On Trains & Buses

Cheshire East Council is consulting on its budget and is in a tight spot. High inflation and the limitations of council tax increases mean that it needs to find savings unless government helps, and that possibility seems remote. Financial support for bus services is again under threat. Only time will see what that means when the network is a shadow of its former self anyway.

Details of Christmas and New Year GoBus services have been published. Apart from Christmas Day when no services operate, there are changes to services on some other days. There are early finishes on Christmas Eve and a later start on St. Stephen’s Day, for example.

Chiltern Trains is facing four weeks of strike action from 2022-12-13 to 2023-01-09. Services will be reduced on days when the Network Rail strike is not happening with 2022-12-18 seeing no service at all.

It now feels as if every public service worker is taking strike action of some sort, so we all could do with a lift. Handily, Wanderlust lists what it classes as the best European rail journeys as of now. At these stage in the year, most of these are worth surveying for 2023 travel planning. Still, we could use the brightness from the included photos in these testing times.

UNITE the Union members will be on strike at EMR on both 2022-12-23 and 2022-12-24. Christmas Eve travel will be challenged by this and the need to get trains to their destinations before the RMT action commences.

There has been a change to RMT strike plans. Instead of the work to rule, there is now a stoppage from 18:00 on 2022-12-24 to 05:59 on 2022-12-27. There is ballot of members regarding an offer from Network Rail. It might be hoping too much for that to sort out things, but I am keeping an open mind on the matter.

Stagecoach East Midlands have published details of their festive bus services over the Christmas and New Year Period. Interestingly, they are adding an extra vehicle for one of their service departures tonight because of today’s strike at EMR.

The Northern Rail app now accepts PayPal payments. This was something that I missed after the demise of Virgin Trains, though the EMR app has offered the functionality. With Northern becoming my preferred rail ticketing app, the extra flexibility makes things handy for buying on the move. Otherwise, two-factor authentication makes things a bit more awkward.

Transport for Wales rail now has a capacity checker for finding quieter trains on which to travel. This sounds like a good idea if you want a more pleasant journey or remain cautious even if most think the pandemic is over.

East Midlands Railway services are affected by industrial action by members of Unite the Union today and tomorrow. Some trains are running, but it is a restricted service level. National Rail has the details.