Yes, it's the same going from Waterloo. I think it advertises as going to "Virginia Water" on the board. I use to work in Chertsey so used the service often from Ashford, but no one should really be using it to go from Weybridge to Waterloo so it makes sense
@@a1white it says “Addlestone” at Waterloo. Same with Kingston rounders which say “Teddington” if starting via Putney, or “Strawberry Hill” if starting via Wimbledon. Because leaving Waterloo with a destination of Waterloo would be silly 😂
Yep, that's quite common on most of the network when there's a fast train and a much slower all-stations train. The fast train is advertised as going to the destination; the slow train is advertised as going to the destination at stations where it's the only train that stops, and to one stop before the destination at stations where there's a fast train that will get you there first. Happens with, e.g., the Leeds-York stopping train being advertised as going to Poppleton and the London-Cambridge stoppers as going to Foxton.
Having said that, it's strange that _all_ the trains are advertised as going to Barnes. Normally, they'd say "Barnes" for the slow trains and "London Waterloo" for the fast ones, so that people who are going to Waterloo will wait for the fast train that departs later but arrives earlier. If the only trains are slow stoppers, the sign ought to say "London Waterloo", as taking that train is the only choice.
Southwestern Railway (SWR) are STILL running trains in the colours of the former franchise South West Trains (SWT).....SEVEN years after SWR took over. I find that abit funny but there you go. How much are the big bosses at SWR getting??? ...and yet they can't be bothered to paint all their trains in the colours of SWR. Shocking really.
@@robtyman4281i mean some like the stagecoach liverys like i liked the old 444, 450, 158 and 159 but they cant be bothered to repaint some 158s and 159s which i like them in the stagecoach liverys but the only train that looks good in the swr livery is the 458
I travel frequently on the 444 to Weymouth. The service has degraded significantly under SWR. No buffet trolley anymore (for what can be a 3 hour journey) 1 train an hour on busy summer Sundays when it’s packed with people coming back from Weymouth and it’s unusual to have all the toilets working
Changing from SWT to SWR exemplifies everything that's wrong with the franchise model, that one of the best performing franchises that regularly generated profits and grew ridership and capacity could be replaced by mediocrity.
@@robtyman4281 The reason is because SWR thought they were going to replace them with the class 701s back in 2019, but there have been epic delivery teething issues and there are still only a couple of units in service. No point in painting trains you are expecting to scrap imminently. I think if they'd known it would take this long, then they might have done it back then.
Usually express trains do not stop there (kinda wished they do as a person living in addlstone) but in some occasions 444s may stop there maybe because to boost capacity or running suburban and yes i seen a 444 stop at addlstone and it gets overshadowed by woking
SWR, another example (like Southeastern), of a privatised monopoly on routes into and out of Waterloo. They have no competitors on most of their routes, so they charge what they like and provide sub-standard quality.
"This station is pretty basic" for a station with four ticket machines, a ticket office/booking hall, takeaway coffee shop, decent waiting room and lifts to/from the footbridge. That's not my definition of "pretty basic"
@@ziaulHaque-pf It's not basic at all. Basic would be a couple of platforms, maybe a ticket machine or two and some seating like the majority of commuter stations in the North, Wales and Scotland. No staffed ticket office, no cafe, no waiting room and often no lifts.
@@richardwillson101 i am fully aware of what drivers and guards do with doors having been a driver for a number of years. The door got stuck opening on closing it would have closed.
My memory of that approach to Waterloo pre-dated all those awful high-rise blocks. There were many places where the view was of the other bank of the Thames. It looks pretty dire nowadays.
In the late 60s or early 70s the area between the railway line and the river was mainly brick factories, one of which was Airfix. I looked out for it on every trip to Waterloo in my early teens, when model making was the thing.
@@rockerjim8045 They do this on the Southeastern High Speed services from St Pancras to St Pancras via the Kent coast -- on leaving St Pancras, they are advertised as terminating at Margate or Sandwich, then the destination changes further along the route.
