Railways around Coventry

The paradox of governments & railways. It is illegal for the UK government to bid for a franchise (because the law says so), but they are currently operating the East Coast franchise (as operator of last resort) after Virgin handed back the keys. In practice they are paying consultants to run it for them. Avanti are running the West Coast as a "partnership" which I think follows the concession model (paid to run the service) rather than the franchise model (you keep the profit). The main problem with the current system is it incentivises companies to maximise income rather than bums on seats. On a fast train to Euston after 9am, but before the off peak starts they make more money from running a train half full at the £85 Anytime fare than filling it on the £35 off peak fare. The will make almost as much money on a £20 advance ticket as they don't have to share it with the other operators (WMT/LNW/Chiltern/Cross Country). Peter.

Virgin Pendolino "Coventry" nameplates - Telegraph report

There's clearly something fundamentally wrong with the whole UK rail ticketing fares system. Last week, I had to go to Liverpool and back the same day. The return fare cost me just under £20. I was going from THL to LIV, on the one train, i.e. no changes. But I didn't purchase a return for Liverpool. I had a return from THL to BHM, then a single from BHM to LIV, and the same but reversed for the return journey. So although on the same train, I had to show different tickets to the inspector depending on where the train happened to be. What nonsense! I saved a few quid by booking online. Last weekend, I had to go to London at short notice (85 year old lady had a cardiac arrest, was in Barnet Hospital, sadly since passed away), so no time to get advance tickets. I checked the national rail online service first, for the train times and fares. I wrote the details on a sheet of A4. At THL, I asked for a return to EUS and showed the attendant the piece of paper. He immediately said "You won't get those prices today; they are not valid today". I retorted: "They were valid a few minutes ago on the national rail site". He was floored and said nothing, just acting dumb. I ended up paying almost double the fare quoted on the national rail site. Clearly one pays a lot more, on average, by buying at a ticket office. My advice is to always book online, split-ticketing if advantageous. Staff are not there to give one a good deal. It should not be the case that one can save money by booking online and/or split-ticketing. A lack of consistency which is typical of many/most large organisations. It's a shambles. The extra tickets issued are a waste of precious paper of course. (Green Party supporters take note!) I have to go to the funeral soon, so will definitely be booking online.

Slim - yes, those advance single tickets are good value. I recently travelled from Oxfordshire to Liverpool, using them with a day return to Birmingham from home - cost about £26 Re your London trip - why didn't you book online and collect your tickets at the station?

MR, yes, will do next time. I was pushed for time, the ticket machine at THL is frequently not working, and often the station is unstaffed. I expected the system to work properly, consistently and fairly.

Good news - just found out someone is giving me a lift to London, so no need to book.

The Office of Rail and Road has published the 2019-2019 station usage estimates (2017-18 figures in brackets). The entrance & exit figures below are for April 2018 to March 2019. Bedworth 101,386 (91,794) Bermuda Park 36,088 (28,378) Berkswell 355,928 (323,352) Birmingham International 6,975,002 (6,664,422) Birmingham New Street 47,927,772 (43,741,712) Canley 398,880 (380,546) Coventry 8,207,914 (7,558,210) Coventry Arena 111,462 (99,516) Hampton-in-Arden 196,678 (172,690) Kenilworth 170,912 (-) Opened 30th April 2018 Leamington Spa 2,773,782 (2,671,422) London Euston 46,146,456 (44,745,816) Nuneaton 1,313,980 (1,364,294) Rugby 2,695,802 (2,527,944) Tile Hill 724,504 (667,980) Wolverhampton 5,305,828 (4,993,372) All stations show an increase in usage. Coventry saw a 8.6% increase in passengers, continuing the trend for a number of years, and remains the second busiest station in the West Midlands. Birmingham New Street (+9.5%) remains the busiest station outside London and has overtaken London Euston. A very impressive start for Kenilworth, especially considering the station was only open 11 months and no Sunday service. Peter.

