Forum | Merseyside Dennis Dart Website

When you consider how Virgin has turned around the fortunes of the West Coast since privatisation, I think it's fair to say the East Coast is in safe hands.

Yes but it's not always value for money. A few months back I was charged eleven quid for a single ticket from Crewe to Chester. Ironically more an the cost of a Megabus train ticket from Lime Street to Euston.

And the other thing is the Virgin branding when operational control is with Stagecoach. Ask anyone who has the misfortune to live in Surrey or Hampshire and has to deal with SWT.

I was going to say it's like booking to fly to LHR on Virgin and finding you're actually on Aer Lingus. However that's a different arrangement and the reality is it's more like booking Virgin and finding you're actually on Ryanair.

Seems East coast are having a Christmas that they would like to forget with over-running engineering work forcing services to terminate and start from Finsbury Park , there has been chaotic scenes there during the course of the day .

I think there needs to be questions asked about this .

(28/11/2014 21:08)SNL 824 Wrote: [ -> ]Yes but it's not always value for money. A few months back I was charged eleven quid for a single ticket from Crewe to Chester. Ironically more an the cost of a Megabus train ticket from Lime Street to Euston.

And the other thing is the Virgin branding when operational control is with Stagecoach. Ask anyone who has the misfortune to live in Surrey or Hampshire and has to deal with SWT.

I was going to say it's like booking to fly to LHR on Virgin and finding you're actually on Aer Lingus. However that's a different arrangement and the reality is it's more like booking Virgin and finding you're actually on Ryanair.

Unfortunately Anytime fares are unregulated. £11.20 for a 21 mile journey is very high but neither ATW or Virgin seem prepared to provide a competitive fare. I think that the problem is that few people buy the ticket as for most people the CTR-CRE journet is part of a through ticket beyond CRE or CTR.

Article in tomorrow's Daily Mail about the salaries the directors of these TOCs are earning. Scandalous.
Was hoping in vain the East Coast would of been kept in public hands but that was never going to happen not with this government.

With Stagecoach / Virgin , they thought that they would be a safe pair of hands after the rollercoaster ride that has happened on the ECML in recent years.

I am now surprised that the Competition Authorities havent come out and asked for some assurances that there isnt a significant lessening of competition , considering that they will have WCML , ECML and Megabus .

A bit of competition?

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015...t-mainline

(11/03/2015 13:17)Squire of the Gate Wrote: [ -> ]A bit of competition?

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015...t-mainline

As it stands at the moment I would be surprised to see any competition on the East Coast Main Line , everytime some open access competition gets mooted the idea seems to get shot down by Network Rail saying lack of paths.

RMT announces two days of strikes on East Coast

https://www.railnews.co.uk/news/2017/04/...ys-of.html

Credit: Railnews.