Thetownend.com

Hi ... and a big THANK YOU to all the Town supporters from Westbury / Trowbridge / Melksham who have been using the new TransWits train service (introduced in the middle of last season) to get to the County Ground.  Services will be running all next season - timetable to December is at http://www.twcrp.org.uk/timetable.html and will only change a little if at all for the rest of the season.   Any questions / issues, please let me know - I'm one of the Community Rail team - a volunteer living in Melksham, and your use of the service and feedback are valuable to us.

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/swindonsupporters.jpg)

The trains still run all through the summer ... and they go "the other way" too.   If you fancy a day at the seaside (in Weymouth),  the train from Swindon at 08:36 on Saturday or 09:26 on Sunday (Chippenham 15 minutes later, Melkdham 25 minutes later) / change at Westbury gets you to Weymouth in the late morning.  Day return fare £16.50 / group of three or more, 34% discount.  No need to book ahead - buy your tickets on the day.

Return train to Melksham at 16:08 on Saturday, 17:56 on Sunday ... extra later services (with connections at Bath Spa) for Chippenham and Swindon.

P.S. The family will love it too  ;D :D

Graham, I tried to get tickets on the day for 2 adults and 2 children and was told at Swindon that they have to be booked in advance to get the discount!!  We drove to W-s-M instead!!

:no: "Who told you THAT?" 

They should have sold you a GroupSave 3 on the day - 3 tickets (for any age) with a 34% discount (10.90 each), plus an extra child's ticket at 50% discount = £40.95.  Available on the day at the ticket office, or the ticket machine.

If you had each bought separate tickets, the cost would be 2 adults at 16.50 each and 2 children at 8.25 each - total £49.50

Advance tickets (the only ones that can't be bought on the day) are available for in limited numbers for single longer distance journeys on specific trains - good for away games that aren't local derbys.  Weymouth isn't far enough from Swindon for them to be available, and in any case you get such a good discount on the return half of a day return that a "day return" ticket is often better value.

If you let me know the time / date you tried to buy the tickets, let me know and I will ask my contacts why.   Chances are it was a mistake by the ticket seller (there are far too many types of tickets).  Can't go back in time and sort your day out (hope you enjoyed Weston!)  but we can get any problems fixed for others.

Seems like you need to sort out the ticket office at Swindon Station, this was about three weeks ago - just after the publicity in Swindon Advertiser - and we got there about 9 am to catch the early train.  Went back home and got the car, collected the grandchildren and wife from station and tootled off to Weston for the day.  Their loss, not ours, but at you so rightly point out there are far too many of these types of tickets - it would appear their own staff do not know!!!

Makes a nice change...opening new lines/services, rather than closing them.

It's good ... and I think very much the direction for the future.    Which is why there are a few teething problems such as Ronnie21's - we've had a couple of others which have been sorted out / not repeated as we all learn, and FGW at  a management level really want this to work and are being very helpful - information that perhaps was missed for staff when the new services went round can be sent round, for example.   Updating the ticket systems to be simpler is a whole different kettle of fish - a nationwide problem and we don't have a cat in h***'s chance of sorting it out without political support - which we won't get ... because it would be a vote looser.

Anyway, Ronnie and everyone - do try it [again] please  ;)

Fuck the trains.

Grahame, what's your favourite cheese?

Hello Grahame

I have been following the campaign on your forum for a few years now and are very happy for your success. I use the Trans Wilts as often as I can as an alternative to going via Bristol. The trip up from Westbury to Swindon is ace.

I think you really do need to push the Weymouth away day opportunity.

Best of luck, will keep using it.

Always found the trains hard to do that to. 

 :D :D :D  <- Cheesy grin


Lots of options via Westbury ... people mostly go there to change; some excellent connections to Taunton and the West, Southampton, and Yeovil (which should give a couple of very busy days next season!).   Being above Exeter and Plymouth, less call to head to the far west.


We're telling people, but need to be careful not to oversell.   As a campaigning tool, filling a train beyond capacity gets you noticed (and actually helps get changes like we've had), but as a customer relation thing once the service is there, it's something of an own goal to have people turn up and find the train's so full they can't get on.   We haven't scored an own goal yet.

Day trip to Weymouth on the train sounds like a great day out. You've just filled a summer's Saturday for us and the kids. Cheers Grahame.

Pity when we are away the last train from yeovil is just before 4 ( according to the timetable above )

Ah the days of the Weymouth Wizard, which used to be put on by BR in the early 80's....direct from Swindon to Weymouth, during the school holiday. Always used to be chocker with kids with buckets and spades. Thatcher axed it  >:(

Great days Reg, guess I just wanted to re-live some of them when I offered to take two of the grandkids to Weymouth for the day!!  They enjoyed Weston though, even if I didn't!!!

Great service for the Warminster boys....trains to Swindon at last.

As long as the kids enjoyed it Ronnie....did they get a donkey ride?   

