What is it with Southern?

tom wrote:
> On Mon, 20 Jun 2005 00:36:38 +0100, Henry Law wrote:
>
> > This evening Southern have got four security staff + 3 BT police on the
> > forecourt of Brighton station to keep out passengers with bicycles. For
> > not much more effort they could have used the few remaining VEPs for a
> > service, or hired in van trains from eg EWS. They have turned away £000s
> > of business. What kind of a company carries on like that?
>
> it's back to communism.

Southern are not a freight service, nor are they there to enhance
Photopic's galleries.

They are a passenger train operating company. Stacks of bikes would
have turned away the passengers who would be more regular than annual
cyclists.

If they HAD to provide some kind of 'specials' then maybe a brace of
455s awaiting refurbishment could have been used. But next year that
option might not exist, and the cries of 'You did it last year' would
happen all over again.

It was simpler to ban the bikes outright.

Regards
Albert

There WERE solutions, as I have said.
However, unless the solution could have been repeated every year, then
the problem would have simply moved to the following year.
A year or so back, slam door stock was used for the bikes: fair enough,
but slam door stock is not going to be available soon, so that option
would simply 'put off' the problem to another year. Better to have them
get used to no bikes.
I have said this before, but if someone is not fit enough to cycle
back, they really should not attempt the journey in the first place.
The organisers should consider the thing in two parts: Sat London -
Brighton, Sun Brighton - London. This should resolve a lot of the
problems. However, the attitude of the organisers is' if the solution
isn't easy, then don't bother to even think about an implementation.'
Regards
Albert

"Albert" <am006f8426@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote in message
news:1119257275.043293.222020@g14g2000cwa. o...
> Southern are not a freight service, nor are they there to enhance
> Photopic's galleries.
> They are a passenger train operating company.

IME not a very good one. Staff morale on Southern seems to be very bad - in
sharp contrast to SET where since the demise of Connex things seem
excellent. Their services seem to be quite unreliable, and we keep hearing
about bad experiences such as with bicycles and security staff.

As far as I can see, this whole thing is a ridiculous.

Just because some people want to participate in this sort of event, why
is it considered the responsibility of a public service provider to
move heaven and earth for them?

Why should other passengers have to contend with the overcrowding of
trains and delays in loading/unloading bikes that would have resulted
if normal services were used, or with the alternative, for Southern to
spend their budget on providing special trains for this minority of
people?

No-one expects the railways to put on special Motorail-style trains for
the return leg of the London-Brighton car event, for example.

As another poster commented, Southern is a PASSENGER operation, not a
freight carrier - indeed I believe (AICBW) that the Conditions of
Carriage would restrict (if not prohibit) a passenger carrying any
other object of similar size to a bicycle with them on a journey.

I think Southern were right here - at least they gave advance warning
rather than (with every train being able to carry only around 5 bikes)
letting people down on the platform as they were turned away trying to
board.

I think this whole situation is another example of a conflict with the
government's objective: to get more people using public transport.
Refusing people use of the train will just see them switch to their
cars, which means more congestion on roads and more pollution. This is
not the motorists' fault: there is no motivation or will to actually
make public transport an attractive or viable option to the road, and
such bans just compound this.

If British Rail's Network SouthEast sector could go to the trouble of
organising 'Santa Special' trains back in the 1990s, then I am
encouraged to think that the cycling event in question would also have
been catered for.