Seen Around

Saturday 30th May 2026

Another packed end-of-month miscellany spotted on my travels begins with a couple of train style launches as we all know how much rail PR people love a launch ….

GBR’s new livery for Southern and South Western

… as do Ministers, so both Heidi Alexander and Lord Hendy were out and about last week launching the first two trains to wear the controversial GBR livery.

First up was Secretary of State Alexander in Brighton Station on Thursday morning last week telling us how GBR will see “more drivers, more frequent services and cleaner toilets” as well as an all important more reliable service.

Quite why this has had to wait for the launch of a new livery seeing how the DfT has been controlling every minutia of the GTR contract for the last 11 years is a bit of a puzzle but let’s be positive and look forward to that long list of things “that don’t look right” finally being SORTED.

The next day, last Friday, saw Lord Hendy doing the same in front of cheering staff on Waterloo’s platform 19 as Arterio 701006 rolled in…

… bearing the new colours which, as you can see, include the South Western name, as did 387172 in Brighton display Southern, alongside Great British Railways.

I have two problems with all of this. Firstly, Ministers are at pains to convince us it will be the new ‘Guiding Mind’ (ie the CEO) who will run GBR rather than a meddlesome DfT, which will take a ‘hands off’ approach to controlling the railways. But this smacks of hypocrisy when all Ministers are seen doing publicly is launching the livery and branding (they did the same last December in London Bridge on a toy train) rather than getting on and appointing the new CEO who surely is the best person to be involved in deciding the merits of branding and how it will be applied. Can you imagine in the early 1980s Ministers getting involved in and deciding on the Network South East livery rather than Chris Green? It wouldn’t have happened.

Secondly, the Secretary of State was also at pains to reassure us ‘taxpayers’ money’ won’t be wasted on the the cost of rebranding all the trains as it will only be done during normal routine maintenance etc etc except in South Western’s case the ‘new’ Arterio trains just coming into service are all painted in the ‘old’ SWR livery so it’ll be over a decade before any need repainting. I can’t imagine the DfT’s PR people being happy with that state of affairs with their beloved GBR branding not being seen in Waterloo in any meaningful numbers until well into the 2030s.

Flying Scotsman returns

The other high profile launch coinciding with the new May timetable was adding the well known ‘Flying Scotsman’ brand back to a mid morning departure from both ends between London’s King’s Cross and Edinburgh.

The 10:30 departure from the former and the 10:00 departure from the latter (both with stops only in York and Newcastle) now carry the famous name. But the only difference I could see, aside from the usual LNER razzamatazz at both KIng’s Cross and Edinburgh, with the Red Hot Chilli Pipers doing their stuff,…

… on launch day, was a special menu available for First Class passengers.

This is in addition to the normal menu.

But it wasn’t clear whether this was a one-off or will be a regular feature for these two departures. In which case, the obvious question is … why? Why not on every departure?

The official photographs marking the launch on Monday 18th May continued while passengers itching to find their seats were kept waiting behind a tape.

Luckily I’d wandered on to the platform before the PR people arrived so got an exclusive view of the activity, as well as checking out my First Class upgrade bought through SeatFrog only to find the £49 I splashed out was for a seat (L58) without a view for the four hours and nine minute journey.

Hardly a first class experience but luckily for me I spotted four other vacant seats further down coach L next to windows, with green ‘available’ lights on, offering a view of the scenery – so why does SeatFrog sell upgrades to seats with no views? And even more odd, the bidding had reached over £75 yet I got offered an ‘instant win’ for £49 which was nice to have but it reminds me just how opaque the whole SeatFrog thing is and always comes across as a bit of a con. While I benefitted on that journey by saving money from the bidding war, it makes we wonder on other occasions whether I’m being ripped off.

Incidentally those other three green ‘available’ seats were taken by passengers boarding without a reservation but a few minutes before the train was due to leave they turned red and passengers came along and turfed the hapless passengers out. Luckily for me again, my seat remained green for the whole journey but it just reinforced my experience of just how perilous it is to travel with LNER.

One other interesting observation was in coach L almost all the passengers travelled through to Edinburgh. Perhaps the Flying Scotsman branding worked.

Another restricted view

And on the same theme of seat allocations for reservations, a journey with Avanti West Coast from Euston to Crewe came with a seat reservation in Standard Class but why, oh why, was I allocated a seat with a restricted view when just over the aisle there were a couple of empty seats with a window (yet the two in front with a restricted view are also reserved)…

… and the next carriage was completely unreserved.

Someone needs to sort out the software which allocates seats to reservations and leave restricted view seats until last. Let’s add it to the list for GBR to sort.

