Eurostar - the train that thinks it's a Plane

Eurostar is undoubtedly a good thing.   But it constantly seems to want to pretend to be a plane, and adopt all the aspects oft ravelling by plane - good or bad - while it ignores what people value from a train.

First off, why does it need a check in arrangement?   No other trains need this.   And please don't say it's to do with security.   There are no links between the passenger and the ticket (apart from a name, which may be common) and the check-in merely checks the ticket.   No other international day train requires a check-in 30 minutes in advance, even where there are serious border requirements such as crossing into Russia.

And what about all the bag searches?   As far as the tunnel is concerned, a lorry load of margarine will do more damage to the tunnel than a suitcase full of semtex, as we have seen.   And is Eurostar more of an attractive target than a TGV or an ICE, or any other inter-city target.   The train bombers in London and Madrid show that if terror is the objective, bombs on underground and suburban trains are far more effective - and these are far harder to defend.

Of course, any form of security check will reduce risk, but is the cost and detail involved justified by the reduction in risk it achieves?

So what is actually the need for the check-in and security arrangements?   Is it just about exercising control?

Then there is the level of service.   On a plane there are serious restrictions on weight and space which justify the quality and approach to catering.   But these restrictions don't apply so strongly on a train.   So why does Eurostar follow an airline style to catering?   Only to achieve, it must be said, a lower standard.   During the last year, the food I have eaten on Eurostar is routinely worse than most airline food.   The opportunity is there to do much better, but it has been lost by thinking in terms of airline approaches.

To be fair, many of these issues are determined by the security services or the Border and Immigration Agency.   But do they not have anyone who is considering the end to end approach rather than just individual opportunistic approaches to different components?

More information

I still don't understand why real time infomration works reasonably well when everything is going smoothly, but collases when there are wiespread delays and is abandoned when the going gets really tough.   Let me give you two examples.

The day before yesterday I was on London Bridge station waiting for the 1619 to Ashford.   As it hppens I was there ten minutes early and expeced to see the 1612 Brighton train at the same platform, but it was marked as 'cancelled'.   I checked on he smart phone ad it appeared to have been diverted via Tulse Hill.   Well, these things happen.

At 1617 an Electrostar rolled in to platform 5.   Regular travellers knew that this was the 'canclled' Brighton train and not the Ahford tran shown on the platform indicatos.   Unseasoned tavellers for the Ashfor line got on to be greeted with an on trian announcement that the next stop would be East Croydon.

In quick time, then, the platform indicators changed to sow the train as going to Gatwick Airport, there was an announcement that this was a train for Gatwick Airport, the doors shut and the train moved off.   Too quick for any unsuspecting passengers to Gatwick and I hope nobody for Ashford was trapped inside.

Then, yesterday afternoon, as I came back from Bruxelles to Ashford, the 1630 Ramsgate train was announced as being 6 minutes late.   I checked on the website and saw that it was running between 12 and 15 minute late.   South Eastern build in an automatic recovery of 1 minute per stop for late running trains - which almsot never happens.   So the announcements kept on understating the delays until the train actually came and left, 12 minutes late.

It all shows that information is never given priority, as it should be.

0544

A day trip to Amsterdam should be easy and almost something to look forward to, but it’s tempered quite a bit by needing to get up for the 0544.   My plane from Gatwick wasn’t until 0910 but it really is slow to get from East Kent to Gatwick by train, even though this is its natural catchment area.   While it takes about an hour and a half by car during the morning peak, it takes more than 2 hours by train.   Not only are the trains slow, the connections, particularly at Tonbridge, are very poor, normally needing a wait of 25 minutes there.

The 0544 from Chilham is a bit better as the connections work, but even then it’s slow.   Change at Ashford (5 minutes connection), Tonbridge (4 minutes connection) and Redhill (9 minutes connection).

I drove to Wye because it’s likely that I’ll get the 2003 back from Ashford and was surprised at just how many people were waiting for the first train.   About a dozen people on what was a dark and damp morning.   The train was a Networker bound for Victoria via Maidstone East.   What the good burgers of Maidstone have done to deserve such awful trains I don’t know, but they really aren’t up to a 2 hour journey.   Their lightweight body makes them bounce around with no feeling of solidity.   Still, it was on time and I had no problems in catching the connection to Tonbridge, even though it meant a dash from platform 6 to platform 2.