@@markcf83 probably doesn’t change until after Feltham, this service takes the Hounslow loop whereas the Reading and Windsor trains go the more direct route via Richmond. It may even be a case that it goes back and forth along the route as stations like Chertsey and Addlestone aren’t served by any other direct Waterloo Trains.
6:44 is painfully relatable as an SWR commuter... It's been downhill ever since the First/MTR takeover. Dwindling reliability, poor service quality, the half-arsed Desiro refurbishment, plans to close literally every ticket office on the network, millions wasted on fleet cascades that never happened, and the Arterio fleet is 5 years late and counting. I cannot wait for the day when First is finally stripped of their contract, and I shall be very jubilant the day that happens.
@@SuperalbsTravels: I couldn’t understand why South Western Railway lost the franchise; they had a history of steady improvement, and a much more customer-focussed attitude.
They decided to scrap the despatch office at Waterloo, which was staffed by folks from both SW and Network Rail. No surprise punctuality suffered . added to this scrapping the 442s, And any time you want to travel between Andover /Southampton / Reading / Woking/ Guildford outside the summer months there's a fair chance the above stations will look like a highway bus station instead .
Interestingly MTR seems to have a better reputation in HK e.g. for reliability (though it's faced some controversy more recently e.g. whether it intentionally terminated a train with anti-gov't protesters 1 station early to trap them there while pro-gov't mafia set upon them in 2019)
@@memespert 25 year old trains are perfectly fine but not brand new. I would say 40 year old trains with proper maintanence work really well, and even a 60-70 year old train can provide good service. The oldest train I have travelled on is almost 100 years old, has been in regular service for around 70 years and is now kept as a sort of nostalgia train (also you are not supposed to know but they put a new train controlling computer and sensors and a bunch of pipes in so it can run on the modern network)
@@oPlazmaMC Meanwhile in Singapore we're replacing C751B rolling stock that're barely 20 yrs old, at the same rate as C151 rolling stock that're 10-15 yrs older i.e. almost 20x trainsets of each model have been de-commissioned so far but we had bought only 21x C751Bs vs 66x C151s. I found it a bit hard to believe that the former is harder to maintain due to lower economies of scale due to its smaller fleet size (both models will be replaced by new R151s), as the former is significantly more modern too (& I think its propulsion system has some similarity to the newer C151A-C stock too)
@@AlanAlanAlan161 it is private enterprise that pays your benefits, laddie. The socialist state under your mob no more built the railways than they built the expensive iphone on which you wrote your nonsense. As it happens, I am not at all a fan of the current franchising model, which was doomed to failure- but then it had to be compliant with the eu model so beloved by you left wingers. Had it been returned to the concept of the big four groups we could have seen world-class railways once more. But that's socialism for you- a race to the bottom largely driven by the weak and gullible.
I always wonder how many people have been priced out of central London when I see those shiny tower blocks. When I lived in the UK thirty years ago, the approach into Waterloo was quite a bit different. I really loved the Class 442 running between Waterloo and Southampton.
I visited Weybridge several times on business. I remember it for several reasons, one of which is that it is practically on the doorstep of the old Brooklands Motor Racing circuit. Another thing I remember Weybridge for was what I saw outside the station building (@0:46): This brand new Mercedes sports car pulls up and this lady steps out and she is the most glamorous, most beautiful woman I had seen in my life up to that point. I'll never forget that moment.
They’re advertised as Barnes so that passengers for Waterloo use the mainline services instead, which are much faster. Passengers for Putney and Wandsworth Town would be faster still to traverse via Clapham Jn on the mainline services.
@@tooleyheadbang4239 There's nothing weaselly about it. The Leeds-York fast trains take about 25 minutes and there are multiple trains per hour; the stopping trains take 50 or 70 minutes and there are only two an hour. If you want to get to York, you'll always get there sooner by taking the next fast train, even if a stopping train leaves first. Advertising the stopping train as going to York would make people's lives harder, as then they wouldn't know which York trains are good and which are bad.
@@beeble2003 Weasel-speak is where you word something to make your listener think one thing, when the reality is something else. Claiming a journey ends at Poppleton, when it actually goes to York, is a good example of it. Tony Blair was the UK Goebbels of Weasel-speak.
