South Western Railway has announced that a revised timetable will be in operation on Saturday, 1st October because of planned industrial action by the RMT and TSSA trades unions.
Network Rail staff, over 2,100 members of the RMT union, and members of the TSSA union employed by South Western Railway will be striking and causing the severe disruption.
Trade union ASLEF is also planning strike action on Saturday, 1st and Wednesday, 5th October. Even though South Western Railway drivers will not be involved in that strike, connections with other train operators may be affected, so customers should check before they travel.
Although Network Rail cannot provide for cover the whole day, it will provide contingency cover for critical roles including electrical control room operators, signallers, maintenance, and response teams.
On Saturday, 1st October, significant parts of the network will be closed completely, and those trains that do run will be far less frequent and much busier than normal. On Sunday, 2nd October, the first trains of the day will start much later than normal and are likely to be very busy due to the effect of the strike on the previous day. On both days there is likely to be severe disruption on the network, and if customers must travel on either of those days, they should seek alternatives.
On Saturday, 1st October, trains will run on the Windsor Line but there will only be two trains per hour and they will terminate early at Feltham due to planned £375m Network Rail engineering upgrades.
Revised timetable for Saturday, 1st October:
Services will only operate from 07:15 to 18:30, only on the following routes, and trains will not stop at all stations:
- between London Waterloo and Feltham – two trains per hour in each direction;
- between London Waterloo and Basingstoke – two semi-fast trains per hour in each direction;
- between London Waterloo and Woking – four trains per hour in each direction;
- between London Waterloo and Southampton Central – two fast trains per hour in each direction.
There will be no services across the rest of the South Western Railway network.
South Western Railway's website has the latest information about the strike here.
South Western Railway's Performance and Planning Director, Steve Tyler, said: “I'm sorry that due to strike action we must urge our customers to only travel if absolutely necessary on Saturday 1 October and Sunday 2 October. Those needing to travel should seek to do so by other means.
“Large parts of our network will be closed on the strike day and there will be a late start up on the morning after. Those who must travel are urged to carefully check the times of first and last trains and avoid them if possible as they are likely to be very busy.
“We are grateful to our customers for their continued cooperation, patience, and understanding as the rail industry works to bring this damaging nationwide strike action to an end.”
What about the Class 701 Arterios. South Western Railway should start allowing these new 5-Car (Class 701/5) and 10-Car (Class 701/0) trains and to operate them in Southwest London and on the Reading & Windsor and Eton Riverside lines.