17:50 train out of Nottingham - saved!

Ooh, lovely. We’ve received word that East Midlands Trains have decided to retain the 17:50 train out of Nottingham. This is a significant win in the campaign!

There is no word about other services in the timetable, nor about stations other than Aslockton, so I can only assume that those cuts are still planned.

But it good news for many - both residents of Aslockton/Whatton, and the folk who live near Bingham station!

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Aug 21st, 2008

Public meeting about train cuts

A public meeting was held last night, hosted jointly by Aslockton and Whatton Parish Councils, and I’m pleased to report that attendance was higher than I expected. Thanks to both Councils for arranging the meeting.

Two guests appeared: one was a Community Rail Bod (who, we assumed, would be on-side) and the other was a chap from East Midlands Trains (who, we assumed, wouldn’t be). That’ll teach us to make assumptions.

John Hillman, East Midlands Trains “Stakeholder Development Manager”, showed genuine concern. He openly admitted that the proposed timetable was inadequate, listened to our arguments and appeared to understand our complaints. The Community Bod*, on the other hand, showed very little sympathy and suggested we were being unreasonable in expecting a “bespoke rail service”. What a waste of space he was.

So I’m feeling a little happier now than I was before the meeting. Just a little.

* Name withheld to protect the useless

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Aug 21st, 2008

Extreme Tips for Unmaintainable MIDlets

I stumbled on a blog post containing “Extreme Tips for Lightning-Fast MIDlets“. Let’s look at some of these programming gems:

Avoid synchronization when possible

Mmm, okay. Don’t know about you, but I synchronize code only when I need it. Perhaps the author of this article likes to synchronize on a whim? Not me…

Array-spreading

Example:

// Before
int[][] table; // a 4×4 table

// After
int[] table; // a 1×16 table

WTF?! Let’s look at the pros and cons of this:

Pros:

  • marginally quicker

Cons:

  • extra computation needed to find the correct array element, if the data structure is supposed to model multi-dimensional data. Espcially relevant if the number of the items in the first dimension isn’t fixed at compile-time
  • yields code which is more difficult to maintain. Associated risk of introducing bugs

Read the rest of this entry »

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Filed under tech : Comments (0) : Aug 5th, 2008

Another letter from East Midlands Trains

Dear Sir,

Our records show that you have contacted the East Midlands Trains Customer Relations team during the last three months.

In order for us to measure how happy our customers are with the way we deal with their feedback, please take a few moments to answer the following questions…

My pleasure! Apparently, I’ll be entered into a draw to win a pair of First Class tickets for travel on East Midlands Trains. Cool… the wife and I would like to go from Nottingham to Aslockton in December please. Oh, hang on…

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 29th, 2008

Survey / petition results

Let’s cut to the chase - the results of the survey and petition at Aslockton station on an ordinary wet Thursday in July:

4.3 people per train is slightly higher than I’d expected, given the official figures at the Office of Rail Regulation. This may be due to one or more of the following reasons:

  • this is just one weekday, and the passenger numbers for weekends may be less - lowering the average (likely)
  • guards on the trains are still lax in collecting fares, so some passengers aren’t counted in the official figures (likely)
  • the upwards trend in passenger numbers is continuing, since the latest published figures from the ORR (possible)
  • it might be “International Let’s Travel To Aslockton Day” and no-one’s told me (unlikely)

Finally, some trivia:

  • I left the house this morning at 05:15
  • today I met three people who are physically incapable of driving, all of whom would be severely inconvenienced if these cuts are made…
  • … including one chaplain at HMP Whatton
  • at least ten commuters, when describing the draft timetable, used language which would make the aforementioned chaplain blush
  • one pristine Bic Biro was chewed by ‘passenger unknown’
  • six pints of delicious Tim Taylor’s Golden Best were sunk (it’s been a long day - I’m allowed)
  • I’m signing off at 22:59, tired to the point of delerium

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 10th, 2008

Proposed “Poacher Line” timetables for December 2008 - download here

East Midlands Trains, bless ‘em, seem to be giving out the draft timetables (for the Poacher Line from December 2008) to anyone who asks. So I thought I’d relieve some of the burden, and reproduce them here.

Note that these are DRAFT timetables - the final timetables will not be available until the end of July.

We have just 2 weeks left to campaign against the service cuts.

poacher-line-weekdays-december-2008.pdf (PDF, 78k)
poacher-line-saturday-december-2008.pdf (PDF, 81k)
poacher-line-sunday-december-2008.pdf (PDF, 52k)

(You’ll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to read these draft timetables)

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 9th, 2008

Survey and petition - tomorrow

Tomorrow morning, I’ll be at Aslockton station before 5.30am, and will be there til the last train at 10.11pm - counting people and collecting signatures on a petition.

The Office of Rail Regulation says that there are “3 Aslockton passengers per train”, so I’d be happy to count 60 people and collect 30 signatures.

Now, 30 signatures doesn’t sound much, I grant you, but those 30 people will be putting around £100,000 into East Midlands Trains‘ coffers annually. So I don’t think we deserve to be treated with such contempt.

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 9th, 2008

Aslockton has more passengers, per train, than Bingham

Ah, train station usage figures. Not usually the stuff of wild excitement, but bear with me.

Figures are collated by the Office of Rail Regulation, and are available on their website.

So what for Aslockton?

The total number of entries and exits (ie, the number of people boarding and and alighting) at Aslockton for financial year 2006/07 was 21363. Given that there are (roughly) 6812 trains stopping at Aslockton each year, that would be 3.14 people per train - and there’s consistent year-on-year growth too:

                        ALK      BIN      RDF
        Year 2006/07    21363    25181    9326
        Year 2005/06    18538    26134    10892
        Year 2004/05    16064    28053    9565
        Year 2003/04
        Year 2002/03    15991    41038    13220

(There are no figures for the year 2003/04)

So, headline figures:

  • Consistent year-on-year growth for Aslockton
  • At the current rate of growth (and decline at Bingham), Alsockton would overtake Bingham this year

Average numbers of passengers per service

6812 trains call each year at Aslockton and Radcliffe, and 8112 at Bingham. This means the average passengers-per-service for the three ALK, BIN and RDF would be 3.14, 3.1 and 1.37.

Let’s compare this with East Midlands Trains’ official line:

“At Radcliffe and Aslockton … our data shows the average number of people joining/alighting at Radcliffe (the busier of the two) to be only 1.3 per train compared to 3 at Bingham.”

1.3 people per train at Radcliffe? Yes

3 at Bingham? Yes

Radcliffe busier than Aslockton? NO!

Indeed, if the figures from the Office of Rail Regulation are to be believed (and who wouldn’t?)… then Aslockton is a busier station than Bingham.

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 4th, 2008

26 People

This morning, I watched as a total of 26 people made use of Aslockton railway station at 06:27, 07:27 and 08:17, most of whom I recognised as people who make return journeys every day. So that’s approximately 50 journeys.

50 journeys witnessed, 21 trains calling at Aslockton per day. I make that an average of 2.3 people per train, and that’s assuming that no-one uses any trains during the day. The true figure will certainly be more than 2.3.

“Less than 1.3″ my arse.

Makes me wonder what East Midland Trains base these assertions on. Surely it can’t be based on revenues, because their ability to collect fares isn’t great (but better than Central Trains before them). How often is my ticket checked? At most, 75% of the time.

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jul 1st, 2008

A reply from East Midlands Trains!

Just 24 hours after accusing East Midlands Trains of not replying to my letters, I received a reply. I feel I should apologise to East Midlands Trains, and Tim Shoveller in particular.

In his reply, Tim (Managing Director of EMT) asserts:

On average, fewer than 1.3 people join or alight each train calling at Aslockton

(I paraphrase slightly)

1.3 people eh? There are 21 trains which call at Aslockton every day, so you reckon that there are no more than 38 journeys in to or out of Aslockton every day? That’s just 19 people making a return trip?

Riiight. We’ll see.

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Filed under transport : Comments (0) : Jun 30th, 2008

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