1 post tagged “southern rail sucks”
I travel, twice a day, on South West Trains and Southern Trains. I was contemplating upgrading to a 1st class season ticket, but after seeing what the 1st class service is like on Southern, I won't be.
South West Trains have sections of the carriages that are door separated, with an improved seating pattern (2-2 vs. 2-3 in standard and 1-2 vs 2-2 in standard, on the "blue" and "white" mainline trains respectively) and, seemingly, nicer seats. Southern on the other hand, simply take a small chunk (at least on the rolling stock that regularly runs the 0731 from Havant to Fareham) of one carriage, stick a head-rest cover over the seat and call it "1st class". Note that this section of the train is "open" to the rest of the carriage, has exactly the same seats and seating pattern and consists of about 16 seats of a 3 carriage train.
The "single" standard class fare for the 0731 from Havant to Fareham is £3.80, the first class fare is £7.30, according to the National Rail website. The question I'd love to pose to Southern is, how do you justify a £3.50 premium for nothing more than a head-rest cover?