@@tooleyheadbang4239 You're missing the "with the intention to mislead" part. There is nothing misleading here. Get off your high horse and understand that it _helps people._ And, by your definition, describing the stopping train as going to York is "weasel-speak" -- it makes your listener think it's a good way to get to York, when the reality is something else.
Trains have certainly changed a lot since I used to use them on a regular basis back in the 70's and 80's. Coach style seating simply was not a thing back then on trains, thus no matter what seat you sat in you always had a full window to look out of, not just half a window like you get in a lot of seats today. I had to smile when you pushed down on the seat and exclaimed about just how generous they were with the padding, a mere fraction of the padding we used to get. Trains may have been dirtier back then, but the seats were extremely comfortable. I remember the south eastern region had a mixture of what must have been a good 4 or 5 inches of foam seat cushions, plus plenty still with proper sprung seat bases. The later only a fool would dare bang their hand down on the cushion - a plume of dust would rise if they did. That said, with the exception of the very shortest commuter rides I would much prefer the old seats - complete with the dust!
"brand new" which is actually 30years old with a badly applied blotch of paint and stained carpets seems like a perfect example of the uk rail industry
well hungary did the same thing a few years ago used old shitty train cars, put in ac, removed a few doors, changed the interior and then called it the IC+
@@andy7bianca well the cars are adverised as top tech when the inside panels are offset of each other because they were put together in a maintanence facility, not a train car making factory
Route into Charring Cross via London Bridge and Waterloo East cant be beaten, you get to see Tower Bridge, St Pauls Cathedral, Houses of Parliament, London Eye and the River Thames.
How do you know it's mould? Could be stains from soap cleaning. Not necessarily disgusting. What is disgusting is the way people use them, worse still if they have no tickets!
You cannot tell me SWR didn’t check over the walls before putting these trains back into service and they just swept past bloody mould, in a first class section too. Disgusting
Those toilets looked as if they were excluded on the refurbishment, and that typeface used looks like they were put up by South West Trains. You could argue in that sense it is quite lucky they arent at this point allocated to the Portsmouth direct line, given expectations are higher on long distance services of at least 1hr 30min, compared to exceptionally indirect services around London suburbs
@@FarmYard-Trains Gonna be riding those on local trains around Exeter at some point in the future , so might get a chance to experience that . Probably no worse than a Mercedes Citaro?
I well remember the old slam door trains , as it pulled into the station doors would open long before it stopped and people would just jump out hit the ground running and carry on as usual . Great days
I used to commute on the Waterloo line, albeit closer to London, back in the 1970s, the station standards look pretty amazing as the two dominant recollections were the smells from the urinals and the long dead coal fire in the waiting room.
The 442 was refurbished and brought back into service, but due to too many faults it was again withdrawn. The 458 was never taken out of service it has always been in service. It has been refurbished and shortened to a 4 coach train. So it's called a 458/4. It was supposed to be on the mainline towards Portsmouth. But at the moment will be on suburban commuter routes.
Hey mate. You were just two stops down the line from me! Nice review. I used to commute on the 458/0s on this line in the early 2010s. I've always thought they had very comfy seats, but apart from that, I prefer the Desiros by a long shot. It's good to see these units getting a tart up, but it's a shame they didn't do a proper job. Some of the grotty grimey stuff you showed is really shoddy. They've obviously spent as little as humanly possible and focused on just rebranding and "icing on the cake" stuff. I can only imagine they don't intend to keep them for a long long time (mind you, if the 455s are anything to go by, it could be another 15 years. lol).
A massive issue, not uprating the power output when increasing the gear ratio. Class 458/4s accelerate basly due to negligence of acceleration. They used to be 75mph capped, now they are 100mph capable (as they were initially
I can only assume they put Barnes on the departure board to prevent passengers filling up the slower stopping services when they can take a more direct service to Waterloo on another train. The same happens at Reading with GWR/EL services towards London. The departure board will say Ealing Broadway rather than Paddington.
