My partner Deborah and I are going to Wales this weekend from London and I really really really tried to avoid driving there. But it has proved impossible because we are undertaking a complicated three legged journey that is not accommodated on the trains.
We are going for a birthday outing up a mountain in Macynlleth but also wanted to drop in on Deborah's mother who lives up the coast near Porthmadog. However, there seemed to be no trains between Mac and Minffordd, the nearest station to Deborah's mum's place. With her mum unable to drive long distances, that meant we would have had to take a bus up to Minffordd and then the train back from Blaenau Festiniog. However, that turned out to be a bus and meant that the return journey to London would take over six hours. Then, of course, no cheap tickets were available, which meant, essentially, we would have to buy two saver returns each, discarding half of both, and therefore the total travel bill would have been over £250 or so. (As an aside, it is shocking that when you go on to the Virgin website and try to buy a single, it fails to point out that it is cheaper to buy a saver return and discard the return bit).
We could not go all the way to Wales without seeing Deborah's mum, so I spent much time checking out possible other options, such as a car hire, but to no avail. So I'm afraid we are jumping in the car on Friday and coming back, along with millions of other people, on sunday evening, instead of spending many pleasant hours on the train.
It is the basic high price of rail fares and the lack of flexibility that is the problem. In Germany, if you have a bahncard, you can get a discount on all fares and the basic levels are lower, thus encouraging rail travel. Here, to get a good deal you have to book in advance and travel at times when the deals are available, which is generally off peak during the week, rather than at holiday weekends.
Public transport disarray means long drive
Tuesday, 23 October 2007
posted by Christian Wolmar at 01:08
13 Comments:
Christian
Of course the dreaded rail replacement bus services are never going to make a pleasant alternative, so that would put me off anyway – but – just a thought - fare wise did you consider the Freedom of Wales any 4 days in 8 flexi pass at 65 quid? – plus buying the cheapest tickets to / from the boundary points (not that there would have been much in the way of cheap tickets on a Friday eve and a Sunday eve – for reasons you will well appreciate – why sell cheap tickets when the services are going to be at their most crowded etc etc).
http://nationalrail.co.uk/promotions/0314490cc35ce74101d518784bce2d58.html
“Allowing 4 days rail and 8 days bus travel in that period.
Also valid on the Ffestiniog Railway and Welsh Highland Railway (3rd Class).
First Great Western, Central Trains, Arriva Trains Wales, Virgin Trains, Northern Rail”
Or checking the routing guide to see if an open return to (say) Bleanau F can be used out via Macyhlleth and Minnfordd and back via Bleanau (not that anyone from National Railway Enquiries is ever much good at answering queries that require a check of the Routing Guide, and not that this would overcome the rail replacement buses!).
Whilst your analysis is of course spot on, I hope you can ‘blog’ the experience of the tedious drive both ways on the M-Ways – dodging the locals on the narrow windy back roads of mid Wales and make some assessment of the time / cost spent driving!
Dan L
The "Saver" return at £58.40 from London to Minffordd is also valid via the Ffestiniog Railway via Llandudno Junction etc as well as via Machynlleth (according to RJIS.
The madness of weekend railway travel!!!
12 months ago I went from London back home to Glasgow on a Saturday....the WCML was shut between Crewe and Preston and the Pendolino had to be dragged all the way around the Manchester loop by a "Thunderbird" locomotive at a steady 20mph (this was on top of the usual weekend diversions via Birmingham); bringing the total journey time to an eye-watering 7 and a half hours!!
I did the same journey this Saturday past and exactly 1 year later the same engineering works are on the go, resulting in the same crazy diversion and equally dismal journey time.
Of course why didn't I go GNER via the East Coast instead?? Well first of all there were no cheap tickets - only full fare. Not only that but all London - Scotland trains on the ECML were diverted via Carlisle after Newcastle adding another hour onto the journey (all trains only went to Edinburgh - meaning that I'd have had to double back to Glasgow anyway, bringing the total journey time even longer than Virgin!).
So basically:
1. Why put the two main lines from London to Scotland partly out of commission on the same weekend??
2. What has took Network Rail so long that a shortish stretch of line has taken over a year to mend?
3. Driving the 400 miles would have taken less time than the train
My only consolation in this whole debacle was that on both the Virgin episodes - I, on both occasions only paid the cheapest Value Advance single fare at £17.50!! So guess I mustn't grumble. My heart goes out however to those who had to fork out the full £98 saver fare and then suffer the whole miserable ordeal!!
Rapidassistant - you should get yourself on the sleeper London to Glasgow - diversions make no difference when you have a bed! It's worth every penny (although your points are very well made).
anonymous - good point! And I do use the Caley Sleeper a fair bit when I can get a cheap deal...so can see what you are saying.
