What do you (dis-)like most about train travel within the UK?

[monkeybusiness]

Hey guys,

I'm currently researching customer's satisfaction of the train transportation systems within the UK. I'm looking for common complaints or/and improvement ideas and suggestions. Is there anything you have noticed that you really dislike about the railway system? Are there frequent complaints in certain areas (eg delays, information accessibility, comfort during travel)?

I would appreciate some feedback and comments!

Thank you!

 

[Bletchleyite]

My main issues (being quite a big bloke) are seat comfort and getting a seat in the first place.

Additionally, the fares system is just way too complicated.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Communication when there's disruption.

NRE gives wildly optimistic estimates about when a service will recover; I've seen them suggest disruption is expected for 60 minutes when a "one under" has happened. On top of that station staff do a runner, and the TOC twitter feeds these days seem to spend all their explaining why it is everyone else's fault but their own rather than explaining alternative routes and ticket acceptance. The way the disruption after Lamington was handled is an excellent case in point.

 

[cjmillsnun]

The lack of vertical integration and the culture of delay attribution.

Also the amount of government interference.

 

[endecotp]

High cost of flexible tickets.
Engineering works concentrated when I want to travel (i.e. weekends and bank holidays).
No trains for 3 nights at Christmas.

But at least the trains are better than the buses & ferries.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The way the disruption after Lamington was handled is an excellent case in point.

The big problem with Lamington was that because the added journey time was about an hour, and TPE and VT alternate their services, for almost everyone it made sense to use the other one. As this wasn't allowed for Advance holders, they all incurred an avoidable delay of an additional hour.

In disruption the presumption needs to be in favour of the passenger.

 

[miami]

Rail staff who don't know the ticketing rules

 

[misterredmist]

I think the majority of our railways fair pretty well when things are running smoothly. Fares are expensive if purchased on the day but my big bug bear, as posters above have mentioned is.

The TOC's and NR don't handle incidents very well , the scarcity of accurate info is appalling and it really ends up as "every man/woman for him/herself"..... You can't expect any pro-active decision process or instruction, one basically has to take unilateral action - unless of course, one is stranded on a train !

 

[Lee_Again]

Fares.

Many are too cheap or expensive. Walk on First Class for off peak are generally the same as peak time. completely daft. Equally daft are packed long distance trains on Sunday afternoons with £15 tickets available with only a day or two notice.

Simple, reasonable and fair.

 

[QueensCurve]

Hey guys,

I'm currently researching customer's satisfaction of the train transportation systems within the UK. I'm looking for common complaints or/and improvement ideas and suggestions. Is there anything you have noticed that you really dislike about the railway system? Are there frequent complaints in certain areas (eg delays, information accessibility, comfort during travel)?

I would appreciate some feedback and comments!

Thank you!

• Excessive prices for walk on fares
• Being restricted to one TOC or train
• Not being able to lean out of the window

 

[QueensCurve]

The lack of vertical integration and the culture of delay attribution.

I know what you mean by that. On the other hand, it does give players in the game an incentive to put in place preventative investment in avoiding delays.

 

[carriageline]

Engineering works concentrated when I want to travel (i.e. weekends and bank holidays).
No trains for 3 nights at Christmas.

I literally have no words!

 

[tsr]

Though I am a railway worker, hopefully the following is not too biased.

To put it briefly, when it goes well and you have enough space, train travel is pretty civilised. Realistically speaking, you don't have to worry about controlling it, refuelling it, making an investment in a vehicle, turning up hours in advance of travel, or what other drivers are doing. Train travel in the UK in particular is extraordinarily safe for the normal passenger, and though delays do occur, a very good number of those delays are actually the price we pay for safety. And we all know that there is now a pretty good frequency of service on many London/South-East/Midlands/Intercity routes. Not all, granted, but many.

