Fishguard Trains

when’s the next timetable?

Fishguard Trains has supported our new rail service from the start with innovative timetables. Now with new summer 2013 times starting on May 19th, Fishguard Trains is going one better, and launching a live online train indicator board.

This will be a timetable with a difference – not only lots of information, but updated night and day to show upcoming departures from Fishguard and Goodwick.

The timetable panel will appear on every Fishguard Trains page, and will serve the daily needs of North Pembrokeshire travellers.  At a glance we’ll give you answers to lots of practical questions …

What’s the time right now?

Have I missed my train?

When’s the next train, and where does it go?

And the one after that?

I’m going to London next Wednesday. When’s the first train?

And the last?

I’m going to Cardiff tomorrow morning, and I don’t want to change. Is there a through train?

I missed this morning’s through train to Manchester. Can I still get there today?

The new live indicator board is designed to be of practical use to all local rail users, and to encourage new users to try the train. Once you’ve used it for a while, let’s have your feedback – does it work for you? What’s missing? How could it be improved?

So note the time and day in your diaries – May 19th: New times, new timetable.

UPDATE MAY 19th – WOT NO TIMETABLE?

Fishguard Trains regrets that extended engineering works mean that the new live timetable remains under absolute possession. The launch is delayed …

In the meantime there’s a pocket timetable replacement service in operation at … well, its a good question. You can’t get a pocket timetable at either of Fishguard’s stations. You could try the Tourist Information Centres in Goodwick and Fishguard.

Our new online timetable will be going live as soon as engineering terminates possession. Apologies.

Nessa Childers MEP

Nessa Childers, MEP for the Ireland East constituency, has raised the bi-national Fishguard Trains debate on the rundown of Rosslare with Ireland’s Transport Minister Alan Kelly TD.

In the past week. Fishguard Trains has hosted an increasingly vigorous discussion about the alarming rundown of the rail-sail route through Rosslare and Fishguard. Commentators on both sides of the Irish Sea have noted the progressive loss of connections, closure of services and dismantling of walk-on walk-off facilities at the Irish port. When the question of a potential breach of European Regulations was raised, Fishguard Trains drew the attention of local MEPs in Wales and Ireland to the issue.

Nessa Childers, daughter of a former President of Ireland, is a Labour MEP for the East constituency, which reaches from Rosslare in the south-east to Dundalk, north of Dublin. In her letter to Alan Kelly, Minister of State at the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport responsible for Public and Commuter Transport, Childers criticises “the timetable anomaly … between the weekday arrival time of the Stena Line ferry from Fishguard to Rosslare and the train service from Rosslare to Dublin.” She describes “both sides stating that the other should revise their timetables to facilitate passengers.”

Quoting the European Regulations for both rail and sea passengers, she concludes:

“I am concerned that the the Irish government appears to be, via its railway operator obstructing the free movement of citizens of EU member states into and out of the country. Regulation 1371/2007 also contains references to “Missed Connections”, with attendant compensation. Also since the Rosslare – Dublin train was temporarily re-timed to meet the ferries during the Icelandic volcanic ash cloud disruption to air travel in 2010, legal precedent has been established that the rail operator can time its schedules to meet the ferries if it so desires.”

We welcome this important issue receiving attention at the level it deserves. Fishguard Trains has also referred the issue to Welsh MEPs. With Dublin taking an interest, we hope that Cardiff will do likewise.

Loughor Viaduct – to be rebuilt to support two tracks

At a cost of £40 million to Welsh taxpayers and travellers, next month will finally see the single track line between Swansea and Llanelli redoubled.

The project, jointly funded by Welsh Government and Network Rail (i.e. by us) corrects a historic mistake, a thirty-year old policy by Thatcher’s government (also taxpayer-funded in its day) to dismantle all but our highest-earning inter-city routes.

We can celebrate, but remembering to keep watch for latter-day ‘rationalisers’ – Network Rail is on record contemplating the singling of the Swansea District Line – which will now come into its own for the duration of these works.

From March 24th to April 6th, trains between Cardiff and west Wales will by-pass Swansea, using the Swansea District Line which normally only carries freight and the lunchtime Fishguard boat trains.  See Arriva’s passenger information here. This may come as a welcome surprise for rail travellers to Carmarthen, Tenby and Haverfordwest, as the Swansea District Line is a far more direct route west, which of course was the point of building it a century ago. If the experience of a non-stop service between Port Talbot and Llanelli raises interest in the future of this line, that will be a real bonus.

Naturally most rail traffic will continue via Swansea in future, even with the additional passenger services on the SDL we hope for. A double track west from the city will remove a serious obstacle to growth, eliminate delays and the knock-on effect of delays, and allow increased reliability and timetable frequency of services on all three Pembrokeshire branches.

So there’s quite a lot to celebrate.

a modest suggestion

Yet another road vehicle strikes a Pembrokeshire train, this time at Manorbier Newton.

When yesterday’s 17:09 from Pembroke Dock passed the Manorbier crossing, a car was obstructing the track. Happily, no one was injured. But unhappily, west Wales incidents of road vehicles obstructing the path of oncoming trains just go on and on.

This crossing is apparently open – no barriers, just a couple of white lines, and a Give Way sign.

Yes, a Give Way sign.

Are we being unfair to suggest that a Give Way sign may not be enough to keep some Pembrokeshire drivers out of the path of approaching trains?

“The big plus of Fishguard Harbour compared to most other ports around Ireland and Britain is that the transfer between ship and train is under cover and the ship’s gangway and train platform are moments rather than minutes apart with no cumbersome shuttle bus transfers.”

Not our words, but quoted from a brand new Irish website launched today: South Tipperary by rail

The non-commercial website, run by Bernard Allan, covers much more than rail travel in a corner of the Irish midlands. Navigate to the page headed Sea & rail via Rosslare – Fishguard to Wales & England, and you get an Irish-eye view of our line, our terminus and its place in the wider scheme of things. It is a refreshing change of perspective.

Instead of seeing our line as a remote extension of the UK rail network, in the gift of vote-seeking politicians (and sadly also at their mercy), Fishguard is seen as a key link in the chain connecting southern Ireland to Cardiff, London, Heathrow and the world. One moment you’ll be crossing Fishguard’s platform under cover from ship to train; a few hours later you’re on the tube at Paddington or checking in at Heathrow.

Which makes it all the more ironic that on the Irish side they are struggling to maintain the integrity of their rail network. The South Tipperary line serves the Irish midlands and south from Limerick to Waterford. It used to continue onwards to Wexford and Rosslare, to provide a continuous sail-rail service from southern Ireland to southern Wales and England. Instead, the line between Waterford and Wexford is closed, replaced by buses. Trains continue to run between Rosslare and Dublin, but the southern sail-rail route for which the Fishguard-Rosslare ferry is ideally placed, has been broken.

Not for us to comment on the politics of rail in Ireland (we can barely understand the politics of rail in Wales). But you might have thought that the European Union would take an interest in how people, goods, business and foreign tourists might best travel between these two neighbouring European regions. Next time a European politician canvasses your vote (they do that, don’t they?), you might ask how they propose to improve travel between southern Ireland and Wales.

Meanwhile we’re with you, Bernard, and a warm Fáilte! to your exciting new website.