Posted: Tue 9 October, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Travel |
I saw yesterday in the news that apparently the route I use to get to work is a huge success, with 35% more passengers on it per year than originally predicted. Which is great in a number of ways – although not so great in a number of others.
Last year saw the route take 670,000 passengers, which isn’t bad for a fairly rural/provincial service.
But, if the route is so successful, and (if you average out the costs of travel at £10 per passenger – which I reckon is probably a conservative estimate) has already repaid the original investment would it be too much to ask to have trains of three or even four carriages, rather than the current standing-room-only rigid-in-peaktime trains of only two carriages? It’s not like the platforms can only cope with two carriages, and it would probably persuade a lot more people to use the service on a regular basis.
As it is, the service is OK – depending on when and where you get on the train. In the mornings, I’m lucky now to get a free table, although on the way back it’s not to bad (for me, anyway) as I get on the train as soon as it pulls in, rather than trying to jam myself in at the last possible second. But for many people that’s how they see the peak-time service – as one equivalent to a commuter train to London, jam-packed and standing room only.
If One Trains repaid some of the customer/passenger investment by adding an extra carriage or two, the service would be just as well used – and probably more so – but with a considerable lessening in the number of customer complaints.
You’d think that would make sense, wouldn’t you?
Posted: Tue 25 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Travel, Work-related |
Blimey, I’ve been working in Cambridge for a year today.
How time flies when you’re having fun. *cough*
Posted: Mon 24 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Travel, Work-related |
According to this story, a study by the RAC Foundatioin suggests that about 70% of British workers travel to work by car.
To be honest, I really can’t say that I’m surprised. Up until recently, I’ve always commuted to work by public transport- whether that’s bus, train, or both. It’s been very rare that I can walk to work, and also pretty rare (until moving to Norfolk) for me to drive to work, although that’s primarily due to the fact I’ve only owned a car in the last six months.
While I was in Manchester, it was always far easier to use a bus than to drive in to work. Cheaper, too- by a massive margin. The amount I paid for a weekly ticket into the city centre was about the same as I’d have paid for one day’s parking. Even when I started working in Oldham, and doubled by weekly bus-ticket costs (due to needing tickets from two bus companies) it was still significantly cheaper. Mind you, the service by First Bus from Oldham was fucking abysmal, which didn’t help – but it was still easier than doing the run by car.
In Bracknell (the only place recently where I could walk to work for some time) I didn’t drive to work- the train to Wokingham (once I’d moved from the walk-to-work place) took 10 minutes, and would race past the daily traffic jams on the A329(M) every day. Again, it cost me about £10 per week to do – and parking for the day in Wokingham would’ve run to about £6 or so, which made it cost effective.
When I started here in Cambridge, I was still living in Bracknell, and used the train to get here and back every week. If I’d been driving it would’ve taken me about as long as the train journey, but if I’d had the choice, I’d have used a car – just lugging a week’s worth of clothes on the train every week was a pain in the arse, and would’ve been far easier in a car.
Since we moved to Norfolk, I do still tend to use the train most of the time. As I’ve written before, it takes a bit more time door-to-door, but does have the advantage of giving me extra time to do work, and the like. Works for me.
This week, though, the train line is being fixed/maintained/repaired/whatever along a large section of the train route, which is being replaced by buses. So I’m driving in this week, because it’s easier.
But if Attleborough wasn’t on the main train line to Cambridge, or if I worked outside the city centre, I’d be driving it every day. There would be no point in using public transport, because it would make the commute unfeasibly long. When I change contracts, if it’s a place off the beaten track, I’ll be driving in.
Reports like this that then say people should use more public transport are all well and good, but before anyone is able to get the majority of people onto public transport, the infrastructure for it has to be there – the services have to be reliable, on-time, and regular. More importantly, they have to go where people want them to go – there’s no point creating a huge business park that doesn’t have a good bus service, for example (and believe me, I’ve worked in a few of those).
Until the infrastructure is sorted out, people won’t use it. And until people start using it, the companies will say there isn’t the demand for the infrastructure to be expanded. Good, innit?
