West Coast Main Line

Won't be long until passengers start calling the consortium First Genitalia.

First Grope

A bit disappointed with this as Virgin provided a good service in my opinion-not sure this might also have some political motivation around Branson.He’s not best pleased but he did fail on the East Coast which is now in public ownership.

Looks like Stagecoach have a hole in the Pension Fund and were omitted from tendering.

It is good that we have had a change.

At the moment, travelling costs by train are putting us back into cars.

Family of four return to London no advance booking, is ridiculously expensive.

The fare and ticketing system, made Ryanair look like Andy Pandy.

It shouldn't cost £125 to book a return ticket to London.
That is too expensive for a train crammed with hundreds of people, whoever operates it.

Try the East Coast-Newcastle to Kings cross first class is around £450!!Full of civil service people.

There was a student who flew to Mallorca,spent a day there then caught a flight back to Newcastle-still cheaper than the train.

CCU wrote: What would you say is a fair fare to London?

Walk-up, on the day...

£75

Well an open return from Newcastle first class is £498zIts £501 from Carlisle to Euston.

I’m in Mallorca and flying back tomorrow-£65.

I personally think they should do away with first class as the coffee and tea and a sandwich is the only difference-plus a bit of leg room.So basically you are being ripped off and would be better offering more space so more carriages.

Yet they still struggle to make money allegedly

Since East Coast was nationalised, standard has definitely fallen with staff now happy to sit in empty seats in first class because they can.Im not a snob but paying £498 for a seat and then sitting next to someone getting a free ride is not good enough.In the old days you got silver service, papers and as much drink as you could get down your neck in 3 hours

Train fares should be like taxi's, fixed minimum charge, then per-mile decreasing over long distance.

No off peak/peak etc, that is a further rip-off, as most travel on the same train !! At Carlisle we pay peak rate for every journey.

If we are serious about climate change, then we need to get cars and freight off the road, and onto the rials, we need new railways, new technology and investment. The same locally.

I have never got the reasoning of three or four first class coaches on the West Coast line, what's that all about ?

CCU wrote: Last time I was in first class from Carlisle to London, I had a cooked breakfast by Penrith, Bacon Rolls offered around Crewe too. Couple of drinks on the later part of the journey and soft drinks/snacks as much as you wanted. Was also a couple of papers available.

Couldn’t fault it in fairness!

It should have been 5* for £350.00 extra if you got an open return...........

Was it soft pink bog-roll in the loo, and did it smell of fairy dust ?

CCU wrote:

thesilentone wrote: I have never got the reasoning of three or four first class coaches on the West Coast line, what's that all about ?

Demand, simply. Not so much further north, but definitely from Preston onwards.

An 11 car Pendolino has 3.5 coaches of First, I’d reduce it to 2.5 (The other 0.5 is Staff prep area etc)...

Well they must all get off before London then, because they are always empty.

I always think there needs to be a radgies section for Scotsmen drinking Buckfast Wine and hen dos and then an alcohol free civilised area.
Then you can have a premium class area for those with money to burn.

thesilentone wrote:

CCU wrote:

thesilentone wrote: I have never got the reasoning of three or four first class coaches on the West Coast line, what's that all about ?

Demand, simply. Not so much further north, but definitely from Preston onwards.

An 11 car Pendolino has 3.5 coaches of First, I’d reduce it to 2.5 (The other 0.5 is Staff prep area etc)...

Well they must all get off before London then, because they are always empty.

That quite simply isn’t the case. As a previous regular user of the west coast into London (2-3 times a week) I can safely say that on every arrival and departure that first class was pretty much full.

Must have been when we had steam trains then...............

It seems the advance deals are more expensive and harder to find especially on the fast trains. Used to travel to London and back often for less than £50 return.

My Orient return ticket would have been £105 if it hadn't been for the wife's Carlisle Living Card discount. That's slow train down Friday and fast train back Sunday and booked on the day they became available.

My recent train travel experience, also listening to fellow traveller comments: scores out of 10
Saturday: Penrith – London (Virgin) 8
Tuesday: East Midlands: London – Sheffield (East Midlands) 5
Tuesday: Northern: Sheffield – Barnsley (Northern) 3
Wednesday: Leeds – Carlisle (Northern) 2 and that score was based on the friendly staff and the bloke who delivered the refreshment trolly.

£500 first class? Who pays that?

I've got a deal a couple of times where you can upgrade to first for an extra 10 or 20. You make it up in snacks and lack of scummers. Plus if you're leaving from a big station you get access to a 1st class lounge. Be careful on weekends though cos they shut them early.

If you are on the ball and get the best deal, than fair play, but it shouldn't be like that , in my opinion.
It's fair enough that you should save money by booking in advance rather than just rolling up 5 minutes before he train is due to leave but having to book 12 weeks in advance etc is just a pisstake, i'm sorry , but it is. It's a [censored] train journey not a ticket for La Scala.

£3 on the day increase sounds fair to me. The government need to decide what they want though. If it costs over £200 for a family of 4 to travel to London by train or £80 by car there'll be a good ammount would take the car.

