In the Paws of the Fat Controller

The news this week that electrification of the Midland main line between St Pancras and the East Midlands is to be “paused” - because of planning and budgeting cock-ups blamed on Network Rail - is disappointing, since travel times on this line have long been unimpressive compared with most of the other main lines radiating out of London. The East Midlands deserves better.

In the late 1960s, when I first started using this route regularly, typical journey times between the capital and Nottingham were around 1 hour 50 minutes, and a regular highlight of evening northbound journeys was the sight of former deputy leader of the Labour Party, George Brown, who was the MP for Belper, propping up the bar, or attempting to, on the way back to his constituency. Today’s journeys are less fun, almost half a century on, with travel times down only slightly, to around 1 hour 40 minutes, or even 1 hour 35 on a good train (and a good day). Electrification seems hardly worthwhile if it is only going to shave another 10 minutes off the total journey time, and “Nottingham in Ninety” could easily be achieved today, with a little effort, especially if the faster trains missed out stops at Market Harborough and East Midlands Parkway.

Yes, “East Midlands Park”, as the electron-sparing dot matrix display in train carriages puts it, or as BBC News described it this week - “a station built in the wrong place”. Well, it wouldn’t be if a regular, dedicated shuttle bus service ran from there to East Midlands Airport and if, rather than London trains wasting time routinely calling there, frequent local services from Nottingham, Derby, Leicester and Sheffield did so, many of the airport’s customers originating from within this catchment area. Someone needs to decide whether it’s supposed to be a park and ride station for London traffic, or a link to the airport. It can be both, but if it includes the latter function, then well-meant suggestions for extended tram routes, including one to the proposed ludicrous HS2 “hub” at Toton, are unnecessary. All the station has ever needed was a little joined-up thinking in the form of a couple of buses with adequate luggage space. EMP to EMA in 10 minutes. Free to anyone with a valid rail ticket. Sorted.

So, yes, the “pause” is bad news, as is anything that frustrates the reduction of time spent in the company of East Midlands Trains, with its shrill, unwelcoming, tediously detailed announcements about the penalties to be incurred should one be travelling with an inappropriate ticket or pass (something which the excellent Victoria Coren-Mitchell complained about in an article many years ago – the inflexible attitude has changed little since), the bizarre electronic beeps that disturb one’s snooze or one’s thoughts when travelling on Meridian trains (with their badly-designed view-blocking window “pillars”), the practice of trains that are being “terminated” at Nottingham doing so as far away as possible from the passenger exits, and the way in which passengers are prevented for ages from boarding at Nottingham or St Pancras, even though their train has already been “platformed” for some time, and is sitting there evidently ready for business. The Midland line isn’t, when all said and done, in comparison to frequencies on other routes, busy. Nor can it appear passenger-friendly. I dread to think what travellers from overseas make of it - especially if they have just arrived at St Pancras by Eurostar and are used to the professionalism of most European rail companies. The expression “a bit of a come-down” doesn’t really do justice to the concept.

Such a visitor to Britain may, one imagines, sometimes (but these days not often) possess a less than fluent knowledge of the English language, and be innocent of the minutiae of ticketing rules and regulations, while being confidently familiar with an alphabet which, with a few minor variations, underpins all western European languages. On board their train, this confidence may soon be shattered, for as they journey north through the green and pleasant English shires they are more than likely to be hectored repeatedly that “owing to a short platform at Market Harborough, passengers in coaches X, Y, M and D are requested to move forward to coaches A, E, N and Z in order to alight from coach S for Stupid, sorry, that should be walk backwards to coach B for Barmy, as coaches Q, H and R for Ridiculous will not be platformed at Market Harborough owing to Market Harborough having a short platform at Market Harborough. This service is now arriving into Market Harborough. The next station stop will be Leicester”.

“Pliz, what is Makket Arbo?”

 
Thus it is disappointing that the minimising of one’s exposure to this kind of experience is to be delayed. One hopes, probably in vain, that the funds can be re-allocated to something useful, like lengthening the platforms at Market Harborough and Beeston. Best of all, this belated “discovery” of inadequate finances might encourage the scrapping of the whole misguided delusion known as HS2. However, while awaiting such a happy outcome, breathing should not be paused.