Where "was" I the other evening when I "saw" these "next direct train" displays?   Is there anywhere missing from these displays that you feel could benefit from a later service?

1.


2.


3.


4.

 
no.3  -  Plymouth

and I think I have the other three but not the connection.....

 
4 is Shrewsbury.

 
2 - Southampton Central?

 

Yes ... I will admit that the "connection" is that they're the same type of question so perhaps a group rather than a connection.   

BUT ... there is a connection possible in that there are two stations which you can travel from to any of the places who's A to Z I have posted on a direct train.

Edit to correct the connection comment.

 

Nope!

Yes for the other two so far - Plymouth and Shrewsbury.

 

well maybe I got three then.....  rethink time

 
2 - Southampton Airport Parkway, complete with GWR's late evening route-retainer

 
OK, I'll go for Taunton and the connection is they all came from Taunton.
Taunton!

 
1 is Westbury.

 
I should have added that the place that obviously could benefit from a later service on that screen is Melksham.

 

Good try again - but no direct trains from Southampton Airport Parkway (nor Shrewsbury these days - thought there used to be) to Taunton.

 
All correct ... and, yes, that 22:33 to Portsmouth and Southsea is the "via Eastleigh" route learner. I don't understand, though, why it departs on time if you're headed for Eastleigh but 13 minutes late if you're headed beyond.

 

Cardiff Central and Newport

 

Looking at the history on RTT for this week, there are two paths for this train in the working timetable, one of which is in practice CANcelled. This seems to have produced a data glitch.

I would guess on the day in question, the one showing as 13 minutes late was genuinely running, and generating tracking data. Perhaps the other one hadn't been properly removed from the public timetable for whatever reason, but had been marked as terminating short at Eastleigh, thus generating an 'on time' service, having not produced any tracking data to flag a delay.

 

Yes ... and no (or, rather, not yet).  In May, the last Monday to Friday train moved from 20:06 to 21:16 off Westbury, and from 20:45 to 22:30 off Swindon, with both new trains doing well.  And then in September, for the first time for many years we have a Winter Saturday train later than the 18:35 - again bedding in very well (actually very well indeed!). We can now claim an "all day, every day" service all year.  But the service is both thin and unreliable, and that view is tacitly acknowledged by GWR

With an increase from a thin to an appropriate (hourly) service which runs reliably, passenger numbers using the service should rise fourfold (for twice the number of trains) and that would include a Westbury departure perhaps as late as 23:00, with a 23:50 service back from Swindon.  But whilst I might have hinted to Uncle Rishi's troops at times in the past that I would like this, he didn't include it in his largess on the cancellation of the northern leg of HS2, so we must keep asking.

 
Another interesting one tonight -



The 22:22 to Swansea moved from "expected 22:29" to "delayed" as I watched.  I wonder if there might be issues on the platform with insufficient capacity even on a Sunday evening.  And I love the first stop and first destination of the Hereford service