London Banter - View Single Post

Paul Corfield · April 8th 06, 04:40 PM posted to uk.transport.london

On Sat, 8 Apr 2006 14:05 +0100 (BST), (Colin
Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article ,
(Edward Cowling London UK) wrote:

I hadn't realised WAGN (Wait Allday Get Nowhere) was being taken
over by First Capital Connect on the 1st April. My first reaction is
that it explains the hobbyist running of Wagn of the past few months.

Timekeeping on Cambridge trains dipped slightly this week from an
excellent final WAGN record IME.

I happened to check the performance figures recently and they looked
pretty decent given that the main line route is not that easy to run
well given the risks of delays caused by GNER, Hull Trains and Freight
operations never mind Network Rail.

Lets hope the new lot finally fix the broken doors on some units that
to my knowledge have been out of action since Moses was a lad :-)

On which units? Hornsey had a very good record in the industry under WAGN.

Exactly - WAGN may not have been very "sexy" as an operation but it did
seem to have rolling stock stuff pretty well sorted out. Hornsey always
came out well in the Roger Ford "golden spanner" awards in Modern
Railways.

I'm afraid I am somewhat dubious about what First will actually be able
to deliver by way of improvements. There are too many issues on the
Thameslink part of the franchise which they have to deal with that I can
see the WAGN part becoming neglected. The issues around Kings Cross and
how they will ever deal with Thameslink 2000 (hah!) threaten to divert
attention.

I'll confess that I don't particularly like the way First run their
businesses as they seem to adopt the "sweat the assets until they break"
philosophy all too readily and then disguise this as "transforming
travel" or whatever their slogan is. I'd love to be proved wrong
though.

--
Paul C

Admits to working for London Underground!