Northen Rail To Lose Franchise

[El Cid 220]

5 hours ago, Pettytom said:

The people to blame are Northern, nobody else.

How can a company run a good service when the Government say that they are getting new trains, then say no they are not, yes they are.

Who is to blame for that, Chris Grayling, worst ever transport minister?

[Pettytom 1]

37 minutes ago, El Cid said:

How can a company run a good service when the Government say that they are getting new trains, then say no they are not, yes they are.

Who is to blame for that, Chris Grayling, worst ever transport minister?

One thing I love about your posts: Certainty.

 

One thing I think you should improve: Accuracy.

 

 

[Annie Bynnol 612]

5 hours ago, Fudbeer said:

Exactly, why come up with a timetable they can not operate? and then come up with every excuse under the sun blaming everyone else.Their customer service is  non existent  too never even replied to my email about a journey from York to Sheffield where they cancelled at the last minute and expected us to get a bus that would get us in Sheffield at 11pm instead of 8!Can give many other examples of their incompetence.

Absolutely appalling service.

Northern only operate 2 or 3 very underused trains a day between York and Sheffield and only one evening service a week (arr. 2203 Sunday).

There are other operators, other routes and faster trains that your ticket would have been valid on in the event of an unplanned cancellation.

 

Nearly every other direct services (two an hour) are operated by faster CrossCountry trains.

Unless there was engineering work or fault on the line, Northern would tell you to travel on a direct CrossCountry/EMR service or Northern/TPE change  Leeds or LNER to Doncaster.

Any major fault needing bustitution would have been organised by LNER.

 

Northern (Arriva) have operated the routes since 2016.

The Government promised new trains.

The Government promised new routes, electrification, signalling and track enhancements.

The Government promised a new working timetable.

The Government forced them into a fares hike.

The Government forced them into a dispute with the Guards.

The Government imposed a "NO Growth" policy 20 years ago.

The Government has used a "blame the TOCs and PTEs for 20 years".

 

Nobody will take on this toxic franchise without massive Government concessions ie Money.

This will result in nearly half of the railway network being Nationalised.

 

Total Tory Failure

 

 

 

Edited January 3, 2020 by Annie Bynnol

[El Cid 220]

8 hours ago, Pettytom said:

One thing I love about your posts: Certainty.

One thing I think you should improve: Accuracy.

I am sure you would like the trains to be more accurate, what causes the problems with Northern?

Is this all about the strikes and the wrong/old trains? Just trying to see what is causing the issues, thinking deeper than the headline.

7 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

Northern only operate 2 or 3 very underused trains a day between York and Sheffield and only one evening service a week (arr. 2203 Sunday).

Total Tory Failure.

Northern Rail is a subsidiary of Arriva UK Trains, Northern is the largest train franchise in the United Kingdom in terms of the size of the network and the number of weekly services run; its trains call at 528 stations – about a quarter of all stations in the country - of these stations 476 are operated by Northern.

[Annie Bynnol 612]

50 minutes ago, El Cid said:

 

Northern Rail is a subsidiary of Arriva UK Trains, Northern is the largest train franchise in the United Kingdom in terms of the size of the network and the number of weekly services run; its trains call at 528 stations – about a quarter of all stations in the country - of these stations 476 are operated by Northern.

Please do not edit my quote by omission.

By selectively removing the central section without acknowledgment implies a different meaning to my post.

 

To be clear:

my reply was to a post which referred to a cancelled service between York and Sheffield and that it was unlikely to have been a Northern service at that time.

 

that the new(2016) Northern and it's predecessors have been dogged by  Government intervention and control.

 

and that Tory vision, (in their own view) of the current franchise system has failed.

 

What point you were trying to make by linking a minimal Northern service between York and Sheffield and a Failed Tory policy and the size and history of the TOC is unclear.

 

 

[taxman 12]

15 hours ago, ECCOnoob said:

 

 

Take a look at the the ECML.  That bounces between public operation and private ownership several times with each one promising the world about what they're going to do.  In reality the service is still just as chaotic, overcrowded and as expensive as it was in British Rail days.

