h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I use trains a fair bit, mainly to get from my home in Maidstone, Kent to university in Aberystwyth, in Wales, and vice-versa. If I could, I would make all train company owners travel everywhere by train. This should mean that the trains would be improved as the owners of the companies would choose to improve their journeys, thus improving the journeys of all train users.

I work for a train operating company, and frequently travel by train. I can't speak for the owners of train companies (that'd be the shareholders) but I can state with authority that those who work on the railway, including senior management and directors, do travel by train regularly. A sizeable number of my colleagues travel almost exclusively by train, and only drive when there is no alternative - quite a few don't drive at all.

I have to say that when I travel by train over any distance I nearly always get a seat and I normally arrive on time. Commuting on the other hand generally involves trains which are full and standing - but show me a big city anywhere in the world where you can reliably get a seat on public transport in the peak.

Better than 9 out of 10 trains are on time for most train operators in the UK but of course if you commute to and from work and one train in ten is late then you will experience a late train on average once a week. Commuting in the peak is not much fun anywhere, by rail, by tram, by subway, by bus or by car - I've tried them all.

That's no comfort if you commute on a line which is badly overcrowded and suffers from delays, and some lines are worse than others. Some lines are really very unpleasant to travel on, no doubt about it.

I'm often told that European railways are more punctual and reliable, and have a more consistent timetable. I've travelled on European railways quite a bit, and I'd have two observations. Firstly, I have not found them noticeably more punctual and reliable than UK trains, although the timetable is often more clockface. The second is that, outside of the high speed train lines, European trains are often relatively slow with long station dwell times - 8 or 10 minutes at a station. This allows them more of a performance buffer - if you have a 10 minute dwell time and you arrive 8 minutes late you can still depart on time. All this gives a timetable which is more robust, but slower and less efficient. If you run a slow train, it's easier to keep time. It's a judgement to be made, and we make it all the time.

Still, there's plenty of room for improvement, and generally train operators know what's required. Unfortunately the problem is often a lack of capacity - we either don't provide enough trains, or the ones we provide are not big enough. In London, at least, there's not a lot to be done - trains have to have a headway between them for safety and they are run as frequently as that allows; and the trains are as long as they can be and still fit on all the stations platforms. To increase capacity in this situation requires major capital investment in track, signalling and stations - hence Crossrail.

In the provinces we may have a bit more infrastructure capacity (we're still pretty full, in many places) but we don't have enough rolling stock - again, this requires major capital investment - new trains cost upwards of £1M per carriage and take some considerable time to build - you can't just pick a train up from a dealer like you do a car, and we really don't have spares lying around the place - the ones you see in sidings are often old stock which we are not allowed to use any more because of safety regs and they are in any case incompatible with modern traction.

Unfortunately, the railways were badly neglected by governments of all persuasions for years. They were badly damaged in the 39-45 war, and investment never matched what was required. We then tore up a good proportion of our tracks in the 60s and 70s, partly because those in charge at the time (step forward Dr Beeching and Ernest Marples) felt that the country's transport needs could be met by road-building and "bustitution." To be fair, there is some basis for this - if you are transporting 20 or 30 people at a time then a bus makes much better economic and environmental sense than a train. However, if you want to shift 500 people at a time, particularly if you want to transport them any distance at speed, you need a train. I think we got the balance wrong - too many railway lines before the cuts, too few afterwards.

It's easy to turn up for a train to find it's delayed, and when it turns up it's full and you can't get a seat, and think that the solution is simple - put more carriages on the trains, provide more trains, build bigger stations. If it were easy to fix, we'd have fixed it. The reasons why the train service is less than perfect are complex and often rooted in history, but the people who work on the railway do use it, do care, and do try to provide as good a service as possible.

Ooh, that turned into a bit of a rant didn't it? I was going to settle for my first sentence as a response to mikeyc's suggestion and just kind of got carried away. Well anyhow, that's a view from the inside.

And yes, I commute to work by car - I live miles from a station.

That's interesting. I live on mainland Europe and haven't generally noticed a longer waiting time - however (see my post in another thread here about my enforced commute) I don't often use the train to get to work as it means spending more than 4 hours a day just trying to get to work and home again.