Eastbourne’s nice concourse

More positively I always like passing through Eastbourne railway station with its large, light and well kept concourse area, nice clean toilets, departure boards with greenery and foliage…

… and an electronic screen showing bus departures.

Outside on the street, another screen overseen by East Sussex County Council lets passengers know where to catch their bus from.

It’s all very good to see.

Lowestoft with character

Meanwhile up in Lowestoft although the station is well past its glory days it’s always lovely to admire the original Parcels Office sign as you step off the train as well as the see-through modern shelter.

And, of course, outside there’s the original sign too.

Wonderful.

Read the small print – if you can

Back in London Liverpool Street, Britain’s busiest station, I always struggle to read the departure board. It seems too high up and uses too small size names and times to easily see. Passing through on Thursday morning with the sun already beaming down through the roof it was even harder to make out the display.

Perhaps as part of the upcoming changes to the station there are plans to install the new high visibility type signs now becoming common in many stations – and isn’t the nice clear roof being built over – if so, that’ll solve that problem of the sun shining down. Shame.

EUS fills up

No such problems over at Euston where my journeys to visit Rugeley and Lichfield earlier this month were thwarted by disruption on the West Coast Main Line leading to one aborted journey and another with an hour’s delay in both directions.

Suffice to say a nice Delay Repay claim for both journeys meant effectively two free days out.

Lichfield Tamworth still being fought over

A reader commented the other day that it might be a good idea to include an update on all the competitive moves between bus companies I’ve reported on this year – the challenge is to know what is happening everywhere.

The Scarborough to Pickering battle between Viscount and East Yorkshire has ended with the former ceasing operation and while I was in Lichfield I noticed the battle between Buslink’s X66 and Arriva’s 765/X65 for the Tamworth corridor is still going strong.

And, although the X38 battle between Trentbarton and Arriva for the Derby to Burton-on-Trent market has eased a little, it’s still over-bussed (Trentbarton still on four an hour and Arriva reduced down to half-hourly) and not the ‘joint operation’ with acceptance of each others tickets it once was.

Down in Chelmsford the crazy battle for the Sandon Park & Ride between Central Connect and Essex County Council continues. I was in the town on Thursday and saw the former’s buses on its competitive 701 travelling around empty with First’s on the 700 not much busier (it was early afternoon though).

I see the County Council has clarified things with notices displayed at bus stops on the route.

I can’t imagine many, if any, motorists are forking out £3.60 extra for the pleasure of a ride on the 701.

Over in Berkshire some of the toe treading between Carousel and Thames Valley Buses is easing with Thames Valley withdrawing route 20 and Carousel cutting its route 7A in Maidenhead from 21st June but on the other hand next week sees new competitive developments in both Southend (Arriva -v- First Bus) and Preston (Stagecoach -v- Preston Bus) which I’ll be reporting on in a few days time once I’ve had a look.

And if you’re thinking the Arriva bus in the earlier photo looks a bit tatty …… it does, being a former Sapphire branded vehicle from Bolton which hopefully will be due for a repaint very soon.

I understand an updated Arriva livery is in hand too.

In more positive Arriva news, its confusing old website has now been replaced but sadly there’s not yet a facility to show pdf versions of the timetables rendering the current presentation useless if you want to print one off. Hopefully that facility is on the way.

A first class makeover

It was good to see and experience LNER’s refurbished First Class lounge at King’s Cross a couple of weeks ago. It’s certainly an improvement on what went before and was proving very popular when I called in to take a look with all tables taken.

The usual array of complimentary light refreshments were available.

Nice ember display

I was impressed with the electronic display at the front of one of ember’s relatively new (from 2024) Yutong coaches when travelling from Dundee to Perth recently. It clearly showed the next upcoming stop and the two more after that including how the coach was doing, timekeeping wise.

It made me wonder why can’t this become an industry standard even for every bus? Sadly, although the screens were installed in four other (older) coaches I travelled on recently, none of them were working.

I saw something that didn’t look right

Meanwhile a new Class 730 London Northwestern Railway train was wrongly advising passengers by display and announcement as we approached Lichfield Trent Valley that only the front six coaches of the 10 coach train would open due to a “short platform”.

This of course is complete rubbish as Lichfield Trent Valley has a long platform, whereas it’s Rugeley Trent Valley (the next station north) with the short platform. Needless to say the announcement caused confusion among passengers getting ready to alight who started rushing forward in the train (including myself) before the train guard/conductor/manager manually intervened to counteract the auto announcement each time it was made.

Happy Christmas

And while on the subject of internal displays I was surprised to see Metrobus promoting “Santabus is coming to town!” on route 400 when I travelled from East Grinstead to Gatwick Airport earlier in the month.

