Northern Rail, England

For my 50th review on Ciao I thought I'd write something a bit different and talk to you about my journey to and from work - sounds exciting already doesn't it?!!! I have also included some pictures - I have to say, it's been quite difficult getting pictures of the train without people noticing that I was taking pictures of the train. Introduction I remember my first time on a Northern rail train. Shattered having come from a day at work in London, I got on the train at Carlisle and drifted in and out of sleep. I awoke to the train stopping. In a panic I rushed to the door only to be told: ... more

Northern are a train operating company (TOC) who cover a large area of the north of England. The services provided by Northern are extensive and I personally use Northern trains to travel near the Manchester area. As Northern offer 'local' trains you can often connect one Northern service to another if you are travelling over a longer distance. Train frequency is good in most places as Northern tend to operate stopper services which mean that they call at most local stations. This also means that you can use Northern to connect with 'express' services at more mainstream stations if you do ... more

I too suffer daily at the hands of Northern Rail. Overcrowding, delays and cancellations are the most common problems. After three years of travelling to work using this company, i am able to say that from experience, there has been no improvement in the level of service for the £300,000,000 tax payers money that is annually chucked their way. The service provided by Northern rail is thrown into sharp contrast by that of Trans Pennine Express who have invested in new trains and actually understand the concept of customer service. I read with interest an interview with the boss of Trans Pennine ... more

I have used Northern rail 3 times in the last two years to adventure off to Leeds festival and back. I've only used the one line so I'm just going to review that. It is the Chester - Manchester Piccadilly line with a change onto Manchester piccadilly with Transpennine Trains. Our rail tickets cost the 2 of us £26 return (journey 1 on the Wednesday, Journey 2 on the following Monday) WITH RAILCARDS. We purchased them from The Trainline around 4 weeks in advance. The price is great but they were very early morning journeys. The day time journeys were revoltingly expensive. The Staff are ... more

The trains themselves seem old, and aren't very fashionable compared to the big virgin ones. They don't have many deals on, like theres no advance tickets. The best deal is a duo ticket, which saves you roughly a third off a ticket price. This basically works say if I was going to Doncaster to sheffield, if someone else was with me, I pay full they pay half. There is always quite a large space on these trains for prams and wheelchairs, and having a baby this can be a problem on the posher trains. I think they mainy run local stopping services as far south as Nottingham, and up to Newcastle. I ... more