However, obviously fares are either high or feel very high for many, sometimes out of proportion with desired flexibility (and I think that's often the crux - paying hundreds of pounds more for the choice of one or two more trains, maybe), and the system of purchasing tickets and choosing operators is fairly fragmented. The latter is actually more confusing and/or the cause of the former two in many cases. And of course investment in information for each and every type of journey and passenger has not kept up in accordance with the boom in demand. Because of this demand we all have our little personal niggles as well, like interchange opportunities between lines in major cities which somehow haven't ever been built, or fluctuations in when the first/last trains are on some lines, and so on.

So many things, so few words I can reasonably write. Whilst a leisure journey that goes well is often quite civilised, a commute in bedlam at Clapham Junction is often not. The demand is extremely hard to keep up with and hopefully there will be more and more will to do so. Integration of lines and modes of transport is surely what needs to be done; it's something I like greatly when it is done well. And of course it will be crucial to develop skills in predicting passenger information needs before they know it. Again, I love it when you have somebody skilled who can predict what goes on CIS/Tyrell emails/websites before or as you need it, rather than having to ask. Sorting this out is key.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Rail staff who don't know the ticketing rules

Rail staff who don't know the ticketing rules *and refuse to look them up*. It seems Euston and Paddington barrier staff are the worst here.

 

[Johnuk123]

Sky high fares for a substandard service.

 

[cuccir]

Mostly, I think that the system works pretty well. As someone who has started commuting in the last 6 months, I've been pleasantly surprised by reliability, cost and seats available.

But if I were to be grumpy and list four issues (regardless of scale or practicality):

* Lack of affordable buy-on-the-day leisure fares. Train travel is usually not financially competitive with car journeys for 2 people, or even for 1. 'Weekend' fares are common in a lot of countries and I think could be explored more here

* Poor evening, Sunday and rural services (though I completely understand the variety of practical reasons behind these)

* Live departure boards are not as sophisticated as they could be (eg I frequently see situations where an incoming service has not yet arrived, and a train is due to depart within the next couple of minutes, but boards display 'on time' until the departure time is missed)

* Short-length of trains outside the South-East or London services gives little resilience to the network (Eg 3 car 185s or 4 car Voyagers quickly fill up) when events or disruption occur

 

[ScouserGirl]

Dislike:

• Disruption and lack of communication on some occasions
• Seat reservations that never work
• The price for walk up tickets

Like

• The views out the train window on a clear day
• Friendly staff who are willing to help you

 

[RepTCTC]

Cost. Rail travel seems to be priced for a captive audience of "forced" commuters and those who lack the means to drive, rather than as a genuine travel option.

Okay, so it's a nightmare to do anything about, partly because the fares subsidy required would be pretty big, and partly (well, a lot more than partly really, by a good few orders of magnitude) because the investment needed to create a rail infrastructure capable of coping the levels of demand generated if rail was cost-competitive with private transport is sufficiently large as to mean it'll never happen. Either way ... it's too expensive.

 

[fishquinn]

Voyagers. Next question

And, as other people have said, the fares. I find them too high on most occasions so if you could make the prices 3/4 of what they are now then that'd be good.

 

[zoneking]

My main complaints:

High price of annual season tickets. They should be calculated based on the off peak fares. In some cases it is cheaper to buy a ticket every day for 48 weeks for the same journey than an annual season. With annual seasons the TOC get the money up front.

Ridiculous punitive rules e.g for stopping or starting short on an advance ticket.

Slow journey times. On many routes journey times are slower than 100 years ago. There are too many stops, There are too many scheduled dwell times of more than a minute.

 

[Haydn1971]

1 Fares - I find it infuriating that season tickets are marketed based upon seven day travel cost, when the reality is that most people travel on season tickets five or less days a week - if you typically have to travel four or more days to get any benefit, you have to pay up to a year in advance, there are no seat reservations possible, then the operator has the cheek to offer delay repay on blocks of 30 minutes via an annoying paper system that sends you a refund based upon seven day travel and that you have to spend on rail tickets - not much use when you've a season ticket !

I'd like to see a complete reinvention, allowing a direct debit based system, that e-mails you a seat reservation request, automatically repays your bank account for delay based upon actual time delayed rather than blocks of 30 minutes, and provides flexibility to people that travel four or less days a week - this could be via some form of smartphone app carnet ticket system where you can amend the system to allow regular travel over 1-7 days, carry over unused carnet's etc... And allow some degree of flexibility for when things go wrong with your travel options. It's a service after all.