Trouble is it doesn't run on a Saturday evening which would have avoided the whole nightmare I talked about above!
Is that right? I did not know that. Does that apply to all the scottish sleeper services? And why?
Hi Christian - Yep its true and there are no services in either direction. as far as I'm aware it's always been this way since privatisation....not sure if it was the case under BR.
Why is anyone's guess - is it a way of enforcing the age-old Saturday night stay rule; my hunch is that it is simply a means of keeping the line free on a Saturday night for engineering works. FirstScotRail would probably be able to tell us!
And while we're on the subject of the Caley Sleeper...why is it the discount "bargain berth" fares only available directly from First ScotRail rather than on the central reservation system and all the portals into it (trainline.com, National Rail Enquiries etc).
It must be the only route on the entire network that operates in this way. Strange - but it's another level of confusion for the passenger.
Yes,a friend of mine noticed that a few weeks ago - that it was much cheaper to book directly with First Scotrail which had special offers not available elsewhere. It's a crazy railway.
Hi - I'm the anon that posted the Caley Sleeper thing in the first place - forgot to put my name.
I think Sleeper Services ceased on sat nights under BR as long ago as the late 1970s or early 80s. Goes for both Scottish and Cornish services and thus were not required by the new operators on privatisation.
It was said this was because too many 'bevved up' people were travelling on them after a Saturday on the football matches etc and it caused too much trouble. I expect this is not the genuine reason and that is about crew shifts and volume of sleeper cars in service / maintenance regimes for stock etc (and now track too).
Booking tickets: Online booking is powered by 'The TrainLine software' for all companies behind the scenes - whatever the front end looks like (and that software is obviously poor) - they never put sleepers on it from day 1 - I expect that is because they thought they would be withdrawn. I suspect it is also because you are required to select special berth options which are not required for seats (ie the software allocates you a rubbish seat on a day train with no view at random) and no one could be bothered to buy a software addition.
What is poor is that Scottish Sleepers and Cornish Sleepers have different booking systems even though they are now both operated by First Group ! Shambolic really.
If you want a good laugh try ringing National Rail Enquiries and seeing if they give you a sleeper option if you ask for the times of the last train to Glasgow for example.
Dan
Hi Dan,
Yep, been there done it got the T-shirt.....first time I went on the Caley Sleeper by booking on the trainline.com I foolishly thought that it automatically allocated me a berth. No; as you say it gives you a reservation on the service itself - but the site doesn't say anything about the fact that a bed is a £35 add-on and you are by default allocated a seat in the seated coach.....which is NO fun as I found out to my cost, being bumped around in a noisy old Mark 2 coach with duff heating, and the fact that ScotRail say that it is furnished to First Class standard is little consolation! To add injury to insult there was a notice to say that seated passengers are banned from using the lounge car.
Funny you should mention the "rubbish seat allocation". Every time I book the cheapest £17.50 single fare from Glasgow to Euston online I ALWAYS without exception get allocated seat A29 - which on a Pendolino puts you next to a window pillar (why do they have to be so damn thick??). I always used to think it was "punishment" for buying the cheapest ticket until I bought a full-fare saver at £94 and got plonked in the dreaded restricted view seat again. Bugger!
Gosh - that is bad - it is worse to be allocated a seated sleeper seat than for the software to allocate nothing at all! Talk about learning the hard way - my sympathies. (Not as amusing as my mate who turned up at Prestwick to fly RyanEasyWhatever jet to London without knowing he needed a passport and they would not let him on) - he ended up with the last seated place on the sleeper out of Edinburgh that night at full walk on cost!
I've stopped booking train tickets on line unless there is a serious discount and use my local station travel centre happily very close to my office - where they are happy to over ride the reservation system and book me my seat of choice. You can get a Virgin leaflet explianing which seats have tables and windows, and for other types of train I've made a personal note of the best seats - inspired by the idea of the 'Man in Seat 61' - that way I get cheap seats and best seats!
Dan
This might be of interest when booking trains. I recently bought a whole slew of tickets from GNER and Transpennine to cover a family visit this Christmas. As two of the five people involved have Student Railcards and two have Senior Railcards but not all are goining on each journey I finished up feeling like a trainee travel agent! However, an odd thing happened.
I started from Trainline in each case. No problems with GNER - tickets issued and appropriate discounts given. But with Transpennine no matter what combination was booked only one discount was given. I contacted Customer Services who at first denied the problem existed but after trying a dummy run for themselves agreed that it did. Their suggestion? I should use the tickets and then apply for a refund!
I am awaiting a reply from Transpennine and the Trainline, but the local Trading Standards Officer replied at once (I had sent them a copy for information) and asked to be kept informed. As I booked by credit card there is a chance of recourse through them as their regulations have been broken. We shall see.
Christopher Irwin.