Will Manchester ever see later night departures

[EM2]

*cough* Paddington *cough*

Not according to RTT, except for buses to Stansted.

 

[Howardh]

Personal bugbear of mine. Bolton has 250k+ population, not to mention the other towns along the Preston line, and
(a) the last stopping train is around 2320 from Victoria (2245-ish from Piccadilly/Oxford Road
(b) there is one later - 2355 I think - which is a bustitution Piccadilly/Bolton/Preston
(c) the Fri/Sat night buses have gone, the last bus is 2359.
So if you want the 2320 from Victoria and you are on a night out (or working) in the Theatre/Gay Village areas you have a 20-minute walk to Victoria or hope a bus/tram comes along.
It's appalling - Britains second city and it's suberbs are cut off after midnight. My regular taxi charges £25 but some are much more, not bad if there are 4 of you but if you are solo for the night...
there SHOULD be a better service Manchester Airport/Centre/NW corridor until 2am, and a good early service too (from 5am) and it should be part of the contract.
Yes, the current electrification means scheduling night trains is difficult; but afterwards?
And if lines need to be worked on, couldn't a train leaving (say) Bolton to Preston on one track simply return on it freeing up the other side for work?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Not according to RTT, except for buses to Stansted.

0134 and 0334 to Reading.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It's appalling - Britains second city and it's suberbs are cut off after midnight. My regular taxi charges £25 but some are much more, not bad if there are 4 of you but if you are solo for the night...

The thing is most people aren't, and a taxi is so much more attractive when you're drunk/tired. It's the likes of Uber that are killing night buses/trains outside London.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

...
It's appalling - Britains second city and it's suberbs are cut off after midnight. ...

We have already established Birmingham doesn't have a lot of late night services

 

[Chester1]

The thing is most people aren't, and a taxi is so much more attractive when you're drunk/tired. It's the likes of Uber that are killing night buses/trains outside London.

I agree Uber is a major contributor, I quoted earlier that I paid £13 for Victoria to Stockport a couple of weeks ago. £13 is expensive on my own but it a no brainer when traveling with another person or part of a group. There is still a market though and I think Metrolink will start to serve it in the medium term. Running a 21 hour service between Firswood to the Airport makes it simple to extend if the finances add up. Its down time is roughly midnight to 3am (the airport has a 4am shift change) the timings would work reasonably well for people on a night out.

We have already established Birmingham doesn't have a lot of late night services

Haha, you should see the scale of development on the edge of Manchester city centre, its vast. 3 Skyscrapers under construction, 9 with permission and 2 in final planning application stages. 2500 city centre flats completed during 2016, more than that will be completed during 2017. Salford Quays is growing fast too. I don't know that much about whats happening in Birmingham but its good that two cities are starting to compete with London.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The thing about Uber is not just cost, it's moved taking a taxi from having to remember the number, try to explain your destination to someone with a strong accent of some kind who can barely hear you, having a filthy 10 year old saloon car turn up (if it bothered, noting that "5 minutes" meant anything from 30 seconds to an hour) and get ripped off, to a couple of taps on a phone to a nearly new Prius turning up and no way to rip you off.

As a result I use far more taxis than I used to. I avoided them because the experience was horrible, not because of the cost.

 

[greyman42]

Surprised there's much demand for an 0325 service to London (or the similar 0317 from Milton Keynes) - I guess it's for those people unfortunate enough to have to start work in London at 0500 or thereabouts. 0300 to 0400 is definitely what I'd call the "depth of night" hour above all others!

Traditionally first trains to London from the bigger "NSE" stations have, IIRC, been 0500 or so, is this a sign employers are becoming more demanding with their hours compared to the old days?

Or maybe it's to allow people to catch early flights at Heathrow or Gatwick?

Perhaps it's just to get the unit and driver back to Kings Cross for early morning services out of Kings Cross. Incidentally, this service runs without a guard.

 

[Y961 XBU]

Am sure i read somewhere that there would be another additional early service from Liverpool - Manchester (in addition to the 3:38 train that already runs) as part of the Northern Franchise, Anyone know any further about that?

 

[hawk1911]

Before the so-called upgrade of the West Coast mainline, the last train from Manchester Piccadilly to Stafford was at 01:25 (now its 22:07) and the last train from Birmingham New Street was around 02:00 (now its 23:09).

Some upgrade!

 

[Bald Rick]

Haha, you should see the scale of development on the edge of Manchester city centre, its vast. 3 Skyscrapers under construction, 9 with permission and 2 in final planning application stages. 2500 city centre flats completed during 2016, more than that will be completed during 2017. Salford Quays is growing fast too. I don't know that much about whats happening in Birmingham but its good that two cities are starting to compete with London.

2,500? Roughly the same as Lewisham!

