Can railway staff arrange an unscheduled stop to pick up a stranded passenger?

[Delticthrash]

On my journey, I am due to arrive quite late and will be changing onto the last local train of the night. Unfortunately cancellations and delays are very common along the route, so if the fast train I am on is delayed or cancelled I will miss the last train and will have to take a taxi. However, faster trains run on a bit longer into the night.

Trains along the route are provided by more than one company, so do they have some sort of cooperation with one another to make an unscheduled stop to drop off another company's passenger?

 

[bb21]

Yes, they can.

There is however no guarantee and they are not obliged to put a Special Stop Order on the next train. They may just call you a taxi as that is often easier.

 

[Merseysider]

The first port of call is to speak to staff.

As you haven't said where you're travelling it's impossible to comment on what normally happens - each situation is different.

It depends on many factors, such as whether those stations would be locked up at a certain time, whether a dispatcher is needed on the platform, route knowledge, pathing, and so on.

 

[Delticthrash]

Yes, they can.

There is however no guarantee and they are not obliged to put a Special Stop Order on the next train. They may just call you a taxi as that is often easier.

I see, though I suppose this depends on the distance doesn't it? It would be easy for them to arrange a taxi for a short trip, but for a longer trip, it would be more cost effective and practical to stop a faster train. The fast trains are not really fast. You could describe them as semi fast. So they're not high speed express trains that need to be stopped at 120 mph. If they were, they'd probably laugh if I asked one to be stopped at a tiny local station.

 

[bb21]

Depends on many factors so it is difficult to say.

Chances are that if stopping the train resulted in an attributable delay, the cost of delay minutes will far outweight the cost of a taxi, and may possibly screw up connections for people further on.

 

[Delticthrash]

Depends on many factors so it is difficult to say.

Chances are that if stopping the train resulted in an attributable delay, the cost of delay minutes will far outweight the cost of a taxi, and may possibly screw up connections for people further on.

I doubt it would cause any delays longer than a minute or two, and that could probably be made up. I'm not familiar with the service but I compared the times with slow and fast trains and they are pretty similar.

 

[sheff1]

It was not that uncommon in the past, and a Special Stop Order was not always deemed necessary .

Nowadays, as others have said, a taxi is the more likely solution, although I did get a stop order put in for me at Haddenham & Thame Parkway earlier this year.

 

[bb21]

I doubt it would cause any delays longer than a minute or two, and that could probably be made up. I'm not familiar with the service but I compared the times with slow and fast trains and they are pretty similar.

You may get your SSOs then. Worth asking.

Obviously without knowing your circumstances I can't really say anything more specific.

 

[robbeech]

Do SOME of the fast trains you'd want an SSO on stop at the station you may need to get on at. If the 'fast' services never call at this station then it may well be that the driver and guard are unable to stop at this station due to route knowledge limitations as someone else mentioned. I think it would have to be some considerable distance for it to be more cost effective and less hassle than getting you a taxi.

 

[marshmallow]

This is the opposite once on a VTEC service (the 20:00 Sunday service from London to Newcastle) there were people who didn't get off at Peterborough so the train made an unscheduled stop at Grantham for them. The next scheduled stop was York, although the scheduled journey times are much longer than needed for that service which probably explains why they were happy to do it.

 

[yorkie]

... although the scheduled journey times are much longer than needed for that service...

Six and a half minutes. Not sure that is "much longer" but it's achievable. You don't want to be more than about 4 min late passing Doncaster though, or the signallers may bring the train to a stand to let the Cleethorpes TPE out.

 

[marshmallow]

Six and a half minutes. Not sure that is "much longer" but it's achievable. You don't want to be more than about 4 min late passing Doncaster though, or the signallers may bring the train to a stand to let the Cleethorpes TPE out.

It is more than six and a half minutes in practice though, the reason being when that train is delayed it always picks up a lot more time than that (around 10 minutes), even though the times given by National Rail never thinks that it will.

