Grand Central Guignol
James Forsyth 1:38pm
At the risk of drawing a sneering response from the Rail Minister Tom Harris, I’d like to have a little moan about my train journey yesterday. I spent the Bank Holiday weekend up in the Lake District and seeing as it takes an absolute age to get down the West Coast line on a Sunday or a Bank Holiday, we decided to go for a walk in the Dales and then have me catch the train from Northallerton to London. The 18:36 from there was meant to get me into London at 21.10.
When I arrived at the station, though, I was told that the train on which I was booked and had a seat reserved on had been cancelled. Apparently, Grand Central had insufficient rolling stock to run the service which they’d be selling tickets for—the man at the station told me they were cancelling one in three trains. As I had a Grand Central ticket I couldn’t just take the next direct train to London. Instead, I had to take the train to York and once on that train I’d be issued a ticket to get me from York to London.
The problem with this scheme was that the York to London train they gave us tickets for was already—and unsurprisingly for a Bank Holiday—full. So if you had been booked on the train from North Allerton to London you had a snowball in hell’s chance of finding a seat.
All of us who had been let down by the incompetence of Grand Central spent the two and a bit hours journey to London trying to find a bit of a corridor to squat down in, which is hardly the kind of service that we’d paid for, and arrived at King Cross just over forty minutes late. I’m all for people travelling by rail, it is obviously greener than us all adding to the Bank Holiday traffic on the roads, but the actions of train companies like Grand Central make it a difficult and uncomfortable experience.
Image credit: David Ingham
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Comments
Tom Harris
May 27th, 2008 2:44pmTory toff. Why don't you get your manservant to drive you in the Bentley?
James Forsyth
May 27th, 2008 2:49pmSomehow, I suspect that's not the real Tom Harris!
Darren Solomons
May 27th, 2008 2:56pmI wonder if you looked at the 1st class carriages whilst being squeezed like cattle in Standard ? Perhaps Mr Harris (or someone of his ilk) where sitting down quite comfortably ?
john
May 27th, 2008 2:58pmThe remarkable thing is that this has all been going on for so very long. Seven years ago despite the amusing advice of the ticket office not to travel on a Sunday (when else would you go back to work after the weekend?) I used to experience a weekly mixture of short hop bus and train legs of my 40 mile journey, mixed weekly in unpredictable ways, one unpredictable leg being Leeds - Sheffield, one of the shortest distances on the earth's surface.
We cannot get this right, I do not think we are ever going to get this right and there is clearly no will ever to get this right.
Rail travel is surely no longer a serious element in the transport resources of this country. What a waste, what a shame - in all senses of the word.
Andrew Firth
May 27th, 2008 3:28pmMoaning. The British public is apparently notorious for a perspective that is a grey as today's May skies. And yet on the subject of railways it is my experience that we are currently putting up with unrivalled discourtesy and disregard. We all have our stories, but I fancy mine has a sinister edge. I am a commuter. I have a season ticket (an expensive one). And I am not able to take advantage of First Class accommodation on my train - there isn't any provided. As I take the train each morning from early in its run, I am usually able to find a seat. Last week, however, I was disappointed to find that there was not one to be had. This was becasue the normally eight-car train was cut to four. Six stations later we were all packed like sardines. I am surprised that, in such an age of health and safety consciousness, no-one has yet sued the company for encouraging the spread of disease amongst closely packed passengers. The remarkable thing was, no-one complained! We didn't even comment on the more-than-usually sociability of the occasion; we just cast eyes to the floor and suffered in silence. While apologies were transmitted by the Guard, the real issue is inexcusable. Rail companies are now cutting margins so far back that customer satisfaction is decreasing as a priority. This in a marketplace where choice is seldom now an option. Crowding more and more commuters on to carriages made for half their number is simply not acceptable, and will be increasingly the case in future. What happened to Mr Prescott's Integrated Transport Strategy, pray? I only hope we start complaining.