Posted: Sat 15 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Geeky, Travel |
One of the good things about getting back to commuting by train is that it’s given me the time to catch up on some of the programmes I’d downloaded on the BBC iPlayer. Despite a number of pain-in-the-arse bits in the program, I’m still far more impressed with it than I was with Channel4’s 4OD offering. Maybe I just watch more stuff from the BBC, I don’t know.
This week, though, I’ve caught up on a lot of the third series of Doctor Who – or at least the ones that I can get at the moment. There’s still a couple more I need to get (and that I’ll watch while travelling next week) but I’ve been pretty impressed with the series. Funny really, because when the series was on TV, I wasn’t at all interested in it, and even stopped recording it on Sky+. Maybe I just stopped recording it when it was about to get better – certainly the episodes I’ve seen on iPlayer have been a massive improvement on the first few. Of course, it’s still a load of old rubbish – but at least it’s watchable rubbish.
As for the iPlayer itself, it’s a decent bit of kit. I’d rather it weren’t (currently) Windows-only, and I’d definitely be far happier if it weren’t also Internet Explorer-only, but for now that’s the way it is, and it’s a case of either use it with the limitations, or don’t use it at at all. Maybe I shouldn’t – after all, why would any company invest in developing a better solution, if people are using the ropy locked-in version? – but I’m going to stick with using it for the moment.
Posted: Wed 12 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Charm School, Customer Services, Cynicism, Travel, Weirdness |
I must admit, on my first reading of the story yesterday of the couple who have been living for 22 years in a Travelodge hotel (and I use that term very loosely) my first reaction was “Why?!?”, closely followed by “Freaks.”
It’s taken me a good 24 hours to get past that reaction- and if I’m honest, it still comes back to that on occasion. Personally, I couldn’t stay in a Travelodge for 22 days, let alone 22 years. I’ve written before about staying in one, and about their dodgy booking practices (although that appears to have stopped now) – but I have to admit that they’re comfortable to sleep in, if nowt else.
However, seeing one of the quotes from the couple, I can understand their motivation a bit more.
“The Travelodge room suits us so much better than our first-floor flat in Sheffield, which has no disabled access for Jean. It’s important as she now suffers from a bone disease and uses a wheelchair.”
Now yeah, fair enough – their disabled access isn’t bad at all, usually.
But still, twenty-two years in a Travelodge. Fucking hell. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.
Posted: Wed 12 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Getting Organised, Own Business, Travel, Work-related |
So as of yesterday, I’m back to using the train rather than driving in to Cambridge every day. In fairness, I only planned to drive in while putting in the extra time and work to get the site launched on time. And now that that’s been done, and the initial bug-hunt is over and done with, some level of sanity can return to my day.
Returning to the train has both good and bad aspects to it. I can’t deny, I’d kind of got used to having some space and time to myself on the journey, so it’s probably a downside to be back in the general throng of people. Time-wise, while the journey is the same time (i.e. roughly an hour) going by train takes about 20-30 minutes longer when one takes into account the waiting for the train to depart, and the walk to/from the office while I’m in Cambridge, rather than the convenience of door-to-door travel.
On the plus side, I get two hours a day back for doing my own stuff. Obviously while driving I can’t use the laptop, which has meant that my writing time has been severely cut back – both for D4D, the business, and letters/emails to friends. That is definitely A Good Thing. It also means I get to relax a bit between home and work (well, except when I’m getting my feet stepped on by fucking idiot people – yes, you, sat opposite me – fuckwit cunt) rather than having to concentrate on driving on roads populated by tosspot motherfuckers BMW drivers.
Oh, and overall it costs me a sod-load less too – £250 per month for the train ticket, rather than a full tank of diesel per week (which is just on the weekly journey, without taking into account any other driving I do) at about £55-60 plus parking when I can’t get a space at work (about 60% of the time) plus depreciation etc. on the car – after all, in the last six weeks I’ve put roughly 4,000 miles on the poxy thing.
So yes, for the forseeable, I’m back on the commuting train. Overall, things could be a lot worse.
Posted: Sat 8 September, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Own Business, Travel, Work-related |
One thing I’m personally really bad at- and that’s partly down to being a contractor, and the sheer cost of it- is organising time away from work. I’d never deny this, although I do work on it when I can.
This week, we’ve booked a holiday for next March – going back to the Lake District, to the same place we did in March 2006. Already, I’m really looking forward to it.