• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

Watford North Curve in use 11/12 January

Status
Not open for further replies.

packermac

Member
Joined
16 Sep 2019
Messages
543
Location
Swanage
Last edited by a moderator:
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Mojo

Forum Staff
Staff Member
Administrator
Joined
7 Aug 2005
Messages
20,382
Location
0035
In the same area also, Chiltern on their branch via High Wycombe will be diverting to West Ealing station and not going to Marylebone.
 

MikeWh

Established Member
Associate Staff
Senior Fares Advisor
Joined
15 Jun 2010
Messages
7,865
Location
Crayford
In the same area also, Chiltern on their branch via High Wycombe will be diverting to West Ealing station and not going to Marylebone.
And that, presumably, is the whole point of the one-a-day West Ealing service?
 

goldenarrow

Member
Joined
28 Sep 2019
Messages
49
Location
London
And that, presumably, is the whole point of the one-a-day West Ealing service?
Precisely, keeping a pool of drivers with the appropriate route knowledge increases the flexibility of the service during times like this. It perhaps had greater uses when running all the way to Paddington but it's still a good utilization of flexibility that maintains a connection to Central London.
 

rogercov

Member
Joined
8 Feb 2019
Messages
185
Location
Coventry/London
I have just seen on the "Ian Visits" website that the curve is in use this weekend for anyone looking for a reasonably rare couple of hundred yards of track.
Thanks for the reminder about this. In all my years exploring the Underground I don't think I've had a chance to travel on the North Curve before.
Anyway, yesterday I managed it (both ways). I made my way to Northwood by various buses and caught the Amersham (via Watford) service.

Interestingly, the train display and announcement was still saying "the next station is Rickmansworth" while we were at Croxley heading towards Watford. Then the driver turned off the display and announcement. I guess the announcement/display system isn't programmed for an "Amersham via Watford" service.

After a short delay we reversed at Watford and used the North curve into Rickmansworth. Fortunately, it was slightly early into Rickmansworth which just gave me time to run to the other platform and catch one back again, avoiding a 15 minute wait.

I've just checked the forthcoming works on the TfL website and it doesn't look like they will be doing it again for a few months. If anyone is still interested, you still have the rest of today to experience it.
 

philthetube

Established Member
Joined
5 Jan 2016
Messages
3,749
The driver can,t turn off the system, though it goes to sleep when it gets lost.

There ought to be a via Watford option on the trains, this engineering pattern is not that uncommon.
 

goldenarrow

Member
Joined
28 Sep 2019
Messages
49
Location
London
The driver can,t turn off the system, though it goes to sleep when it gets lost.

There ought to be a via Watford option on the trains, this engineering pattern is not that uncommon.
You could argue that designating trains Watford then Amersham/Chesham as their destination was less confusing for passengers thinking that it would instead be heading direct to Ricky from Moor Park.
 
Last edited:

LU_timetabler

Member
Joined
5 Feb 2017
Messages
165
The Timetable Notice issued for this gave the instruction for trains to be billed as Watford trains until Watford, then show Amersham or Chesham on departing Watford, but apparently this didn't happen!
 

jumble

Member
Joined
1 Jul 2011
Messages
1,100
The Timetable Notice issued for this gave the instruction for trains to be billed as Watford trains until Watford, then show Amersham or Chesham on departing Watford, but apparently this didn't happen!

It did on the train that I took on Sunday mid morning
The PA at Northwood was making the announcement that everyone had to change at Watford
A member of staff told me that some trains were shuttling between Northwood and Watford
 

bluegoblin7

Established Member
Joined
10 May 2011
Messages
1,357
Location
JB/JP/JW
All trains were running Northwood-Watford-Amersham/Chesham.

As mentioned, they should have all been displayed as appropriate to the next reversal, but some drivers put in codes for the ultimate destination. Sadly these will not therefore announced Croxley/Watford and can sometimes cause more confusion than is solved.

Ideally the S stock should have been specified with a via Watford code, because this service pattern is not particularly unusual.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top