London and back is 600 miles and you want it for £75? 12.5p per mile?
Good luck with that.

thesilentone wrote:

CCU wrote:

thesilentone wrote: I have never got the reasoning of three or four first class coaches on the West Coast line, what's that all about ?

Demand, simply. Not so much further north, but definitely from Preston onwards.

An 11 car Pendolino has 3.5 coaches of First, I’d reduce it to 2.5 (The other 0.5 is Staff prep area etc)...

Well they must all get off before London then, because they are always empty.

Do you ever post anything that’s factual and accurate?
I travel quite regularly and it’s always full, both ways.
By the time you’ve walked down from the back of the train,1st will have emptied

A brief history in advance fares:
BR started them (APEX) as an opportunity to fill seats on lesser used trains (ie middle of the day etc)
At privatisation, fares were divided up between operators ( day for example London-Glasgow) Now, you would think Virgin would get all of the money of these tickets sold, but no, you can of course travel up the East Coast from Kimgs Cross or change at Preston for TPE. As such, Virgin would, for example, get 80% East Coast 10% and TPE 10%. Now, if Virgin were to sell an advance ticket, valid only on their train, then they get 100% of that fare.
So say someone buys a London- Glasgow for £120, Virgin get £96. If they sell an advance for £100, they get all £100. Poor example, but that’s how it works.
All advance fares are quota’d by some very sophisticated software, so you’re unlikely to get any cheap fares on 05:43 as it’s solidly booked every day, but more likely on 11:49, say.
Another by product of the dash for cash is ‘OCRATS raiding’ whereby train companies start new routes to gain from the afore mentioned share of fares (for example Virgin running to Shrewsbury, so they would now get 10% of all Birmingham- Shrewsbury revenue, when they only run one train a day)

it was £180 ish up and down in the day 5 50 from Carlisle that got you into Euston at 9 05 then a return about 4ish got you back about 730ish (5 years ago)I had to do that every month for years when I had meetings in London

Taffy-P wrote: it was £180 ish up and down in the day 5 50 from Carlisle that got you into Euston at 9 05 then a return about 4ish got you back about 730ish (5 years ago)I had to do that every month for years when I had meetings in London

Yeah yeah YOU should have been putting out fires instead of wasting time in meetings, that very day my smoke alarm went off because I burnt some toast but you were too busy lording it up in London to deal with it etc etc

If you need a smoke alarm or a full fire safety visit I can arrange it for you even though I retired on 31st July after 27 years

Taffy-P wrote: If you need a smoke alarm or a full fire safety visit I can arrange it for you even though I retired on 31st July after 27 years

As you could probably guess pal I was only joking but I do appreciate the offer.

And also thank you for your service, the amount of lives that you must have saved must be enormous in 27 years.

I once worked for The Ambulance Control in the planning bit as a lad and I fully respect what the Police, Ambulance and Fire fighters do totally, the commitment is amazing.

Enjoy your retirement pal as you have deserved it.

Whoever predicted it’s going to court, well done.According to the Times anyway

This was back in April, he got into bed with the wrong partner ?

"Sir Richard Branson has said Virgin trains could disappear from Britain’s railways by the end of the year after more than two decades following the government’s decision to block the renewal of its West Coast franchise.

The Department for Transport has barred Stagecoach, Virgin’s joint venture partner, from bidding for three new franchises – including West Coast – in a row over rail staff pensions."

High Street wrote:

thesilentone wrote:

CCU wrote:

thesilentone wrote: I have never got the reasoning of three or four first class coaches on the West Coast line, what's that all about ?

Demand, simply. Not so much further north, but definitely from Preston onwards.

An 11 car Pendolino has 3.5 coaches of First, I’d reduce it to 2.5 (The other 0.5 is Staff prep area etc)...

Well they must all get off before London then, because they are always empty.

Do you ever post anything that’s factual and accurate?
I travel quite regularly and it’s always full, both ways.
By the time you’ve walked down from the back of the train,1st will have emptied

Bxxxcks, they must jump off and run like hell, as I am usually off coach U pretty smartish (the next one along) by the time I walk past 1st, they are all usually empty.

Maybe they all got off at Warrington..........

That will be your indicator that you are running late, quicker to walk

High Street wrote: London and back is 600 miles and you want it for £75? 12.5p per mile?
Good luck with that.

Not really. Obviously I’d expect to pay a premium as it’s easier but there has to be a tipping point that would make people like myself that doesn’t mind driving take the train instead if they are serious about reducing car numbers.

It's the big range of prices that hack me off.
Friends and family and you can get to London for £40. Full price £110 ish.
No reason for such a discrepancy, apart from they can.
Oh for the days with Branson's suggestively (or stupidly) named foursomes we used to use for the England games.

There was a train enthusiast in Carlisle station last night, filming what I assume was the last Virgin service to leave Carlisle.
Problem was there were several groups of pissed up lasses mobbing his camera and spoiling his romantic moment.
He wa going ballistic.
Felt a bit sorry for him, but they meant no harm and it was quite amusing.