Today I attended Northern’s Stakeholder Conference in York. The day started well, with me arriving at Morpeth station in time to enjoy a coffee and sausage sandwich at the new café. An amazing deal for just £4.00. I travelled on the 08:22 CrossCountry service, but I arrived at the station to find an LNER train making an unscheduled stop. This was because the earlier 07:13 had been cancelled. Well done to LNER for showing the flexibility in having their next train stop. The CIS of course couldn’t cope, and was showing “stand back – fast train passing” as the Azuma slowly pulled in. But another “well done” – this one to the Northern Booking Office Clerk who was out on the platform explaining to passengers what was going on, and where the train was going. This, I think, is the future for station staff – we do need them out on the platform assisting passengers particularly in times of disruption.
The unscheduled LNER was itself running late – presumably it had similarly stopped at Berwick and Alnmouth, and as a result, so was the freight train behind it, and so was Northern’s “Chahill Chugger” behind that. Which meant of course the CrossCountry service was also late, in turn. It was a comfortable journey with CrossCountry, but I did note the conductor kept emphasising the reason for the delay was the late running Northern service in front. Not entirely fair, I thought, since if LNER hadn’t allowed the later train to make the unscheduled stop (surely the primary cause of the delay, rather than Northern), then all those left behind LNER passengers would have piled on to the CrossCountry service, making our journey to York quite unpleasant, inevitably with passengers standing. But overall, the rail industry responding well I thought, minimising inconvenience, but the inability of the CIS to cope proving once again the need for stations to be staffed.
The Stakeholder Conference itself was useful, good presentations, Northern’s MD Nick Donovan staying around all day (and yes, I did tell him how annoyed I was at Northern cancelling our public meeting scheduled for that evening). Surprisingly however, those questions submitted in advance were not considered – had Northern made that clear they would not be addressed I could have asked them “live”. As it was, it made it a bit pointless submitting questions beforehand. Nevertheless, overall a very useful day.
Northern had a number of exhibitions stands during the breaks – including one on the Northumberland Line – making their cancellation of this evening’s public meeting with SENRUG even more curious. Perhaps their instructions from DfT were that they could talk to anyone except SENRUG about the project! Or perhaps they just didn’t bother to explain they would have to pull out of an existing, pre-booked engagement. As one angry SENRUG member put it to me: “It’s just more evidence that Northern cancel things too easily. They don’t have the understanding that people have booked things, must be at places, and the massive disruption it will cause”. Maybe not an entirely fair comment when it comes to train cancellations, but certainly a totally understandable sentiment with regard to them pulling out of our Public Meeting, for which the Town Hall had been booked and meeting well publicised around the town.
