If you need urgent support, call 999 or go to your nearest A&E. To contact our Crisis Messenger (open 24/7) text THEMIX to 85258.
Options
Essential support for under 25s
Essential support for under 25s
Take a look around and enjoy reading the discussions. If you'd like to join in, it's really easy to register and then you'll be able to post. If you'd like to learn what this place is all about, head here.
Comments
To time it within 2 minutes is just daft, and to be brutally honest all sorts of things can cause a 2 minute delay. I went for a train home from Leeds today (12:25 service to Manchester) it arrived at 12:20 - at 12:24 a disabled couple turned up wanting to travel - do you refuse to let them travel because it takes too long for them to board and would cause a two minute delay? They were rightly allowed to board and the train left at 12:27 - this is just one of many many hundreds of things that can cause an odd minute or two to be added to a journey.
Every single minute of delay is calculated - irrelevant of the cause.
About 10 train journeys a year to and from uni, with three trains on each journey? I don't think luck had anything to do with it. I just think they are constistantly at least a few minutes late. I can't count the times I'm stood by the door with my bag and the clock is already at the time it's supposed to be in, and there's another five minutes while it crawls into the station, and you're getting ready to run across 12 platforms with a massive bag. It did always involve Manchester Piccadily and Brimingham New Street though, so maybe that was the reason. As for the train being early, that should theoretically never happen, because it's not supposed to leave the previous station until the time on the timetable, so it'd have to burn it the rest of the way. So I can understand why it would never be early.
Trains can run early if there is cancelled track work or slack in the timetables, or on lines with request stops.
TransPennine Express are pretty good, and usually on time. Even better if you get the ones that don't stop at Dewsbury. The trains are nice and new, too (and fucking quick).
I've not really had any good experiences with Southwest Trains.
Virgin Cross Country are a windup. I think maybe the scrotes that travel on them (the express reading old buggers as much as the special brew swilling scuffers) are half the problem. The other half of the problem is the fact that they're too short, squished and smelly (and have to call at Birmingham :sour:).
Last time I went from Leeds to Southampton, going via London and faffing about with the tube was preferable to travelling across country. The GNER was great, but SWT were as shite as usual.
For long journeys I'd be happer with a car (first class on a train would be OK, too), especially if I had more than one item of luggage.
If they didn't call at Birmingham they'd be SO much faster
So, a lot of people don't like using trains. Migpilot and IWS have given lots of reasons why, such as it not being convenient to get to the station, or it not being cost effective compared to using their cars in that instance. That it's too costly.
What then, can be done to improve the railways? I remember Kermit saying that there is a black hole where money goes because the railway operators have to rent their rolling stock. Perhaps the government could make franchises last long enough to make it worthwhile for companies to OWN their rolling stock. Maybe that would make tickets cheaper. (and get better rolling stock too. GO 185s!)
I don't think expensive maglev trains are the answer, seems a bit of a gimmick really. Also, you can only have one on a track at one time, so not that good really.
Oh yeah, and would using trams rather than buses in city centres be a better idea? I know they are more expensive to set up, but the long term cost is probably better than buses...
Spooky that you were just dissing the Virgin trains!
No deaths thankfully.
And someone has got to sort Carrilion PLC out!!!!!
And a couple of days after their ban has been lifted!
What has this to do with Carillion?! There is no idea what has happened here yet. Initial suggestions suggest an obstruction on the line. I suggest we hope that the passengers and crew are OK, rather than randomly speculating rubbish!
Linespeed is around 100mph max in this area.
I'll admit that my having a go at Carillion PLC is unfounded at the moment, but since Carillion has built those lines, and their record with rail lines is so poor, and they've been banned on working on rail lines because of that... I thought I'd have a dig at them. And it's not just their rail section that's got a bad safety record.
And I have also said that thankfully there are no deaths, and with all due respect I am not talking rubbish.
Also, calm the fuck down.
:thumb:
That response was to flashmans post, get your knickers untwisted if you want to have a discussion.
And the 200mph is obviously hypothetical. :rolleyes:
No deaths yet - they have only cleared one carridge by all accounts.
Carillion were poor but there is nothing to say they were even involved
Shame on you.
I was having a dig at Carillion for other reasons, and have already said that there's no proof it was Carillion's fault for the crash. In fact it more than likely isn't. I was trying to point out Carillion's bad safety record ( I am sure you would agree if you were from Battersea) and in a roundbaout way suggest that the workmanship on our rail networks is less than satisfactory.
But to accuse me of milking something would imply some personal gain.
What would I gain by milking a crash like this?
That's downright wrong and insulting.
Again, you don't know me.
*shrug*
First of all, this is not a thread about train safety, you've somehow got it in your head that is after I numerously said I wasn't talking about that. Stubborness or what!!
Also, I posted the post after I read the news on yahoo mail, and you know what, I ain't gotta defend myself. You got things wrong, and you are not man enough to admit it so you are persisting in this fools errand.
Never mind, eh!
I think it's really peculiar it happened in the midst of this thread though.
Three people die in a car crash on the same night and the BBC tuck the story away on page 1,756.
And lets not even get into the hypocracy of you using the death of someone to have a go at the BBC, whilst willfully ignoring how anyone else covers the story, and then having a barny of someone else for using the story in another context.
Guess one rule for you, one rule for everyone else?
It was more to compare how much people care about the various deaths, and to show that, actually, railways are pretty damn safe, its just that media reporting is always negative and that makes people feel unsafe. One death in a train accident is headline news, so much so they go and interview the deceased's neighbours, but three dead in a car accident is filed away as "news in brief" on page 999. Even the National Express coach crash wasn't reported to this extent. It's no wonder that people feel completely safe in their car, but feel unsafe in trains.