On 28 Jul 2014 at 7:13pm Extra wrote:
A Southern Railway poster outside Lewes Railway Station proclaims one hundred and seventy new carrriages available on our network. And yet we still have the dreaded off peak four overcrowded coaches from Ore to London Victoria, attaching another four overcrowded coaches at Haywards Heath. This train serves the centres of Hastings, Eastbourne, Lewes etc. At times it's standing room only from Haywards Heath, deadly from Gatick (Welcome to the UK!) and worse on return until late evening. Now with 2 for 1 special offers, tourists, parties, Glyndebourne etc - standing from Victoria to Lewes is common, it's about time we had an additional four, preferably six of those new coaches, to address this situation once and for all. Rant over.
On 28 Jul 2014 at 8:36pm spotter wrote:
Give them chance to build them... Read the poster! 170 new carriages BEING built
On 28 Jul 2014 at 8:40pm Sussex Jim wrote:
There used to be an hourly service from Eastbourne to Victoria, off-peak. From Haywards Heath it would run at exactly the opposite minutes past the hour to the Littlehampton-Victoria hourly service.
In recent years there have been two trains an hour EB-Vic. Presumably the same thing has happened to the L.Hampton service. The two trains couple up at HHeath to use the same "slot" into London.
So, you now have two short trains an hour instead of one long train. Same capacity. Perhaps adjust your travelling times?
On 28 Jul 2014 at 10:06pm Pimp le wrote:
Wouldn't four ores from coaches make the journey a bit better?
On 29 Jul 2014 at 6:51am Clifford wrote:
It does make me laugh how people leap to defend the train companies as if they're a persecuted minority. Extra is right - the trains are grossly overcrowded and need more coaches. What else are we subsidising their shareholders' profits through our taxes for?
On 29 Jul 2014 at 12:29pm ar10642 wrote:
Clifford, the Brighton line is at capacity and would be incredibly expensive and disruptive to increase that capacity. Part of the answer might be to reopen the Uckfield - Lewes line to provide extra journeys to London, but for now they have to have the splitting/joining thing going on because there are not enough train pathways from Haywards Heath to London to provide more service. The trains can be a maximum of 3 "units", the units come in 3 or 4 coach varieties. You can either halve frequency from Littlehampton and Eastbourne and have 12 coach trains, or keep it as it is and have 30 minute frequency. Generally the West Coastway line will get the 8 carriage bit because more people live there and there are more stations. Apologist or not, I don't see any quick and easy solutions to this problem.
On 31 Jul 2014 at 8:37pm belladonna wrote:
what has the amount of carriages on the train got to do with train pathways ? 10-12 carriage trains go up in peak hours, why not 8 carriage trains in off peak ?
On 1 Aug 2014 at 11:44am ar10642 wrote:
Because you have to join at HH with the Littlehampton bit. If Lewes has 8 coaches, Littlehampton would have to have 4, and the Littlehampton side is busier. The trains can only be a maximum of 12 when joined up. The ones in the morning don't join up, they made that work by extending Gatwick Express down to the coast in the peaks, freeing up pathways at the London side (it was either that or scrapping Gatwick Express).
On 1 Aug 2014 at 2:30pm Extra wrote:
I've been making a few enquiries. Most of the new stock has been delivered and is being leased from Porterbrook to Southern.
In amongst the order are what's called class 377/7s which consist of five cars. So, 2x5=10 - better. But why can't you run 2X6
anyway?
On 2 Aug 2014 at 10:12am ar10642 wrote:
The main reason you can't run 2x6 is that 6 car units don't exist. There are a handful of 3 car units but I don't think you can join 4 of them together, at least I've never seen it happen. Actually one way they could increase Lewes services is to cut the Brighton service a bit, I think they have something like 7 trains per hour to London. Do they really need that many?
On 2 Aug 2014 at 12:14pm Extra wrote:
Thanks. They seem to able to join 2x3 together in the north.
And whats wrong with the suggestion of 2x5? That would alleviate the problem. Note, I have disregarded the obvious
diesal solution.