It used to in the Network South East / Thames Trains / Great Western Link / Great Western / TfL Rail days. Elizabeth Line services are now advertised as "Abbey Wood".
@@tj2375 you"ll be surprised with the amount of people who willingly choose the slow train, even if the fast one arrived first, and if it was on the same platform. i dont know why people are so obsessed with slow trains. this is effective as people who want to use the slow route to waterloo will likely check the timetable or rtt or something and know its not terminating st barnes anyway
They advertise it as Barnes as faster services run through to Clapham Junction, Vauxhall and London Waterloo and also not to confuse passengers so they take the longer way.
Awful front end, surely any streamlining with the slope is negated by the corridor connection. You're spot on with the traffic south of the river, I used to work near the line through Surbiton, you sometimes couldn't hear the gap between trains from a distance!
Thank you for an interesting clip on a train from England.The dirty condition of the train you were on, & the out of order toilet.And terrible condition of the other one you were in, is very similar to the train I was recently on in New South Wales Australia.Unfortunately we have that in common on our trains from our respective countries.But I enjoyed your programme, so once again thank you.
This is essentially unwatchable - I don't know if its just me, but there is an advert every few minutes! Thought you may wish to know, as the content is great - but adverts every few minutes really spoils your great work.
Once the Class 701s are fully in service, the poorly-refurbished Class 458s would get withdrawn from service. I'm from Shanghai actually and yes, it's a good place to visit. Love from China! You should also check out the Chinese HSR from Beijing to Shanghai running at 350 km/h.
Weybridge is my local station! The platform 3 Barnes service gets you to Waterloo in about 1hr11min, and is meant for travelling to the intermediate stops e.g. Virginia Water, Chertsey, Staines etc. - There are fast Waterloo services via Surbiton on platform 2 anywhere from 24min non-stop to about 35min regularly.
Weybridge definitely isn't classed as a minor station, it serves a large town and is DFT categoried as C which is the same status as Plymouth, Tamworth, and Grantham. Middle distance mainline trains also call at Weybridge to Basingstoke and occasionally further afield to Alton, long distance trains also do serve it from Poole in Dorset and Southampton Central on some evenings and weekends
the fact that they were originally intended for the portsmouth direct line with those “seats” is shockijgmand also unsurprising for what happened to the 450s and 444s during their “refurbishment”
So instead we have to suffer the cramped 3+2 seating on the 450 on lines to Portsmouth, whereas people on the shorter distance commuter lines get to bring their shoulders with them when they travel
@@SuperalbsTravels the 458s are actually only doing part time work on commuter trains, they are intended to run Portsmouth via Guildford fast trains once the 701s fully enter service
i preferred the old SWR Red, Yellow and Blue livery... i was born in 1996 so i remember the southern slam doors being phased out and replaced by the 377 and i was about 7yrs old...
This Weybridge to Waterloo route via Barnes is standard throughout Weekday services at Weekends it changes to Woking. This was very handy for me as I was based in Staines and was visiting Exeter.
Hamburg S-Bahn featured surprisingly whooo \o/ Throw me a memo when you come here next time 😬 I'll pass through London on October 3rd, but not going on this line. Eurostar -> Greater Anglia. I'm a bit nervous because apaprently there are works on the signalling systems in Cologne, so the Eurostar from Düsseldorf was canceled and I had to rebook onto an ICE (3 neo) which is gonna get rerouted... and they don't have the schedule up for it yet.
Weybridge Station burnt down sometime in the late 80s, when I used to go to college there was one of the yellow towable trailers being used as a tempory ticket office, when they started the building of the current station building you had to enter and exit the station from the other side of the station.
I think it says Barnes on all services cause they want to encourage you to get a quicker service that goes via Wimbledon. The 458 toilets hardly ever work anyway prior to it got refurbished, that unit only looks like the main searing areas have only been refurbished. Not the toilets.
