Short trains blamed for ‘disastrous’ service on SWR line

The rail user group for South Western Railway’s Salisbury to Exeter route has branded services as “disastrous” following a large increase in the number of short-formation trains.

SWR said it was because more Class 158/9 trains needed maintenance.

SERUG, the Salisbury Exeter Rail Users Group, reported that trains from Exeter to London Waterloo have been full and standing from Pinhoe on the outskirts of Exeter, with passengers denied boarding all the way from Axminster in Devon.

On Friday 16 August, it said that of 37 Exeter services, counting both directions, 24 were formed of fewer than six carriages.

At Crewkerne in Somerset, two out of three trains were short-formed. Instead of six carriages, four services had only two carriages, and nine had three carriages.

Spokesman Nick Hurrell told RAIL: “With only one Labour MP – Steve Race in Exeter – on the section between Salisbury and Exeter, lobbying government will be no easy task now.”

SWR published an explanation: “We seem to have had a series of engine faults and wheelset issues. At times we’ve had three 159s and two 158s out of service.

“Temperature issues have also hit us in the last few weeks. This has impacted on availability.

“It does reinforce however how tight our 15x fleet availability is with the growing demand.”