The Chocolate Teapot Train Station.

After many years of discussion and planning, more discussion and more planning, Coventry's latest railway station is due to open.

Located on the Coventry-Nuneaton line, the station is meant to service the Ricoh Arena (home to Coventry City FC, Wasps RFC and location of many high profile concerts including Bon Jovi and Pink) and the adjoining shopping centre which contains such stores as Next, Marks & Spencer and New Look.

Photo courtesy of Coventry Telegraph

Firstly the opening of the unmanned station was delayed due to staff needing training to use it.

Now it has been announced that only one train that will be running per hour with a maximum capacity of 75. There is apparently a problem sourcing further trains.

Also, the service will be suspended for an hour following any major event at the Ricoh.

Initially the timetable was to be trains every 15 minutes, but according to London Midland, who operate on the line, they advised five years ago that this would not be possible.

The station has been built as part of an almost £14 million scheme to update the Coventry-Nuneaton line, a joint project between Coventry City Council, Warwickshire County Council and CENTRO.

Why public transport needs an overhaul.

Let's face it, no-one gets out of bed in the morning and thinks, 'today I am not going to take the car, I want to double my commute time and travel by bus', you use public transport because you have a reason to.

I study in Birmingham city centre, which is a nightmare to get in to at the best of times, but with the road closures over the summer and the Christmas market now on, driving in is quite stressful.  Parking is expensive too, at nearly £9 per day, so I choose to travel by train, this also gives me the option to get some extra studying done.

A return train ticket can be as little as £3.40 and the journey is roughly 25 minutes.

The problem is that trains start from a place where you don't live and deposit you not quite at the place you need to be so you have to catch a bus, and that is where the problem lies.

Yesterday I caught the 4.30 train from Birmingham New Street, it was on time and I arrived in Coventry around 4.55.  During the journey, the train manager had announced that the train was due to arrive in Euston at 5.55pm.

I have to catch two buses home from the station and I ended up walking through my front door also at 5.55pm.

By car it takes less than 10 minutes for the 2.5 mile journey from the station home, but by bus it takes the same amount of time as the train takes to get all the way to London.

And you still have to get from the bus stop home.

And buses are not cheap, whilst the train ticket is £3.40, the bus costs me £5.80 and because the routes are run by two different companies I cannot buy a cheaper day ticket.

Going to work too, by car it now takes me about 15 minutes, but when I was travelling by bus, the journey could take up to two hours purely because of the circuitous route that the service took.

Depending on where you live, services sometimes start too late and finish too early, even in the city and in the country it is much worse.

Until travel by bus is more relevant to people's needs, it is never going to be the first choice of anybody. 

Instead of buying buses with plush seats which constantly have to be replaced due to vandalism or irremovable dirt, why not have solid, but comfortably shaped, seats, this would cut down on cleaning time (the whole bus could just be hosed down) and repair costs, buses would last longer so more would be available, meaning more routes could be introduced.

Recently our bus stops have been installed with electronic displays, unfortunately, the times displayed are those at which the bus is due, information which can already be found on the paper timetables also displayed at the bus stop.  These displays would be more useful showing the time the bus will actually arrive.

How do you feel about public transport?

Silent Sunday - 24/11/13

My Weekend in Wymondham, Norfolk.

Last weekend I was invited to a birthday party, as I haven't taken much annual leave this year I made a weekend of it and headed over to Norfolk on the Friday.  The journey there was uneventful, which is more than I can say about the return journey, but more about that later.

I had booked a single room at the hotel, I had stayed in the same hotel last year too and was perfectly happy in the single room that I had, but I was given a free upgrade to a double room.

I didn't do much on the Friday as it is quite a long day when I travel over, having left home at 10.30am I did not arrive at the hotel until after 4pm, so I had a walk round, got something to eat and then chocolate and wine to take back to the room.

Saturday morning I was up bright and early.  I went for a walk past the Abbey and up to the old railway station, it was a nice walk along the river and I got to see more of the town.

Lunchtime I headed off to the pub up the road, I was going to be all grown up and have a mature cheese & ham sandwich, but The Cross Keys had Fish Finger sandwiches on the menu, I haven't had one of those for years so I treated myself.

It was then time to head off to the party.  As it was a nice day I decided to walk there, it was only a mile or so.   When I was crossing the bridge over the main road I heard a noise, I looked down and there was a steam engine travelling along.

Most of the party was spent catching up with people that I had not seen for a while, but I also met some new people too, there was plenty of food and there may have been some alcohol too.

Sunday was very foggy, so again I was up and about early.  I walked back up to the Abbey to take some more photos in the fog.

These photos do not do the fog justice, it was extremely foggy.

The train from Norwich to London was very busy, luckily I had a reserved seat.  I arrived in London to find that my usual underground route to Euston from Liverpool Street was unavailable due to the Northern Line being closed between Angel and Euston so I had to plan an alternative route.

There isn't much time between the Norwich train arriving and the Coventry train leaving although it is plenty of time for my usual underground route, and in my rush I caught the tube going in the wrong direction so had to get off at the next station.  Those of you that use the London Underground will know that it is rarely a case that when you swap trains you can step off one, cross the platform and get onto another, the change always seems to require climbing up several flights of steps, walking miles round various corridors and then back down steps to the platform.

Once I arrived at the right platform I was pleased that there was a train already there, I hurried on and threw myself into a seat.

I then realised that I was the only person on it.

There was no-one else either on the train, nor on the platform.  There was no noise, not even any announcements.  The display in the carriage which tells you the station was blank.  

I am not someone who is easily scared, but I have watched my fair share of horror movies and read my fair share of horror stories, I was sitting there expecting the lights to all start flickering and going off one by one.

Suddenly there was a noise and people started to appear, phew!

I made it to Euston and my final train with about 5 minutes to spare, the rest of the journey was uneventful.

I am doing it all again in 4 weeks time, this time for a Hallowe'en party, I had best find a costume!