Readers air their views about the railway industry and Rail Professional
Email your letters to:
letters@railpro.co.uk fax them to: 01223 327356 or post them to: The Editor, Rail Professional, 275 Newmarket Road, Cambridge CB5 8JE. Letters may be edited for length.
Self employed set-back I run a consultancy company, which occasionally provides services to the rail industry. However, if I am unable to work my business cannot earn revenue and therefore I receive no income. I could, of course, purchase insurance cover for this eventuality. Could your highly- knowledgeable readers offer me some advice? Is there an insurance policy that would pay me to have two months off work if I was a bit- part player in an incident that was filmed, posted on YouTube and viewed by more than a million people around the world (March 2012 issue, page 10)? If so, how much might the premium be?
Jerry Alderson Milton
Cambridge
Class 442s and 444s are excellent
Taking the scenic route
I recently had to travel from Peterborough to Matlock and easily bought tickets on line. However the only option available was Peterborough – Leicester – change – Leicester – Derby – change – Derby – Matlock. On the return journey, the revenue protection
inspector could not believe our itinerary. ‘But the train from Matlock continues past Derby to Nottingham and you can get a direct train from there to Peterborough.’ So I stayed on the train to Nottingham and
home from there. Who programmes online ticketing systems so as not include all options? Not only is via Nottingham more convenient, it would also have been cheaper. I tried booking a single from Ramsgate to
Peterborough online (via London of course) and found a ticket at £19.00. Remembering split ticketing I tried breaking the journey down only to find Ramsgate to just London was £21. Similarly, at certain times of the day
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Peterborough – King’s Cross – Waterloo – Eastleigh (continuing to Eastleigh is cheaper than getting off at Waterloo) even if using the same train for that final leg of the journey. At certain times of the day, if travelling from Peterborough to Crewe (and not coming back), it is cheaper to buy a return rather than a single. Finally, in January a lady announced to the TV
cameras that the Tocs have had to raise their prices as they had been told to do so by the government. With that one statement the lady proved Britain’s railways are not really privatised and must do as instructed. If the lady had instead stated the government
had ‘requested’ or ‘advised’ price rises, that would have left the privately run Tocs to introduce fare increases each thought their passengers, sorry customers, could afford.
Martin Thorn Peterborough
David Smith offers us ‘a little history’ (Train of thought, March 2012 issue) but gets it wrong! CIGs were built in the early ’60s for the Brighton line. VEPs were introduced in 1967 at the same time as REPs/TCs for the Bournemouth electrification. The 1930s COR stock
soldiered on until around 1970 on the Portsmouth line, but the VEPs started in 1967 running the stopping services. A new batch of CIGs was built especially for the Portsmouth, Alton and Reading lines from 1970, taking over the fast services in the case of Portsmouth.
It was a mistake to place the
442s in Portsmouth, their gearing being unsuited to the gradients. The Portsmouth line average
journey-length is about 40 miles, around half that of the Bournemouth line. There are some 444 workings and regulars will know them, but 450s are needed to maximise seats. As someone who travels around the country frequently I do so agree with Steve Hyde
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