Rant number 4: Railways

An occasional feature in which residents of Nordelph vent their frustration at some aspect of everyday life.

Not so long ago, I was comfortably seated in a Eurostar train, returning from the 2009 Brussels Jazz Marathon. The train pulled into its one intermediate stop at Lille and I mused a little over the difference in offerings from Eurostar and from our local train operator First Capital Connect.

The passengers waiting at Lille were standing in the spot they needed to be, because the detail of which coach would stop where was graphically displayed all along the platform. Passengers waiting at Kings Cross don't even learn which platform the train is going to depart from until a few minutes before departure, resulting in an indecorous and potentially dangerous rush in which old ladies and disabled travellers are swept aside. How difficult can it be to repeat yesterday's platform assignments today? And just why is the fact that eight-coach trains divide at Cambridge a state secret that is rarely, if ever, mentioned before the train is approaching Cambridge?

Back in Lille, I savoured the fact that the return journey I was completing had been free! Back in 2008, the return from a weekend in Paris had been delayed because of problems well outside Eurostar's control (vandalism, quite possibly terrorist-related). We were simply glad to have got home at all and probably wouldn't have thought of claiming compensation, had the chef du train not announced as we pulled in to St Pancras that on presentation of our existing tickets we were all entitled to a free Eurostar ticket -- an offer that turned out to be for a return journey even though our outward Paris trip was impeccable, that could be used to any Eurostar destination (we could have got to Avignon in season), that was valid for a full year, and which did not have to be claimed formally -- simply turn up with your ticket and exchange it for a new one!

This contrasted sharply with the lacklustre and incompetent response from FCC on the only occasion on which a delayed journey impacted sufficiently on me to provoke a claim. The partial refund arrived after about three weeks; it was accompanied by a letter telling me that since my journey had been delayed by only 90 minutes, I did not qualify for the full refund that would have been due had I been delayed for more than one hour!


Ho hum! You probably don't need to be told that -- beyond the delayed journey -- all the Eurostar trips involved here were on time to the minute.