Britain - The Official Thread

[baldgye]

How far is the commute @baldgye

2 hours each way

 

[MatskiMonk]

2 hours each way

If it were me I'd move or change jobs. Don't think I could spend 4 hours a day commuting even if it was free!

 

[Moglet]

Problem is, is that they are competing with cars price wise. The trains are now so insanely expensive and restrictive that I'm now looking into driving to and from work... which is the exact opposite of what public transport is supposed to do.

About 5 years ago while I was living on the Isle of Wight I had a job interview in Wakefield (255 miles away by car) and the company paid for my train tickets. I decided to look up the journey to see how much it would cost by car. It was cheaper to rent a car, pay for several full tanks of petrol, pay for a ferry and drive to Wakefield and back than it was to take the train before you even consider taxi costs to get to the interview location the other end. Thanks to a transfer at Kings Cross it also took about the same amount of time.

 

[baldgye]

If it were me I'd move or change jobs. Don't think I could spend 4 hours a day commuting even if it was free!

I'm not advocating other people do it

 

[PzR Slim]

Problem is, is that they are competing with cars price wise. The trains are now so insanely expensive and restrictive that I'm now looking into driving to and from work... which is the exact opposite of what public transport is supposed to do. It's supposed to provide a service and the Gov is supposed to be used it to help reduce the stress on the roads, but the train network and service is so god-awful that it forces people back onto the roads.

I'd love to calm down, but I face being gouged by price or doubling my commute time... all because the rail networks are so horribly run and managed...


..to further rant and give an example of how badly managed the whole situation is;

My season pass allows me to reserve a seat, I always get the same outbound train and so went to reserve a seat on it. Only one seat reservation = one ticket. To reserve a seat for a month, on the same train, I needed 30 separate tickets... and the people at the station are loathed to print off a weeks worth at any one time.
Its ridiculous, and since moving north where there are no competing train operators, the cost has doubled.

Ok I'm done ranting

Defo on your side. Travelling by train in Europe is a real eye opener into quite how bad our trains are.

 

[MaxAttack]

About 5 years ago while I was living on the Isle of Wight I had a job interview in Wakefield (255 miles away by car) and the company paid for my train tickets. I decided to look up the journey to see how much it would cost by car. It was cheaper to rent a car, pay for several full tanks of petrol, pay for a ferry and drive to Wakefield and back than it was to take the train before you even consider taxi costs to get to the interview location the other end. Thanks to a transfer at Kings Cross it also took about the same amount of time.

As an Islander, I know exactly how much that 45 minute max ferry journey cost you, and I feel your pain.

 

[Moglet]

As an Islander, I know exactly how much that 45 minute max ferry journey cost you, and I feel your pain.

I took the train option in the end, the company paid for everything 👍

When we had to get a last minute ferry back to the mainland for a family emergency on a bank holiday, now that one hit our wallets pretty hard!

 

[MaxAttack]

I took the train option in the end, the company paid for everything 👍

When we had to get a last minute ferry back to the mainland for a family emergency on a bank holiday, now that one hit our wallets pretty hard!

I'd wager it was at least half an hour late, too! Good old WightLink, good old Red Funnel, it really is pick your poison.

The Hovercraft is, at least, a neat bit of engineering with a good story behind it. And also impressively fast, which suits a man of my tastes.

 

[ExigeEvan]

Defo on your side. Travelling by train in Europe is a real eye opener into quite how bad our trains are.

I've travelled by train in a few European countries and North America (because until a couple of years ago I really didn't fancy driving on the wrong side of the road), and I can't say that I was too impressed.

Weirdly, I'd say California had the best trains, but also the worst service intervals and most people seemed to struggle to even buy a ticket.

The non-TGV service I took out of Paris was like stepping back to the 80s, and that was after surviving the gauntlet at Gare Du Nord.

Our railways are certainly crap, expensive and even worse outside of London but I've never understood this idea that everyone else was so much better.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I don't know if there's a record for terrorism groups with the highest average age... but the UK has to be in with a shout.

Warning: Be careful clicking through the links as some of the posters have pictures of funerals with open coffins on their timelines.