I agree the whole system is a complete joke as well as being a rip-off. Our rail fares are far higher than most other European countries and it is deliberately complicated to extract the most money possible out of the poor, exasperated passengers. I rarely use trains except to travel around the West Midlands on my free senior pass. However, we are soon going on a cruise where we sail from Southampton and fly back from Malta. No point in leaving the car at Southampton so we decided the best way was to travel down by train. It turns out that it is considerably cheaper to use split ticketing, and there are now websites that calculate the splits for you. We have ended up with four tickets each for the journey: Birmingham International to Banbury; Banbury to Oxford; Oxford to Basingstoke; Basingstoke to Southampton Airport Parkway. It is a journey of just over two hours and all on the same train. Complete and utter madness!

There is even more madness. There is a 'Fare Trial' on the route between London and Edinburgh so the off-peak single is now £75.75 (half the return). Despite being an LNER fare it is valid on 'any permitted' route and for break of journey with no evening peak restrictions from Coventry. So if you want to come home from London c18:00 you pay £75.75 for an off-peak single to Edinburgh, or £82.00 anytime single on Avanti. Peter.

MisterD-Di, you are WRONG on Rail Fares. A survey by EU has found we are the 11th most expensive in Europe. We the taxpayer spent £7.1bn on UK Railways in 2019 such is the level of Public Subsidy and you are falling for RMT propoganda. Fare deals can be had especially by split ticketing - I have recently done Coventry-Edinburgh return for £35 on Avanti.

Hi all I don't pretend that our ticketing system isn't very complex, that it should be far more straight forward & I am well aware of the shambles of reliability of our local network, although that might change since a senior head has rolled recently. A return journey to Glasgow, part of which was peaktime, cost £53. That journey was without delay & very comfortable. That was using a pre-booked split ticket. I paid a premium for the first part of the journey being before 9am. Last summer, I provided a week of holiday cover & since all but one client was in the East Midlands, I bought a week's ranger ticket for £75. I enjoyed the best working trainspotting holiday in ages. A friend joined me using the any three days out of seven option on the same ranger.

I just think its a bit daft that I can do a simple journey say to Euston from Cov and the Trainline offers me tickets varying from £23 return to £266?! Did I hear that the proposed extended platform for Coventry has just been ditched - after all that work (and the loss of The Rocket!)

Hi Neil, I heard the same. In spite of what might be said at local level, it will always be overridden by Whitehall. Until HS2 is decided upon, I don't believe any decision made now has much credibility. The problem I believe with HS2, isn't the concept, it's the route! A century ago, the Great Central railway was built to do what HS2 is supposed to do, but with the emphasis on freight. It connected Sheffield with London, on a no nonsense straight route. That route would make much more sense for HS2, with a spur to Birmingham. Sadly, governments have a habit of appointing folk, to oversee projects, who have no practical experience in that area - Dr Beeching a case in point. Yes, a clever man, he was an ICI chemist. His only experience of a railway was his bathroom towel rail! He closed the Great Central.

When I watch dramas, say like Poldark, serious fiction as that was, or a soap like "Yes Minister", tongue in cheek, they are not widely out on the concept of Parliament, the prejudices, the lies, inner dealings & so on. I'm not hitting at any particular political party, but the stance of human nature is always present. So it isn't so surprising that our nation's railway is in such disarray. This man really tried to run a railway. Most of the modern best aspects of our current railway were forged by him, yet he fell foul of Parliament, as he wasn't interested in oil shares or the like. Parliament in the seventies wanted to do away with our railway heritage altogether, to just have motorways & a skeleton London Underground & Overground. But for an unexpected turn around in passenger receipts in 1980, I am sure that is what would have happened. Trains were so empty in the seventies, I regularly travelled off-peak to London at 6.20am, arriving in Euston at 8.01. On one occasion with Pete Waterman & his little dog. The train was half empty even on Monday mornings. It's the property prices in the Home Counties that is part of the driving force for our era of mass commuting. Not Parliament or anyone else, I believe. At the end of the day, my opinions are simply just that. I enjoy wholesome discussions, like we have on our forum. I'm unlikely to see the fruits of society's future plans, not unless my name is Methuselah! My grandchildren hopefully might!

Agreed. It never ceases to amaze me when the PM has a "reshuffle". Cabinet ministers who have been heading one facet of government are suddenly heading something completely different. In the real world, they wouldn't get the job because they have not got the relevant experience. Not just government, either. It happens all too often in academia!