And if 10,000 houses are built around Parkway as projected, even more services might be needed!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-67214450

 

With the usual huge realtimetrains-too far-in-advance caveat it looks promising that from May there will be a significant boost to the number of XC services calling.

There's currently 31 a day almost all on the Cardiff<>Nottingham axis.  That looks set to almost double to 56 trains a day with the Cardiff<>Nottingham's supplemented by a mostly hourly call on the longer distance XC services.

It's a bit 'lop sided' with the Manchester>Bristol axis providing the southbound calls and the Plymouth>Scotland service providing the northbound calls, but that means an hourly service to Bristiol that takes less than an hour, also calling at Cheltenham and Bristol Parkway.  And an extra train to Birmingham New Street each hour and direct services either to or from a whole host of other large places.

What great news if it's true.

I will nit pick slightly in that the morning commuter service remains little changed, just one extra train from Plymouth to Edinburgh that gets into New Street just before 9am, and nothing heading south for Cheltenham/Gloucester other than the current 07:58 as the first Bristol southbound service doesn't get there until gone 10am.  The spacing isn't perfect either with two trains in the same direction calling 12-14 minutes apart, but that is understandable as it would take a re-write of the timetable to make that any better.

Overall a great improvement.

XC also seem to be making improvements to the Birmingham<>Stansted corridor to resume to hourly, and modest improvements to the Reading<>Newcastle axis.

 
The recently released station usage figures, which were excellent as quoted elsewhere, will hopefully give a boost to those campaigning for more XC trains to call.

 
I  parked at Worcestershire Parkway for my first ever use of the station at around 1700 on Tuesday.  Returned around 1940 on Wednesday and enquired at the booking office about paying for parking, as I could see no machines.  Got told to scan one of the QR codes off a sign in the car park and pay online.  Which I did.

However, I've noted that the parking receipt that was emailed to me acknowledges receipt of £8.80 for 1 day 3 hours of parking, including 20p for the privilege of paying, but it states that the payment covers the period forward from when I paid, not backwards.  I admit that it was tricky to see what I was doing in the dark as I used the website to pay, but I don't recall ant facility to pay retrospectively. 

Am I going to get taken to the cleaners for "non-payment" for the time my car was actually present in the car park, even though GWR has a full payment of the correct amount from me?

An awful system.  How does anyone without a smart phone do this?

 

Travelling back to Worcestershire Parkway from Manchester, I was at New Street in time for the 1730 XC servie southwards from there, which got cancelled at Derby (breakdown, lack of crew, ambulance service attendance - take your pick of the excuses)

After a bit of a delay, the train, 1V13 was einstatedfor the Birmingham to Newport section of the diagram.  The empty stock for this appears to have originate in the Leicester area, and rolled into New Street just after 1900.  The "next" hourly train from New Street had also been cancelled.  The 1730 then got chopped short, and would run as far as Gloucester only

The worst thing about the wait was not knowing if it was risky or not to go and get a warming cuppa.  I had the benefit of looking at RTT and Tracksy, and knowing what to look for.  But most of the waiting passengers had no way of knowing what was happening

 

A bit of an implosion in the Cardiff<>Nottingham service today, meant several of the longer distance Voyager operated service called additionally at Worcestershire Parkway. 

Performance was as follows:
1M21 left Cheltenham 4 late and arrived New Street 6 late
1S37 left Cheltenham 2 late and arrived New Street 2 late
1V50 left New Street on time and arrived Cheltenham 13 late
1M49 left Cheltenham 6 late and arrived New Street 4 late
1V60 left New Street on time and arrived Cheltenham 3 late

So, aside from 1V50 very little time was lost due to the additional call, with one train losing no time and one actually gaining two minutes.  Bodes well for introducing a call on these train permanantly without having to do too much tinkering with the schedules.

 

I thought that word was deemed derogatory after Bernard Manning ceased to be on TV?

 
I can confirm that the updated announcements with the female voice are now in use on IETs.

The station announcements at Pershore however stiil say WOP.

A couple of other things I have spotted:

The Station location GPS data seems to be missing from the database used by the National rail enquiries APP. I tried to look up trains at Worcestershire parkway while stood on the station using the nearest stations tab and Parkway was not listed.