 

[Liquid]

I still can't work out why trains are so horribly expensive, slow and poorly managed in the UK

- Being the first railway system nation, the first lines were never laid with the future in mind
- Pre-1923 grouping, the private railways laid tracks wherever the hell they pleased, even if it overlapped and intersected other railways
- Avoiding ground action in WW2 meant there was never any need nor opportunity to rip up the old routes and start again
- The Beeching Axes were a total failure and destroyed any chance of future-proofing the network
- Horrible franchise system that creates regional monopolies

On the third point, that is an "advantage" given to some other countries such as Germany, Austria and Japan.

 

[daan]

About 5 years ago while I was living on the Isle of Wight I had a job interview in Wakefield (255 miles away by car) and the company paid for my train tickets. I decided to look up the journey to see how much it would cost by car. It was cheaper to rent a car, pay for several full tanks of petrol, pay for a ferry and drive to Wakefield and back than it was to take the train before you even consider taxi costs to get to the interview location the other end. Thanks to a transfer at Kings Cross it also took about the same amount of time.

A few years ago, my wife was looking to get from central Scotland to Pembrokeshire in Wales but was unable to drive at the time. She looked at trains from here to there, and it was pretty expensive. It worked out cheaper to go to Cairnryan, get a ferry to Belfast, go from Belfast to Rosslare and then get another ferry back across to Milford Haven!

 

[baldgye]

- Being the first railway system nation, the first lines were never laid with the future in mind
- Pre-1923 grouping, the private railways laid tracks wherever the hell they pleased, even if it overlapped and intersected other railways
- Avoiding ground action in WW2 meant there was never any need nor opportunity to rip up the old routes and start again
- The Beeching Axes were a total failure and destroyed any chance of future-proofing the network
- Horrible franchise system that creates regional monopolies

On the third point, that is an "advantage" given to some other countries such as Germany, Austria and Japan.

I get that it's old, but almost 200 years have gone by since the first lines where laid. Again we are almost 100 years past the the 1920's...
I'll have to look into the Beeching cuts, as they are a new one to me

- Horrible franchise system that creates regional monopolies

Oh, indeed.

 

[Moglet]

Defo on your side. Travelling by train in Europe is a real eye opener into quite how bad our trains are.

Coming back to the UK after travelling around Japan for 2 weeks was like stepping back into the stone age. We went from immaculately maintained and super clean trains that arrived and left on the second they said they would, to a late train home that we were forced to stand in for 2 hours with the doors coming open partially each time a train went the other way.

I'd wager it was at least half an hour late, too! Good old WightLink, good old Red Funnel, it really is pick your poison.

The Hovercraft is, at least, a neat bit of engineering with a good story behind it. And also impressively fast, which suits a man of my tastes.

We rarely had any issues with Red Funnel TBF, it was always WightLink we had bad experiences with. Red Funnel were generally cheaper too.

 

[ryzno]

This popped up on my timeline...

 

[Dotini]

I found this BBC production to be sobering.

 

[Touring Mars]

I found this BBC production to be sobering.

I bet Prince Andrew found it pretty sobering too.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I bet Prince Andrew found it pretty sobering too.

Indeed, he can talk away historic Epstein associations but being filmed in Epstein's flat after the first round of allegations was... beyond stupid. And waving at ze young ladies while he was at it. Genius.

 

[Dotini]

A newly released nationwide poll has revealed that an astonishing 89 percent of Britons between the ages of 16- to 29-years-old think that their lives are meaningless and without purpose.

https://voiceofeurope.com/2019/08/g...oung-brits-think-their-lives-are-meaningless/

 

[UKMikey]

Perhaps they should plug into the universal unconsciousness.

Simon Sinek blames the parents for overvaluing them as kids growing up. He says when they enter the workplace and they're not valued as highly as at home they turn to social media for a dopamine like hit of validation.

 

[Dotini]

Perhaps they should plug into the universal unconsciousness.

Simon Sinek blames the parents for overvaluing them as kids growing up. He says when they enter the workplace and they're not valued as highly as at home they turn to social media for a dopamine like hit of validation.

Hahahahah! That's great video. Yes, these friendless addicted kids need to realize that being meaningless and purposeless is the best they can hope for! It's all up to the individual person to deal with what's in front of them, living in the moment. ROFLMAO.

