West Midlands Railway

[mikestone]

Late last Friday night passengers on board a late running Virgin train I was on wanted to catch the last Leamington train at Coventry. Full marks to whoever diverted the Virgin Train to platform 2 and routed the WMT Leamington train into platform 3 so that they could walk across and catch it.

Looking at RTT that appears to have happened because they were farting about in 1 with a terminated Birmingham - Northampton, which finally went they decided to do it!

[mikestone]

Some changes to formations from 9 July
.
West Midlands Trains   Additional carriages for busy commuter services to and from Birmingham Snow Hill West Midlands Trains - Jul 04, 2019 13:17 BST

Changes will be made to of some of West Midlands Railway's busiest commuter trains to and from Birmingham from next week, following feedback from passengers.

The biggest timetable shake-up in over 10 years has been good news for many rail passengers with direct services to more destinations, faster journeys on many routes and more seats to and from Birmingham everyday. Further changes to be introduced from Tuesday 9 July will see additional carriages operating some of the busiest peak time services to and from Birmingham Snow Hill.

West Midlands Railway will be reallocating the number of carriages on the 1713 departure from Birmingham Snow Hill to Worcester Shrub Hill from Tuesdays to Fridays. A five carriage train will be used to operate this service – an increase from the four carriage train used since the timetable change in May.

The 1703 and 1723 departures either side of this service saw an increase in carriages with the new timetable, meaning that an additional four carriages now operate between Birmingham and Stourbridge between 1700 and 1730 on weekdays, compared to before the timetable change.

Another improvement comes with the reintroduction of five carriages on the 0708 departure from Leamington Spa to Birmingham from Tuesdays to Fridays.

The train operator will be providing the additional capacity by reallocating carriages from other services, based on passenger counts and demand elsewhere on the Snow Hill lines.*

Richard Brooks, customer experience director for West Midlands Railway, said: "The new timetable introduced in May represented the biggest change for over a decade. While passengers have been adjusting to the new timetable, we appreciate that some services have been incredibly busy. We have been working hard to see what further improvements could be made and we are confident we now have a solution for our passengers.

"In response to particular feedback about the 0708 service from Leamington Spa to Birmingham and the 1713 service from Birmingham Snow Hill to Worcester, we didn't want to make any rushed decisions that may have had unintended consequences elsewhere on the network. We have therefore spent a number of weeks assessing what could be done to reallocate some carriages and we believe our solution will deliver consistent performance and benefit passengers on some of our busiest evening services.

"We want to thank all our passengers for their patience while the new timetable has been bedding in and we will continue to look at making further refinements to improve our timetable going forward."

ENDS

For further information on this release, call our press office on 03300 955150 or email press.office@wmtrains.co.uk

Notes to editors

*The following changes will be made to train formations from Tuesdays to Fridays from Tuesday 9 July onwards to accommodate additional carriages some of the busiest West Midlands Railway commuter services to and from Birmingham Snow Hill:

Morning peak: Tuesday – Friday

0708 Leamington Spa to Kidderminster: 5 carriages (previously 4 carriages) 0741 Stratford-upon-Avon to Birmingham Snow Hill: 3 carriages (previously 6 carriages) 0749 Kidderminster to Stratford-upon-Avon: 4 carriages (previously 3 carriages) 0807 Whitlocks End to Kidderminster: 5 carriages (previously 4 carriages)

Evening peak: Tuesday – Friday

1623 Kidderminster to Stratford-upon-Avon: 4 carriages (previously 3 carriages) 1627 Stourbridge Junction to Dorridge: 3 carriages (previously 6 carriages) 1646 Dorridge to Worcester Shrub Hill: 5 carriages (previously 4 carriages) 1657 Stourbridge Junction to Stratford-upon-Avon: 4 carriages (previously 3 carriages) 1728 Dorridge to Worcester shrub Hill: 3 carriages (previously 6 carriages)

[mikestone]

Track access application has gone in for an extra hourly Birmingham-Walsall service, stopping only at Tame Bridge from December - I expect it's  too much to hope these will run to Euston to allow one of the Chase line services to be self contained.

[Westy]

When the services via Willenhall & Darlaston get going, what routes besides the  Walsall to Wolverhampton are they planning to do?

[Pat]

When the services via Willenhall & Darlaston get going, what routes besides the  Walsall to Wolverhampton are they planning to do?

I think they're routing one of the Shrewsbury's through there.

[mikestone]

December TT uploaded to RTT - no sign of the additional Walsall trains though it is of course possible they might appear later.
The second Birmingham-Shrewsbury moves to xx.34, so perhaps the plan for these to eventually serve Darlaston has changed?
Through Shrewsbury-Walsall trains all replaced by electric services on the Walsall-Birmingham leg..
Many SX and a couple of Saturday trains to Rugeley showing from P.3 at Walsall.
The Pleck parliamentary extended non-stop to Rugeley!
On Sundays one London-Birmingham train per hour is combined with Birmingham-Liverpool and a second extended as an additional service to Stafford with "depot workings" to/from Crewe.

[Pat]

December TT uploaded to RTT - no sign of the additional Walsall trains though it is of course possible they might appear later.
The second Birmingham-Shrewsbury moves to xx.34, so perhaps the plan for these to eventually serve Darlaston has changed?
Through Shrewsbury-Walsall trains all replaced by electric services on the Walsall-Birmingham leg..
Many SX and a couple of Saturday trains to Rugeley showing from P.3 at Walsall.
The Pleck parliamentary extended non-stop to Rugeley!
On Sundays one London-Birmingham train per hour is combined with Birmingham-Liverpool and a second extended as an additional service to Stafford with "depot workings" to/from Crewe.

The Shrewsbury timetable is much better.  No more trains departing New Street within 7 minutes of each other so it is now more or less half hourly.

[Roy]

One of the 172/2s (172 221, I think) has had its internal refurbishment.  However, the tip up seats in the vestibule areas are still in London Midland green, which looks odd.

[BK63 YWP]

How do you find the changes on real train times

[Pat]

How do you find the changes on real train times

You type in the name of the station you want to find times for and then select a date after 9th December when the new timetable starts.

[Roy]

Two things to add
- you have to be in Detailed mode
- the December 2019 timetable starts on 15th December

[mikestone]

Two car Cl.170 on Central Rivers Depot today

[mikestone]

https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/rmt-declares-dispute-on-west-midlands-trains-over-doo/
;
https://www.westmidlandsrailway.co.uk/about-us/news-desk/west-midlands-trains-statement-in-response-rmt

[Stu]

https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/rmt-declares-dispute-on-west-midlands-trains-over-doo/
;
https://www.westmidlandsrailway.co.uk/about-us/news-desk/west-midlands-trains-statement-in-response-rmt

Hmm, so someone is telling porkies then, if WMT is correct in their statement that 'a safety-critical conductor would be retained on every train', unless the RMT are just itching for some strike action to cause more passenger misery.

Another example I can think of here, based on my own experience a few weeks ago now, is how would 'request only' stops like The Lakes, Wood End and Danzey work without any guard or conductor? You'd be able to 'flag down' the train from the platform, but who would you ask to get the train to stop if you were on board it?

[Tony]

Another example I can think of here, based on my own experience a few weeks ago now, is how would 'request only' stops like The Lakes, Wood End and Danzey work without any guard or conductor? You'd be able to 'flag down' the train from the platform, but who would you ask to get the train to stop if you were on board it?

Perhaps they will ask you to hold a 'hitch hiker's# style board up as the train pulls into the platform  :D