That's really poor. Reminds me of shops that buy and "refurbish" your iPhone by cleaning your screen in 10 seconds and then selling it for double the price. This needs a lot more work, it's shambolic and pretty disgusting. But, I have to thank you, because, you kind of inspired me to go on obscure commuter trains in my country. I mostly just want to see how crappy the trains are, but, there's also some fabulous hiking and snacking opportunities, and I am still waiting for a train to break down in the middle of nowhere :(
Reintroducing a 25 year old train? That sounds familiar to Regiobahn when they decided to replace their Talent diesels for the even older Integral S5D95. 17 units were build until the company went bankrupt. They were known for their technical problems and their age didn't help them either. If you're interested in taking a ride on them, they serve the S28 Kaarst, Düsseldorf, Mettmann, Wuppertal. Also theoretically the RE47 as well but half of the fleet is broken so busses run instead.
I was once at Düsseldorf Hbf and witnessed live how an S28 was cancelled because the unit operating the service broke down at Flingern. Another S28 trip had already been dropped that day so by that point only like 60% of the scheduled S28 trips ran 😂
Ha ha, we used to say that Feltham was twinned with Beirut twenty years ago. Diverted round that way on A Wloo service from Salisbury it wasn't unusual to see a few burnt out cars on wasteland. Built up now.
Somehow or other First have managed to get their sticky fingers acorss far too many franchises, and in those they are not stuffing up they run alternative services against. First must have a guardian Angel somewhere in the franchising monolith.
Despite the large number of assertions of problems with the 442s returning to service, these were much the same as the teething problems of any other class and would have been resolved, but the first was barely returned to service for testing when the pandemic struck. Significant service reductions soon followed leaving a surplus of trains and this meant that the need for them had disappeared. Once it became clear that this situation would continue for some time, the project was stopped simply to save the rest of the cost.
Herbert Walker boss of the Southern before the war electrified the region (mostly) using 600 volts DC on the third rail system in the 1930s. It was hugely successful and combined with clockface timetabling hugely increased passenger numbers. Also coined the phrase ‘sparks effect’ for the impact electrification had on ridership.
I wonder what percentage of the fare cross-subsidises travel on the Hong Kong MTR, the high speed link of which, between the airport and the urban centre was already FANTASTIC when I travelled on it around twenty two years ago. The privatised UK system is very expensive, slow and obsolete by international comparison. For a hilarious account of how we’ve arrived at where we are, do read a book called Eleven Minutes Late. It’s very funny and informative. My pet hate is how so many carriage seats are lined up not with a window but a pillar which obstructs the view of our lovely landscapes passing by quite slowly😉
It gets advertised as Barnes because it would confuse people going to London Waterloo which go from Platform 2. Your service takes a lot longer into London compared to those which depart from Platform 2 there at Weybridge
I chatted at a friend’s birthday party to a railway engineer who was in charge of Class 442 maintenance and repairs. He said the main reason they were initially withdrawn was that they were unreliable and a nightmare to maintain in acceptable condition.
@@SuperalbsTravels It was the new 'traction package' that they put in instead of leaving the old REP motors. They couldn't cope with the Pompey Direct. They were alright in SWR days when I was based at Bomo and worked them from Pompey.
They certainly could do with a good clean, how do they let rolling stock get mould in the carriage after a week. Excellent video highlighting the short comings of the trains.
I literally became speechless bc of the route, since it was my first one, from Weybridge to Waterloo too Idk if it was the same train or not, but I remember that the tables were different, with a different texture when you open them
The reason why at Weybridge it says it was going to Barnes is because if the timetable said London Waterloo,everyone would get confused which way it goes
South Western Railway could use them on the London Waterloo-Aldershot and Alton route. With the rest of the Class 701 Arterio fleet to start operating on the suburban lines and Reading service.
I was on a Great Western train from Swansea travelling to Bristol. I was convinced there was something wrong with my seat as it was strangely lumpy and very uncomfortable so I moved to another seat only to find that they are all the same! I find it hard to believe that anyone could manage to design a seat as uncomfortable as this! Next time I am unlucky enough to have to use this service I will bring a cushion of my own to sit on.
