can be used. I know for sure the GWR route that you state via Basingstoke and Reading is authorised. I cannot see why backtracking via London would be permissable, but depends what others think

Its actually quicker timewise to go via Reading, the direct service to Exeter takes about 3 hours from Woking, you can get to Reading in an hour from Woking and from there its another hour and a half. Plus I prefer the 800s than the 159s, and as you say I would want to get to St Davids.

 

[infobleep]

Its actually quicker timewise to go via Reading, the direct service to Exeter takes about 3 hours from Woking, you can get to Reading in an hour from Woking and from there its another hour and a half. Plus I prefer the 800s than the 159s, and as you say I would want to get to St Davids.

Is it permitted to go to Reading via Basingstoke during the strikes? :grin: I imagine the answer is yes but given it's only recently not been allowed as standard, it may not be something the planners have thought of or are evem aware of.

 

[infobleep]

I was at Clapham Junction today and a train departed from platform 10 with just 8 carriages. It was a 455.

The pictures show the departure board saying 8 carriages.



I don't know if there is rolling stock in the sidings at Guildford or other locations, where the 455/456 stock is stabled or whether every kind of 455/456 that is in working order, is in use.

On another point, if one does a search on National Rail Enquiries on Guildford to Surbtion, the 7:37 direct service via Cobham shows up. You arrive at 8:11. However the 7:37 change at Woking for the 8:00 fast to Surbtion doesn't show up, despite the fact you arrive at the same time, 8:11.

It only shows up if you specify via Woking. Anyone know why this might be the case? Would I be right in assuming National Rail Enquiries only show trains with changes providing they are faster and only trains that take just as long or are slower, if they do not involve any changes.

Here are some screenshots. I do appricate other journey search engines may behave differently but I am referring to this one as it is the official one.

The 7:37 Guildford to Woking was late from the depot today so it wouldn't have connected with the 8:00 anyway.

 

[trainophile]

I have Advance SWR tickets for Basingstoke to Bournemouth on Sunday 8th Dec. Any further updates re. XC ticket acceptance?

 

[Bill Badger]

I have Advance SWR tickets for Basingstoke to Bournemouth on Sunday 8th Dec. Any further updates re. XC ticket acceptance?

You should be fine; taken from the SWR FAQs

CrossCountry will accept the following South Western Railway tickets:

• South Western Railway only, or South Western Railway + connections Advance tickets on their services between Bournemouth, Brockenhurst, Southampton Central, Southampton Airport Parkway, Winchester and Basingstoke.

 

[trainophile]

You should be fine; taken from the SWR FAQs

Brilliant, thanks for that. Probably be sardines but at least we should be able to get there.

What time of the day would we be able to find out if our SWR (the 1426) train would be running? Presumably we can’t just take any XC, would have to be the one after our cancelled service?

 

[infobleep]

I was on the 17:48 Surbtion to Guildford service this evening. It was slightly delayed by the 17:44 service to Woking.

The guard came on to say that there was no train service from Weybridge and the next bus wouldn't be for an hour. We were meant to arrive in at 18:03 and the bus leaves 18:06. That is surely too short. Hopefully they held the bus for any passengers on this train.

I do appreciate that every hour, bar 18:06 and 19:06, there is no x03 arrival and passengers would be on the stopping service to Woking, that runs 4 minutes head of the x03, giving passengers 7 minutes to make the bus. However during those two hours it would make sense to hold the bus.

On a silver lining note, there are 19:00 and 19:11 semi-fast services from Surbtion to Woking. Usually there is no semi-fast or fast trains between 18:40 and 20:00. The 19:11 only takes 20 minutes too. Shame there isn't the infrasture avilable for it to normally stop at Surbtion.

Other silver linings include services from Woking to Clapham Junction in the morning high peak and even an 08:00 fast from Woking to Surbtion.

I'm sure there are other improved journey opportunities, amongst all the disrupted journeys.

 

[Dibbo4025]

I was on the 17:48 Surbtion to Guildford service this evening. It was slightly delayed by the 17:44 service to Woking.

The guard came on to say that there was no train service from Weybridge and the next bus wouldn't be for an hour. We were meant to arrive in at 18:03 and the bus leaves 18:06. That is surely too short. Hopefully they held the bus for any passengers on this train.

I do appreciate that every hour, bar 18:06 and 19:06, there is no x03 arrival and passengers would be on the stopping service to Woking, that runs 4 minutes head of the x03, giving passengers 7 minutes to make the bus. However during those two hours it would make sense to hold the bus.

