Rail firms are encouraging people to take this week off work to avoid delays while “essential” engineering works are being carried out.

That’s nice of them. If only they’d announced the closure of the west coast main line (which is nowhere near the coast incidentally) railway last year so that people could have booked their holidays in advance. But no, it seemed a better idea to suggest this to people the day before the engineering works are due to start. As much as they may have given plenty of notice that these works were going to be taking place, this sort of advice doesn’t really fill me with confidence that they know what they’re doing.

Inability to manage customers doesn’t suprise me though. After all, I used to be a Connex South Central passenger!

The main reason I’m blogging about this is not to have a moan about the rail companies in general - well, okay, it’s that too - but because I am caught up in the middle of it all.

Wha is surprising me is that it’s being run like a military campaign and so far this morning things have so far gone pretty smoothly. The bus was there on time, the driver was pretty chirpy, the traffic wasn’t bad and the train is fast into London. Not only that but it’s virtually empty. I’m just waiting for someone to bring the drinks and duty-free trolley and my morning will be complete. (In fact, why weren’t they offering us bacon sarnies when we got to the station as some sort of compensation? Think I might suggest it to them.)

It’s a shame is that it takes a major disruption like this to get things to run smoothly. There are signs at the station saying the platform will be shut a minute before the train leaves so that people aren’t rushing to get on and delay the train. I’ve never seen so many staff at a station before. And I’ve never met so many people who actually seem to know what’s going on and what time the next train is going to be. There must be a lesson for the rail companies to learn here somewhere.

Anyway, I’m going to relax in my uncramped space and go back to leching at the cute girl in the leather jacket and FMBs so if you’ll excuse me…