2 Rolling Stock - huge numbers of UK trains are poor quality, have poor heating and ventilation, not enough seats for passengers and are plagued by mechanical and other failures.

The private sector is making a nice tidy profit from passengers and quite simply not reinvesting back, I'd like to see all future rolling stock run under a not for profit business model.

 

[ravenik45]

1. Cost of fares: Expensive and complicated, large gap between cheapest and most expensive

2. Overcrowding: Clearly with more people opting for the trains, the network is at its capacity.

3. Weather prone: Wrong type of leaf? Wrong type of ice? Whole system grinds to a halt.

4. Growth (or lack of): Need to expand/reopen lines. Journeys can take longer by train than by car in numerous cases.

5. Slow adaptation: Particularly high speed network, electrification, new trains. In this country, due to the NIMBY culture and red tape, rail networks have a hard time keeping ahead with the times.

 

[Clip]

Passengers

 

[GrimsbyPacer]

For me it's prices.
Many can't afford it, yet it's supposed to be amongst the most efficient way of transporting people. And it was a fair price under British Rail not that long ago.
And improvements haven't matched the fare rises at all.

If fares are lower many more would use it and bring a rapid increase in rail's value to the economy by allowing new commutes, more holidays, more shopping trips, and less cars.

 

[anti-pacer]

DISLIKE: Sitting on a bouncy Pacer, surrounded by other people's rubbish.

LIKE: Long distance trips on a HST or 225.

 

[Phil.]

I like
letting someone else do the driving
being able to read or snooze
(sort of) knowing when I'll reach my destination
the ever changing scenery

I dislike
(on behalf of non-railstaff passengers) the complicated and expensive
fare structure which frequently confuses and occasionally lands people in
trouble.
screaming obnoxious children - I could keep mine under control
obnoxious drunks
Saturday evening football crowds
continuous drivel being spoken over the P.A. system.
interfering "music" via personal stereos (the key word is "personal" - I
wish it was)
lack of proper information when it all goes wrong.
unsuitable/inappropriate rolling stock. (Two car DMU with 3+2 seating
from Plymouth to Penzance after stepping off an HST from Reading - oh
dear!
stupid stops on what should be express trains (Paddington - Penzance
HSTs now frequently stop at Ivybridge, Saltash and St. Germans.
The unwillingness to introduce single line working when doing a little
gardening on the line condemning us to the dreaded rail replacement
bus (no bicycles, no prams, no wheelchairs).
"rail improvement" works which aren't. There's been years of this between
Redhill and Reading but the journey time is no better.
I'll stop now.

 

[Robertj21a]

.

Dislike

Ridiculous cost of tickets unless booked in advance (and then limited to a specific train).

Poor window/seat alignment

Seats not very comfortable

Other passengers - loud/rowdy

Like

Generally fast services

Good views if enough window available

 

[miami]

You know I don't see how any of these responses would be of any use to a researcher.

 

[IKB]

Dislikes:

- 3 + 2 seating. Uncomfortable squeeze, major pet hate.
- Decline in conditions of carriage (we've gone from soft comfy seats to ironing boards)
- Automated announcements - too many, people switch off, drives you insane
- Half-tables. What is the point?
- Passengers expecting staff to have instant info about disruption as soon as it happens.
- Delay attribution blame game
- Low line speeds in places where, with a little investment, could be higher

Likes:

- Good online information
- Good variety of services (many more than 20yrs ago, yet people still complain)
- Mk3 carriages
- Sleeper services
- Facilities at major termini

 

[Esker-pades]

Dislikes:
Communication during disruption - or rather, lack of it.
The constant re-occurrence of problems that always seem to have a short term, not long term fix.
The complex and misleading fare structure.

Likes:
Front line staff - they're usually pretty damn good.
Non-rush hour traveling experience; when it actually works, it's fantastic.