I was at Newport recently awaiting the arrival of a Nottingham service. The English language automated station announcement included Worcestershire Parkway. However the Welsh language announcement missed it out entirely not even WOP It jumped straight from Ashcurch for Tewkesbury to University (all in English I should add).

 

I have assumed you have not reported this matter to Apcoa so I have done it for you …I suggest if the car park machines are not cleaned soon that you contact Apcoa direct

This is their email for the future .. UK Customer Complaints <UK_Customer_Complaints@apcoa.com>

 
I use it fairly regularly and can confirm it's a well-used station. The early morning XC services to Birmingham and GWR services to London in particular always attract a large crowd of passengers. I don't think I've ever seen the car park less than half full either. Although my one criticism is regarding the two pay machines, one at either end of the car park. For months now, both of them have had a sheen of condensation on the inside of the glass in front of the LCD screen. I can navigate the interface by memory as I've done it so often, so don't actually need to see what the screen says. But several times I have had to stop and help people who can't see what the screen is saying due to the condensation. Someone needs to take away the glass in front of the screens and give them a proper wipe down!

 
I'm hearing that first thoughts are being given to putting up an extra deck in the car park, it's regularly over 80% full now. (500 spaces, except for the EV charging spaces, that is!)

 
I mentioned that I thought the station was doing rather well after being unfortunate in that it opened just as Covid-19 hit the world.

This press release confirms that:
https://news.gwr.com/news/worcestershire-parkway-passenger-numbers-exceed-all-expectations

I remember there being a groundswell of opinion at the time full approval was given that it would be a white elephant and complete waste of money, borne out by most of the comments on this article:
https://news.gwr.com/news/worcestershire-parkway-passenger-numbers-exceed-all-expectations

And from one vocal former member of this forum:

Just goes to show. 

I am hopeful that these usage figures will mean CrossCountry will stop trains on their Manchester<>Bristol axis soon (May 2024?), which I know a number of influential people are pushing for.  It might even help with regaining momentum regarding the aspiration of a 2tph GWR service between Worcester and Paddington.  Think what the usage would be with eight trains an hour calling!

 
A lockable gate? Doesn’t seem to be an issue at the majority of smaller stations- even on mainlines.

 
Station security....how do you stop people entering station at night if that was open?

 
I hadn't realised until recently how bad the "rear access" is to Worcestershire Parkway. (Spoiler: it doesn't really have any.)

Part of the appeal of the station is that it's in easy access of Worcester's southern suburbia. It's 1.5 miles from Norton, 2.5 miles from St Peters. There's a fancy new cycle/footbridge over the southern bypass, dedicated signage, and traffic calming on the minor roads, together designed to make it easy to cycle to Parkway. (Here's a map: https://cycle.travel/map?from=&to=&fromLL=52.171032,-2.201800&toLL=52.156044,-2.161293)

There's then a cycleway/footpath that takes you up to the Birmingham-bound platform. "Up to", but not "onto". You park your bike in the stands provided (fine so far). But then: you have to climb n steps up onto a separate footbridge over the CrossCountry line; descend the steps on the other side; perform a swift U-turn into the station building; climb n steps again up onto the main station footbridge; finally, descend n steps onto the Birmingham platform.

n*4 steps in order to get five yards from the bike parking to the Birmingham platform. I could understand it (though perhaps not agree with it) if Parkway were a gated station, but it isn't.

 

As does grahame!!

 

I always blame the spill chucker.

 

It was a spelling misteak.

 
The natural habitat of station codes is the data feeds, where they are defined in the stations file of each set of files (fares, timetabling, and routeing guide). In the Routeing guide they are CRS codes (in 2017). In the timetable information they are CRS codes (in 2018), and the file also has the OS grid reference as well as the name (uo to 26 characters) and TIPLOC. In 2012, the definition document for this file called them 3-Alpha codes! So less new than old-ish.

