Wednesday 20 Jan 2010
NINE OUT OF TEN TRAINS RAN ON TIME DESPITE ROUGH PERIOD IN WALES
- Region & Route:
- | Wales & Western: Wales & Borders
- | Wales & Western
Nine out of 10 trains still ran to time in Wales, despite a tough month of severe weather and industrial action in the region.
The figure was released today in Network Rail's latest national monthly report on train performance that, during the four weeks from 13 December to 9 January, saw 90.4% of services in Wales arriving on time.
This puts Arriva Train Wales, the main rail operator in Wales, among the top three train operating companies with the highest record of punctuality last month.
While punctuality did drop slightly during the extreme cold snap compared to performance last year, the underlying performance remains at record level with 94.8% of services arriving on-time on average over the past 12 months.
Chris Rayner, western route director for Network Rail, said: “It's been a difficult month, possibly one of the toughest periods, as we come face to face with different challenges and work against mother nature. Despite all, we managed to ride out the rough period and kept the railways open, by being extremely prepared and working closely with colleagues from Arriva Train Wales and First Great Western. Most services ran with nine out of 10 services running to time last month, but we are not resting on our laurels and will continue to keep punctuality records high in Wales."
Network Rail and the train operators worked tirelessly over the past few weeks to keep the railways open. Hundreds of workers – also known as ‘snowmen’ - were deployed overnight across Wales to keep the railway clear of ice and snow and snow ploughs were sent out to tackle the freezing conditions and keep all the main routes open.
Period 10 of 2009/10 – 13 December to 09 January 2010
Franchise | Punctuality P10 2009 | Punctuality P10 2008 | Moving Annual Average (MAA) |
c2c Rail | 94.60% | 95.60% | 96.20% |
Merseyrail | 92.50% | 93.20% | 96.20% |
Arriva Trains Wales | 90.40% | 93.50% | 94.80% |
East Midlands Trains | 89.70% | 89.20% | 92.30% |
Chiltern | 89.40% | 95.80% | 95.40% |
London Overground | 88.90% | 92.80% | 92.60% |
First Great Western | 85.90% | 91.90% | 92.10% |
London Midland | 83.40% | 78.90% | 88.50% |
South West Trains | 82.20% | 93.80% | 92.80% |
Northern Rail | 82.10% | 85.50% | 91.60% |
National Express East Anglia | 78.50% | 92.00% | 90.80% |
Southern | 77.80% | 88.90% | 89.80% |
Crosscountry | 77.00% | 87.50% | 90.50% |
First Transpennine Express | 75.70% | 90.50% | 92.00% |
First Scotrail | 72.90% | 88.90% | 90.30% |
First Capital Connect | 72.80% | 93.00% | 89.40% |
Southeastern | 70.00% | 91.70% | 89.60% |
East Coast | 67.20% | 88.40% | 87.50% |
Virgin Trains | 65.70% | 75.70% | 82.60% |
National | 80.00% | 89.80% | 91.10% |
PPM
PPM is a % measure of passenger trains arriving ‘on time’ at their scheduled destination. For long distance trains ‘on time’ is within 10 minutes of the timetabled arrival time, for all others it is within 5 minutes.
Heathrow Express, Grand Central, Hull Trains, Eurostar and Wrexham and Shropshire are not included in the National PPM.
MAA
Moving annual average
Note: The data contained within this report is for initial indications only and is subject to change in subsequent publications |
Notes to editors
1) Arrived on time - the measure of train punctuality also know as PPM (public performance measure) means trains arriving at their destinations within five minutes for commuter services and within 10 for long distance services. This measure of punctuality is commonly used throughout Europe
2) National train punctuality is measured for all trains across every day, including cancelled services and delays caused by external factors (such as vandalism, extreme weather, suicides etc). Punctuality did not start to be recorded in this vigorous and thorough way until 1997. Before then Railtrack, and BR before it, did not measure all services and also excluded external factors and other items from their numbers
3) These figures represent provisional data for the period and individuals operators performance data may vary slightly from the full period performance report that Network Rail publishes on its website around one month after period end
4) Network Rail and the train operators run more trains across Great Britain than are run in most European countries - almost 20% more than in France and 60% more than in Italy. Great Britain's 24,000 trains per-day is also more than Spain, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Portugal and Norway combined
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