| Customers cannot travel on plans and promises. They need real trains Posted by grahame at 08:20, 25th September 2025 |     |
I am close to my wit's end in trying to promote the train service here in Melksham. Infrequent we can manage, planned engineering that closes the line with good notice is handleable. Service cancelled on the day will, very occasioanally, happen - but we have a problem that they happen far, far too often and without a robust, customer-friendly alternative. This has been going on for years - and meetings and plans and ideas have come to nothing - if anything, it has got worse.
GWR - our train operator - are meeting with the TransWilts CRP - our Community Rail Partnership - later today (I think) but as far as I'm aware no-one from the Melksham Community - certainly no-one who feeds back widely - is invited. They (or rather, their senior manager who is also a director of TransWilts) has offered us a meeting - which (copy below) I have accepted in my MTUG role, with the proviso that we need to move on from meetings to actually having trains routinely running as timetabled. Customers cannot travel on plans and promises, they need real trains.
Hi, [redacted]
Thanks for getting back with me.
I’m in agreement that some momentum is needed - but not just to “come up with an action plan” but for you (as the train operator) to implement that plan through to getting us a reliable train service that we can be almost-assured will turn up when it’s advertised, or within a quarter of an hour of that timetable. We have heard of actions plans and promises in the past, but still we have seen cancellation rates this summer of 11% (last 12 weeks) - in other words you (GWR) have failed to run over 150 trains.
From a passenger viewpoint, it’s even worse - it’s common for you to tell people (via your electronic systems) that trains will be cancelled at the start of their day, but then re-instate them, and then they don’t show up in your cancellation figures - nether do the customers who you have told in effect to “go away”. I was on a re-instated service last week that I would have expected to be carrying around two dozen passengers but apart from myself there were just four. That’s good for your company stats, but awful for the 20 people who have abandoned or changed their plans.
There are bound to be some issues, but I note that the consumer magazine Which? criticises airlines with a 2% cancellation rate … and you are five times worse - mostly due to lack of available staff or working trains which, surely, is something that rests on GWR and its suppliers shoulders. Comparing to the airlines, there ARE some things you get right and I would really regret having to check in at Melksham station 30 minutes before the train leaves, need a reservation, or have a tight luggage limit or extra charge for a decent window seat!
Please, [redacted], carry on with your industry internal meeting of Transwilts and GWR. And, yes, let’s set up a regular communication channel again - but as a means towards the end of an appropriate service (and part of that is one that people can rely on) and not just to kick the problem down the track. I was a founding board member of TransWilts as a Community Rail Partnership, and in those days the engagement with the general community was strong. The name remains the same, but with the changes in community rail as a whole, it has become a rail and local government offshoot, with “accredited” status and funding being traceable back to the same paymasters as GWR removing independence and localisation, and we (as general passengers) hear and see very little from it on the ground. I was asked if I would consider rejoining the board, but after careful thought sadly declined; it was requested that I refrain from expressing any critical views of organisations that have lost their way in providing reliable service for the general customers in Melksham apart from at board meetings and in my view the provision of a robust passenger service, and an ability to point out where it is failing with a view to helping improve things, is paramount.
On that view, let’s move forward. This summer, we took what I believe was the right decision in Melksham to NOT promote days out by train during the summer to newcomers to rail , on the grounds of a risk assessment that told us they were likely to be disappointed on the day, or dumped (with long delay) before they got to destination or home. Decision confirmed by occasions which kept occurring of horror stories. Can we get to a plan, and have you implement it robustly, for a service that we can help you promote, for 2026? We have an opportunity to reach a substantial segment of the residents of Melksham on 6th December when the Christmas lights are turned on - and a decision to make over the next few days as to whether to take the opportunity.
Should we take that opportunity? When are you available to meet to plan and move towards implementation?
Graham
Graham Ellis - graham@sn12.net
Links via https://www.sn12.net
07974 925 928 / 01225 708225
48 Spa Road, Melksham SN12 7NY, UK
Thanks for getting back with me.
I’m in agreement that some momentum is needed - but not just to “come up with an action plan” but for you (as the train operator) to implement that plan through to getting us a reliable train service that we can be almost-assured will turn up when it’s advertised, or within a quarter of an hour of that timetable. We have heard of actions plans and promises in the past, but still we have seen cancellation rates this summer of 11% (last 12 weeks) - in other words you (GWR) have failed to run over 150 trains.
From a passenger viewpoint, it’s even worse - it’s common for you to tell people (via your electronic systems) that trains will be cancelled at the start of their day, but then re-instate them, and then they don’t show up in your cancellation figures - nether do the customers who you have told in effect to “go away”. I was on a re-instated service last week that I would have expected to be carrying around two dozen passengers but apart from myself there were just four. That’s good for your company stats, but awful for the 20 people who have abandoned or changed their plans.
There are bound to be some issues, but I note that the consumer magazine Which? criticises airlines with a 2% cancellation rate … and you are five times worse - mostly due to lack of available staff or working trains which, surely, is something that rests on GWR and its suppliers shoulders. Comparing to the airlines, there ARE some things you get right and I would really regret having to check in at Melksham station 30 minutes before the train leaves, need a reservation, or have a tight luggage limit or extra charge for a decent window seat!
Please, [redacted], carry on with your industry internal meeting of Transwilts and GWR. And, yes, let’s set up a regular communication channel again - but as a means towards the end of an appropriate service (and part of that is one that people can rely on) and not just to kick the problem down the track. I was a founding board member of TransWilts as a Community Rail Partnership, and in those days the engagement with the general community was strong. The name remains the same, but with the changes in community rail as a whole, it has become a rail and local government offshoot, with “accredited” status and funding being traceable back to the same paymasters as GWR removing independence and localisation, and we (as general passengers) hear and see very little from it on the ground. I was asked if I would consider rejoining the board, but after careful thought sadly declined; it was requested that I refrain from expressing any critical views of organisations that have lost their way in providing reliable service for the general customers in Melksham apart from at board meetings and in my view the provision of a robust passenger service, and an ability to point out where it is failing with a view to helping improve things, is paramount.
On that view, let’s move forward. This summer, we took what I believe was the right decision in Melksham to NOT promote days out by train during the summer to newcomers to rail , on the grounds of a risk assessment that told us they were likely to be disappointed on the day, or dumped (with long delay) before they got to destination or home. Decision confirmed by occasions which kept occurring of horror stories. Can we get to a plan, and have you implement it robustly, for a service that we can help you promote, for 2026? We have an opportunity to reach a substantial segment of the residents of Melksham on 6th December when the Christmas lights are turned on - and a decision to make over the next few days as to whether to take the opportunity.
Should we take that opportunity? When are you available to meet to plan and move towards implementation?
Graham
Graham Ellis - graham@sn12.net
Links via https://www.sn12.net
07974 925 928 / 01225 708225
48 Spa Road, Melksham SN12 7NY, UK
| Re: Customers cannot travel on plans and promises. They need real trains Posted by grahame at 09:39, 25th September 2025 | |
From my Interrail log in July / more or less on time except where late arrivals noted
Melksham
to Chippenham - CANCELLED
to Paddington - 5 minutes late
to Liverpool Street
to Manningtree - 3 minutes late
to Harwich International
to Hoek van Holland
to Schiedam
to Den Haag
to Hengelo
to Osnabroek - 5 minutes late
to Hamburg - 25 minutes late
to Odense
to Copenhagen
to Gothenburg - (10 minutes late leaving, made up)
to Orebro - 40 minutes late
to Ludvika
to Mora - rail replacement bus, preplanned
to Ostersund
to Gullivare - 20 minutes late
to Narvik