The fares feed has to deal with locations that are not NR stations, so its file uses additional codes. There is an internal unique identifier code (UIC), CRS, NLC, RESV (international reservation code), ERS (Eurostar), UTS (used on Underground ticket magnetic stripes), and then other coded location data (Administrative area - '70'=Britain, ERS country, county, PTE, zone, NLC for zone, UK region, ... and maybe I missed a few).

 

Or maybe a good use of a somewhat archaic term? I await the answer with bated breath.

 

Is that "bating" the aphetic form of "abating"? Or a typo for batting? Or beating? Or bathing, or even boating?

 
I know. I call it wilful squirrel-bating.

 

And yet, if you look at the supporting leaflet in the planning application mentioned in this post:


you will find, quoted by NR itself:

 
Quite so.

Which reminds me of Red Squirrel's Pet Peeve No.37: BTM. Why do people insist on using this code? It is neither CRS, NLC, TIPLOC, STANOX, ELR, fish, fowl nor good red herring (or squirrel, for that matter).

 
Welcome to the world of ...
Computer reservation system (CRS)
National reservation system (NRS)
National location codes (NLC)
Timing point locations (TIPLOC)
Station number names (STANME)
Station numbers (STANOX)
National Passenger Transport Access Nodes (NaPTAN)
Latitude and Longitude
OS Grid Reference
and the name that the customer uses, appears on tickets, and on the station itself.

 
Well that set me off on an interesting time-waste...

Today, I learnt that what I'd always though of as CRS codes are not CRS codes. They aren't NRS codes either; they're 3-Alpha codes. I'll never keep up.

I was also intrigued by the 'ZZ' codes for the South Tynedale Railway. CRS codes starting with Z are usually for training purposes. Why, I wonder, does this railway get a double-Z prefix? And if the South Tynedale has CRS codes then why doesn't the Welsh Highland?

Oof, all this talk of Z's reminds me that it's time for my morning nap.

 

Database comparison - I need to consider:
ANZ Anerley
APN Newcastle Airport Metro
APY Apperley Bridge
ARM Armadale (W Lothian)
BEP Bermuda Park
BIB Bishop's Lydeard
BKR Blackridge
BNR Brockley Whins
BSV Buckshaw Parkway
CAA Coventry Arena
CAC Caldercruix
CBD Conon Bridge
CBK Cranbrook
CDN Coulsdon Town
CMB Cambridge North
DLJ Dalston Junction
EBD Ebbsfleet International
EBL East Boldon
ECP Energlyn & Churchill Park
EGY Edinburgh Gateway
EKB Eskbank
FGW Fishguard & Goodwick
FRR Frosterley
GAL Galashiels
GBG Gorebridge
GCL Glasgow Central Low Level
GQL Glasgow Queen Street Low Level
HAF Heathrow Terminal 4
HGG Haggerston
HII Highbury & Islington
HOX Hoxton
HTR Heathrow Airport Central Bus Stn (Rail-Air)
HWF Heathrow Terminal 4 (Rail-Air)
HWV Heathrow Terminal 5
HWX Heathrow Airport Terminal 5
ILN Ilkeston
JCH James Cook University Hospital
KLF Kirkstall Forge
KNW Kenilworth
KTR Kintore
LEB Lea Bridge
LHR Heathrow Terminals 1-3
LIF Lichfield Trent Valley High Level
LMR Low Moor
LPY Liverpool South Parkway
LPY Liverpool South Parkway
LRD London Road (Guildford)
LVL Liverpool Lime Street Low Level
MFD Minffordd Ffestiniog
MRW Meridian Water
NCO Newcourt
NEG Newtongrange
NFA North Fambridge
OKE Okehampton
OPY Oxford Parkway
PMG Porthmadog Harbour Ffestiniog
PYE Pye Corner
RBU Reading
REL Retford Low Level
ROE Rotherhithe
RRN Robroyston
SDC Shoreditch High Street
SDE Shadwell
SEB Seaburn
SFI Shawfair
SHV Southsea Hoverport
SIA Southend Airport
SMC Sampford Courtenay
SNP Stanhope
SOF South Woodham Ferrers
SOI Stow
SPL London St Pancras International LL
SQE Surrey Quays
STQ Southampton Town Quay
STY Stratford-upon-Avon Parkway
STZ St Peters
TAH Tamworth High Level
TWB Tweedbank
TYB Tan-y-Bwlch Ffestiniog
WAW Warrington West
WLH Wolsingham
WOP Worcestershire Parkway
WPE Wapping
ZBU Southease - Piddinghoe Road
ZCW Canada Water
ZWL Whitechapel
ZZT Alston
ZZT Kirkhaugh
ZZT Lintley

