On Tue, 3 Feb 2009, Mark Goodge wrote:

On Sun, 01 Feb 2009 21:49:03 GMT, Neil Williams put finger to keyboard
and typed:

[1] It's a pity that M&S Food[2] seem to have an almost-monopoly on
station supermarkets, though. A small Tesco or Sainsbury's would be a
lot more useful for a "get a quick shop on the way home" type
diversion - which is why the latter is very welcome at Manc Picc.

That's an interesting point. I've always seen station retail as catering
primarily to departing travellers, and thus focussing on goods (mainly
food, toiletries and reading material, plus a few over-priced gifts)
that are useful to someone who is waiting to get on a train. That's
certainly how I use station retail facilities, anyway - either to eat
before I get on the train, or buying something to take on the train with
me. By contrast, when I arrive at a station on a train, I only ever want
to get out of it as soon as possible in order to complete the journey to
my ultimate destination

Right. Hold that thought ...

by whatever method (car/bus/tube/taxi/walk/etc) will take me there. The
idea of using station retail facilities for a quick shop on the way
through after arrival hadn't occurred to me. But, given that I do most
of my supermarket shopping on the way home from work (by car), it's not
unreasonable for rail commuters to want to be able to do the same thing
when arriving home by train. The obvious locations, though, for station
supermarkets would be commuter stations at the "home" end of the route,
rather than the city centre destination stations.

.... and apply it!

The advantage of being able to do your shopping at the starting end is
that you can do it while waiting for your train, which is time you're
going to be spedning hanging around the station anyway. If the shop is at
the destination end, then every minute spent shopping is a minute later
walking in your front door.

It doesn't have to be a full-sized shop, but it's useful to be able to buy
the kind of things that don't keep, like fresh fruit and veg, milk, etc.
The little M&Ss ought to do this, but have mostly become glorified
sandwich shops.

tom

--
There is no strange thing.