South with Chiltern / North with LondonMidland

+Chiltern Railways is looking for feedback on the Business Zone provision on the Silver Sets - complete the online survey for a chance to win VIP tickets to London as well as influence the company's thinking.

Of course as a regular off-peak user of the BZ I am one happy customer (so long as they don't increase the supplement beyond £10) but it will be interesting to see what peak users say now that the supplement for them is £25.

Yesterday, I caught the 1055 from Moor Street and benefited from the usual high level 'at seat' service from one of the regular BZ hosts. Also enjoyed the vegetable chow mien plated meal at £3.50 - tremendous value when needing an early lunch.

Yesterday too allowed Chiltern to boast that the company has been 'named top franchise rail operator for right time train punctuality for a record sixth period running, according to research released today by Network Rail.'  The company is well ahead of +London Midland and Virgin Trains in this regard BUT of course it doesn't have to use the West Coast Main Line...

Returning from London on the LondonMidland 1813 'fast' service to Birmingham New Street showed just why LondonMidland and Virgin Trains haven't a chance in the right time train punctuality stakes. A points problem in the Wembley area during the afternoon was proving difficult to sort meaning that trains were stacking up on the approach to Euston (Virgin being particularly affected). Fortunately the 1813 made it into Platform 14 in reasonable time to load but then was delayed by 4 minutes on departure and then held several times on the approach to Wembley to allow Virgin services to get in front. Once past Wembley, the train had a good run but the damage had been done and it reached Northampton 20 minutes late. The 4 coaches for Birmingham left at 1945 but LM control took the decision to terminate the service at Birmingham International where a following Virgin Pendolino took us onto New Street - arrival 28 minutes late!

Clearly neither LM or Virgin can do anything about Network Rail infrastructure problems and one has to admire the resilience of the staff who have to put up with these ongoing issues day in day out. It does seem a bit hard for the press to focus on the train operating companies when it is actually the infrastructure company at fault (and don't get me started on Network Rail bonuses).

Talking of staff, one final note of sympathy for those on the front line. Last night, the admirable @londonmidland twitter feed was in full swing keeping passengers informed. Also in effect was the real time running information available from the Chiltern Railways App. Thus it was that those of us 'connected' knew well in advance of the Train Manager that the 1813 was going to terminate at International - the poor man only found out once Control actually paged him... Wonder when LM staff will be able to use the information now available to passengers???