With bold entries first / in our wider wedge of GB out from London

 

I know I have that work to do.  Fishguard and Goodwick, Meridian Water, Kenilworth, Maghull North and some other "recent" additions are missing too - probably around 30 stations out of 2500 in the UK.

 
Sorry but I am making more work for Graham again.
Just noticed that Worcestershire Parkway is missing from the station index
http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/smr/index.html

 
There are some moderately amusing IATA codes too. Codified, the flight from Dickinson Theodore Roosevelt Airport to Herendeen Bay in Alaska is a particularly pleasing combo.

 
What about BOG, PEA, and POO

 

Not unique - there are those of us draw a deep breath when we talk about Barnstaple by code.

 
WOP, wouldn't some of our European neighbours take offence at that term?

 

Yes, it’s apparently a big deal to change it due to a last minute change of station code by Network Rail.  Made more difficult by the the current situation.  Even so, not particularly impressive!

 
I noticed today that even 5 months after opening the coach side displays on an IET where not showing Worcestershire parkway.
Also the automated announcements at Pershore still say "Calling at WOP and Worcester shrub hill".

 
BNM's 5th photo.....Taunton !

I haven't quite got the hang of this have I ??

 

Welcome indeed, TonyN, and an interesting answer to the question.

 

Interesting map - it also shows the path that remains open and that has been bridged for pedestrians within the new station.

Welcome to the forum, TonyN.   Your home area??

 
The Attached snapshot from the OS map shows that the extra bridge span was for a farm track that was also a Public Bridleway. This ran to a foot crossing further south.
Looking at the Current Worcestershire county council footpath mapping https://gis.worcestershire.gov.uk/website/countryside/ the Bridleway and foot crossing have now been closed.

 

Interesting. One thing that map does illustrate neatly - at 25 inches to the mile - is the very short distance from Norton Junction to the new station, and how incredibly short-sighted it was not to re-double the few chains concerned in conjunction with a second platform as part of the scheme. This is particularly the case when we learn that there are proposals to extend the redoubling from Evesham West to Pershore - which would probably not be needed if Pershore remained the only station on the single-track section.

 
Looking at the 1st edition 25 inch OS map, it would seem that the gap was there from the beginning.

https://maps.nls.uk/view/120901057

 

Who knows? It was a long time ago - around 1850. I suspect it was one of the horses traded between the OW&WR (who built the bridge) and the B&GR/MR (which was there first). They were also "collaborating" over the loop line via Worcester and on to Bromsgove at the time.

In any case, it doesn't seem likely you would build the formation in advance of needing it. And the nearest bridge over a road isn't far away, so an accommodation bridge doesn't look likely. It also looks to me like it was originally spanned with timber, and so needed replacing pretty soon.

 
Could it provide a cheap underpass if the North Cotswold line was ever double tracked at this point?

 
Are we talking about this photo? I'm no engineer but I note the tracks are on a slight embankment, with no sign of that ever having been wide enough for four tracks. I don't know how significant that might be but could it be that the bridge was made wider in order to allow non-rail access? Vehicles for maintenance or maybe for farm access?

 

No sign of that on old maps - rather that the bridge was built to allow for quadrupling that never happened. It may be hard to recreate now the thought processes that led anyone to expect that would ever be needed on the Bristol & Birmingham  - but times change!

 

I wondered that, too.  There's a loop which starts a little further south of the station, so perhaps that used to be longer?

 

It’s quite a pull up!

The photo from the lower level of the Midland passing under the GW is interesting, as it has an extra bridge on the Down side, with apparently space for two tracks. I’ve never noticed it before. Was there a loop there?

 

Each our own pictures.   I had been up Worcestershire Beacon from Great Malvern ... came back planning to change onto a Cross Country Cardiff service.    Sadly that was cancelled, so back up to Shrub Hill after a brief visit to Parkway and the onto the GWR Westbury train ...