The Tonbridge train was not full, though it suddenly filled up at Paddock Wood.   Thankfully, at that time in the morning there were mercifully few announcements.   The change at Tonbridge was just a cross platform interchange and not long to wait before we were away.

The route to Redhill is a slow route, though, and it takes half an hour for quite a short distance.   At Redhill, the train pulled up to the far end of the platform (presumably because a Great Western train would pull in behind it, but it seems inconvenient to have such a long walk, especially as the train was beyond the station canopy and it was now starting to rain.

A slow train to Gatwick and then the transit to the North terminal and it had taken me 2 hours just to get to the airport.

Gatwick North now has a separate priority channel through security which I was bale to use – only one person in the queue ahead of me, so that was quick.

I have to say I do like having my boarding card on my mobile.   It really is simple and convenient – no more bits of paper to find and lose or to see scrumpled up.   I am sure this is the way of the future.   I can’t see why every operator doesn’t use it.

The BA lounge was quite quiet but definitely one of the pleasanter places to wait for a plane at Gatwick, even though I had only 40 minutes by the time I got in there.   They are getting their timings worked out, too, because even though I got up to leave the lounge as soon as it said ‘boarding’’, by the time I got to gate 61 most people were on board, so there was no wait there.

The plane left a bit early and got to Amsterdam early but despite the short flight we had a reasonable breakfast (much better than Eurostar) and two cups of coffee before landing.

The weather is not good and the forecast worse.   As we descended over the Dutch coats the sea looked fierce with breakers as fare as you could see.   Not a nice day to be on a boat.

Despite the claims of Schipol, it’s actually not a very large airport and I got out within 10 minutes of leaving the plane.   I had thought there would be a passport delay, but the queues for EU and non-EU had got confused as the non-EU queue was so long it went out of the arrivals hall and down the corridor.   Only one desk for them.   Once we had sorted ourselves out, the EU queue was short and moved quickly.   If only we were part of Schengen!

The hysteria about passports and borders in the UK is quite absurd.   The main checks are really when visas are issued and when checking in and boarding, not at the passport desk.   Apart from a simple identity check – done when you get on the plane you don’t need anything else at the airport.   And if we were coherent about Schengen that’s all we would get.   But, oh no, we have to condemn anyone who might admit that there might be a reason for having something short of the third degree on arrival.   It’s an attitude rooted in the past.

One advantage of a relatively small airport is that everything’s close at hand, including the station.   I had 10 minutes to wait for a train to the RAI and then a battle through the wind (not raining yet) to the RAI itself.   I have to say that NS has become quite grotty.   Lots of trains are covered in graffiti and though it’s nice to travel on a double decker, as an Inter City offering it’s very mediocre – comfort levels of Networkers, if that.

Coming back to RAI station it was throwing it down and too windy for an umbrella.   As I had a bit of time and it was convenient I took the tram to Centraal.   It’s a beautiful station, but it’s all about trains.   This is conventional, I know, and what stations should be about, but it means few good facilities.   Not that it really mattered as I had only a few minutes to wait before the Benelux express appeared to whisk me the Schipol.

NS are now marketing these as ‘Hi-speed’ but they’ve not changed much and the ambience is still very much 1980s.  Leatherette seats, stark lighting, lino flooring.   (I also saw one of the new, genuine high speed, Fyra trains come in and, internally, they’re not much better).

A quick passage into the departure lounge.   At Schipol the security checks are at the gates rather than at the entrance to the departure lounge.   I’m not sure of this is a good thing because it risks delay at the gate when boarding and is quite an inefficient use of equipment.   On the other hand, all I had to show was a passport to get in and that was convenient.

The BA lounge at Amsterdam is pretty standard fare, though the food is less good.   They hassled us through to the gate a good 40 minutes in advance, to make sure we got through the security check on time.   All ready to go on time when the captain announced a 50 minute delay for air traffic control reasons.   No wonder the Americans now consider that driving is a more reliable form of transport than flying!