Had many trips on the Weymouth Wizard and thoroughly enjoyed them. My mum thought that the introduction of Thamesdown Transport's cheaper services to Bournemouth and Weymouth killed it off.

Now don't get me wrong...I'm not her biggest fan - although I do think her legacy will not be quite as black/white (delete as appropriate) as a lot would like it to be.

But...did Maggie really axe the Swindon to Weymouth holiday special?  Or was that just something that happened during the 1980s that you didn't like?

Thatcher crushed mining communities because she saw no future in the industry?  Yes, I buy that.  Thatcher let 'free enterprise' run unchecked in a way that left a lot of traditional industries on their knees?  Yes, agree with that as well.  But Thatcher stepped in to cancel a train service from Wiltshire to Dorset?  I think that's really pushing it.  She's no more responsible for that than David Cameron was for my bin collection being missed a while back.

My bin collection has been missed on alternative Wednesdays, since February, because of a decision made by a Tory administration, so yes I do blame Cameron. Thatcher loathed BR wanted it privatised, and so cut funding and sold off its assets etc.....hence STFC lost its training ground, and all those smiling, sweet faced little tackers, were denied a communal cultural experience. A lost generation....

Thatcher ruined the railways FACT.

Bring back the Merrymaker :)

The rise of the personal car and the road transport lobby (which was the underhand background to Beeching's reports) ruined the railways, following on from the nationalisation in 1947.

If the GWR, LMS, LNER and SR had been left alone to react appropriately to market forces, or even go out of business if they failed to deliver we would now have an appropriate railway system.

This is true, the coffin had already been assembled but Thatcher nailgunned in the final spike.

That's a load of complete bollocks Reg. You are wearing rose tinted Thatcher bashing specs. I have been doing a fair amount of digging on the story of Maggie's relationship with the railways and she left them alone to get on with it and there were no cuts of any kind or selling off when she was in power. This objective forum post sums it up:


Ardiles has it right, she went after the declining industries like mining. She had nothing to do with the axing of the Swindon to Weymouth train.

In fact there was a lot of investment under her stint:



If you want a scapegoat then you should review John Major's government who botched the privatisation of BR.


Again, incorrect John. What do you base that on? Also, it seems to me that today's railways are not that bad. Ok, so they are effectively still run by the government through franchises and the TOCs do not own the track which is ridiculous, but I will take the train at every opportunity I can. And do.

They are fucking useless if you want to come home after 10:30/11pm.

The last weekday train from Paddington to Swindon leaves at 23:30 and gets here at 00:47. I guess it depends on where you want to travel. Agreed, the Sunday timetables are pretty crap.

What I do know is that I regularly get a return from Swindon to Gatwick, first class, for £36. I couldn't drive and pay for the petrol and parking for that.

They are also pretty punctual. In a year of traveling to Norway I have only missed one flight due to a broken down train and even then got a full refund and free replacement tickets from FGW.

There was me thinking that Swindon Works was closed in 1985, and all the associated land flogged off on the cheap to a company which claimed it would use it for industry, as was so say required, before it got houses and flats built on it. Same sort of scam is happening with a lot of Swindon's leisure facilities atm

Well, try getting home from Bath or Bristol after 10:30. Try getting home from a gig in London on a weekend. That's the main two times I'd rather not drive but...

Agree £36 first class to Gatwick is phenomenal value. How did you get that price OAP super saver with railcard?!

I don't think you read my post Reg. It wasn't the government that closed the railway works or were involved in the later usage. BR were managing it themselves at the time.

You should take a closer look at local government involvement if you want to sniff out the corruption and back handers (no change there):

http://www.swindon.gov.uk/ep/Environment%20Document%20Library/Information%20-%20Conservation%20Area%20Appraisal%20-%20Swindon%20Railway%20Works.pdf (http://www.swindon.gov.uk/ep/Environment%20Document%20Library/Information%20-%20Conservation%20Area%20Appraisal%20-%20Swindon%20Railway%20Works.pdf)

The TOCs do have a strategy of meeting demand but they are not going to lay on services for a handful of people. Contact FGW and ask them why they don't run late night trains. You might be one of a growing number of customers they are missing out on and they might do something about it. http://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/About-Us/Connect-with-us (http://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/About-Us/Connect-with-us)


Cheeky git. No, just an advance ticket and I travel off peak on lightly loaded services.

The government of the day sets the tone, it's what they do....all sorts of shit for better or worse flow from their decisions.

 The Thatcherite governments of the 80's, sought to deconstruct the public ownership of assets and move them into private hands....a process still continuing.  There were bound to consequences....one of which was the loss of the Weymouth Wizard.

The trains in Norway are brilliant. I love trains.

In which case I am all for it. Governments do not - and have never - run anything well. Education, health, pensions, roads, transport, international relations (wars and death) etc. They fuck them all up.

If they can do it without retaining a controlling interest, unlike the railway system then bring it on. History has shown that socialism does not work, it is theft a.k.a. the redistribution of wealth. It is very easy to spend stolen money when it is not yours.