It improves and makes money when brought into public ownership but the Tories obsession with privatisation means than as soon as it is successful they sell it off again.

[El Cid 220]

3 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

What point you were trying to make by linking a minimal Northern service between York and Sheffield and a Failed Tory policy and the size and history of the TOC is unclear.

Your point seemed to imply that Northern is a small operator, when in fact when you concider the whole group its part of a massive company with many resources.

[Fudbeer 12]

18 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

Northern only operate 2 or 3 very underused trains a day between York and Sheffield and only one evening service a week (arr. 2203 Sunday).

There are other operators, other routes and faster trains that your ticket would have been valid on in the event of an unplanned cancellation.

 

Nearly every other direct services (two an hour) are operated by faster CrossCountry trains.

Unless there was engineering work or fault on the line, Northern would tell you to travel on a direct CrossCountry/EMR service or Northern/TPE change  Leeds or LNER to Doncaster.

Any major fault needing bustitution would have been organised by LNER.

 

Northern (Arriva) have operated the routes since 2016.

The Government promised new trains.

The Government promised new routes, electrification, signalling and track enhancements.

The Government promised a new working timetable.

The Government forced them into a fares hike.

The Government forced them into a dispute with the Guards.

The Government imposed a "NO Growth" policy 20 years ago.

The Government has used a "blame the TOCs and PTEs for 20 years".

 

Nobody will take on this toxic franchise without massive Government concessions ie Money.

This will result in nearly half of the railway network being Nationalised.

 

Total Tory Failure

 

 

 

We ended up getting an Aviva train but were told that the ticket was not valid as it was only valid on northern trains even though they are owned by the same people.

[Annie Bynnol 612]

21 minutes ago, Fudbeer said:

We ended up getting an Aviva train but were told that the ticket was not valid as it was only valid on northern trains even though they are owned by the same people.

I sympathise, you fell foul of the rather aggressive CrossCountry( yes an Arriva company) people.

They would have argued that you could use a Northern services to Leeds and the then on to Sheffield on a Northern connection or a Northern arranged bustitution to Leeds.

Technically they were correct but normally most TOCs  would overlook this, particularly in the evening.

 

The traditional excuse appears to stems from their short trains being so busy in Yorkshire that they need to challenge everything.

 

CrossCountry have infuriated me in the past regarding Derbyshire Wayfarer travel to Burton, Disabled ENCTS pass between Doncaster and Sheffield and being abandoned in the New Forest

 

 

 

 

[the_bloke 17]

11 hours ago, taxman said:

It improves and makes money when brought into public ownership but the Tories obsession with privatisation means than as soon as it is successful they sell it off again.

When the ECML was brought temporarily into public ownership no money was spent in the five(?) years actually upgrading anything; they inherited recently refurbished rolling stock from NXEC and then  drove it into the ground. Anyone can make a profit when your outgoings are deliberately kept to nothing much more than staff costs. They even charged for WiFi when previously it was free.

[Fudbeer 12]

1 hour ago, Annie Bynnol said:

I sympathise, you fell foul of the rather aggressive CrossCountry( yes an Arriva company) people.

They would have argued that you could use a Northern services to Leeds and the then on to Sheffield on a Northern connection or a Northern arranged bustitution to Leeds.

Technically they were correct but normally most TOCs  would overlook this, particularly in the evening.

 

The traditional excuse appears to stems from their short trains being so busy in Yorkshire that they need to challenge everything.

 

CrossCountry have infuriated me in the past regarding Derbyshire Wayfarer travel to Burton, Disabled ENCTS pass between Doncaster and Sheffield and being abandoned in the New Forest

 

 

 

 

Thanks.

 

And to make things worse the whole journey which I had now paid twice for was spent stood up, really does put you off rail travel, I love it when things work as they should but quickly turns into a nightmare when things go wrong making me favour the car again.

[El Cid 220]

2 hours ago, Fudbeer said:

And to make things worse the whole journey which I had now paid twice for was spent stood up, really does put you off rail travel, I love it when things work as they should but quickly turns into a nightmare when things go wrong making me favour the car again.

Millions of people prefer to take the train, over the bus or car, every day; the trains are really popular.