Water
May 27th, 2008 3:31pmOn those occasions when their service goes smoothly though it is truly superb.
KB
May 27th, 2008 3:36pmRail isn't as environmentally friendly as most people think (http://travel.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/travel/article2067255.ece).
Ian C
May 27th, 2008 3:44pmYou are far too nice Water! I used to think quite regularly of those poor sardines doing this, day in day out as I used to.
Today I moaned about the grey east wind blowing rain down the channel at my front door, and tried hard to be bothered to walk the dogs on the cliffs before work (and quite alot of blogging at the moment thanks to enforced deferral of work plans)! And the alternative... joining that extra 10m vehicles on the roads since Prezza announced we could sack him if he failed. If only....
Drew
May 27th, 2008 3:47pmIn fairness to Grand Central - who have taken on the GNER/NXEC franchisees under the "open rails" policy - they have been systematically stuffed by their Rolling Stock Company since inception. The Roscos are the real villains of the entire rail privatisation scandal - unaccountable profiteering at its worst. Only when train operating companies own their own trains will this sort of bollocks cease.
Will
May 27th, 2008 4:03pmContact the Office of Fair Trading regarding their new Unfair Trading Regulations, March 2008. These bam outright:
Making an invitation to purchase products at a specified price, without disclosing any reasonable grounds that they will not be able to supply those products. Passing on materially inaccurate information with the intention of inducing the customer to acquire the product at less favourable conditions.
Water
May 27th, 2008 4:06pmWhy thank you Ian, compliments are terribly hard to come by these days (I think they may have some existential connection to the economy). Though it comes as no surprise that you have an affiliation with them because (as the name states) they are truly grand when things go to plan.
Water
May 27th, 2008 4:27pmThis said Ian the only reason I blog so often is due to the fact that I just finished University (which is great as it finally gives me time to read the wonderful words of Rod Liddle).
Thomas Widmann
May 27th, 2008 4:36pmI agree people should start complaining formally instead of just moaning amongst themselves. When Arriva started running trains in Denmark, they got so many complaints that the Minister of Transport personally threatened them with tearing up their contract, and they suddenly started performing adequately.
Also, I think the punishment for the companies should be much more severe. For instance, be forced to pay taxi fares for anybody whose connexion has been cancelled or seriously delayed.
billy
May 27th, 2008 5:25pmWell, dearie me. Welcome to the real world of rail travel.
Still, now a lournalist has been troubled perhaps somebody will take notice.
Commondog
May 27th, 2008 7:29pmIs that a train in the photograph?
Perry, reluctant passenger
May 27th, 2008 9:49pmBritish Rail, - or whatever it calls itself : a metaphor for UK plc.
Deranged, failing, pretentious, occasional flashes of inspiration which are quickly checked and controlled, a plethora of platitudes, and complicated prostitution to vested interests.
Best avoid if possible.
And long ago it was, - and still could, and should be, - so different.
James
May 27th, 2008 10:32pmDrew is quite right, the fault lies very often with the companies that own the trains, rather than the operators like grand central. These companies have often paid off the cost of the trains many times over, but won't readily re-invest in new rolling stock, preferring instead to funnel their cash back to their owners, some of whom are big banks. The government really needs to get a grip on this issue.
Athesius the Facilitator
May 28th, 2008 9:37amLuxury, whilst serving in the Fleet Air Arm in the seventies I once went from Kings Cross to Aberdeen standing in the corridor. It was the middle of winter. I was "nithered" for the whole 10 hours journey.
Commondog
May 28th, 2008 11:19amAthesius the Facilitator.
Wasn't there a roof rack for wafus?
TGF UKIP
May 28th, 2008 11:28pmWho on earth are Grand Central? Northallerton is my local station for my one trip a year to that alien hellhole called London and in previous years the trip was always made via GNER and this year via National Express Eastern. Grand Central New York I've heard of but Grand Central Northallerton is definitely a new one to me.