Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Chat

Join the discussion and chat with other Mumsnetters about everyday life, relationships and parenting.

Original poster

The state of the fucking railway

52 replies

Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 22:53

After trumpeting their green credentials, passengers are trying to get beyond Milton Keynes to Edinburgh - with tales of reporters giving each other lifts of over 300 miles to Scotland because all the planes are full.

I tried to travel 18 miles by train, only to find that today everything i fucked by 'essential' rail works that shut down or diverted everything north of Birmingham.

A rail replacement bus service was going to take three times as long as the train to get there and I was going to miss the event I was going to.

Now, there's a train collision in a tunnel - Wiltshire Police say it's lucky there are no fatalities.

The crash has swiped signalling over a wide area and there are delays all over the network

WTF is going on??

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10150571/Two-trains-collide-one-left-accident-near-Salisbury.html

OP posts:
Iggly · 31/10/2021 22:54

Constant under investment in our public service infrastructure….

Same with water companies, same with energy companies.

All privatised and funnily enough it didn’t work. What is missing is the political Will for keep investing in infrastructure- not obsessing over who owns it.

Lightswitch123 · 31/10/2021 22:55

It's also FIng expensive

How can it be cheaper to fly, or drive alone in a car.

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 22:57

After years of warnings about weather and most of the pandemic to sort out the sidings, why are fallen trees still causing issues?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-59110091

OP posts:
longtompot · 31/10/2021 23:03

I think tonight is just an unfortunate night to be travelling by rail. I live in Salisbury and have had the helicopters and the emergency vehicles driving about the city all evening. The first one went really low over our house so we felt it before hearing it. Thankfully, like you said, no one was killed, but still 12 people were injured and the driver was trapped. It is a shame there are no other hubs that trains can go through to get north of Wiltshire. They need to go via London or Bristol so they all pretty much go through our station.
I think where other first train crashed into something on the tracks, perhaps to do with the storms, and that wiped out the signals which then allowed the other train to crash into it, maybe if signals are down then it should be all stop on the lines.

OP posts:
rrhuth · 31/10/2021 23:06

It is frustrating but unsurprising given who we have had in government the last eleven years.

Fetarabbit · 31/10/2021 23:07

I'm not sure if you're being ironic here, moaning about essential maintenance causing changes to the timetable but also rueing how poorly maintained they are Confused.

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:07

The West Coast Main Line has been having problems for days.

This was the 'flagship' line from London to Edinburgh, where reporters and visitors from across the world would have been travelling on.

And it's so royally fucked up, that people are cadging lifts from one another.

OP posts:
Chloemol · 31/10/2021 23:09

[quote Gingernaut]After years of warnings about weather and most of the pandemic to sort out the sidings, why are fallen trees still causing issues?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-59110091[/quote]
Don’t be ridiculous. Do you really think all landowners are going round every month to check trees are ok?

Not all trees are on Network Rail land, therefore they are reliant on others doing checks, which are normally recommended every two years

However trees are living things, and weigh heavy at the moment as a lot are still in nearly full leaf ( although not now with the wind) and these winds are not helping

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:10

I understand essential maintenance is, of course, essential.

However, the issues on this particular stretch of rail have been being dealt with for years, from the overhead lines, to the track side security.

Today, with barely a whisper, is the day they decide some urgent, essential maintenance has to be done. Again.

OP posts:
MrsFezziwig · 31/10/2021 23:12

Same on the East Coast main line. Seven hours to get from King’s Cross to Yorkshire, a journey which should have taken 90 minutes. I felt a bit sorry for myself, but not as sorry as I did for the passengers who were then turfed off the train as its original destination of Edinburgh was cancelled.

scraggadoo · 31/10/2021 23:14

It's been a nightmare since Weds. We travelled to Edinburgh with Avanti on Weds from Coventry and they terminated the service at Preston.... 2 hours later a very slow connection to Glasgow followed by a connection to Edinburgh.. 9 hour journey! Feeling v lucky that we had decided to travel home yesterday- although even then the train terminated at Wolverhampton due to no driver! Feel for anyone who's been stuck today.

OP posts:
Fetarabbit · 31/10/2021 23:16

It's surprising how many moving parts the railways have to be coordinating, monitoring and maintaining at any one time. They're far from perfect, in fact pretty crap, but they don't close lines for fun- if something has to be done then it has to be done. The weather has been uncharacteristically bad for this time of year, its not surprising services have been affected, as would also happen elsewhere in the world.

Fetarabbit · 31/10/2021 23:18

[quote Gingernaut]Someone's fallen asleep on the job.

www.networkrail.co.uk/running-the-railway/looking-after-the-railway/vegetation-management/

www.networkrail.co.uk/communities/living-by-the-railway/vegetation/[/quote]
They don't cut down every tree that could possibly fall down, they cut down those most likely to cause issues.

MrsFezziwig · 31/10/2021 23:19

Not all trees are on Network Rail land, therefore they are reliant on others doing checks, which are normally recommended every two years

But equally you shouldn’t have to rely on luck for the system to function correctly. Looking at how close the trees are in some places to the overhead lines (which obviously there was plenty of time to do today), I’m amazed it’s not happening every time there is a strong wind.

EastWestWhosBest · 31/10/2021 23:22

While I completely agree that the trains are ridiculously expensive and poorly run I don’t think we can bring the extreme circumstances of a train crash and falling trees into it.

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:24

The last few days just seem to have been suffering from everything all at once and tonight is the culmination of it all.

OP posts:
Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:26

They don't cut down every tree that could possibly fall down, they cut down those most likely to cause issues.

They clearly need to look again at those trees "most likely to cause issues".

OP posts:
MrsFezziwig · 31/10/2021 23:26

I do have a certain sympathy as I’ve also worked in an industry which has been systematically deprived of resources, but I and probably a few thousand others are entitled to full ticket refunds. They had to issue a statement not to travel today. Hardly a good look when they’re trying to persuade more people to travel by train.

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:27

@MrsFezziwig

I do have a certain sympathy as I’ve also worked in an industry which has been systematically deprived of resources, but I and probably a few thousand others are entitled to full ticket refunds. They had to issue a statement not to travel today. Hardly a good look when they’re trying to persuade more people to travel by train.
Exactly
OP posts:
2020isnotbehaving · 31/10/2021 23:28

Travelling by train on a Sunday or bank holiday is just asking for trouble. Rail replacement is stuff made of horrors. Plus bad weather and the train crash it’s hell on earth. Might as well club together with few passengers and hirer a taxi it be cheaper almost anywhere.

Kummerspeck · 31/10/2021 23:29

Train services north of Birmingham are shit all the time but no-one cares.
I recently was invited to London for an event, train fare was over £100 from Preston, my nearest station. A friend asked me if I would like to visit her, stay over, and travel from her nearest station just south of Birmingham, train fare was under £15

Original poster
Gingernaut · 31/10/2021 23:38

Train fares are nuts.

Why is it almost twice as expensive to travel from one station to a destination, than from another, only a few miles up the track?

How are they calculated?

OP posts:
Original poster
Gingernaut · 01/11/2021 08:46

Signalling issues at Coventry means the line is blocked.

Signalling issues means trains between Chester and Crewe are affected.

OP posts: