On May 21, 10:00*am, trundlefast wrote:
Some observations from a weekend in UK. Might be of interest to some.

Friday

DLR
0900 ish City Airport to Stratford Int
City Airport station always chilly, but being cleaned. Four carriage
train (I know. To the in the know they're two cars, but say what one
likes, it looks like four cars.) Busy but get a seat with the coveted
forward view. Empties at Stratford Reg. About two dozen of us trundle
on to Int - quite busy here as it's a London Ambassadors morning.
GBP1.50 or so with Oyster. No compaints about that. More readers have
appeared at SFI and new ticket machines are in evidence at City.

Se High Speed
1010 Strat Int to Ashford Int
Stratford Int is a truly horrid place to have to wait. Perhaps the
least British station in the country. It always reminds me of Charles
de Gaulle TGV. Soulless and cold at any time of year. Why are all the
lights on all day? The 395 is a solid train, but noisy in the North
London tunnels. Not too busy, on time. Good announcements from
conductor.
Se Mainline
1102 AFK to Ramsgate
A 375/8 with redecked seats. Quite nice, and the new seat covers mean
these trains have lost the rather unpleasant smell they seemed to
develop over the last couple of years. On time again.

Saturday

Se High Speed
0905 RAM to SPI & 1642 Return
Pretty much as per Friday, although 395 021 needs its dampeners seeing
to, as it was verging on scary for the first km or so in the Barking
tunnel as we wobbled alarmingly. Train full and standing in the up
direction from Ashford. Over 60 people got on at Ramsgate alone. Think
a catering service might be in order, at least at weekends. Quieter
coming back, but on time. SPI extension not too nice. Reminds me of
Madrid Atocha a lot. One set of escalators shut (and why are the
escalators arranged so oddly - you have to do two U turns to get from
the concourse to the gateline!).

For completeness: Bus 91 to & from Aldwych arrived sharpish and lots
of space upstairs.

One day travel card (NSE): about GBP 24.

Sunday

Se High Speed & FCC
1505 RAM to SPI & 1639 SPI(LL) to Gatwick
1505 is cancelled, literally as walk into the station due to
Signalling Problems between Ramsgate and Margate. Gulp. This has never
happened to me in Thanet before in 30 years of travel. East Kent
resignalling seems to still be having issues.

I have to be at Gatwick at 1830.

A quick chat with a (very calm - good) Se station staff suggests
things are not going to get better soon (and even if they do it's an
hour for the next High Speed, and no point using mainline as it'd take
too long to go into London and come out again). Only option - get to
AFK and do something from there - either a High Speed from Dover or go
via Tonbridge and Redhill. I'd not have known this if I was utterly
normal, and would have needed Se to advise me. I think they'd have
given me the right advice, but not sure they'd have recommended the
only sure way to get to AFK in time to make the trains to make the
flight: A (Ford mondeo) minicab to AFK. This costs 40 GBP.

Manage that in 45 minutes and just miss the 1613 High Speed by a
whistle's length. Only option available then, after a phone call to
other half to check on NRES, is - Ashford-Tonbridge-Redhill-GTW.

So
1633 AFK to TON
Gateline open at AFK: customer in me wonders why we bother having it,
then? 375/8 from AFK is very busy with shoppers, a good few of whom
jump off when the PIS announces the next stop is Minster before we
leave! PIS not fixed, guard makes no announcements, but off we go.
Glad I know what I'm doing. We leave 5 mins late. PIS eventually kicks
in and starts getting it right. Conductor does ticket check but seems
to forget me!

1741 TON to Redhill
Tonbridge station is like a trip back in time to the days of NSE, if
not the Southern Region. But a new waiting room has been added in the
same style as the other buildings on platforms 1&2 and a new customer
info desk seems to be going in. Toilets are clean and tidy.

Last time I was here there was *no* mention of Southern's Redhill
service anywhere (including on the PIS, for some reason), and the
timetable posters were all wrong. No time to check today, but at least
it's on the PIS.

377/x Always feel these trains look classier than the spartan Se ones
(it's the orange, which feels like a hangover from those horrid
vestibules in the CEPs). Se conductor does a check and I tell my tale.
He's really good. Really. First class customer service. Sympathetic
and apologetic (I give myself away a bit by mentioning that I know its
NR who do the signalling), and he goes so far as to check the
connections for me at Redhill, reassure me that I should make one or
other of them with no difficulty and even printing them out from the
ticket machine.

1815 Redhill to GTW
A quick sprint around Redhill, but time enough to notice some rather
nice black sofas in the redone waiting room on Platform 3. 377/x x2.
See above. Another ticket check. I'm virtually overlooked again, the
flash of railcard wallet plus orange and green seemingly enough.
Gateline at GTW staffed by Gatex and lots of people still surprised by
it.

Price: 24.15 GBP and 6.55 GBP. And 40 GBP. Will be on delay repay
pronto to try to recoup what I can. By the way, Se are not good at
mentioning Delay repay to customers at all, and it's not easy to find
on the website.

So: Friday 8/10. Saturday: 9/10. Sunday overall 2/10 for a very
stressful and expensive experience, but I must say within that almost
everything else ran to time, and the Se conductor on the Edenbridge
line helped restore some faith (in the customer in me).

Arrived at GTW at 1828. Flight left 35 minutes late in the end!

Thank you for sharing your experience. Unfortunately, it was your
most important journey that awry.