British trains

[eve_prime]

J recounts his experiences with the British train system for one of his online communities:

The train we were trying to take from London to Wales was cancelled due to the electrical lines being down?! And they couldn't tell us when future trains would be running because the whole station was out of commission, but we walked to a different station with a different set of trains, and think we've found a couple routes that could get us there, with extra connections. 🤞

So the first train is the same on both of those routes, so we're going!

Also we mostly had to assemble the routes ourselves (with help from eve_prime), because the different trains are run by different companies who don't talk to each other
And the existing website that tries to combine them didn't know about the outage and insisted on trying to use the old route

Later:
Apparently they are constantly changing and cancelling trains, we're on an entirely new route now
This sort of puzzle would be more interesting if we didn't have an actual place we're trying to get to

Later:
Sounds like our next train is delayed... But maybe not by too much to make our next connection?

Later:
While waiting for our late train, hearing announcements for other trains: "We are sorry that the 13:40 cross country service to Cardiff has been cancelled, due a fault on this train. We apologize for any inconvenience this causes."

Later:
On our fifth train of the day, leaving our sixth station of the day. Hopefully this is the last one and we arrive at our destination in Wales!

And they did!

Comments

[heleninwales]

I so glad they got there in the end. I'm afraid our rail system seems to be falling apart these days. Privatisation has not worked as intended and lack of investment in the existing services plus vandals and thieves stealing vital cabling just add to the chaos. It's brilliant when it all works, but sadly it often doesn't.

[eve_prime]

I've passed along your insights into the problem, which help make sense of the situation for us. I'd assumed the train system was reliable when I planned out the trip, so now I'm more concerned. I am confident that they can eventually get from Conwy to Oxford tomorrow, but we also have a plan for Oxford-to-Winchester with a time element involved (getting to Chawton to see the Jane Austen House) and now I know to suggest they ask how reliable that will be.

[heleninwales]

I hope the journeys go well. There may be no problems at all, but it's best to be mentally prepared for possible delays, just in case.

[eve_prime]

I think they're moderately prepared now. They were sure good sports about the five trains between London and Conwy.