11:43 Bedford to Brighton FCC train overshot Preston Park Station this morning.

[worthingseagull123]

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/performance-results/

Shocking only 79% of trains are less than 4 minutes or late or on time.

That is surely worse than Connex?

Check out Network Rail stats, Southern has amongst the worst performance of any train company.

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/performance-results/

 

[Deadly Danson]

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/performance-results/

Shocking only 79% of trains are less than 4 minutes or late or on time.

That is surely worse than Connex?

Check out Network Rail stats, Southern has amongst the worst performance of any train company.

http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/performance-results/

But surely the important question is why those delays occur? If it's infrastructure problems then Southern aren't to blame. In my experience the majority of issues are with signalling, congestion, fatalities, trespassers, overrunning engineering works etc- nothing to do with Southern although certainly there is PLENTY of room for improvement their end too.

And certainly it's easier to remember the bad trips than the good - your original post said your train is always 5 mins late yet on the first day it's been checked it was more or less on time. However, if I was paying the amount commuters pay I'd expect a near perfect service - it's just that you need to look a bit deeper for the reasons sometimes.

 

[Arthur]

But surely the important question is why those delays occur? If it's infrastructure problems then Southern aren't to blame. In my experience the majority of issues are with signalling, congestion, fatalities, trespassers, overrunning engineering works etc- nothing to do with Southern although certainly there is PLENTY of room for improvement their end too.

And certainly it's easier to remember the bad trips than the good - your original post said your train is always 5 mins late yet on the first day it's been checked it was more or less on time. However, if I was paying the amount commuters pay I'd expect a near perfect service - it's just that you need to look a bit deeper for the reasons sometimes.

And therein lines the crux of the problem. It's all too easy for the operators to blame the network and vice versa.

As someone pointed out in another post quite frankly I don't care who's fault it is just get me there in not unpleasant conditions and on time.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

I would say my morning train is within 4 minutes of schedule probably 14 times out of 15. Trouble is you do more easily remember the bad journeys, and usually when they're bad, they're very bad.

Terminating at E. Croydon when you're 15 mins late is extremely annoying too (especially when you know the return train to Brighton is going to be 99% empty, so is impacting very few people).

 

[greyseagull]

From The Times yesterday which, ironically, I read squashed on a very busy train:

Rail commuters are heroes of labour, like coal miners

They sacrifice comfort and cash to provide for their families and the national good

Whenever I read about — or have personally to endure — overcrowding on trains, I return to three questions. Why is it, I ask myself, sitting, swaying on the floor outside the loo in Coach B, that my son or my mum can travel hundreds of miles on a train for 15 quid? Whereas I can make the same journey and never get change out of £80? And am sometimes quoted a price greater than what it costs to fly to New York? Youngsters and pensioners should pay less than those of us in our so-called prime. But not that much less.

Next, still on the floor, legs braced against the panel opposite, lower back starting to throb, I ask this: would it be that difficult to invent a locomotive capable of shifting more than what appears to be the standard eight carriages? Britain — or the southeast of England at any rate, which is where the problem is most acute — is pretty flat. It’s not as if an engine has to haul its payload over the Rockies. You often see freight trains composed of 20 or 30 fully laden wagons.

My information is that such a locomotive already exists. I suspect the restriction to eight carriages is about platform length rather than pulling power. Fair enough. So (bit of blue-sky thinking, up out of the box, shoot me down if you like) why not . . . wait for it . . . extend the platform!? Just an idea. Or, failing that, ask the passengers in the overhanging carriages to walk forward until they are able to get off? As happens at some Tube stations?

Back to your columnist on the train floor, where, despite scalding tea slopping into his lap, he is gamely posing a third question, a question given extra urgency by new research that concludes many first class carriages are under-occupied, even at rush hour. If the system is at capacity, what sense does it make for the average service to comprise three carriages that are 50 per cent empty and five that can be 200 per cent full?

We don’t need a revolution. First class doesn’t have to be binned. Instead, by way of a modest proposal, how about shifting to two first class and six standard? Having done that, the train operators could then, ad hoc, convert one of the remaining first class carriages to standard.

I make most of my train journeys at off-peak. For those that don’t, I am filled with admiration. Seriously, I salute them. They are, to my mind, modern heroes of labour, the suited, season-ticketed, smartphoned early 21st-century version of the coalminers and trawlermen of 50 years ago, sacrificing their own comfort to provide for their families and, at one remove, the national good.

To get out of a warm bed in the dark at 6am, to pay a small fortune on a train that might well be delayed, to work a long day, and then to surrender yourself again to the same process in reverse, opening your front door at 8pm at the earliest if you’re lucky, again in the dark, and to do this year after year, that is impressive. The least such people deserve is a seat.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Why is it, I ask myself, sitting, swaying on the floor outside the loo in Coach B, that my son or my mum can travel hundreds of miles on a train for 15 quid? Whereas I can make the same journey and never get change out of £80?

The answer to that as far as commuters are concerned, we're a guaranteed market, essentially a cash-cow they can charge what they like as we have to pay it or change jobs or move - which many people can't do.

 

[HawkTheSeagull]

Either you work for Southern or your watch doesn't keep time properly. The 0659 Victoria train is even worse.

The same 0659 train that was only 1 minute late into Victoria this morning and yesterday morning ? In fact 7 days, the longest delay that service has had was 7 minutes.

The 0649 train you mention - the longest delay in the last week was 12 minutes (due to congestion because of other late running trains), with it being under 5 minutes late other times.

It really isnt that bad.

The answer to that as far as commuters are concerned, we're a guaranteed market, essentially a cash-cow they can charge what they like as we have to pay it or change jobs or move - which many people can't do.

If the train in question has reservable seats (the card above seats usually), then there is no reason why normal commuters cant reserve them, since they have tickets. The cheap "Advance" tickets are mandatory to have a seat reservation as you can only travel on a set train unlike a Season Ticket, which gives you near total flexibility.

I'd like to know how the FCC train that's due at Preston Park at 0706 manages to arrive two minutes late as often than not. I mean, it's only had to go half a mile down the track by that point.

In the last week, it has been late once - and that was by 1 single minute. All depends on the driver, rail conditions, whether its dispatched on time etc.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Just to add to everything - looks like problems at London Bridge this evening.

 

[HawkTheSeagull]

Just to add to everything - looks like problems at London Bridge this evening.

Signalling problem at New Cross Gate, looks confined to the "slow" lines, though the stopping trains will be put on the "fast" lines.

Still probably best to use Victoria for now though - or FCC from Blackfriars as they will probably start avoiding London Bridge soon.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Signalling problem at New Cross Gate, looks confined to the "slow" lines, though the stopping trains will be put on the "fast" lines.

Still probably best to use Victoria for now though - or FCC from Blackfriars as they will probably start avoiding London Bridge soon.

Thanks. Will head to Vic I think.