 

[robbeech]

I think what we have established here overall is that where trains do not run at 12tph on every line, 24/7 it will be a problem for the people that wish to use them. I don't genuinely think there is anyone here, certainly not that has participated in this thread that thinks that this scenario is possible or in any way sensible, but the fact remains that the entire network as it stands is not particularly comfortable with the amount of traffic on it for the most part. The upgrading of track, signalling, other infrastructure is happening at a rate that we may find acceptable or not, and in SOME areas things are still going downhill. More train, later in the day gives us less time to do essential maintenance to the infrastructure.
And what about if they did decide to put on trains until 0200, 0300, or whatever. The first time they NEEDED to do maintenance overnight and needed to cancel those, they'd have to put on a replacement bus service which may or may not be possible, or cancel them outright in advance. Most people wouldn't pick up on this information until they got to the station, drunk, cold and with the return portion of a day return and about £0.81 and half a twix on them. They'd be relying on the service they'd been used to and maybe would not be able to afford a taxi home.
I sympathise fully with those people who do not benefit from later services. For a point of reference some last train examples from nearby towns and cities that i have to catch in order to get home to my village are : Nottingham 2205 (35min drive) / Sheffield 2142 (25 min drive)/ Derby 2114 (40 minute drive) / Leeds 2045 (1hr drive) / Manchester 2043 (1h30 drive) / York 1931 (1hr45 drive). No trains run on a Sunday, so i do get it. I do however sympathise with the railway, probably more so as they cannot win.
I know every service is different, and a higher mileage journey isn't necessarily a higher cost for the TOC, or a higher ticket price, and the two are not necessarily proportional anyway but at the risk of going OT, i wonder, say something that left at 0100 and went to Buxton, how full would that train have to be to turn a profit?
The last train that leaves Sheffield for Worksop on a Monday to Thursday (Fri and Sat are different) usually has 20 people on it max. It only goes as far as Worksop, and if everyone on that train bought a single ticket and travelled all the way to Worksop with no railcard it would turn over £108. This clearly isn't profitable for Northern. Given that most people are travelling on return tickets which are £5.50 against £5.40 and lots get off at intermediate stations you can see why the 2244 is the latest service (incidentally i can't get my last connection from that one so have to leave earlier).
To say that these late night services benefit quite a few people is not likely to cut it with any TOC, in order to go to the hassle of putting on later services, having less down time for maintenance of trains and infrastructure, a complete shake up of staffing introducing later running services, the inevitable ECS moves that would have to be done in some circumstances to get things to the right place, they'd need a large volume of passengers and/or subsidy from local authorities.

I'd sooner go out earlier and go home earlier, when my job allows it, but then i'm unlikely to be going home drunk and if i did want to be out later i'd choose the hotel option, or i'd drive either to the place or to a station closer where there WAS a later service and drink soft drinks.

 

[Hadders]

Surprised there's much demand for an 0325 service to London (or the similar 0317 from Milton Keynes) - I guess it's for those people unfortunate enough to have to start work in London at 0500 or thereabouts. 0300 to 0400 is definitely what I'd call the "depth of night" hour above all others!

Traditionally first trains to London from the bigger "NSE" stations have, IIRC, been 0500 or so, is this a sign employers are becoming more demanding with their hours compared to the old days?

Or maybe it's to allow people to catch early flights at Heathrow or Gatwick?

The 0325 from Peterborough is 'all shacks' arriving into Kings Cross at 0500. There is a demand for it,especially as it gets closer to London.

 

[Chester1]

2,500? Roughly the same as Lewisham!

The Greater Manchester spatial plan wanted 40,000 new homes in the city centre over 20 years (2014-2034) and this looks pessimistic with the councils dream scenario of a city centre with a population of 200,000 looking possible. This years figure is likely to be higher and 2018 and 2019 even higher. The largest building in the UK outside of London (200m) is under construction near to Deansgate (1 of 4). Another taller tower (213m and 1 of 5) and another 3 over 100m nearby have been granted permission recently. It is not the scale of London but a dozen skyscrappers within a 5-10 minute of Deansgate-Castlefield completed within a 4 year period will have an impact on Metrolink. Its certainly very big compared with development outside of central(ish) London.