There is hardly a commuter train in the world that isn't overfull that is true, but they are dangerously overfull and when I was in Seoul I saw more than one person faint. The justification for high commuter fairs does not sit well with customers when they are squashed in like cattle, and it should be a priority for train companies (worldwide) to address this. Even to the point of perhaps taking out most of the seats and charging less for standing carriages, at least that might take out some of the frustration?

As for late trains - I don't know about one in 10. I know that my trains when I use them here mostly run on time. But when they are late - what people really want is information. When is the train coming, what is the delay (I'm less likely to be annoyed when it is an accient - once the trains were held up indefinitely due to a suicide which garnered more sympathy for the train company than a points failure we experienced one week later)

Where I live the station is only manned Mon-Fri 08:00 - 16:00. That's ok if you are there between those times, but most commuters have to be at their desks at 08:00 and nobody leaves the office before 16:00. One problem I faced was renewing my monthly ticket - it had to be bought there, couldn't be obtained from the ticket machine due to being a bus/train combo and that was it. I have to take half a day of work just to purchase the means to get there?

There also seems to be a lack of backup plan. This year we had violent summer storms which led to disruption of train services. Understandable. The lack of information was not understandable nor was the lack of a back-up plan that could swing into action. My discussions with the train company only ever ended with them saying "nobody can anticipate a storm" and me saying "sure, nobody minds that. But it is your utter hopelessness at reacting to it and giving information that makes your customers - who pay your wages - mad"

sorry - ranting again!

The point about information is well made. It's certainly something we're aware of, at my train company at least.

I had experience of this a couple of weeks back. I was waiting for a tram in central Manchester (I don't have anything to do with the tram company, I'm just a regular customer). I'd been waiting for a little while when an announcement was made via the public address that the broken down vehicle had been recovered and services would be returning to normal, but that some customers may experience some delays. A broken down vehicle - these things happen. Services returning to normal. Yay, good. But some customers may experience some delays? What does that mean? The station serves three lines - what are the delays on each line?

There were 6 (yes, SIX) members of the tram company staff on the platform. I approached one and asked the question - how long would the delay be on my line? He said he didn't know. "Well, how about you ring your control and find out then," I suggested. This is a no-brainer. He shouldn't have needed telling - and the control centre should have passed this information in the first place. The control centre would know where all their vehicles are, and as the cause of the original problem had been rectified they would know when the next service is likely to arrive at each location.

The guy made the call, and a couple of minutes later a fresh announcement was made, this time stating when the next service was due on each of the three lines. There were audible sighs of relief around the packed platform. Why did it take me, a customer, to prompt the tram company staff into doing what should have been obvious to them? Either they aren't trained properly, or the company's procedures need to be tightened up.

This is basic stuff - get it wrong and you have unhappy customers. Get it right, and whilst people may be irritated at the delay, they will be far more understanding if they know the cause of the delay and how long they are likely to be delayed.

I didn't bother following it up with their Customer Services at the time. I should have, really - perhaps they aren't aware. They should be, though, as I say, it's basic stuff.

Oh you should definitely follow it up, even now.

When I was commuting in June we had a freak-ish storm (the weather forecasters had been warning about it for at least five days, however)

It didn't so much bother me that the lines were down - it was a storm, trees came down and it was a frightful mess.

It didn't really bother me that much that for a couple of days everything was pear-shaped with the timetable - it was a freaky bad storm.

What really really really bugged me was the attitude of the train company. The station I use on the way home is unmanned - it consists of two platforms and an automated road barrier. There is a shelter kind of affair (that stinks of wee) with a timetable in it, a ticket machine (and gawd alone knows how you get tickets out of it if you don't want a straight A to B - it takes me yonks to get anything out of those) and an Info Phone thing.

So on the day after the storm, before I left the office (5pm) I checked the train company website. After all - the internet is the PERFECT way to update information quickly and efficiently. It said that my line was normal and trains were running.

When I got off the bus at the station, the driver said to the 3 of us: I don't know why you came here, there haven't been any trains all day (I'd had to take an alternative route to work so I had no idea)

The other two said: oh no, it's ok, website says everything is OK.