Exhausted.   Done more walking today than I've even done since I lost my balance / hearing on one side.   First time up the Beacon for 40 years!

 
Great minds think alike grahame. I did tell you I'd be visiting Worcestershire Parkway today too. I came in down the North Cotswold Line. I guess you arrived on the Bristol-Birmingham Line.

Some pictures from my visit to the newest GWR served station.







I counted 26 EV charging points. And 0 vehicles using them. But good future proofing. Cost here is £0.30 per kW.

 
Pictures of Worcestershire Parkway (well - only seen a very few here!)




London train at platform 3


View of the station enrtrance fro platform 3


Seats on platform 3 - very exposed and just about the only seats around


A quiet Saturday scene.  I understand initial traffic is commuter traffic, with Birmingham most popular destination so far






Level off platform 3, passes over the Cheltenham to Birmingahm line


Platforss 1 and 2, where Cardiff to Nottingham services call, and Bristol and Manchester services race through


What - no seats.  No buffet either.   Both on order!




Public footpath bridge.  Does not appeat to be wheelchair accessible (in fact you need to be darned fit!)




My next train arrives!

 
Rather an amusing flyer received in the post today, which I've attached to this post. I assume the whole of Worcester received it. A couple of glaring errors. It claims that this is the first time we have had a direct rail connection to London and Oxford, which is of course nonsense, and the map labels the motorway bordering Worcester as being the M4 instead of the M5. Anyone coming off at M4 Jn7 as this flyer suggests would have one heck of a drive ahead of them!

 
Once a week I do a shift in a charity bookshop (cos who wouldn't want to spend a morning drinking tea, chatting to people, playing the boss's Led Zeppelin LPs, all while surrounded by books, and being able to delude yourself that you're helping to make the world a tiny bit better?). Most purchases are small sums – rarely into double digits – but at least two thirds of payments are electronic in one form or another. There no longer seems to be a generational divide in this, either, except in the actual technology used (young people use phones, old people use smart watches, those between use cards – generalisation, obviously) and maybe the choice of bank/financial service provider.

 

And taking it to the bank.


I arrived in Iceland without any króna, due to unforeseen circumstances*. I had a few dollars, both Canadian and yankee, plus some real British money, and figured I could change it at a bank or draw some from a cashpoint. Five days later, I left without doing any of that. Even the street hotdog stall took cards.

(*I forgot.)

 

Indeed ... even in railway station catering.  Mind you, the food has changed too.

 

I would say that that is a side benefit to GWR. The facts of the matter, from things that I read, is that we re becoming more and more a cashless society, preferring instead to wave bits of plastic around or, if the device is really antiquated ( ) shove the card in and enter a PIN number.

Its happening all over the world. I've been in South Africa for five and a bit weeks and I haven't spent 500 rand (about £25.50) in cash yet - everything goes on a card, including in the fish and chip shop 

 

And presumably also saving the cost of emptying the machines.

 

I suppose the hope is people will become used to it - I recently used Keynsham car park for the first time and noticed that car park can only be paid via app or over the phone. Maybe being cash free, hopefully with less risk of criminal activity, is standard for the GWR network now?

 

5. Car park machines do not take cash. Perhaps in London and the bigger cities this is the norm, but not in Worcester, and several people were caught short by it today.

Am I missing something here? Presumably it is only a problem for those who are expecting to pay cash for both the car park AND their train ticket. Is that likely in practice?

 
From The BBC

 

Yes, it surprised me that more shelters weren't provided, especially on the exposed high level platform.  It is on the embankment that any such facilities would have to be built on though, so no doubt they wanted to keep the costs down.  Anybody travelling first class on a 9-car IET will have quite a walk from the shelter to the train, and a 9-car IET will stop slightly beyond the station building so that might cause delayed boarding in inclement weather.

Great to see it finally opening though!

 
I went to Parkway this morning, in fact I purchased the first ticket to Parkway that the Shrub Hill ticket office had sold this morning. The station was relatively busy, mainly enthusiasts, but there were several batches of people who had come from St Peters in south Worcester. The consensus amongst them was that Parkway is just as close to them as the two Worcester stations, and so if they needed to go to Birmingham they would go there rather than into town.