I think what we have established here overall is that where trains do not run at 12tph on every line, 24/7 it will be a problem for the people that wish to use them. I don't genuinely think there is anyone here, certainly not that has participated in this thread that thinks that this scenario is possible or in any way sensible, but the fact remains that the entire network as it stands is not particularly comfortable with the amount of traffic on it for the most part. The upgrading of track, signalling, other infrastructure is happening at a rate that we may find acceptable or not, and in SOME areas things are still going downhill. More train, later in the day gives us less time to do essential maintenance to the infrastructure.
And what about if they did decide to put on trains until 0200, 0300, or whatever. The first time they NEEDED to do maintenance overnight and needed to cancel those, they'd have to put on a replacement bus service which may or may not be possible, or cancel them outright in advance. Most people wouldn't pick up on this information until they got to the station, drunk, cold and with the return portion of a day return and about £0.81 and half a twix on them. They'd be relying on the service they'd been used to and maybe would not be able to afford a taxi home.
I sympathise fully with those people who do not benefit from later services. For a point of reference some last train examples from nearby towns and cities that i have to catch in order to get home to my village are : Nottingham 2205 (35min drive) / Sheffield 2142 (25 min drive)/ Derby 2114 (40 minute drive) / Leeds 2045 (1hr drive) / Manchester 2043 (1h30 drive) / York 1931 (1hr45 drive). No trains run on a Sunday, so i do get it. I do however sympathise with the railway, probably more so as they cannot win.
I know every service is different, and a higher mileage journey isn't necessarily a higher cost for the TOC, or a higher ticket price, and the two are not necessarily proportional anyway but at the risk of going OT, i wonder, say something that left at 0100 and went to Buxton, how full would that train have to be to turn a profit?
The last train that leaves Sheffield for Worksop on a Monday to Thursday (Fri and Sat are different) usually has 20 people on it max. It only goes as far as Worksop, and if everyone on that train bought a single ticket and travelled all the way to Worksop with no railcard it would turn over £108. This clearly isn't profitable for Northern. Given that most people are travelling on return tickets which are £5.50 against £5.40 and lots get off at intermediate stations you can see why the 2244 is the latest service (incidentally i can't get my last connection from that one so have to leave earlier).
To say that these late night services benefit quite a few people is not likely to cut it with any TOC, in order to go to the hassle of putting on later services, having less down time for maintenance of trains and infrastructure, a complete shake up of staffing introducing later running services, the inevitable ECS moves that would have to be done in some circumstances to get things to the right place, they'd need a large volume of passengers and/or subsidy from local authorities.

I'd sooner go out earlier and go home earlier, when my job allows it, but then i'm unlikely to be going home drunk and if i did want to be out later i'd choose the hotel option, or i'd drive either to the place or to a station closer where there WAS a later service and drink soft drinks.

There are multiple route options though so both night train and tram services could be designed to be flexible to accommodate closures. Metrolink night services are much more likely because they could begin with extending the airport line services and because the ToC issues you outlined are not relevant.

 

[6Gman]

Personal bugbear of mine. Bolton has 250k+ population, not to mention the other towns along the Preston line, and
(a) the last stopping train is around 2320 from Victoria (2245-ish from Piccadilly/Oxford Road
(b) there is one later - 2355 I think - which is a bustitution Piccadilly/Bolton/Preston
(c) the Fri/Sat night buses have gone, the last bus is 2359.
So if you want the 2320 from Victoria and you are on a night out (or working) in the Theatre/Gay Village areas you have a 20-minute walk to Victoria or hope a bus/tram comes along.
It's appalling - Britains second city and it's suberbs are cut off after midnight. My regular taxi charges £25 but some are much more, not bad if there are 4 of you but if you are solo for the night...
there SHOULD be a better service Manchester Airport/Centre/NW corridor until 2am, and a good early service too (from 5am) and it should be part of the contract.
Yes, the current electrification means scheduling night trains is difficult; but afterwards?
And if lines need to be worked on, couldn't a train leaving (say) Bolton to Preston on one track simply return on it freeing up the other side for work?

No.

Signalling may not allow it and H&S would almost certainly prohibit it. (The days when guys could work next to a running line are - I suspect - in the past.)

 

[frodshamfella]

My last train Mon to Fri from lime street to Acton Bridge is 23.34 , which I think is not bad.....but on a Saturday its 19.04 !! Saturday a night when people go out.

 

[Bletchleyite]

My last train Mon to Fri from lime street to Acton Bridge is 23.34 , which I think is not bad.....but on a Saturday its 19.04 !! Saturday a night when people go out.

Given the behaviour issues on those trains I'm not *that* surprised, though I doubt the troublemakers are all from Acton Bridge!

 

[jon0844]

The 0325 from Peterborough is 'all shacks' arriving into Kings Cross at 0500. There is a demand for it,especially as it gets closer to London.

The first train into London from Hatfield can be very busy (0419 or thereabouts) and I've seen the 0507 at Knebworth extremely busy, and with probably 85% of the occupants being asleep or near asleep!

 

[rg177]

The 03:30 from Milton Keynes to London (I boarded at Wembley Central at 04:21 on a Wednesday morning) was surprisingly well used, maybe having nearly half of its seats taken when I used it.

