Stop Press - 0900 Saturday - all First Great Western "High Speed" services, i.e. everything from Paddington are currently CANCELLED to inveestigate cracks in the suspension of all their 800 series Hitachi trains.
LNER and Hull Trains may well have the same problems.
Cancellations to services at London PaddingtonDue to more trains than usual needing repairs at the same time at London Paddington fewer trains are able to run on some lines.
Impact:
Train services running to and from this station have been cancelled. Disruption is expected until the end of the day.
Owing to the short notice unavailability of carriages which form our High Speed train services there will be no train service or only an extremely limited service with no alternative means of transport available for throughout journeys, in either direction, on the following routes :-
London Paddington - Swindon - Bath Spa - Bristol Temple Meads.
London Paddington - Swindon - Bristol Parkway - Newport - Cardiff Central - Swansea.
London Paddington - Reading - Taunton - Exeter St Davids - Plymouth - Penzance.
London Paddington - Reading - Oxford - Evesham - Worcester - Great Malvern - Hereford.
London Paddington - Reading - Swindon - Gloucester - Cheltenham Spa.
INTENDING CUSTOMERS FOR THESE ROUTES ARE ADVISED NOT TO ATTEMPT TO TRAVEL
In those areas such as Paddington / Reading / Didcot Parkway / Oxford / Bristol & Exeter local areas / Cardiff - Portsmouth and around 75% of Plymouth - Penzance services will continue to operate.
Avanti West Coast and West Midlands Railway are conveying passengers via any reasonable route until further notice. Arrangements have been made for Great Western Railway rail tickets to be accepted for these journeys.
L N E R Headline is similar
Logos And Liveries - Block 1
In each case, the answer will start from top left and rotate clockwise
Travel West Midlands celebrated Outer Circle route 11.Route 11 was Europe's longest urban bus route. It first came into existence as two routes in 1923: route 10 ran from King's Heath to the King's Head (Hagley Road) via Cotteridge, and route 11 from Six Ways Erdington to Acocks Green and Moseley. The route was first operated as a complete circuit on 26 April 1926, the idea being to better link the suburbs of Birmingham, as most routes at that time travelled in and out of the city.
It circumnavigates Birmingham via the A4040 apart from a small deviation via the B4182 and A4030 in Bearwood. It is mainly operated by National Express West Midlands w both clockwise and anti-clockwise directions as routes 11C and 11A.
Although fbb has visited Brum on many occasions her has never ridden any part of the 11A/11C much to his chagrin and sorrow. There are very good biological reasons why the old man might not be capable of doing it in one go these days!
It is one of very few genuine Circular services in the UK
Bath Bus Company A4 to Bristol AirportUnlike many Airport services, it is a "normal" bus route happily carrying intermediate passengers.
The Bards Bus X20
When it isn't carrying the ghost of William Shakespeare ...... this is Johnson's X20, currently running every hour between Coventry and Stratford upon Avon. If the name Catherine de Barnes is unfamiliar to you, she is one of the drivers of the X20.
Oh, no she's not. Catherine is a community served BY the X20.Catherine-de-Barnes (known to locals as Catney) is a village within the Metropolitan Borough of Solihull in the English county of West Midlands. It is situated about 2 miles (3.25 km) east of Solihull town centre, in the civil parish of Hampton in Arden, and 2 miles west of Hampton village. Its name originates from Ketelberne, the man who owned it after the Norman Conquest in 1066.
So Catherine was a bloke!
Burnley Bus MainlineThis is a group of services whose core runs from Burnley yo Nelson and Colne but sprays out to many different destinations at the ends, notable Clitheroe, Accrington and Keighley. The advertising has been simplified in recent years into two groups, viz Burnley to Clitheroe and Accrington ...... and Burnley to Barnoldswick, Trawden or Keighley (off map to the right).In the past it seems that anything could run to anywhere!