I’m sure Metrobus will soon sort that out, as they’re excellent at putting anything right. It was fleet no 6010, Nick.

Mind you it wasn’t as out of date as this Dukes Travel timetable spotted by blog reader Peter in Chepstow promoting a local service that ran between 28th July and 1st September 2001, thereby about to celebrate its 25th anniversary this summer of being completely useless.

And, only a year on was a notice Stephen let me know about that he got excited about when he saw it posted in Cambridge Central library…

… “it’s not obvious this refers to the Tiger services introduced on 27 May 2025, and worse still contains no usable printed information but just a QR code to get the information that probably quite a lot of bus passengers can’t access” Stephen explained. 

RooM for your feet

Travelling on the RMC on the Shrewsbury Tour recently I’d forgotten just how much leg room passengers enjoyed in the front seats on one of these former London Green Line ‘coaches’. You certainly don’t get such a generous space to stretch out your legs on modern buses these days.

170 meets 158

Back in Scotland I caught a ScotRail train from Edinburgh to Dundee earlier this month and was surprised to see a Class 170 joined up to a Class 158. I’m sure it happens all the time, but it was the first time I’d noticed such a combination. Indeed, I didn’t know it was even possible. They look so different.

This way out

In Dundee I was intrigued by the design and layout of the bus shelters all over the city centre. They’re quite a thing to get in and out of although the upside is they do offer good protection from the rain….

… which is something I noticed is lacking at those stops used by ember in the city where there’s no shelter at all making for an uncomfortable wait on a wet day. And the above photographed bus stop is clearly in the wrong place as if a coach stopped at it, rather than the lay-by just further on, it would block the road (which has been rather nicely paved).

It wasn’t just in Dundee either. I noticed the same thing in Perth, where ember picks up at a bus stop on the road by the station rather than go into the bus station. But again there’s no covered protection for passengers.

Ember loves its technology but I do think it would help if it showed a list of departures at its bus stops rather than relying on a QR code.

Sadly this is becoming a trend in other areas too, including Norfolk County Council. The problem is, it wrongly assumes mobile phone reception is universally good. It isn’t.

Harlow’s new bus station

with work continuing on the much needed new bus station in Harlow with an estimated completion date by the end of this year, blog reader John kindly sent three artists impressions he came across of how it’ll look once finished.

I look forward to sampling it.

There’s a tail in this stop

John also sent me this rather anomalous ‘Tail Stop’ he spotted in St Albans recently . He added “you and I will remember “headstops” in London in our younger days. This “tailstop” is on a westbound stop in Hatfield Road about two miles east of St. Albans city centre. I can see no reason for it and have seen no others.”

Looking on Google Maps the stop is midway between two drives so it might be something to do with the resident just prior to the stop complaining about their drive being blocked if the bus entrance lines up with the bus stop pole and flag. If the bus stops exactly between the two drives, it looks like there’ll be just enough room.

First Class stops here

In Ipswich station recently I noticed a helpful sign at the southern end of the London bound platform 2 letting passengers know where the First Class section in the front two coaches will stop so if you have a Standard Class ticket it’s not worth waiting beyond it.

Except the notice is too far south, and was only one instead of two coach lengths from where the train stops. Not only that but some trains on the Norwich to London service are those used on the Stansted Express, which are all Standard Class seating as shown above. And, of course, some of the others are formed the wrong way round with First Class at the ‘northern end’ of the train. Other than that, it’s a great idea.

I also spotted the above notice further back on the platform, which I may have featured before in one of these round-ups, but it still bugs me every time I see it, as the claim plainly can’t be true at all times of the day and night.

Shoeburyness tracks to Pigs Bay

Meanwhile down in Shoeburyness recently I noticed the rail tack across the High Street just by c2c’s terminus station which looked like it hadn’t been used for quite some time and I hadn’t realised was even there.

It’s shown on a map as leading into a quite extensive area known as ‘Pigs Bay’ which is off limits to the Google car and looks like it may be something to do with the MoD.

Does any reader know the background?

Mike’s map updated

A shout out for Mike Harris who’s just released the latest update online of his much appreciated Greater London Bus Map as remember, printed copies are no longer produced. It costs just £1 and is uopdated to 18th May and available to order then download here.

GBR or GBN?

Finally, a few people have observed the likeness between the GBR logo and the GBN logo of the GBNews channel. Hopefully any perceived similarity will just be in the logo.

More miscellany at the end of next month and my thanks to Geoff for the photos of the GBR liveried train in Brighton – check out his video of that launch here.

Roger French

Blogging timetable: 06:00 TThS