Are you satisfied with train services in the UK?

Satisfied

  • Yes

    Votes: 11 18.0%

  • No

    Votes: 37 60.7%

  • Look at you peasants using public transport

    Votes: 13 21.3%
  • Total voters
    61
  • Poll closed .
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Northern Rail piss me off the most. 30 year old diesel trains with 2 carriages. The 'new' second hand electric trains are better and bigger, but still awful compared to most European countries. They won't invest in the infrastructure, but they'll pay Mancs to hang around outside Huyton station to act like bouncers handing out fines if you haven't got your Trio on ya.
 
tsubaki said:
Where they are still under some form of effective state control - Merseyrail, the London Overground, East Coast (before it was sold off to Virgin - they are of quite a high standard. There are also one or two good private companies running services on part of the network - Chiltern (who run the route out of Marylebone to Birmingham) are great, and the Wrexham and Shropshire Railway (which received no subsidy at all) was the best service in the country before unfair competition from Virgin killed it off.

As for the rest, in my experience Virgin are terrible, South West Trains and Southern tolerable at best, Great Northern alright.
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It's a bit of an illusion that Merseyrail have more state ownership than others, it's a closed line but other than that it's operated by Serco and Abellio whom are also in partnership behind the Northern franchise. They just use the Merseytravel branding.


Fresh Prince of Belle Val said:
Northern Rail piss me off the most. 30 year old diesel trains with 2 carriages. The 'new' second hand electric trains are better and bigger, but still awful compared to most European countries. They won't invest in the infrastructure, but they'll pay Mancs to hang around outside Huyton station to act like bouncers handing out fines if you haven't got your Trio on ya.
Click to expand...

Serco and Abellio have lost this franchise and it's going to Arriva (aka the German government) from April. Hopefully they will improve a bit, they've promised to get rid of pacer trains in the next five years.
 
Never had an issue, don't use merseyrail because they are like stock from a third world country but the virgin pendolino' share always sound, quick enough to Euston and if you book in good time fairly reasonable.

Last time I went to London we drove, and it cost £40 ish in diesel there and back, but I also had 8 or 9 hours of driving, whereas on the train I could've been sat reading the paper and having a beer. Swings and roundabouts.
 
I use the c2c line, and whilst today is an unfortunate day to ask this question as they had chaos due to power line failure, they are a brilliantly run line. 95%+ punctuality, modern clean trains, good value vs other SE lines, loads of trains per hour. Couldn't be happier.

Was on a Virgin train from London to Birmingham at the weekend and that was also excellent; I've traveled that line tens of times over the years and rarely had a problem. Super quick too.

However, I know that other parts of the country fare much worse.

But I certainly wouldn't want my line re-nationalised. You wonder why the govt doesn't get the best lines to take over more of the poorer lines, the way TFL has been doing with the East Anglia routes.
 

I use the c2c line, and whilst today is an unfortunate day to ask this question as they had chaos due to power line failure, they are a brilliantly run line. 95%+ punctuality, modern clean trains, good value vs other SE lines, loads of trains per hour. Couldn't be happier.

Was on a Virgin train from London to Birmingham at the weekend and that was also excellent; I've traveled that line tens of times over the years and rarely had a problem. Super quick too.

However, I know that other parts of the country fare much worse.

But I certainly wouldn't want my line re-nationalised. You wonder why the govt doesn't get the best lines to take over more of the poorer lines, the way TFL has been doing with the East Anglia routes.
 
I use MerseyRail everyday and while it's not bad, it's not great either.

In my experience of using Virgin it's great but expensive. Too expensive.

Northern Rail can get in the bin.
 

Sometimes I have to goto London for meetings at short notice and I can't be arsed to drive all the time from the North East but the train prices are ridiculous. Cheaper to fly, and I get a can of Heineken with the ticket.
 
Varies by region. The South West is particularly shockingly served in terms of quality of carriage, capacity, punctuality, and pricing. Virginia pull your pants down for cost, but never experienced real bother on their London lines. Cross country stink, figuratively and literally. London Midland provide painfully slow intercity services, but decent reliable and relatively cheap local services.

Pricing needs sorting overall tbf
 
Don't think they're too bad but the cost is a major negative. It costs me £102 to get home from Plymouth for a weekend and that's with a third off from my railcard. It's a piss take.
 

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