Arcticterntalk.org

The blog of a travelling psychiatrist and football lover. Who happens to be a halfway decent photographer. Takes a cynical view of the world

Archive for the month “May, 2012”

04 May 2012

East Midlands Railway. A service from Stagecoach to be avoided. Stuck in the Broken Toilet


East Midlands Trains are on my mind right now. Scenario is this. Happy for them to take 56£ for a single first class ticket from Sheffield to London. Happy to check all tickets. But not happy to actually provide a train that has the right amount of carriages . End result train is packed and luggage is obstructing the aisles. Have I mentioned the broken toilets also? None working that I can find. I will never travel on this awful railway again. The staff are doing their bit but what really can they do. Little in the way of food or drink either free or to buy. The free wi-fi managed to hijack all my top sites and I can assure you that East Midlands railway are bottom in more ways than one. They also apparently are having industrial action next tuesday to thursday, but with this awful level of non-customer service, how will we know the difference? But as I repeat happy to take our money.

now you could not make this up but someone has got stuck in the broken toilets! they have also lost the passenger who was sitting in the seat in front of me and are worried he too has got stuck in the toilet! 

The guard has just announced that the train has toilet trouble.  Questions to the managers are these:

  1. Are you going to refund a significant part of my fare?
  2. What did you think when you started a train without functioning toilets?
  3. Do you care at all about your coal face staff?
  4. Why provide a ” different set”, your words not mine that describes providing 4 carriages when you have taken money for and sold seats for 5?
  5. Why did your wi-fi service hijack all my topsides meaning that I had to find these all over again?
  6. Why are the phone signals so awful? Virgin trains managed to have an enhanced phone signal service all the way from Glasgow to Birmingham yesterday.

    Luggage all over the train. Reminds me of a train from Florence to Milan in the Ash Cloud Debacle 2 years ago

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02 May 2012


Darlington may be leaving their ground. Sadly a return to Feethams seems unlikely. Shame

chris1957's avatarArcticterntalk.org

What has happened at Darlington is tragic. I have always followed Darlington by default as until recently they often sat in the same league as my team Brentford. They had a perfectly good small league 2 ground that held at least 10,000 is my estimate. They then were built a huge ground seating 25,000 just off the A66 sort of in the middle of nowehere, decent stadium for sure, but never needed. Now it seems they will go into liquidation and at best emerge a few leagues below, with or without their huge ground. Tragedy and travesty. The last time I was at Darlington it was a happy day, Brentford won 3-0 to win promotion to league 1 a few years ago. Football needs to look at its soul. So much money goes into the top end that folks forget the real end. even today there are plenty of premiership…

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01 May 2012
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I was the rush hour. A transport story involving a Rheumatology Congress in Glasgow at SECC, Southampton football club and the rush hour.


One of the more unusual presentations at this years BSR congress ( the annual rheumatology congress in UK, usually devoted mainly to illnesses such as Rheumatoid Arthritis etc), was a nice presentation from Phillip Cooper describing the epidemiology of sporting injuries amongst elite football players. This was a study conducted at Southampton football club from 2007-2010 and included all 272 players. As expected most injuries were muscular or ligamentous, but of interest was the time that they happened.  There was a trend to slightly increased frequency in the latter parts of each 45 minute half and in the last quarter of a training session in the first-team players. My question to the presenter related to whether injuries were worse in any one division as Southampton have been up and down the leagues over that period. A great talk and a real surprise to find this on the agenda.

The SECC is also a great venue just outside Glasgow, two stops down from Glasgow Central. Travelling there this morning in the rush hour and on the platform at 8 am I was expecting just that, a rush but found myself to be the only person on the platform. Bizarre. I was the rush hour and at a cost of 1.40£ return was not single-handedly funding Scotrail.

Anderston Station. One stop down from Glasgow Central. At 8 am this morning. I was the Rush hour

Arriving at SECC station or the station for the Exhibition Centre yesterday in rush hour. Again I was the rush hour

Walkway across to SECC from the station. Plenty of room for graffiti and plenty of graffiti there

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