New train that's 25 years old... You should come up and try the EMR Connect trains, we were advertised to have new trains but got 20+ year old hand-me-downs from Greater Anglia, which are still in dire need of refurbishment!
I heard the Class 442s were withdrawn after their short return due to poor reliability. Seemed mad to me to replace 25 year old trains with 40 year old trains... It will be interesting to see what SWR do with these units, as they should be replaced on suburban services by the new Aventra fleet. Although that fleet has been delayed for so long, i suppose any semblance of the original "plan" is out the window at this point
I use this train daily to get to college, and it’s surprising that they’re still working; even more surprising is that they were considered one of Britain’s best. Windows filled with mouldy water. Seat cushions falling off. Bins not opening. Doors only working half of the time. It’s such a shame they’ve been allowed to get to this state because they really were so pleasant. I was hoping more from the refurb, particularly new screens inside, and installing new windows. Then again, I’m not surprised from SWR. Their contract is at its end, and they still haven’t fully introduced the trains they wanted to when they were awarded it 😭😭
It can't be a 'lack' of overhead catenary on a third rail system, it is an ABSCENCE; for many months I watched the snail's pace of electrification of a branch line, complete but for the LACK of the contact wire.
After SWT had problems with these trains originally, they did improve remarkably, with a win of the 'golden spanner' award from Modern Railways one year for UK's most reliable electric train. This was long before the rebuild late under SWT management where they were lengthened to 5 -car using the intermediate trailer vehicles from the similar ex Gatwick Express trains. It was newly appointed SWR who then made the decision to dispose of them while their 442 reinstatement plan commenced and they were waiting for their new inner suburban trains from Bombardier, now Alstom (still waiting for most of them...).
On the topic These refurbished 455/4 are to the eye very pleasingly, Nice livery seating in line with windows. Tables in the bays ×4 and at single seats,Obviously let down by the rough ride, and grotty toilets, Passengers want seats most of all. Prefer these to S%£te 701 anyday.
No idea why they couldn't have just preserved the 442's and used them for railtours. But NO. They decided to scrap them, which was a waste of time AND money.
@@blinard1 Well, you just answered that yourself. There's only one Class 442 power car left. Just use MK3 coaches as replacement for the other scrapped coaches.
Sadly SWR do not pay for refurbishment of the toilets etc the panels in first class are now being fixed and are now all gray first class interior on the last few trains to roll off the production line, nice to see our work finally in service though
Going back to BR days the service from Birmingham New Street to Euston via Northampton was advertised to Hemel Hempstead so that passengers traveiilg to London did not board it instead or the fast InterCity service. No doubt other examples exist.
ONLY 25 years old??? If Northern Rail had any trains less than 40 years old in the North East, I'd collapse with shock! By the lack of many opening windows, presumably the 458s had Air Con? Such luxuries are unheard of up here!
Both the mainline CEP/CIG and suburban EPB slammers were in service on the SR for 40 years. Same story for some of the AC units north of the Thames e.g. the LTS "Misery Line" 302s. They were all in a pretty poor state when plastics replaced them. If you're dealing with 150s and the like I can sympathise but pretty much every commuter group has been through it too at some point.
Most of Northern's fleet are well under 40 years old since the new-ish Civities replaced the pacers. Only the two oldest class 150's are exactly 40 years old.
@@nathanw9770 But in the North East, we don't have any of these Civities - there are only 158s which date back to the 90s and 156s which date from the 80s - both being originally British Rail trains.
Commuted with this shower, and their predecessors for over 20 years. The most comfortable were the old slam-door stock. comfy, well-padded seats, and of a size to fit a person, unlike the horrible plastic seats with insufficient shoulder space. Hugely expensive which, even to this day do not represent value for money. Train travel in Canada or France much cleaner, cheaper and more comfortable.
Probably advertised as Barnes as it's slow to discourage people from getting the slower trains unless they have a lot of people who want to see the suburb of London where T Rex died ....the 1970's singer not the dinosaur 🦖!
My 458 is my favorite model. I think that they are just using it bad, this train is one of the best commuter suburban services. This is a commuter train
