Published on: Friday, 10 July 2020
Last updated: Friday, 10 July 2020
Greater Anglia’s key workers have delivered a third successive month of excellent performance for passengers across East Anglia, with a punctuality result of 96.2% in June, following on from similarly good results in April at 97.3% and May at 95.7%.
The collective efforts of teams across the company, including drivers, conductors, station staff, cleaning teams, depot teams, fleet teams, control teams and back office teams, resulted in another period of very high punctuality across the region, maintaining the positive trends of recent months.
Jamie Burles, Managing Director, Greater Anglia said: “I’d like to thank our teams across Greater Anglia for providing our customers with an excellent service for a third month running, despite all the challenges and complications resulting from the pandemic.
“Our key workers have again demonstrated their constant commitment and dedication, as the situation evolved in mid-June, with further timetable changes and alterations to travel advice. We remain committed to providing the best possible service for everyone who is travelling by train.”
All routes saw very high performance with the top 5 individual route results for June as follows - the London to Southend services with the best result at 98.0%, followed by the Norwich/Ipswich – London Intercity services at 97.8%, London to Chelmsford/Colchester/Clacton/Harwich services at 97.7%, the Norwich to Sheringham line at 97.0% and the Marks Tey to Sudbury line at 96.9%.
The good results on all the other routes were - the Norwich to Great Yarmouth line at 96.8%, the Ipswich to Felixstowe line at 96.5%, West Anglia services at 95.0%, the Norwich to Cambridge and Norwich to Lowestoft services at 94.7%, the Ipswich to Cambridge/Peterborough services at 94.1%, the Stansted Express services at 93.6% and the Ipswich to Lowestoft services at 93.3%.
Punctuality figures have mostly been between 90% and 99% on routes across the network throughout the period while Greater Anglia has been running a revised service for key workers to get to work and back during lockdown.
Additional services were reintroduced from 18 May and again on 15 June - and then back to a full service on most routes from 6 July - other than an increased, but not yet full, intercity service between Norwich and London and a half hourly Stansted Express service.
It is now mandatory for customers to wear a face covering when using public transport, to help reduce the spread of coronavirus. Children under the age of 11 and people with a disability or illness which means they cannot wear a face covering are exempt from wearing them.
The rail industry, including Greater Anglia, has launched a “safer travel pledge” outlining the actions rail companies are taking to keep customers safe, and four things passengers can do to help: travelling at quieter times, wearing a face covering, hand washing and checking before you travel.
Greater Anglia has introduced a wide range of measures to make it easier for customers to maintain social distancing at stations and on trains - including floor markings, one-way systems, new signs and queuing systems. Hand gel dispensers have been installed at 20 of the busiest stations. The company has also stepped up cleaning on stations and trains, concentrating on high-touch areas such as push buttons, grab rails and door handles.
People are advised to spend as little time at stations as possible – buying tickets online or via the Greater Anglia app or using contactless payment at vending machines if they have to buy tickets at the station. However, all ticket offices have now re-opened for those who need to use them.
Customers are asked to try and travel outside the busiest times - details of the busiest trains are available online, to use the whole length of the platforms and trains, to ensure they are as spread-out as possible, and to stand back to let people off the train before boarding. Passengers should also remain in their seat until they reach their destination, rather than walking down to the front of the train.
Effective partnership working with Network Rail, Stadler, Siemens, the Department for Transport and the Rail Delivery Group has been a key factor in the delivery of such a reliable service for rail travellers in the East of England. Greater Anglia will continue to monitor demand on a daily basis and plan for the phased re-introduction of the remaining intercity and Stansted Express services when appropriate.
Full details of all train times and current travel advice are available on the Greater Anglia website.