As it happens the position improved and we actually left on time and arrived at City Airport a couple of minutes early.   The speed of exit is where such a small airport wins out (though they have no IRIS here so it was fortunate there was no queue for passport control.

DLR to Stratford international is easy now, as is the connection to South Eastern.   The combination got me home just about 2 hours after touch down.   Surprisingly, on a good day, I can manage just about the same form Heathrow now.   By public transport Gatwick – the most convenient by car – is now least accessible.⨪

Cobbling together a trip to Northampton

A trip to Northampton should be plain sailing: to Ashford, then by High Speed to St Pancras, walk to Euston and London Midland from there.   The 0641 from Chilham should get me there by 0915 – ideal time for a 1000 meeting.   And, at the outset, plain sailing is what it seemed.

It was a chilly morning and that, combined with a late night return, encouraged me to take the car to the station rather than walk. The 0641 was on time for a change (and not 4 or 5 minutes late) and the transfer at Ashford smooth enough.  The platform at Ashford, waiting for the High Speed was surprisingly packed, especially as once on the train, it didn’t seem that full.   There were seats available, for example.   The train itself was on time both leaving Ashford and arriving at St Pancras.   The rough riding in the tunnel section, though, was awful.   I thought Hitachi had said they had sorted all that out, but the judder was so pronounced it was barely possibly to read, let alone write.

A chilly walk through the Phoenix Road estate and I had plenty of time to get the 0813 from Euston.   This was where the plain sailing stopped.   As I got into Euston I noticed that the 0747 had yet to leave and was just marked ‘departure delayed’ as were all the other London Midland departures.   The information desk had no information – just ‘delayed’ they didn’t know how long for.   There was an announcement after about 5 minutes but apart from telling us that this was due to overhead power supply problems near Northampton, this added nothing new.

0813 came and went and the departure board changed the 0813’s status from ‘departure delayed’ to ‘cancelled’ but nothing else changed.   The bland announcement was repeated every 10 minutes but nobody was the wiser.   I looked at the National Rail website which reported that the line would re-open at 0900 and a rumour went around that the 0846 would run, but 0846 came and went with still no change and no news.

I decided to go to Milton Keynes on the 0900 Virgin train (Virgin was apparently not affected by the delays) and take a taxi from there and, as I boarded, both the 0747 and 0846 were still marked as ‘departure delayed’.   Not surprisingly the 0900 was heaving and I was lucky to find a seat.   We left on time and arrived at Milton Keynes about 5 minutes late at 0936.   Here I found that the Northampton line had indeed re-opened and the 0925 (the 0846 from Euston) was expected at 0952 – it must have left Euston at about 0910 with little or no notice to passengers.

Over the next 16 minutes we saw various changes.   First, the train which was meant to be 8 cars, with portions for Crewe and Birmingham, moved from 0952 to 0956.   I wasn’t that much surprised because once a train is significantly late it almost invariably just gets later.   Then, at about 0945 the display changed to say that the train would now terminate at Northampton and, by the way, was only 4 cars.   Then, at about 0954, there came an announcement saying that the train had been cancelled    This was repeated twice and was confirmed on the website..

All this time there appeared to be no platform staff or any other information.

At 0956, the train arrived (8 cars) with passengers clearly expecting to travel on towards Northampton, so I boarded and, almost immediately, we left for Northampton.   Shortly before we arrived, the conductor announced that he ‘had just been informed’ that the train would now terminate at Northampton.   Several passengers who had clearly intended to travel further were visibly annoyed by this.

The whole event was a shambles and the clear impression was that London Midland didn’t know what it was doing.   I would have a number of questions:

(a)   when the decision was made to run the 0846 from Euston, nearly 30 minutes late, why didn’t London Midland know then that they wouldn’t run the train beyond Northampton?

(b)   When they did decide this, presumably sometime around 0945, why was the information changed to say it was only 4 cars?

(c)   Why was the train announced as cancelled only 2 or 3 minutes before it actually turned up?   Why was no announcement made at Milton Keynes to say it wasn’t cancelled?

