Railing against the system

Ann

Virgin has always been a disaster, as much in the customer relations department as in operations, and that's hardly surprising when you remember which 'philantropic', smug, self-important individual heads it.

I do hope Gilligan sues them for assault.

fulcanelli

Having used many different train networks around the world, including the wonderful Japanese system, I am simply ashamed of the state of trains in this country. What was once a pleasurable, and somewhat exciting, form of transport has degenerated into an extortionate, ineffecient, and uncomfortable experience. It's often cheaper to fly to Europe, and the service, as close to a cattle market experience as that may be, is often preferable to using the train in this country.

Symptomatic of customer service in general in the UK? Probably, and yet another example of people who really don't seem to give a damn about their fellow neighbour, their environment or, indeed, the society in general.

When will things finally start to change for the better in this country?

mckenzie

I had the same experience once, going back many years. I took my mountain bike on a train so I could do a bit of riding up the country, with the intention of getting the train back. Such an innocent and simple mistake to make, but I could see other passengers shaking their heads in disbelief at my stupidity for not reserving a place for my despicable piece of machinery.
I was made to look and feel a complete twat. Try it, it's very humbling you know, good for the soul. I don't use trains at all now, and certain things and people will not be pissed on no matter how much they are on fire.

dexey

You should try getting on when you have a reservation.
You need to know what type of train is due in and which end the bike compartment will be. Then you get just a couple of minutes to get it aboard while rail staff tut around you, but fail to help.
I've given up. My bike cost £1700 and my camping kit is near another grand. It is to precious to allow our rail operator's to transport it.

TGF UKIP

As one of those nasty, evil people called motorists, and even worse, a staunch disciple of the Satan Clarkson (except for his anti-americanism), I would have thought cyclists would wish to bear such earthly afflictions with the spiritual fortitude and forebearance that sainthood must confer on them.

THX1138

Well what do you expect Branson never puts the customer first his I'm for the little guy persona is a cynical marketing ploy.

His Airline colluded with it's main rival BA to rip off the customer over fuel surcharges & is now having to pay back $200M thanks to US courts

Derah Yasque

fulcanelli.

"When will things finally start to change for the better in this country?"

RIght after the war.

Robert

Gilligan should have cycled back to London. It's only about 100 miles.

THX1138

TGF I never would have put you down as Clarksonist.

cuffleyburgers

In the good olddays there was a guards van where such impedimenta could be stored and travelled with without any bother.

This is all symptomatic of the jobsworth culture which is so horrendously endemic in GB nowadays.

Anybody have any idea why this mediocrity should be so?

One idea - your photo appears to show a braod gauge locomotive; back in the days when Brunel was conjuring his miracles people were proud to work on the railway and it is said that many men were rejected on physical grounds that were subsequently accepted for the Army. That pride, almost a passion, makes people work well and is essential particularly for customer service. It is enough that people be interested in what they do. Unfortunately for reasons possibly related to poor education or the celebrity culture or a general malaise, this is rather rare nowadays. In fact you have to travel to find it, but travelling is such a misery...

Dave

Trying to get a reserved space on a Virgin or Cross Country (Arriva but DfT won't allow the to brand the group name - so people keep complaining to Virgin!) is nothing short of a scandal. On local trains the frequent service and the fact that many of the operators do not subscribe to the seat reservation ticketing software, means that a generally co-operative attitude exists with a few notable exceptions - suchas Southern who abdicate from any attempt to manage the situation which arises every June with the London to Brighton Bike Ride and shut off their entire network to cyclists. Needless to say this is widely ignored by the more sensible and pragmatic front-line staff who simply check that you are not going anywhere near Brighton or London, and SWT seem happy to deliver the riders to Clapham for the start!

Online booking for bike spaces was withdrawn by Trainline in Sept 2004 and replaced by car hire and hotel bookings and we've stumbled along with a totally inadequate system of ill trained or ill informed call centre staff and a limited range of ststions at which you can book the bike space driving callers to desparation - one passenger had 3 attempts to book his bike on a Virgin service eventually (a month after the attepted journey) discovering that because of a football match, seat reservations had been suspended (but on the trains concerned bikes do not go in the seated area - and space was available) so CTC the National Cyclists' Organisation has been pressing that a reservation should NEVER be compulsory but only an advisory measure to ensure that you can travel as planned - but even with this proviso the limit of 2 bikes introduced by Arriva on their Cross-Country services (where until December 2007 the published information, and user experience had 4 spaces - enough to book a family going on a cycling holiday.

Now Arriva is re-arranging the trains to put in more seats (fixed not fold-away) and ore luggage racks - which apparently cannot be converted to take a bike (as DFT specifies both these details) and we then have the MD of Arriva XC on record as saying he need to find new markets to fill all those extra seats when they are running around full of fresh air outside the times thay are apparently needed for passengers.

