Right, I'm in rant mode at the moment.

I pay about £2,000+ a year on traveling around on trains.

Now today in Croydon ALL train stations were shut and there were no trains running at all.

We have known for over a week snow was coming.

So why are the train companies so unprepared for it when we all pay so much?

Look at Europe, you pay half the price to travel on trains and when the Mrs and I were in Paris and it was snowing and -4 C everything was still working and on time.

So why, when we pay so much more than every other fucking country does our public transport fall over as soon as the weather changes!!

 

get yourself a ford mate i know what you mean a bit of snow and the country is at a stand still

 

We use a crap 3rd rail system here in the southeast.

Snow lays on it then freezes so the trains can't pick up the electric.

Steve

 

because, england does not have the right equipment to clear the tracks of snow and ice,they would not want to risk lives of passengers but in our case with the shite you drabble it would benefit pf if you got on a train in this weather

 

Only two things stopping me at the moment,

i) Only one car parking space at out flat and the Mrs has a car which she uses for work.
ii) Money

Besides I'm a bit off fords to be honest, dunno what I am getting.

 

At work ( national express east anglia ) we have been in winter prep mode for over 8 weeks now, but still strugle, a lot of cash has gone into trying to keep our trains running in the snow , but its still not great.

The amount of sand we are going through filling the trains sander systems at the moment is massive

I know most of the managerment grade staff have to be out at the main stations from 4am assisting, with weather related issues, lucky me gets to stay in a nice warm depot!

25kV overheads arnt so affected

 

But we ain't the only country that used 3rd rail systems, and we ain't the coldest country in the world that use em.

I mean, the Neatherlands, Norway, Russia, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany Finland all use em and they get much much worse weather than us at times.

And all these countries have de-icing machines which basically deposit some sort of oil on the tracks. If you consider the amount of money these companies bring in can they not afford a few dozen of em to oil the main line tracks?

But its not like they are the only option, a lot of the trains I see running through Croydon are diesel trains.

But over the last couple of days it hasn't been the lines that have caused the main problems, its been the trains breaking down and signals failing that seems to be causing most of the problems.

 

And they are still running aint they?

Southern Rail today just decided to stop, everything.