Last night, Lisa and I went to see the "Vox Beatles" at the Melksham Assembly Hall. We bought our tickets ahead of time, and saw the "Fab(ish) Four" performing many of the old hits. 

Had just one of the Fab Four turned up, in spite of all the prior advertising, we would have been very disappointed. But that's what GWR did to our train service during the day yesterday, and are doing again today. And this seems to be repeated weekend after weekend.

Here's the record for yesterday and the expectation for today:





The red services are CANCELLED (not calling at Melksham)

The solid mustard service were adveristed as RUNNING SHORT - the day trip to Weymouth train was advertised, a few minutes before it left, as only running to Yeovil for example (nice town - no seaside arcades, funfair, beach, ice creams, bracing sea air ...)

The speckled mustard services ran so DELAYED that they are flagged up by the rail indusrty as an embarrassment

Only the GREEN services actually ran (or as I write are expected to run) within a few minutes of the time that GWR are contracted to run them.

If just one Beatle had turned up, we might have enjoyed one song rather that twenty. Ironically, for a couple of numbers we did have a single performer - here is the Paul look-alike singing about Michelle.



Ironically, "Michelle" got me thinking of our MP for the best part of the last 10 years - Michelle Donelan, who has risen to be a cabinet minister.  And to wondering why she and her goverment have failed to provide a framework in which a reliable train service is provided.   I would describe our constituency as marginal this time and, whilst she has been very visible locally of late, I would hesitate to endorse her record on public transport.   Melksham service, unreliable and still very thin. Bradford-on-Avon through trains to/from London lost. Devizes Gateway business case failed to make the grade.  Town bus past our house down from 20 to 5 services a day. ...  Bus routed modernised to take in the Campus and Station - you must be joking. They HAVE provided the £2 bus fare which runs at least until December which slashed the cost of longer bus journeys - down from £6.50 to £2 into Bath.  Bus Back Better funding, initial tranche, award nothing to Wiltshire (or Gloucestershire or Hampshire) but £100 million to Bristol and Bath - cynic might suggest more urban and marginal areas.  A second and much smaller award has come our way and has allowed a re-instatement of a Sunday service on Chippenham - Trowbridge; evening service still missing so the last bus from Chippenham to Melksham is now 17:30 as opposed to 22:16 when Michelle was elected first.

Michelle declined an invitation to come and tell us of her plans and make her case at our hustings last week - one of only two such events in the constituency, and that was a blanket declining for any date at all.  But I do see lots of video clips of her going around and asking voters to judge her on her local record, which I will do; I can understand her desire to rally the faithful, but she might have done better giving a hour to talk to and be seen by 120 people last Wednesday who care enough to come along or tune in to hear statements and ask questions matters relating to the sustainabily of our area, country and planet.

I digress. But by this time next week, unless something really dramatic happens, we'll have a new government, and an MP who is not a member of the government party.  Whether that will be Michelle or Brian, I don't know.  And how we work with that MP, and the new government, will be intersting and something that I am thinking about already.

We need, first and foremost, a reliable public transport service

We need to adjust it to being appropiate for now and the future - going where people want when people want, at a suitable frequency, safely, welcoming, easy to use and cost effective.

And we need to consider it again net zero targets - so that's probably some form of electricficaion fuelled by renewables.

 
 So much for a ticket to ride !..

 

They did sing about Ticket to Ryde - after a joke about thinking it's probably still possible after Dr Beeching.  Actually the service there seem statistically almost as bad as at Melksham form my reading - except that when one gets pulled, the next one is just 30 minutes later.

 

 

I am just back after having a ticket to Ryde - where by chance I caught sight of the Red Arrows.







...and as we are a railway forum....