Typically off peak the trains have 20% or fewer seats filled -and when you count up the bikes you'll often find that cyclists make up 10% of the passengers (I travelled on the 07.13 Watton-Stevenage the other week, and there were 30 passengers and 3 bikes getting off at Stevenage (10% of the 7& loaded train).

Senibly laid out trains with flexible space, and staff who are prepared to manage bikes show amazing results. Linked to a local bike ride the Liverpool-Chester Sunday service had 6 coach trains inplace of 3 and one train delivered 47 cyclists and their bikes to Chester - between 60 and 70% of the passengers all contributing to the fares revenue.

CTC has called for all cyclists to write to Virgin and Cross-Country - and to fill-in the First GW cyclists questionnaire (they are deliveriung on cycling, along with Capital Connect).

The advice is not to write to Customer Services (the answers are more likely to make you even more angry), but to get a name or postbox on where your query will be properly dealt with.

Cross Country rightly got very nervous when we suggested that people should e-mail Andy Cooper and have suggested using Communications@crosscountrytrains.co.uk but to date all I have for Virgin is the MD's public invitation address Chris@virgintrains.co.uk (cylists e-mailing on the Highway code consultation crshed the DfT mailbox, and a previous row with Wessex Trains saw the Bristol office fax completely overloaded with cyclist complaints)

Don't neglect though that this state of affairs has at its root the DfT's franchise conditions and the DfT's specifications (micro management!) so there is also a need to lobby your MP to ask the Secretary of state or one of the 2 Ministers (Rosie and Tom) about resolving matters.

The recent CTC member survay revealed that an overwhelming number of respondents wanted to take their bike with the on leisure rides, and they are prepared to pay for a service (31 years after the 1977 free carriage offer) Typically individuals are taking £1000 and upwards of optional rail travel away from what are generally off-peak and lightly used services - in 1984 the Harris report estimated that the move to withdraw van space from passenger trains with the demise of the railway's role as a common carrier would lose then around £11m/year in business from displaced cyclists. I wonder how much potential business they are losing now?

Finally there are to be 5 ulti storey car parks built for SWT and more on East & West Coast Main Lines, typically costing at least £12,000 per space but only charged out at £500-£1000 per year which I beleive barely coveres the running costs - effectively subsidising those who drive to the station to n outrageous extent - typically 7 can be delivered by bike for the same land-take as one delivered by car, and the cost of the parking facilities are even more divergent (cycle shelter which fits onto a parking bay can take 10-12 bikes and often costs less than the parking bay to construct. this is a scandalous use of public money which has to be seriously questioned, especially as the enlarged ststion car parks in tuyrn feed incresed surges of traffic onto local roads and causing even more congestion than if the users had driven in preference to catching th trains!

Take a look at CTC's website for more detail.

TrevorH

The pompous arrogance of cyclists is amply demonstrated by 'Dave' and his long winded response.

Roads are for cars and trains are for pedestrians.

Bikes are of limited use - if Gilligan wanted to travel with his bike he should have stuck it on the back of his car.

Tian

Another example of the little Hitler's getting above their station. We are a nation of jobsworths.

John

I can't believe the drivel that the pompous, ignorant anti-cycling prats are spewing out here. But then, anyone who admires the Neanderthal jerk Clarkson needs professional help.

S N Barnes

Sorry Cuffleyburgers that is a picture of the Lion IIRC the original used on the Furness Railway the Northern bit of Virgin/TPE franchise ight be at the old Euston for the 150th birthday party?

The Lion starred incidentally in the Titchfield Thunderbolt and is still available for any future open access operator ...

THX1138

Cyclists pay for the road too matey.

Craig Strachan

“I was physically assaulted, called a f***ing c*** and a prick"

Who knew Alastair Campbell was working for Virgin Trains these days?

BigJohnnyY

Oh come on. This is Andrew Gilligan we're talking about. "Even one of my political enemies". Who does he think he is?

Virgin trains are terrible, but with this man working for them they can't be too bad.

Anan

Of course the staff don't want to help. No one in this country wants to help anyone else. It
is beneath the store-worker to find an item for a customer; it is beneath the checkout woman
to query a price for the busy mother. It is beneath the motorist to wait 2 seconds when the light turns green before hooting his horn at the driver in front. This is the result of 12 years of Labour. Along with, of course, children who can't read or write but who know how to kill another human being (usually an older child) without a second thought.