 

[Bletchleyite]

FWIW when David Whitley (senior management) used to run the LM Twitter I managed to get stop orders put in on a couple of occasions. Those were the days!

 

[yorkie]

It is more than six and a half minutes in practice though, the reason being when that train is delayed it always picks up a lot more time than that (around 10 minutes), even though the times given by National Rail never thinks that it will.

What do you think a good time for Peterborough to York is then?

 

[Lockwood]

it may well be that the driver and guard are unable to stop at this station due to route knowledge limitations as someone else mentioned.

Wasn't it recently said that the crew would have to have start/stop route knowledge for all stations along their route, whether they were expected to stop there or not?

 

[marshmallow]

What do you think a good time for Peterborough to York is then?

This is pretty good, as not many services run non-stop from Peterborough to York.

 

[yorkie]

This is pretty good, as not many services run non-stop from Peterborough to York.

??

It's 67 minutes, and you think there is 10 minutes slack, so you think 57 minutes start-to-stop? I've never had a timing that good. It is 112 miles!

 

[AlterEgo]

FWIW when David Whitley (senior management) used to run the LM Twitter I managed to get stop orders put in on a couple of occasions. Those were the days!

I organised a few as well. Not on my own authority but via a word with a route controller. That’s how Twitter ought to work; immediate resolution of issues wherever possible.

 

[marshmallow]

??

It's 67 minutes, and you think there is 10 minutes slack, so you think 57 minutes start-to-stop? I think not.

It's been a while since I have travelled on that service but thinking about it, perhaps it was between York and Northallerton that there is over 10 minutes slack (they allow 32 minutes for the non-stop journey but it can be done in 18 minutes), sorry if I got that slightly wrong! The most ridiculous thing though is that they schedule 29 minutes from Durham to Newcastle at the end!

 

[Starmill]

A train from Cardiff Central made an additional call at Pilning for me and a few others not long ago when one of the two services per day was cancelled.

 

[Lemmy99uk]

The Plymouth/Glasgow sleeper dropped me of at Hartford once.

 

[tsr]

Special stops are very much the norm at some operators and less so at others. I have participated in many but there do seem to be reports around the country that other places are somewhat lacking. On my patch a number of “last trains” are semi-fast - and do run at fairly high linespeeds between stops - but can get converted into stoppers if people need to get home. For example, when the 0102 Victoria-Brighton was a more regular fixture in the timetable, it often used to get the all-stations calls from the 0042 Victoria-East Croydon if that was cancelled - and Coulsdon South and Merstham if the 0014 to Three Bridges went wrong. Likewise the limited-stops 2304 London Bridge-Uckfield makes calls at Hever/Cowden/Ashurst if there’s been disruption and people have missed connections into the 2204, which is the last stopping service. Much the same applies across GTR and indeed around the South as a whole. SWT once pulled a particularly impressive additional call at somewhere like Brookwood (IIRC), late at night, as someone got stranded there, who sent them a slightly desperate tweet with only a few minutes until a train passed through - and it stopped...

Wasn't it recently said that the crew would have to have start/stop route knowledge for all stations along their route, whether they were expected to stop there or not?

Correct. Crews of passenger services need to be able to understand the protocol to safely stop at any station en-route... unless a particular type of stock/service can’t call in passenger service at a specific station, in which case you would only be familiar with its location for evacuation and also if there was a platform starter signal to be stopped at / speed restriction / other infrastructure feature.

I sign a number of routes where I have never had to call at the smaller stations since I learnt them, years ago - but I can be asked to demonstrate or use my knowledge of station names and locations, access arrangements at all hours, platform lengths, signals, off indicators and repeaters, dispatch positions, interchanges, the points at which to make announcements on approach, etc.

 

[RJ]

When on duty, I request SSOs from Control if a cancellation leaves my customers with a long wait. They are normally granted, which is a big help.

 

[Haywain]

The most ridiculous thing though is that they schedule 29 minutes from Durham to Newcastle at the end!

Except, on the vast majority of trains across each day "they" (?) don't.