(d)   Why were the passengers on the train kept in blissful ignorance of the early termination at Northampton until after the train had left Milton Keynes when clearly had they known earlier, some of them, at least, could have completed their journey earlier by changing at Milton Keynes?

Like on so many occasions, a difficult set of circumstances, managed probably as best as was possible, was let down badly by atrocious communications at all stages.   The operators don’t want to tell people anything until they can say anything definitive.   Why can’t they adopt some of the airlines’ approach of saying, for example, departure delayed, next information at 0845, or whatever?

My return in the afternoon was better.   Even then there were still knock on delays, to be expected, but, again, communication was not great.   The 1450 from Northampton was marked as 1452 when I arrived at 1445, delayed, the tannoy said, awaiting a member of staff.   Then this changed to 1456 and we were told that the train would be delayed attaching another portion to the rear.   Then the display changed to ‘delayed’ (always a bad sign).   The train arrived at about 1453 and left at 1457 with the indicators still saying ‘delayed’.When staff know what’s going to happen it looks as though the first thing is to put things into operation and then start telling passengers.   It should be the other way round.   The first thing to be done is to tell the passengers, then start to make it happen.⨪

Real time information - fact or fiction

Just less than 25 years ago, the first dot matrix indicators giving real time information appeared on the underground.   And what a novelty they were.   Now, we can't do without them or without the other pieces of real time information we get on the web, on twitter and elsewhere.

But they do lull us into what is sometimes a false sense of security because we believe they are accurate.   At Chilham, where I wait for the train each morning, the indicator usually says my train will arrive 'on time'.   Sometimes it does.   Other times it can be anything up to 5 minutes late.   So we all get out our smartphones and consult our various apps and websites to decide what 'on time' means today.

Even the web based information isn't perfect and a frequent outcome shows the train has left Canterbury West 2 minutes late - having been 2 minutes late up the line - but is still forecast to be on time at the next stop, Chartham, only 5 minutes run from Canterbury.   How anyone seriously expects the train to shave 2 minutes off a 5 minute run escapes me.

On other occasions we see 2 minutes late at Canterbury West, on time at Chartham and 2 minutes late at Chilham.   And the train still turns up anything between on time and 5 minutes late.

Well, you may say, what's 5 minutes between friends (or even passengers, sorry, customers).   According to the definitions, even 5 minutes late is still, strictly, 'on time'.   But it does matter because it damages the confidence in the information provided overall.

On occasions of more widespread disruption, the system collapses entirely and perhaps that's not surprising.   But it still produces false positives.   During the snow, last winter, we regulalrly saw trains posted as 'expected on time' and time would come and go with no sign of any train.   And then that train would dissappear off the display.  All the time, a more detailed interrogation of the website showed that the train was not running at all, had never started and was, in effect, cancelled.   (I wonder how that shows up in train performance statistics.)  But most passengers won't do that more detailed interrogation, and why should they need to?

Vince Lucas helpfully told me that the system at Chilham was put in on the cheap on the basis that something is better than nothing, but that it couldn't be as reliable as information at bigger stations.   He is almost certainly right that something is better than nothing, but our expectations need to be managed better if we can't wholly rely on the information provided.

It's a hoary old question if bad information is worse than no information, but we have to give much greater priority to minimising errors and discrepancies and thinking how we get across the limitations of the systems.   A pretence of accuracy which simply damages any confidence in the system isn't the right answer.

Nightmare Journeys?

We all have nightmre journeys.   Most of them get talked about with riends and family and then forgotten.   All too often, as users, we experience things as part of nightmare journeysthat the providers don't realise are important or even exist.   I want to use this occasional blog to outline these - and get the frusration out of my system.

At the same time, there's just a remote chance that some service provider will see a point and maybe, just maybe, a light will flash onand something will change.   Sometime.   (Well, it's nice to dream).

At the same time, nothing is ever a total nightmare and if good things come out, that's worth saying, too.

This will all be about my journeys, mainly in London and teh South East, plus further afield in Europe.   If there's anyone out there, I hope you find it interesting.