On a silver lining note, there are 19:00 and 19:11 semi-fast services from Surbtion to Woking. Usually there is no semi-fast or fast trains between 18:40 and 20:00. The 19:11 only takes 20 minutes too. Shame there isn't the infrasture avilable for it to normally stop at Surbtion.

Other silver linings include services from Woking to Clapham Junction in the morning high peak and even an 08:00 fast from Woking to Surbtion.

I'm sure there are other improved journey opportunities, amongst all the disrupted journeys.

The bus is instead of the 1807 train which while often used as a connection by people off the Guildford isn't actually a connection so while it might be nice for the bus to be held it's easy to see how this would've been missed when planning the service.

More generally the connections at Weybridge between mainline and Chertsey under the normal timetable anyway, particularly to/dmfrom Woking, is surprisingly poor, especially when it could easily be solved without changing the paths of any trains so this oversight is hardly a surprise...

 

[infobleep]

The bus is instead of the 1807 train which while often used as a connection by people off the Guildford isn't actually a connection so while it might be nice for the bus to be held it's easy to see how this would've been missed when planning the service.

More generally the connections at Weybridge between mainline and Chertsey under the normal timetable anyway, particularly to/dmfrom Woking, is surprisingly poor, especially when it could easily be solved without changing the paths of any trains so this oversight is hardly a surprise...

It sure is poor and has been made worse by the 19:00 Waterloo to Portsmouth service not stopping at Woking any more. The 19:25 Woking to Portsmouth service would have been used by passengers from the Chertsey line. There next service from Woking would be the 19:43.

To bring this back on topic. I just made the 17:48 Surbtion to Guildford today. However I hadn't realised there was a train 9 minutes later from Surbtion that was timetabled to arrive into Guildford just 2 minutes after the 17:48.

It was an additional service added today. So when you travel, do remember to check the online journey planners and deapture boards, as you may find they were able to run additional trains on the day.

Also worth checking the expected arrival times too.Today the 17:48 was timetabled to arrive into Guildford at 18:30. Usually is 18:29. There was also a 17:57 today (usually 17:58) that was timetabled to arrive at 18:32 as opposed to 18:40. That's 7 minutes faster than usual.

Whether they will ever arrive at those timetabled arrival times is another matter of course.

 

[Goldfish62]

There's a 90 min interval Ascot - Aldershot service being advertised today.

 

[Bill Badger]

There's a 90 min interval Ascot - Aldershot service being advertised today.

Where it that advertised; can't spot it on their Website

 

[Goldfish62]

Where it that advertised; can't spot it on their Website

Journey check.

 

[Bill Badger]

Journey check.

Thank you, can see all the changes now.

I somewhat rashly tried looking in the Industrial Action section of their Website!

 

[maxbarnish]

But the temporary timetable is in place for 28 days

 

[infobleep]

But the temporary timetable is in place for 28 days

They are adding in trains on the day.

Today there was an 8:00 Hampton Court to Waterloo service. It was suppose to stop at: Wimbledon, Earlsfield, Clapham Junction, Vauxhall and Waterloo. However after people boarded at Wimbledon they dropped Earlsfield and Clapham Junction. I say that because I heard them say it was all stops to Waterloo but later I saw those two stops were removed. I saw no one on it as it arrived so no idea if passengers from Hampton Court boarded it.

There were however other trains cancelled due to shortage of train crew. No idea if that was due to guards or drivers though.

 

[Goldfish62]

They are adding in trains on the day.

Today there was an 8:00 Hampton Court to Waterloo service. It was suppose to stop at: Wimbledon, Earlsfield, Clapham Junction, Vauxhall and Waterloo. However after people boarded at Wimbledon they dropped Earlsfield and Clapham Junction. I say that because I heard them say it was all stops to Waterloo but later I saw those two stops were removed. I saw no one on it as it arrived so no idea if passengers from Hampton Court boarded it.

There were however other trains cancelled due to shortage of train crew. No idea if that was due to guards or drivers though.

I assume there's absolutely no slack in the guards scheduling at the moment.

 

[infobleep]

I assume there's absolutely no slack in the guards scheduling at the moment.

I'm sure there isn't. Many trains are running with delays due to awaiting a member of train crew, especially in the evening peak or just after it seems. One train at Farnham was over 20 minutes late departing today. Govia Thameslink Railway use to say if it was a guard or driving who was being waited for but rightly, in my opinion, SWR just use train crew. I don't see the need to be more precise than that.

I've been trying to gage the liklihood of train connections being made but so far, for the services I've been looking at, they have been delayed bu different amounts each evening. Some even make up more time one following a delay one evening than the other. This extends beyond SWR services it must be said.

 

[MikeWh]

Govia Thameslink Railway use to say if it was a guard or driving who was being waited for but rightly, in my opinion, SWR just use train crew. I don't see the need to be more precise than that.

I agree, though it's entertaining when Southeastern use the "member of the train crew" excuse on commuter DOO trains.

 

[infobleep]

I was on the 8:19 from Guildford today. It was a 10 car 444. I wasn't aware of first class being declassified and I got on the entrance by first class.

Now under the circumstances, given I hold a standard class ticket, I decided not to go into first class. Whilst I did try to keep out of the way of others boarding I'm sure it probably annoyed the odd person trying to board behind me. Someone with a folding bike who went into first class also delayed things too. I'm sure they and others didn't hold a first class tickets but were now in first class. Everyone did get on in this carriage at least. They wouldn't have done if everyone took my approach and didn't go into first class though.

Under the circumstances would it not make sense for SWR to just blanket declassified first class on certain busy services or do they not wish to pay out compensation to first clsss ticket holders?

In hindsight I could have gone and stood in the area in between the two units but I didn't think of that and I was once told by a member of staff that wasn't for passenger use. I wonder if that member of staff would say the same thing today!

There were delays at Woking as they figured out what to do with the trains there. The 8:33 to Waterloo was given the right to go but it had no driver so they put the signal back to red and let the 8:36 to Waterloo go.

How difficult is it to keep track of guards and drivers?

With less trains running, do they have more spare drivers to provide cover?

By not knowing there was no driver it delayed 2 trains, the 8:29 (8:19 from Guildford) and 8:36, the 8:36 departing first

Incidentally the calling pattern of the 8:36
is Woking, Surbtion, Wimbledon and Waterloo. Not seen that before.

 

[Goldfish62]

I see Ascot - Aldershot has a roughly hourly service again today.

 

[infobleep]

I see the 05:10 Exeter to Waterloo was delayed at Grateley due to overcrowding. It wasn't delayed prior to this station though and nor was it delayed for more than a minute yesterday or Monday.

How popular is the 5:10 from Exeter normally? There was two trains from Grateley prior to this service but of course not another for 60 minutes, whereas usually the wait would be 30 minutes later.

I single out this train as it led to congestion in the Woking area around 8:30.

 

[infobleep]

I thought the leaf fall timetable had finished but not so. This Sunday trains from Guildford to Waterloo via Cobham are departing at x48 as opposed to x50.

Interestingly there are one or two additona x04 services running Monday to Friday, if they can resource them on the day. These reflect the leaf fall timetable but in the case of today's 16:04, National Rail Enquiries App shows it departing Surbtion at 16:38, whereas Real Time Trains has it as 16:41, which is what I'd expect.

I thought the live departure boards used the same timetable data as Real Time Trains.

 

[embers25]

I see the 05:10 Exeter to Waterloo was delayed at Grateley due to overcrowding. It wasn't delayed prior to this station though and nor was it delayed for more than a minute yesterday or Monday.

How popular is the 5:10 from Exeter normally? There was two trains from Grateley prior to this service but of course not another for 60 minutes, whereas usually the wait would be 30 minutes later.

I single out this train as it led to congestion in the Woking area around 8:30.

On non-strike days: Monday & Tuesday it is most seats taken from Andover and all from Basingstoke with standing. On Wednesday it's most seats taken on leaving Basingstoke and standing from Woking, Thursday varies between Wednesday and Friday loadings. On Friday it is most seats taken from Woking but in the back coach I usually have a table to myself the whole way from Pinhoe to Woking.

On strike days there is no train until 0900 from Exeter which leads to much higher loadings. It's also the only through eastbound train from Exeter. Obviously, when it's cancelled you get a 4 hour wait (like on Monday when it started from Salisbury due to no guard).

 

[infobleep]

On non-strike days: Monday & Tuesday it is most seats taken from Andover and all from Basingstoke with standing. On Wednesday it's most seats taken on leaving Basingstoke and standing from Woking, Thursday varies between Wednesday and Friday loadings. On Friday it is most seats taken from Woking but in the back coach I usually have a table to myself the whole way from Pinhoe to Woking.

On strike days there is no train until 0900 from Exeter which leads to much higher loadings. It's also the only through eastbound train from Exeter. Obviously, when it's cancelled you get a 4 hour wait (like on Monday when it started from Salisbury due to no guard).

Well that explains why there was no delay on Monday, assuming it had its full number of coaches. However Tuesday it did depart from Exeter and wasn't delayed, unlike Wednesday. Perhaps more people travelled on Wednesday for a change.

It will be interesting to see if there are less delays on Friday more generally.

 

[Goldfish62]

I see Ascot - Aldershot has a roughly hourly service again today.

And today as well.