« on: November 06, 2009, 04:33:52 AM »
I travel daily from Manchester Victoria to Rochdale, in the past week, today in particular the service has been abysmal.
Arrived at Victoria at about 10 to 11, to catch the 11AM train to Leeds, which stops at Rochdale, this had been cancelled, along with all the other trains to Leeds that run on the hour due to a point or signal failure.
Waited for the next train at 21 minutes past, which arrived. Board it at ten past, then waited... And waited, and waited. The train eventually left about about 11:40. No apologies or other announcements were made on the train, if one was made on the platform I didn't hear it and would likely have a hard time actually deciphering it due to the amount of natural reverberation the station has.
One thing of interest was the fact that at about 20 past, I heard a conversation between three platform staff that ran along the lines of 'the driver wasn't told he was working the 11:21' Then either 'We'll keep it listed but delay it' or 'We'll cancell it and run this as a later train'
At this point I'd have expected an announcement to this effect on the trains tannoy - nothing was said. A few minutes later a member of staff, who looked like he may be a driver walked down the train, so I figured that things would start moving soon. Apparently not.
It would have been pretty useful if they had announced any of the changes or delays or, well anything on the train since their was another train at 28 minutes past I could have caught. As it stands, I got into Rochdale at 11:55, with the tannoy their announcing it as the delayed 11:35 train.
Absolute joke.
