Diary of a London Commuter
The Joy of Commuting (did I just say Commuting, whoops I meant …)

So we are getting longer trains in a few weeks time (allegedly). The must explain why the trains (in the evening) at least have suddenly got shorter - the ultimate being last Thursday during the evening rush hour, when FCC chose to run a 4 carriage train between Kings Cross and Peterborough. Even the drivers have now given up apologising for the lack of rolling stock.
In a few weeks time I imagine FCC will turn round and say ‘We have kept our promise, you now have more seats..’.
Come on FCC who are you kidding?
We are also getting another stop to make the journey longer, so this will actually mean a longer journey, more overcrowding and trains the same length they were before. No doubt some other services will have to be cut to find the carriages so probably even more overcrowding than before….

As the French say, “plus ça change…”

Well it’s the middle of March and things are getting worse, the trains in the morning and even more crowded, even luggage rack space to sit on is at a premium, while the trains in the evening seem to be getting shorter. It appears there is not enough rolling stock around for the trains to run at their usual length.  FCCs answer to the problem is to run longer trains in the morning and add an additional stop (Stevenage). This sort of begs the question…”if they can’t find enough stock to run the current service, where are they going to magic new stock for the new improved service - oh yes, I know, run fewer trains and make them stop more… and this will cure overcrowding…how. Anyway the new improved service starts in May so let’s see what happens.

We had to travel up to Scotland last weekend at short notice, for two of us the train was going to cost somewhere between £150 - £200 each return, so we drove up, travelling time about the same, cost around £50 per head. It’s a strange situation where one has to drive as public transport is too expensive?

Ok,

So a week of snow… and the whole transport system breaks down, no wonder the rest of Europe laughs at us!!

Last Monday we woke to a fair covering of snow aound us but amazingly enough the roads were clear, having been gritted the night before. The trip to the station was eneventful and FCC were even running a train service into London… Thinks could only get better, or at least, so I thought. We arrived in London about 15 mins late to discover transport in London had more or less come to a total stop, no bus service and the Underground service had collapesed . Amazingly enough the Northern line was working, a bit of a squash but no worse that some other days. Arriving at Bank station, it seemed all was well as the DLR was running… We even managed to get on a train and start our journey towards Canary Wharf… and then it stopped! It seems the train in front of us was unable to climb the slope out of the tunnel at Bank and we were stuck behind it, after 10 mins we reversed back to Bank along with the other train and the DLR station was shut. In true TFL  fashion it was a case of ‘…we suggest passangers make alternative arragements’, which given almost all the ‘alternative arrangements’ were not actually moving was a bit ‘rich’! I braved the Northern line to travel to London Bridge hoping to catch the Jubliee Line  to Canary Wharf. After 15 mins at London Bridge with no sign of  any trains I decided to give up and go home…..So near and yet so far!! Onlt 3 hours to get nowhere

Starting and finishing my London journey at Kings Cross, my Oyster car was charged £8.00 for two ‘open’ journeys. It seems that if your journey takes more than 15mins TFL assume you have forgotten to touch out and charge you the maximim fee!! You then have to wait 24 hours before you can claim the money back and another 2 days before they can refund you (but at least they do refund you).

Tuesday and Wednesday were uneventful, there was still snow but the trains were working, although the FCC were running an ‘Emergency Service’ into London - A ploy, it seems to avoid paying compensation for cancelled and delayed trains. But at least transport in London was running again.

Thursday, more snow, but this time the roads were not gritted so travel to the station was even more fun. Arriving at the station it seems that trains don’t work in the snow as no trains were travelling into London from Peterborough… So much for commiting today, I went home!!

Well nothing changes…

Last Friday morning I arrived at the station to see a broken down London train packed full of commuters waiting at one platform which resulted in the inevitable stampede as the next train arrived on the opposite side and an (even more) over crowded journey into London.

Apart from that little ‘diversion’ nothing much changes. Trains are still overcrowded (in both directions) and the uderground still breaks down on a regular basis. …

Well we have been back commuting into London for almost two week, has anything changed?

Well yes, they have.

Is it for the better?

Well probably not, fares have gone up, car parking has gone up, both by around 10% and there seem to be even fewer seats available on the trains! Passangers are even having to stand on a regular basis in the evenings coming out of London now. Almost every other means of public travel has to compete for passangers, while the train companies (to most stations) have a virtual monopoly so they can do what they like and charge what they want, after all it’s not as if most commuters have a much of a choice when it comes to commuting.

FCC were busy yesterday handing out leaflets explaining that parking rates were going up. St. Neots  being the most expensive station to park at of the stations listed. The logic seems to be that, the more used a station is the more demand there is for parking so the more you can ’squeeze’ out of the commuter for parking (as they can’t really go anywhere else).

We now have a new way of communicating - rabbit talk. Just enter your message below and my rabbit (aka a Nabaztag called gonk) will tell me the message next time he sees me!

Well Happy New Year to anybody who visits…

Its a new year with new (higher) ticket prices, let’s see what else or new (or not).  It’s back to commuting tomorrow morning so perhaps there will be a lot to talk about this year … or perhaps not!

Well, here we are back a week after just over two weeks visiting the ‘in-laws’ at the end of the world (well New Zealand).
Came back to commuting with a PMA, after all I had missed the cold snow snap (so I thought) but this didn’t last past the first day.
Travelling this week on the train has been pretty consistent, no seats on the way in (not even the ‘rack’ most days) and a seat on the way back, mainly because I have been catching an even later train than usual. The Nothing line (whoop I mean Northern line) has been as cramped and smelly as ever and with Bank station being half closed….
I am still at a slight loss to understand how closing a station when it’s overcrowded helps to clear the people as the people waiting for trains have to go somewhere? It’s a bit like the crowd control system at Kings Cross where stairways are made one direction only and half closed off. If you take water flowing from a lake and squeeze it through a small channel don’t you get flooding??

Last week was a short working week (Monday and Tuesday only) and the commute was as usual the luggage rack in the morning and a seat back in the evening. Had a bit of luck on Monday morning as Kings Cross closed just after I had gone through, it seems that the Underground was slowly grinding to a halt due to the weather so to avoid overcrowding ‘they’ decided to close the station. I don’t really know how that works as people have to go somewhere.Worked from home on Wednesday. No commuting for the rest of the month as on holiday

Phoned the ‘Prosecutions Department’ first thing this morning. It appears they are too busy to answer the phone so the message says leave your number and we will call you back, remembering that we only work between 9:00 am and 4:00 pm!! So with time off for lunch I wonder why they bother to go to work at all! Anyway I leave my number and wait…. and wait… and wait. Try again after lunch and leave another (slightly more annoyed) message. It seems they are still too busy to pick up the phone (must be all the happy commuters). As luck would have it TOH calls them in the afternoon and gets straight through.

It appears the cheque was refused by the Bank as it was post dated for April 2008??

TOH bought the ticket at the ticket counter at St. Neots station on the 28th of December 2007. Somehow I don’t imagine they would have issued a season ticket costing close to £3500 on a post dated cheque for April 2008 (must try this)? But somebody had changed the date on the cheque, so one can only assume that the change was made after the cheque had been handed over to FCC. Yesterday my bank told me the ticket had been ‘refused’ in January but that they had somehow forgotten to tell me about this and it appears it took FCC until March to notice!!!

.. and they never called me back either!!!!