West End of Central Line to Close for Weekend of 21 & 22 November 2009

This weekend (21 November 2009 & 22 November 2009) there is no Central Line at all west of Marble Arch. That is a huge chunk of the Central Line that will not be working due to engineering work.

If you are traveling out from Central London heading to the West Ruislip branch this weekend, the advice is to travel to Willesden Junction on the Bakerloo Line. You will then be able to pick up one of a couple of rail replacement bus services.

If you are heading for Ealing Broadway, there is a replacement bus that starts at Sheperds Bush Market (Hammersmith & City Line), which also picks up at North Acton (where the West Ruislip branch buses will be able to drop you off to change buses). I think I'd rather travel out on the District Line or catch a First Great Western train from Paddington to Ealing Broadway.

Chiltern Railways also offer a regular but infrequent service to West Ruislip and South Ruslip from London Marylebone. There is also a half hourly service for most of Saturday from Paddington to Greenford. Do check National Rail times before you travel on a big train.

There are loads of alternative train, tube and bus routes - I can't possibly summarise them all, but it could be a good opportunity to check the accuracy of the tfl Journey Planner. I've just run a sample journey through it (work to where I used to live, on Saturday, and it was spot on for that sample).

I am glad that I chose to go to the Westfield Shopping Centre last Sunday and not this coming weekend.

Big Weekend of Engineering Work - 17/18 January 2009

There is a huge amount of engineering work taking place this weekend across the London Underground Network.

The only lines that are NOT affected in some way, manner, or form are the Bakerloo, Northern, Piccadilly and Waterloo & City lines.

Out West, the Central Line is totally closed today (17th January 2009) and tomorrow (18th January 2009) between West Ruislip and North Acton, with two rail replacement bus services in place.

Live updates on the status of the various lines is available here.

First Great Western have no sense of history

Actually, what I mean is they are poo. They couldn't catch a cold, are as much use as a chocolate teapot and do not deserve the word 'Great' in their company name.

Today there are some invisible engineering works which mean that the Heathrow Connect services from London Paddington have been cancelled. Also the 1/2 hourly service between London Paddington and Greenford has been replaced by an hourly train between Greenford and Hanwell plus a replacement bus service between Ealing Broadway and Greenford.

I suggest the works are invisible only because I have just spent 45 minutes standing at Hanwell waiting for a train to Greenford and can confirm that (1) all four mainline tracks are in use and (2) there is no mention of engineering works in the are on either the National Rail site or the First Great Western Site. There may well be some works going on somewhere, but goodness knows where.

The train to Greenford never arrived. Other travellers and myself ended up catching a train back to Ealing Broadway, then getting the Central Line (changing at North Acton) back out to our destinations. Not so much as a by your leave from the cretins at the railway company in charge of communicating with their passengers.

Dictionary.com has an abundance of definitions for the word Great. You may wish to remind yourself of some of them. The company has 'Great Western' in its name as a historical reminder of the Great Western Railway. There is no comparison. Anyone with any sense of railway history will know that a mention of GWR is highly evocative: Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the Box Tunnel, the age of steam and Victorian Britain. The modern day company has purple trains that run late, stations with clocks that don't function for months on end and no real evidence of appreciating that their passengers are anything other than cattle.

First Great Western should remove the word Great from their name forthwith. They do not deserve it and certainly will have no positive impact on the history of railways in this country, if my experiences are anything to go by.

I also missed out on the unusual train journey from Hanwell to Drayton Green, a very short stretch of line that does not usually carry passenger trains.

The Weather Forecast is Rubbish

For the first time ever, I have posted an image directly into this blog.

The image is an extract from the BBC Weather page with the forecast for today's weather where I live, in West London. It is now just after 10.00am. I woke up just after 7.00am this morning.

It has been persistently raining (rather heavily) since I woke up, with no sign of any break in the clouds or the weather. The forecast is, to be blunt, wrong.

I know it's not quite of 'Great Storm of 1987' proportions, but it has certainly put paid to any plans to hang washing out to dry.

Oh and, by the way, No Central Line west of White City this weekend and I am not going to mention again (today) that the replacement bus service yesterday afternoon was poor.

Later: "Doh! I've just posted a blog about the weather. Aaargh."

A sensible bus driver

There was an accident at the Target Roundabout late this afternoon. A car had caught the back-end of one of the aforementioned rail replacement buses. The struck bus had a few passengers on and the accident, though apparently minor, had all the signs of causing absolute gridlock with two lanes blocked.

What did our driver do? He pulled infront of the stranded bus and then escorted the handful of passengers to our bus- we were on our way within seconds.

This action shouldn't be worthy of a mention, but it is. Why? Because in my experience there are very few bus drivers in my part of London who demonstrate any sense of empathy with their passengers- tonight's should be applauded for having good, perhaps old fashioned, customer service values.

Weekend Engineering Work on the Central Line... Again!

This weekend, for the umpteenth time this year it is not possible to catch a Central Line train from West London into the heart of this glorious city. Forthcoming closures across the network can be viewed here- at least they've managed to avoid doing too much in the run up to Christmas.

Actually, the replacement bus services are fairly good. I've caught a couple over the Summer where I was the only passenger- a bit like having your own huge private taxi. When trains are replaced by buses, there are definitely only a tiny fraction of the usual number of people traveling. What happens to everybody? Where do they go?

The Crossroad of the World

An early trip to Heathrow Terminal 4 this morning to meet my father who was returning from a five week visit to Delhi in India. He was well and was pleased to see my mother and I, though I suspect he will be glad to be home. There will no doubt be plenty of pictures and stories to see and hear over the coming months.

For those who don't know, London Heathrow is the World's busiest international airport and early morning is when a huge proportion of the long-haul flights arrive. You certainly see all sorts of people and every emotion!

For stalkers, the route today was:

• Out: Bus 140 to LHR123; Heathrow Express (free) to Terminal 4.
• Back: Rail replacement Coach to Hatton Cross, Piccadillly Line to Northfields, E2 bus to West Ealing, to Greenford on First Great Western Link, then the last leg on the Central Line.

Not a single hitch either way, so having got up at 5.30am I can now go for a snooze before I get on with my weekend tasks.