National Rail Timetable problems
In past years, my review of the National Rail Timetable (NRT) would have been out the weekend of the change (which this time would have been RAIL 853).
As I write, however, the new timetable has just started and I’m only halfway through my review. It will appear in RAIL 855, a month after implementation.
I accept the lateness cannot be blamed on the NRT team, as they have to deal with late data from Network Rail. Nevertheless, I am frustrated with the fact that the same old errors appear time after time, despite my always informing the team.
In the introduction to my review of the December 2017 NRT in RAIL 844, I wrote: “I have come to expect the Sunday Preston-Hellifield trains in Table 94 to be shown as terminating at Clitheroe; I expect one of Chiltern Railways’ two ‘Parliamentary’ trains to/from Paddington to be omitted; and I expect the 0830 Llandudno-Cardiff to be omitted from Table 131.”
Under Table 131 (Manchester/Holyhead to Cardiff) I re-emphasised: “As is now the norm - despite my having said this every successive edition for many years - the 0830 from Llandudno to Cardiff Central, which has the non-stop run from Shrewsbury to Newport, is omitted.’
In January, I received an email from a reader who had been involved with the timetable in BR days.
He explained that Table 131 had been set up to make it easy to populate accurately, excluding anything via Birmingham, by simply ensuring that only trains calling at Hereford are included.
The 0830 from Llandudno doesn’t call, so always gets excluded and needs hand-editing back in. I emailed the NRT Team to point this out and was thanked, saying special note of this would be taken for May.
Readers won’t be surprised to hear this May’s NRT still omits the 0830, still omits the 1057 South Ruislip-Paddington, and still says the Blackpool-Preston-Carlisle service on Sundays terminates at Clitheroe (worse, it’s shown until December 2, yet it’s replaced by Hellifield shuttles in September).
When the files were put online on May 4, 17 tables were missing (to appear on May 11), while another 13 tables were there but users were told they would change again before May 20. As I write, on May 21, nine of the first batch of 17 have not yet appeared - and none of the second batch.
A senior planner with a major operator told me he expects the NRT to be fluid to the extent of tables being revised frequently, and that it might well be late autumn before the whole is correct - if at all.
So, readers will hopefully sympathise with my predicament in trying to review the changes to the timetable when, the day it has started, it’s not even complete and what is there cannot be relied upon.
In turn, I sympathise with the NRT Team with having to work with late data from Network Rail, but the constant repetition of the same errors edition after edition is just not acceptable.