Say what you will about the ridiculous policies of Thatcher and the last Conservatives, the children growing up under them became lawyers, doctors and rich businessmen (the last of which, true to their working class backgrounds pumped their new found millions straight into the Labour party). In contrast, Blair and Brown's children became killers, rapists, and paedophiles; people who "care" more for levels of an invisible gas without which life would not have been possible, than about being decent, polite and kind. Gotta love socialism!

ray

Cyclists arenothing but a bloody menace.
remember the fighter pilots with enemy kills painted on their noses....that's me with bikers on me front bumper 'ah 'ah wishful thinking!

Austin Barry

I used to like cyclists when they wore normal clothes and bicycle clips. Once they moved into Lycra and helmets they became the most self-regarding, arrogant bunch of road users since the sedan-chair.

TGF UKIP

TrevorH, it's probably an even money bet that Gilligan, like many London based hacks and politicos, doesn't even have a car. Indeed, there's probably an increasingly fashionable number who don't have a driving licence either - and brag about it.

City boys who go to to city universities and go straight into the metropolitan politico/media bubble - and then tell the rest of Britain how to live.

EyeSee

In Milton Keynes we have 'redways' for people and cyclists. I actually feel pretty good when a cyclist gives a little ting on his bell and we move out of the way, receiving a courteous 'thank you' as he passes. The dopey ones still insist on riding on the grid roads, making life difficult and that little bit more dangerous for everyone. As all intelligent life forms know, speed doesn't kill, disparity of speed does.

Fergus Pickering

Cuffleyburgers, of course it's not a broad gauge locomotive. Think about it. And do remember that in those days the chance of getting killed or injured on the railway was much higher, what with exploding boilers and faulty signals and collapsing bridges. And do you know WHY the Tay bridge collapsed? Because they skimped on the materials, that's why. I think I'll go by Virgin trains.

Hysteri

erm - I can never understand why bicycles elicit such passion - it's just a bike for goodness sake!

And actualy - no they don't contribute to road use - last time I checked there is no road tax payable on a bike (but whisper it quietly lest that nice gentleman at No 11 hears!)

Mark Heenan

I won't forget in a hurry spending five minutes looking eyeball to eyeball through the window of a locked door of a stationary train at some jobsworth who refused to let me onto the last train back from London. Thanks to him I had to spend an entire evening trying to sleep in a cold station on benches seemingly designed specifically to prevent such use... Nice one - next time I'll drive.

Rush-is-Right

You can see the original article here.

And yes, while I think most cyclists are pillocks I am prepared to believe that Gilligan is an exception.

Rush-is-Right

Whoops, sorry the right link is here

John Lea

There is no more disgusting sight that seeing a grown man in full lycra gear.

THX1138

Hysteri -"And actualy - no they don't contribute to road use - last time I checked there is no road tax payable on a bike"

Neither do you road tax doesn't exist it's called Vehicle Excise Duty a specific Road Tax was abolished in 1936.

Cyclists like me pay income tax, Council tax, VAT & excise duty which is spent on many things including roads. It's absurd notion that some motorists seem to have that their is any connection , direct or in direct, between money raised by taxing various forms of road transport, and the cost of roads. All taxation income ends up in the same pot & is spent by Government on things we need including roads for cars & bikes, of which I have both.

cufleyburgers

Fergus Pickering

Sorry of course you are correct it isn't a broad gauger but what on earth has the Tay bridge got to do with Brunel?

Or is your point that it was was put up by some scottish jobsworth??

Charles

Mr Cuffleyburgers,

"Unfortunately for reasons possibly related to poor education ..."

A point well made, sir. When I first headed off for school, courtesy of Southern Railway, the "Schools" class of locos were still running. Each engine carried the name of a great British school - a fitting nexus between the world of education and the best of British engineering.

Good old days, indeed.

Liam Holland

I've always had a bit of a problem with Virgin Trains, but will try to use them more regularly from now on. Any outfit that describes Gilligan so succinctly, yet accurately, is alright in my books.

THX1138

SP- You always have a go at Monbiot but I'm wagering that you agree more with him more than you might think & with anything to with science more than "The Indefatigable defender of Liberty" Melanie Phillips" although I notice that she dropped off your blog roll recently, did you fall out?

A few examples where from your previous bloging I would expect you agree with George over Mel:

Man made climate change
MMR jab causes autism
Intelligent design (Mel states we are here due to an Intelligent designer)
Primacy of science & rational thought over superstition & religion

I don't want to second guess you but I would imagine that you probably would fall out with George on economics, The Middle East & the solutions to climate change & me too but he is always interesting, thoroughly well researched & controversial, just what I want in a columnist

Did you read his fisheries post last week brilliant & right

http://tinyurl.com/6ee5rx

& watch him put Mel to the sword on climate change 2.40 mins & 6.12 mins in.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=fubJLYm4JJk

THX1138

Doh wrong blog. Thanks Pete!