 

[Tired Tyres]

A newly released nationwide poll has revealed that an astonishing 89 percent of Britons between the ages of 16- to 29-years-old think that their lives are meaningless and without purpose.

https://voiceofeurope.com/2019/08/g...oung-brits-think-their-lives-are-meaningless/

Comment: These Brits are plainly far more stupid than they are purposeless or meaningless. All they have to do is join GTP forums to learn the profound error of their thinking.

The only purposes are to survive, thrive and reproduce. Anything else is meaningless rubbish.

It's a shame millennials don't seem to know this. Perhaps they've been sold something that is unobtainable?

 

[Liquid]

I get that it's old, but almost 200 years have gone by since the first lines where laid. Again we are almost 100 years past the the 1920's...

But that's the point; you're using a railway network that's been extant since the 1830s and been ineffective since the 1830s. Too much time has now passed to rip it all up and start again because you can't put the toothpaste back into the tube.

I'll have to look into the Beeching cuts, as they are a new one to me

British Railways' plan to stem its losses was to look up all the routes and stations with below-than-adequate passenger numbers and close them. It was a policy that had already begun in the late 1950s but was expedited with Richard Beeching's 1963 white paper The Re-Shaping Of British Railways. Hundreds of stations closed and thousands of miles of track was abandoned or ripped up. The problem was that the report did not take into account, or did not act upon, that 90% of the passenger revenue losses was on 10% of the network i.e. the major trunk routes that the report did so much to defend. Many rural communities lost their only significant transport connection.

There were no recommendations on the management or administration levels of British Rail and no consideration on, for example, staffing levels and staffing times at railway stations, all of which would have reduced the network's losses had their resources and budgets been better allocated.

The paper was essentially an after the fact justification for something the Tory governments were already doing; closing railways. The transport secretary under both Macmillan and Douglas-Home, Ernest Marples, had a significant share in the road construction company Marples Ridgeway and it's not unfair to suggest that he had an interest in closing railways and getting new roads built and used, particularly for the freight industry.

The promise of 'bustitution' for those rural communities that had their transport taken away failed to deliver and was often slower, less reliable and more infrequent than the railways which they had replaced.

It isn't to say that the state of railways in Britain in the 1960s was excellent but there was never any real interest in making it better and future-proofing any developments. Since the axes, those lines which today might be seen as significant and important had they still been around have been developed on so much that there is an impossibility of rebuilding them.

 

[baldgye]

But that's the point; you're using a railway network that's been extant since the 1830s and been ineffective since the 1830s. Too much time has now passed to rip it all up and start again because you can't put the toothpaste back into the tube.

You don’t need to do that, just continual work on updating and streamlining the network.
Hell start it now! It’s been left and left and left and now it’s so bad there are small monopolies all over the country.


It’s **** and constantly going up in price with zero increase in quality.... my YEAR pass was paper last year and my monthly passes are too, you only get so many replacements before you have to pay... it’s insane

 

[Liquid]

You don’t need to do that, just continual work on updating and streamlining the network.
Hell start it now! It’s been left and left and left and now it’s so bad there are small monopolies all over the country.

I agree but it would cost a colossal amount of money and who's going to pay for it?

 

[TenEightyOne]

I agree but it would cost a colossal amount of money and who's going to pay for it?

We own it... so that'll be us.

At least Horse **** 2 is under review.

 

[Dotini]

UK consulate worker detained in China.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Some papers are reporting that Boris's Big Idea is that Ireland should diverge from the EU on a temporary-ish basis to be part of a customs union with the UK.

I'm struggling to find an original source that isn't The Sun but it sounds like ******** and is therefore credible.

 

[UKMikey]

Some papers are reporting that Boris's Big Idea is that Ireland should diverge from the EU on a temporary-ish basis to be part of a customs union with the UK.

I'm struggling to find an original source that isn't The Sun but it sounds like ******** and is therefore credible.

Maybe they should put it to the Irish people as a referendum.

 

[baldgye]

I agree but it would cost a colossal amount of money and who's going to pay for it?

If that cost had been spread out over the last few hundred years it wouldn't be so bad... or y'know... HS2 that no one actually wants (when I lived in Brum and thought about using it in the future for work it was ridiculously expensive and, only one way... meaning I'd still get home very late)