Train travel and bikes: a low-level rant

[Emanresu]

Italian Cross Country trains. Note to self. Book next holiday.

 

[Emanresu]

Switzerland are more integrated. Bikes on the train and then on the back of the bus to go further up the mountain.

 

[Boopop]

Italian Cross Country trains. Note to self. Book next holiday.

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Was that actually high speed rail? This is my experience of Italian high speed rail. Bike in bag, or no bike at all:

 

[roubaixtuesday]

The tandem club keep a handy list: https://tandem-club.org.uk/files/information/trains/index.html

Bear in mind that with Avanti you need two bike reservations for a tandem, and their staff refuse to give you two bike reservations with just one ticket to travel. I'm sure that's fine for most people but I sometimes bring my tandem to the other end of the country, to the person I'm planning on riding it with. I've found in this instance you can usually blag getting two reservations from your local ticket office instead.

Also at least for the local trains I wouldn't necessarily pay attention to what the TOC says anyway. In my experience it's better to use Real Train Times to work out what model of train you'll be getting for your journey, and then look that up on youtube. If it has a big bike space like the train I put my cargo bike on in the photo, you might be OK anyway, especially if it's a quiet train and they don't put many staff on the service.

Obviously carriages that force you to hang your bike are a non-starter.

Hope that all helps.

Very helpful, thank you

 

[LucretiaMyReflection]

I bought a book over Christmas which recounts tails of railway travel woe in the mid 1990s directly following privatisation, it's good to know things have got better since then (or not, read the story lol).



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Meanwhile on a train from Cambridge to Newmarket September 2024, the conductor on the 5pm departure says 'give me your tyres, your pumps,your huddled masses cycling to breathe free'
Loadsabikes

Spot my bike!

 

[ianrauk]

I spy with my little eye a FNR patch.

 

[Drago]

I spy with my little eye a FNR patch.

The dyslexic GnR tribute band?

 

[LucretiaMyReflection]

Indeed it is.

 

[Domus]

Coming back from a Friday Night Ride last year I had a bike reservation and in the bike space was the world's biggest suitcase and a surf board. How come you need to reserve a bike space but not oversize luggage?

 

[wiggydiggy]

Coming back from a Friday Night Ride last year I had a bike reservation and in the bike space was the world's biggest suitcase and a surf board. How come you need to reserve a bike space but not oversize luggage?

Some train companies do have rules on luggage to be fair, though not all.

I once saw a family apparently moving house through Leeds Station, the son was enthusiasticilly running back and forth with boxes Inc a 50" TV. No idea if they managed to travel ok lol.

 

[Spartak]

You should try booking a bike on the Eurostar ... 🫣

 

[Drago]

Coming back from a Friday Night Ride last year I had a bike reservation and in the bike space was the world's biggest suitcase and a surf board. How come you need to reserve a bike space but not oversize luggage?

They're the same people who'd cheerfully park their car in a motorbike space.

 

[Dogtrousers]

Coming back from a Friday Night Ride last year I had a bike reservation and in the bike space was the world's biggest suitcase and a surf board. How come you need to reserve a bike space but not oversize luggage?

I thought I remembered reading it and yes ...

GWR has an explicit surfboard policy. (Not allowed except on certain services that have guards vans.)
https://www.gwr.com/help-and-support/faqs/travelling-with-gwr

I guess that's because they go to Cornwall

But if you weren't on GWR that won't be of much interest

 

[Moon bunny]

I am in the early stages of planning a might, possibly, if we can find the money, exhibition of Cycles by Rail at work, an interesting history, from specially fitted vans in the Edwardian era, to specially made silk bags in the 1930s (if a bike was in a bag it was luggage and travelled free) to the 1978 scheme of sending off for free tickets, which was so overloaded it was abandoned after a week and the foundations of the present free for all laid.