I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but I am unable to stop myself from commenting on the fact that National Rail are spoiling my social life for the FOURTH Saturday in a row. This time I have the relatively modest goal of trying to get to Peterborough for 10am on Saturday morning. You wouldn’t think, in this day and age, that that would be a virtually impossible task.

Well, get this: not only are there no trains between Birmingham and Leicester for the fourth (did I mention that it was the FOURTH?!) Saturday in a row, there are also no trains between Leicester and Peterborough! :cry: Or, to be precise, there is a train from Leicester which stops at Stamford (where on earth is Stamford anyway?). From Stamford there is then a rail replacement bus to Peterborough. There’s only one thing which could be more fun than catching one rail replacement bus on a Saturday – catching two rail replacement buses on a Saturday!

Oh, and did I mention the timings?! In turns out to get to Peterborough for 10am, I would need to leave Birmingham New Street at 6.15am. That would necessitate me catching a bus from my suburb before half five … but of course, buses don’t run so early in the morning So I would have to walk. To be fair it’s only six miles, but it’s through an area where I’m loathe to be, on my own, at that time. Basically, not happening!

The best I can do is to get a bus at half six and catch the following rail replacement bus at 7.15. That will allegedly get to Leicester for 9am, although it may disappear down a warp in the space-time continuum somewhere around Coleshill Parkway. There’s a pretty tight turn around time at Leicester to get on the correct train, so I’ll need luck to actually make it, but if I say some prayers, the train departing Leicester at 9.14, plus the supplementary bus, should get me to Peterborough for 10.35.

I then have to get to Suffolk, but somebody else is driving so it’s not my problem

I am considerably upset with National Rail. I have to get up at half five tomorrow morning to get to London and will have to do likewise on Monday, so it would have been nice to have a lie in of sorts on Saturday. I feel sorry for myself

This, however, is what I am most outraged about: I decided to have a look on National Rail Enquiries to see if there were going to be trains to Leicester next weekend.

The result?!

It turns out THERE ARE NO TRAINS BETWEEN LEICESTER AND BIRMINGHAM ON ANY SATURDAY FOR THE ENTIRE MONTH OF APRIL!!!!!

I think I might explode. I would like to think I do not have anger management issues, but this is seven Saturdays in a row on which I will have to spend six hours travelling to see a boyfriend who only lives forty miles away! I am going to relieve my feelings by writing to someone to complain, I just haven’t figured out who yet…

I really need to learn to drive.

 Update

Further checking of National Rail Enquiries indicates that there are also no trains on three out of the five Saturdays in May.  A normal service does not appear to resume until June, by which point I may have spontaneously combusted!  I have just emailed Cross Country Trains, who run this non-service.

I have just been checking the journey planner for the next three months and I am horrified to see the alterations to schedules on your route between Birmingham and Leicester.

There have been no trains on a Saturday for the past three weeks, and according to National Rail there will be none on any single Saturday in April plus three of the Saturdays in May.

I understand that a certain amount of engineering work has to be done but to cause this much disruption to a single route over such a prolonged period of time shows an utter disregard for passengers.

It took me two and a half hours to get from Leicester to Birmingham last Saturday evening, which is simply not acceptable.  The driver chose a ridiculous route out of Leicester which passed the football and rugby grounds at the precise time the crowds were exiting.  He then proceeded to drive down narrow country lanes between Nuneaton and Coleshill (which were too narrow in my opinion for the vehicle to pass safely).  Predictably, there was no one who wanted to get either on or off at Coleshill.

I would suggest that you run more bus services between Leicester and Birmingham so that those who want to go direct do not have to put up with a ridiculously convoluted journey to the middle of nowhere.  I would also suggest that you reduce your prices on days when you are not operating a train service to compensate for the severe disruption you are causing your passengers.

I travel to and from Leicester every Saturday and I do not see why I should pay £8.50 for a journey which takes twice as long as that which you are contracted to provide.

I shall be making complaints to as many higher authorities as I can find!

Tags: rail replacement buses

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 2:39 pm and is filed under Holidays and outings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.