Burnley Bus Pendle WizzOnce an hourly extension of the Witchway, these journeys became simply a once an hour trip between Keighley and Burnley.
Logos and Liveries Block 2
Go CornwallBus services operated by Go Ahead Plymouth Bus under contract to Cornwall Council. Roger French has been to sample the County's "One service for all", that is "One service" that completely ignores First Kernow's commercial routes. There is also a Go Cornwall web site which completely ignores First Kernow's commercial routes. There is also a Go Cornwall journey planner which completely ignores First Kernow's commercial routes and does not include rail!
Generally the "One service" information simply isn't.
It is useless.
Uncle Roger rode on several Go Cornwall routes and found passenger numbers pitiful.
Not the best news for the Council's grand scheme.
Stagecoach MegdekkaA preserved "heritage bus" which began its life trumpeting its high seating capacity. It had seats for 110 but the design was not developed. It remained a one-off.
First Glasgow 38A while back First's routes in Glasgow were tweaked and twiddled to provide citizens with an easy to remember set of services along main corridors.
38s run from three termini in the south of the city ...
... to four termini in the north east.
This brings a brave new interpretation to the word "simplification".
When the "simplification" was introduced there were almost a dozen suffix letters to account for school time diversions and short workings. fbb has travelled from Giffnock to Easterhouse, but recovered fairly quickly.
Harrogate Town ServicesTransdev introduced gantry charged electric buses on the town's three remaining town services.
Occasionally they venture much further afield as here on the 24 to Pateley Bridge.
Hopefully the flateries did not go batt!!!
Go North East CoasterOne of many brands developed by Go Ahead, this one runs from Metrocentre to Whitley Bay, currently at three buses an hour.
A close examination of the "official" route map ...
... reveals inadequate details of the difference between 1A and 1B at Lobley Hill.
Hardly helpful!
Blocks 3 and 4 tomorrow.
All Lit Up In The Toiletsfbb was aiming to install lights in the building - an ancient Tri-ang model dating from the late 1950s - which stands at the outer end of his new platform canopy.
It all looks promising, but getting to this stage was, as they say, trying!
More tomorrow.
Farewell ...A carriage from an Isle of Wight ex-Tube train awaiting its destructive fate at C F Booth's scrapyard in Rotherham. It's a bit late now but, in view of the recent news about their much delayed replacements, you wonder whether they should have kept them!
On Your Way?
On a shiny Gatwick Express train to Gatwick Airport, sadly moved to Royston in Hertfordshire. Actually, it looks as if the GatEx branding has been removed.
And Hello - Soon!Rear end branding has now been applied to the Lands End Coaster buses. It is good to see buses advertising themselves rather than other products.
First Kernow is really having a go this year, aiming much of its marketing at tourists and day trippers. The key is going to be the cost. Traditionally First buses have been far too expensive for a day's travel, either using individual fares or a day ticket. If it remains pricey, the day trip market may not materialise.
Final batch of answers and more variety tomorrow.
Next Variety blog : Sunday 9th May
There were three Megadekkas altogether, the other pair, F201/2 FHH, going to Cumberland, where I think they were intended for Sellafield works journeys. These had 96 coach seats, and later gravitated to Scotland.
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ReplyDeleteHmmm ... I don't like the 800s with their poor ride and awful seating, and I'm tempted to blame the current debacle on the DfT specifying these trains. However there have been problems with new trains before, leading to complete temporary withdrawal: the "Britannias" whose driving wheels slipped on their axles, the Glasgow Blue Trains whose transformers blew up, even the "Kings" which (when not new) all had to be withdrawn due to fatigue cracks in their bogies. And we won't even talk about the many problems with early diesels! The difficulties now are (a) that we have a standardised train design across so much of the system and (b) few trains in reserve, even assuming they are type-approved to run on the affected lines.
ReplyDeleteSouth Wales services seem to be running pretty well now - of course it's a reduced Covid timetable and there are probably no passengers! West of England not so good though.
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