There are a few issues with the station, all of which can probably be fixed:

1. Only two toilets for the entire station. They are both accessible cubicles, which is great, but that's all there is.
2. No seating at all inside the station building. Each platform has a few sparse seats, but some of them are right at the far end of the platforms where no one will ever go.
3. Each platform only has a single bus shelter construction for cover, located around a third of the way along. There is very little protection from the elements. The high level platform in particular was like a wind tunnel today, it's extremely exposed to the elements. What this means is that if it's chucking it down people will stay within the station building, rather than spreading out along the platform, and so will all be boarding the trains at the door closest to that end of the platform.
4. Each platform only has one info display screen, located right at the point where you join the platform, again encouraging people to all cluster at that end of the platform, rather than spreading out along it.
5. Car park machines do not take cash. Perhaps in London and the bigger cities this is the norm, but not in Worcester, and several people were caught short by it today.

 

Drove past earlier. The road signs have all been uncovered at the roundabout and all seems ready. Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

 
Yes.

 
And a press release from Cross Country


Guessing that Station Management is GWR, based on the fact that the Cross Country franchise does not "do" station management.

 
From the GWR Media Centre

 

Thanks, Dan

 
Hi all - Worcestershire County Council announced today that the station would open on 23rd February.

http://www.worcestershire.gov.uk/news/article/2017/county_s_first_new_station_in_over_100_years_to_open_next_sunday

Here is a link to their press release

Not sure where the other date has come from.

All being well in terms of any final legal/regulatory issues we expect to run trains on the same day.

 

And the BBC is suggesting this Sunday (17th) when you work it out.


I wonder if Dan Panes is around to confirm one, or t'other ... or give us an alternative

 
The Worcester News is reporting the opening date as being Sunday February 23 (https://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/18230449.opening-date-worcestershire-parkway-finally-revealed/).

I assume that that's this year.

 

Exactly. “One of the most efficient stations on the network, minister. No cancellations, no litter problem, car parking always available”.
“But Humphrey, there are no trains”.
“Minister, there are plenty of trains - four per hour on XC in each direction, one per hour GWR in each direction”.
“Do any of them stop at the station?”
“Minister, that is not my department”.

 

Are staff being sent to work at trainless Worcestershire Parkway, anyone know?  In the "normal" course of events the station would have needed staff from back before Christmas.

Echos of "Yes Minister" episode "The Compassionate Society"

 

I drove past it at 2230 this evening. Lit up like a Christmas tree. No trains, natch. It is getting silly.

 
Another article on the Worcester News website. This one trying to debunk the apparently popular rumour that the station will be opening this weekend.

https://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/18208579.no-answer-suggestion-worcestershire-parkway-opening-weekend/

 
Not disagreeing with you II, but I think that under CDM a procedure for cleaning high up glass (and everywhere else in fact) should have been dealt with at the design stage.  Whether this was documented in sufficient detail and in the right format etc to satisfy ORR is of course a different matter.

 
Not allowing anywhere enough time from the 'completion of works' stage to dealing with any snagging details and sorting out the paperwork.  Paperwork covers anything from evacuation procedures to cleaning procedures - for example the large amount of glass high up means quite large equipment will be needed to keep it clean and you need to have an agreed procedure.  All will prevent sign off from the ORR.

It's all very reminiscent of Kenilworth, but lessons obviously weren't learned!

 
Presuming that the at least two dates for opening were agreed by all parties involved does anyone actually know why the dates have not been met. All that seems to be being said is what they are now doing not why they haven’t done it. Someone must have failed somewhere!

 

... for some values of “events”.

 
A new article from the Worcester News reporting on the latest events:

https://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/18194514.still-no-opening-date-worcestershire-parkway-latest-timetables-reveal-no-direct-london-train-mid-may/

 
Oh dear- the prospect of going to watch Reading at the Mad Stad by train to Green Park seems ever more remote.......