 

[PR1Berske]

Personal bugbear of mine. Bolton has 250k+ population, not to mention the other towns along the Preston line, and
(a) the last stopping train is around 2320 from Victoria (2245-ish from Piccadilly/Oxford Road
(b) there is one later - 2355 I think - which is a bustitution Piccadilly/Bolton/Preston
(c) the Fri/Sat night buses have gone, the last bus is 2359.
So if you want the 2320 from Victoria and you are on a night out (or working) in the Theatre/Gay Village areas you have a 20-minute walk to Victoria or hope a bus/tram comes along.
It's appalling - Britains second city and it's suberbs are cut off after midnight. My regular taxi charges £25 but some are much more, not bad if there are 4 of you but if you are solo for the night...
there SHOULD be a better service Manchester Airport/Centre/NW corridor until 2am, and a good early service too (from 5am) and it should be part of the contract.
Yes, the current electrification means scheduling night trains is difficult; but afterwards?
And if lines need to be worked on, couldn't a train leaving (say) Bolton to Preston on one track simply return on it freeing up the other side for work?

I'm too old now, but in my youth, nights out in Manchester stretched beyond midnight just because it was easier to catch a morning train than suffer the 1am coach back to Preston.

Of course there should be better midnight-5am services up here. I suspect it will never happen, for reasons both technical (timetables, stock, engineering) and mortal (wages, Union rules and regs, passenger safety).

 

[Hadders]

The first train into London from Hatfield can be very busy (0419 or thereabouts) and I've seen the 0507 at Knebworth extremely busy, and with probably 85% of the occupants being asleep or near asleep!

I've got the 0504 from Stevenage a few times - standing room only by the time it gets to Kings Cross!

 

[RAPC]

Not sure which part of Manchester you would be going to in order to pay £60 for a taxi home.

£60 is pretty much the cost for me to get home by taxi and I am up near Preston, so a bit further than the Manchester area.

I agree that it would be nice to have some services a little bit later from Manchester, but I don't think we are too far behind London generally either.

Mentions of the last train from Euston to MKC brings back memories for me. That was often my train of choice to get home to MK after industry shindigs in London. Was lightly loaded, but with circa 80% of the passengers all bringing Burgerking products on board with them too. Emergency provisions!

 

[frodshamfella]

Given the behaviour issues on those trains I'm not *that* surprised, though I doubt the troublemakers are all from Acton Bridge!

I can't say I've ever noticed any behaviour issues.....but I'm hardly ever on the last service of a week day night . I would however quite like to be able to see a show or have a meal on a Saturday and return a bit later than 7PM which is a bit rubbish.

 

[RichmondCommu]

I've got the 0504 from Stevenage a few times - standing room only by the time it gets to Kings Cross!

Depending on their role there are many people working for investment banks who need to be at their desks before 07.00 so that is hardly surprising. Just out of interest how long is the train?

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'm too old now, but in my youth, nights out in Manchester stretched beyond midnight just because it was easier to catch a morning train than suffer the 1am coach back to Preston.

Once upon a time that was a train!

 

[6Gman]

I'm too old now, but in my youth, nights out in Manchester stretched beyond midnight just because it was easier to catch a morning train than suffer the 1am coach back to Preston.

Of course there should be better midnight-5am services up here. I suspect it will never happen, for reasons both technical (timetables, stock, engineering) and mortal (wages, Union rules and regs, passenger safety).

I'm not aware of any "Union rules and regs" which would prevent such trains running. However, on a heavily subsidised network I'm not sure there's a strong case for further services of uncertain patronage, and which might create particular problems of fitting in maintenance requirements and special cleaning ...

 

[6Gman]

I can't say I've ever noticed any behaviour issues.....but I'm hardly ever on the last service of a week day night . I would however quite like to be able to see a show or have a meal on a Saturday and return a bit later than 7PM which is a bit rubbish.

The late evening LM services out of Lime Street have a significant reputation for antisocial behaviour.

Sadly.

Hence the alcohol ban and the presence of security staff on Platform 8 on Saturday evenings.

 

[Antman]

The thing is most people aren't, and a taxi is so much more attractive when you're drunk/tired. It's the likes of Uber that are killing night buses/trains outside London.

In London as well, there has been a steady decline in bus usage and I think a lot of that is down to Uber.

I'm sure there is a case for later trains out of many major cities but obviously infrastructure work is a major consideration. I'm fortunate enough to have a 24 hour Thameslink service not too far away.

 

[nw1]

We have already established Birmingham doesn't have a lot of late night services

Worse was my experience in 2013 when it was impossible to get into Birmingham on the Cross City line before 0900 on a Sunday morning from Barnt Green - was genuinely surprised by this.

 

[yorksrob]

I can't say I've noticed any uber related drop-off in last train usage anywhere around Leeds.