The bus waited as per his timetable. We pressed the button on the info phone when our train would have been 10 minutes late, and I consulted the webpage via phone. Webpage said: trains normal. Guy at the info-phone said: delays of 30 minutes. We waited. After 35 minutes and no train we called the telephone "hotline" where a very rude lady told us that of course there were delays there had been a storm. She further told us that the train station had been closed all day.

When we asked where the signs were or information about that she snapped: check the website. So I asked her to check the website with me. Silence. Oh, says she, you're right. The website is wrong.

It went on for a while, and during the conversation I was transferred to her superior. I asked him why they hadn't put any signs up especially at the unmanned stations. "too many stations"

When I pointed out that too many customers were having difficulty, and that all that was required of them was a man with a car, some A3 paper, sellotape and a marker pen, he started getting grumpy.

At which point I told him that given a man and a car I could orginise it for him. I'm good at organising. I then asked when we could expect information (note: information, not trains) about a temporary timetable. And then it all started again, it was a huge storm, freak of nature they can't plan for that.

But they can. Nobody expects a temporary plan to jump into place immediately, but we do expect that they have contingency plans so that they can try. We also pay a lot of money on our fares and expect information.

In fact: information is the key. I am actually in the business of selling Public Information Displays, so I know how much they cost to purchase and install, and I also know how relatively easy it is to update the information on them. As a passenger it's the very least I expect, especially in out-of-the way stations.

The majority of complaints when there has been some outside problem causing delays (like freak weather) are about incomplete or inaccurate information. Although it's not my department I know at our company we are working on improving internal communications - it's important that our frontline staff have the correct information. As far as I know the people who update our website are pretty responsive, and the live feeds which are available through the National Rail Enquiries website are kept up-to-date as they are feeds off the internal control systems - if it says a train was last reported in a certain location then that's where it was last reported.

On the planning side, which is my department, we do have contingency plans but you can't plan for every eventuality. A flood or a landslip, for example, can take place anywhere on the network, and the effects will be different depending where it is. Industrial action also can cause disruption without closing down the whole network. The immediate planning after an incident is done by the control, who will keep as many trains running as they can,bearing in mind that they need to get trains to depots at the end of the day for fuel (if they are diesels) and maintenance and to start the timetable the following day - facilities vary at different depots. They also need to get traincrew home so they are available for their next shift. There are all kind of things to consider - even things like ensuring the trains go to a location where the toilet tanks can be emptied - people would soon complain if they finally got on their delayed train and couldn't go to the loo!

If it's a major incident the planning team will then create an emergency timetable. We have to recast the timetable around whatever blockage there is, ensuring that the trains cycle around correctly for maintenance and that all the trains can be resourced with traincrew, observing the traincrew terms and conditions (there are restrictions on how long they can work, how long they can go without a break, how long after signing off they can sign on again, etc). The emergency plan must also take account of the route and traction knowledge of the traincrew (train drivers and guards are required to "know" or "sign" the routes they work on, as well as the specific types of traction they work on - they aren't allowed to just drive any train anywhere like you can with a car). Given those restrictions, we will try to run as complete a train service as possible, and will then plan and procure bus replacement services for everywhere that trains can't run. This normally takes a day, but we may have to revisit the plan if the situation changes - for example we get back part of the network or lose another part which means we need a new emergency timetable to meet the new situation.

And then we then have to pass that new timetable onto the publicity department and to our frontline staff to make sure the passengers know when and where they can expect trains and/or buses.

None of this is exceptional, this is our job, and when it doesn't happen properly our passengers are entitled to complain and feel aggrieved with us. But all the train operators I'm familiar with, and I'm pretty familiar with quite a bit of the UK rail industry, do take this very seriously. Doesn't mean they always get it right, though.

It certainly doesn't sound like the customer services or publicity departments of whatever train company you deal with are very responsive, Hos. Perhaps a written complaint exploring if any compensation is on offer might be worthwhile. In the UK train operators will sometimes make some kind of a goodwill gesture, even where there is no specific compensation due.

I voted with my feet and wrote to tell them so. I got a car.


I live in a country with notoriously and scandalously bad customer service - it's expected here. At the same time, there is no speed limit on most of the Autobahn which shows what they really think of public transport


(I'm Sho, btw, Hos is my Halloween disguise!)