 
Every item has to be checked , and signed of for the ORR, it dire for Worcestershire Parkway , pity Crossrail with 14million items.
Better check for Bats and Newts, they might be back , during the delay ..

 

Mustn't rush these things: it's expanding  the railway and it wouldn't do for people to get too used to such things or they'll start expecting other enhancements in their lifetime. Perhaps a last minute check for bats and newts is needed.

 

Love the irony.

 

But in all seriousness, this getting ridiculous. The station has been structurally complete for months. Just.get.it.open!

 

Or maybe the first pop-up station...

 
A large number of entries in journey check today to address this of which this is an example.
26/01/20 08:37 London Paddington to Great Malvern due 11:25 will no longer call at Worcestershire Parkway Hl.
This is due to a train not stopping at a station it was supposed to.
I love the reason given.

 
I have a lot of sympathy for the staff at the call centre and at Shrub Hill - given that it's supposed to be opening quietly, then this sudden appearance in the databases on a Sunday morning is exactly what one would expect.

Even more cunning would be to "open" it without putting anything in the databases - just tell the drivers to start stopping there. The first stealth station on the national network...

 

Not calling now on GWR Journey Check

 
Thanks for the confirmation, it saves me a wasted trip tomorrow! It's just a shame that so many staff these days rely too much on what their computer tells them. In addition to contacting the call centre I also asked at the Shrub Hill ticket office, and both places checked their computer system and told me quite confidently that trains were running tomorrow.

 

Welcome to the forum, Dan.

Thanks for flagging that up so promptly.

Worcestershire Parkway is not opening tomorrow - sorry!

For the benefit of members - yes, the "we" in the above really is GWR 

 
Hi all - I can confirm that this is an error and Worcestershire Parkway is not scheduled to open tomorrow. Worcestershire CC have not yet released an opening date.
The stops there are taken into account in the WTT but should not appear in customer info/sales channels. It looks like there are a couple of dates where the stops appear publicly.
We are looking at why this has happened but in the meantime we are flagging on the main page of our website. Any tickets purchased will be fully refunded.

Thanks to everyone who raised it on here.

 

I went down there just now. The station names are on the platforms. Still no access off the roundabout to the car park, but the blockage is now reduced from nuclear bunker specification to single Heras panels, so presumably these will be removed overnight.

 

Excellent ... we would love a report, please 

 
Tickets are on sale to / from the new Parkway station as from tomorrow Sunday 26th. We've been here before, so I'm not holding my breath, but I will be at Shrub Hill tomorrow morning to see if the 10:13 will indeed be stopping at Parkway. If so, then I'll try and buy a return ticket from the ticket office, get the 10:13 to Parkway, have half an hour to look around the station, and then the 10:50 back to Shrub Hill. However, I suspect I'll turn up at Shrub Hill and be disappointed again!

UPDATE: Just rung National Rail Enquiries and have been assured that services are running to Parkway tomorrow, so I'm going to go for it!

 

I walked into a pub offering free WiFi, and asked for the code.
"You have to buy a drink first" said the barman, as deadpan as a senior squirrel.
So I bought a pint, plus a G&T for the lady, and asked again.
"You have to buy a drink first" said the barman. "All lower case, no spaces."


Let's see what happens! Sadly, I will be away (not very sadly in truth), so will rely on others for reports.

 
Parkway station has reappeared in RTT for services from Sunday, January 26th.

 

That is certainly a lot of squirrels in such a modest drey!

You know, I've forgotten what ICAM stood for myself, what with all the shenanigans of the past day or two .

EDIT: I couldn't agree more!

 
Anyway, so it’s Pershore is it?  With no replacement bus required?  Thought that might be the case.

 
Institut Catholique d'Arts et Métiers?

I remember asking my dad one happy Sunday afternoon what YTYTK stood for. I must have been twelve of thirteen.

'You're too young to know', he said, deadpan.
'Aw! Please tell me!' I replied.
You're too young to know', he repeated somewhat more forcefully, and walked away.

 

I rather hoped my comment would prompt someone to do that! I can't.


ICAM! TTFN,

TK (Ex FT,N!)

 
If RRS and too many other TLAs are MIA from the LOA, it becomes OOU, which is bang OOO.