Northern Train pain again

#NorthernFail

It isn’t hard to imagine a conversation taking place at beleaguered train operator Northern, sometime in the depths of winter, that went something like this:

“Passengers want more trains!”

“Fine – give them more trains.”

“What, really? Won’t we need loads more staff to operate them?”

“We can worry about that nearer the go-live date.”

“But, surely we’ll need time to employ them, train th....”

“Shhsh! Stop worrying. It’s cold in here. Chuck something else on the fire.”

“How about this large box of customer complaints?”

“Perfect – we’ve got loads of those we need to get rid of!”

OK, that’s made up, but there is more than enough anger and frustration amongst let-down passengers that it wouldn’t have surprised many of them if it were a true story.

Northern have removed 165 services every day until nearly the end of July, as they struggle to cope with an expanded timetable. Some of these are the Lakes Line, running to and from Preston, Lancaster, Oxenholme and Windermere, which has been shelved for at least a fortnight. Here’s hoping you like buses.

Transport for the North (TfN), the body overseeing transport in our area, has told Northern they need to compensate let-down customers, including season ticket and advanced ticket holders, and sort out schemes with other train operators to accept their tickets, as well as reduce the cost of journeys for those affected.

That TfN are urging them to make sure that their services are “at least as good” as before the changes to timetables, shows how badly Northern have failed to deliver the additional trains badly needed by their customers.

MP Tim Farron has been vocal on the matter, arguing that the services should be handed to the Department for Transport to run instead. He also correctly observed that the service was already shocking prior to the new timetables.

One victim of the lack of trains, Nick Mitchell, has used his skills to create a handy app for fellow commuters. It helpfully lists when trains are cancelled, a route partially suspended or a station closed. The brilliantly named “Northern Fail” app allows users to find the data they need to help them claim compensation.

Meanwhile, an ongoing dispute between the RMT union and Northern, over driver-only operated trains, means further industrial action later this month.

It’s a tough time for rail travellers in our region. Catch a train? Yeah... good luck with that.

This post first appeared as my "A wry look at the week" column, in The Mail, on Friday the 8th of June 2018.

The same day it went out, Northern requested an extension to the suspension of the Lakes Line. What a bloody shambles. My wife spent ridiculous amounts of time over multiple years contending with delayed and cancelled trains. Since we moved she now has a car, despite the fact that we live bang opposite a station - as the trains are at ridiculous times, meaning she'd either have to leave work stupidly early, or stay late every day.

It would be an insult to those who have attempted to organise a piss up in a brewery to suggest that they were in anyway incompetent, compared to the abject failure that is Northern and their train 'services'.

(CD A-Z: One of my earliest acquisitions, the fab "Formula thirty 2" from 1986, featuring a cracking selection of late 70s/early 80s tunes.)