I doubt the situation on the ground will be very similar to Virgin. On a HST or a Pendolino, the bike storage is behind locked doors and you have to ask the train staff nicely to let you on.
[...]
...but I don't see it getting as bad as Virgin, because the physical layout of the train simply isn't conducive to that type of setup.
I'm not sure it's fair to describe the Virgin setup as 'bad'. I mean, sure, you need to have a reservation. And it can sometimes be challenging to track down a member of platform staff. But once you have your reservation and have caught your dispatcher, you know you can get your bike on the train, that the space isn't going to be full of luggage and/or passengers, and that (at least on a Pendolino) you won't have to do any of that dangly bike space will-it-fit and can-I-lift-it nonsense.
CrossCountry seems to be consistently the worst. They want you to have reservations, but in reality operate a first-come-first-served system, on routes where lack of capacity means the bike spaces are regularly contended by other users.
I've never seen a member of staff from any train company evict an unreserved bike because someone has turned up with a reservation. They either bend the rules with a bit of bike-tetris or allowing someone to stand with a bike in a vestibule, or they refuse to let the additional bike on. Which means that reservations seem pointless unless it's a space that requires staff to access.
OTOH, I went to a London Midland bikes-on-trains hack day a while back, and while none of use were able to come up with a magic solution, I did learn a couple of interesting factoids[1]. One of which was that in the absence of a reservation system, the TOC has no source of data for how many people are taking bikes on their trains. So maybe that's what it's about?
[1] The other really interesting factoid was a comment from a wheelchair user, to the effect that she loves it when there's a cyclist, because it means she doesn't have to worry about staff not turning up with the ramp to get her off the train - cyclists would invariably get platform staff's attention or if necessary block the doors until the guard appeared.
Another mildly interesting factoid is that you can get a bike reservation , for free,
without buying, or even having, a ticket. You can just walk into any station and ask for one, or ring up, and they'll give you a collection reference.
I used to think you had to have a ticket, or buy a ticket at the same time, but you don't.
I do also know for a fact that on virgin their system doesn't dictate that it has to be 24 hours in advance, as I've got one printed off for a train in 20 minutes before. Their policy might say that you're supposed to get one 24 hours before, but if it does, it relies on the staff implementing it, so if you need one under 24 hours always worth just asking nicely.
Agree that XC are awful, they put bin bags in the bike space, and it's a pain in the arse if someone else's bike is blocking yours. Far rather the dedicated carriage of virgin.
Another anecdote is when getting on a virgin train they always ask "have you got a reservation?" and I always just answer "yes" but they very very rarely actually ask to see it. I wouldn't
plan to risk it, but I wonder if you got caught short without a reservation for a train you wanted to get on you could just chance it and just say "oh yes, of
course I've got a reservation officer
" when you actually haven't.
By contrast, on scotrail, it is far more likely to be checked ime.