Atomisation

[Cudzoziemiec]

Ostensibly on a different road, one with rails, but this leapt out:

But we have not, with one exception, actually been on a train in five months. I bought a secondhand car just before the shops shut in March – my first time behind the wheel since passing my test a year earlier – and so driving became our exclusive means of getting about.

And just as you don’t quite register until you become a driver how dangerous it is, that your life depends on you and multiple others not losing focus for a second, I also hadn’t quite twigged how isolating it is.

That’s the point, of course: to cocoon you from infection. But it also amplifies all the negative aspects of being in a bubble. Interaction with fellow travellers is fleeting at best, and hostile as standard. You swear and are sworn at. You tut and tense and dismiss. People blur into a mass of incompetent rotters out to thwart your progress. You could go anywhere, fast. The world ought to be your oyster. And so your sense of your own importance and agency within it inflates.

The worst effect of people like me – those with the luxury of choice – now abandoning public transport is, of course, environmental. There’s also likely to be a more immediate impact on mortality. Just as April’s improvements in air quality have been obliterated, so it’s hard not to anticipate a spike in road accidents over the summer, following spring’s record low.

Yet the loss to society of the richness of interaction public transport affords is also significant. Riding buses and trains and being at stations was how I used to see the world, in every way. I grew up in a family without a car, and days were plotted around timetables and route maps, special ticket deals and off-peak loopholes – all part of the fun, even when they went wrong. Your horizons were expanded by the people you’d meet as well as the places you’d see, people you could freely speak to, no matter how different their background. Some of my son’s most memorable encounters have been with ticket inspectors and random fellow travellers. This is now off limits.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/10/pandemic-train-travel-rail-network

[Kim]

I've certainly been missing trains.  Not as much as some track-bashers I could mention, but still.  It's been long enough that the memory of my last bikes-on-trains trauma^[1] has faded, leaving just the traditional BRITISH rolling-stockholm syndrome of thinking our trains are actually okay.


_{[1] I had to scroll back through the calendar to check:  The last Chiltern and Blacksheep audaxes were fine, and Origami rides by definition involve smug folding tactics, so the last incident was back in October when I had to get a soggy loaded tourer on overcrowded Welsh trains.}

[Jurek]

I caught a train back from Whitstable, a week ago yesterday.
That's the first time I've been on a train since early March.
Other than myself, there were just two other people in my carriage, all the way to Bromley South.
This was at half ten in the morning.

[Notsototalnewbie]

We've not been on a train since early March. While I miss not being able to get further afield, I've not missed the bikes-on-trains trauma one bit.

I've had a few bad experiences as have we all, but I'm still particularly scarred by what happened on the way back from the not-the-royal-wedding camping trip in Wales quite some years ago*. Even cycling through Croydon to get to the nicer lanes isn't as stressful as the palaver of loaded bikes on trains. Josie Dew has a bit in one of her books that describes what a nightmare it is quite aptly, and how after it travelling on a train without a bike seems almost luxurious.

I know a few people who've bought cars since the pandemic. 

*Bikes booked on train complete with bike reservation. Unloaded bikes on appropriate platform ready to load onto train. 30 seconds before train pulled in, there was a platform change announced. On the other side of the station, up and down stairs. The lifts were of course full of people and luggage. I panicked and grabbed the bike and a pannier and carried it up the stairs; another yacfer helped me with another pannier (sorry it was so traumatic I've forgotten who it was, possibly Jane who never seems to have much luggage of her own), and I believe a random other passenger took pity and helped with another (we had six panniers between the pair of us ISTR, no idea what was in them all). As we dashed to the appropriate carriage, breathless, the guard had a go at us saying 'we should have been ready and waiting' and then said there wasn't room anyway. Following The Look from me and attention drawn to our bike reservations, they were eventually allowed on.

[citoyen]

It's five months to the day since I last travelled on a train. Crazy.

Can't say I find travelling by train to be a sociable experience like the author of that piece describes. You're mostly trying to avoid eye contact with your fellow passengers and shutting out their inane conversations and/or annoying music.

And politely as possible trying to ignore the weirdos'random fellow travellers' who insist on 'speaking freely' to you. 

[ian]

I'm sure I've written about the motorised disconnect and how we know lots of people who never interface with people who aren't like themselves because they drive from one event to the next, essentially creating a bubble, where they're never exposed to anyone who isn't like themselves.

I think since this started we've shifted to the same, we've not been on public transport since this kicked off and now drive everywhere. I confess it's seductive. Our Saturday hikes that usually would have involved a couple of changes of trains and a few hours of travel and condensed into a 40-minute drive to the destination (the downside is that we can't do linear walks between places of course, but we have more destinations that would have been difficult to get to by train). Rolling up at the station at the end to find the hourly train left a minute before is a no-more (two hours sitting on a platform at Winchelsea is two hours more than anyone needs). We pass nice isolated houses in the countryside and think, well, we could both drive...

Of course, we don't meet anyone who isn't primarily white, educated, and middle-class. We've written others out of our lives and into the distance of news stories.

I suppose we were late for this particular journey. Part of me looks forward to resuming our reliance on public transport, but another part reminds me that in some ways it's an affectation, and it would be more comfortable - easier – to continue with the car and accept the life that offers. I confess it's seductive.

Getting a bike on a train has always been a measure of 'fun' – the other year we circumnavigated Kent by train. I remember one trip where the entire orthodox Jewish population of London squeezed onto the train. I think I had a family of ten balanced on my head. We'd planned to get off in Herne Bay. I think we managed to extract the bikes in Ramsgate. It added to the sense of adventure.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It's five months to the day since I last travelled on a train. Crazy.

Can't say I find travelling by train to be a sociable experience like the author of that piece describes. You're mostly trying to avoid eye contact with your fellow passengers and shutting out their inane conversations and/or annoying music.

And politely as possible trying to ignore the weirdos'random fellow travellers' who insist on 'speaking freely' to you. 

Yeah. But I think it depends on the train. A commuter train or bus is not going to be sociable, a longer distance journey or a leisure trip you can get talking to random people.

It also depends who you are or who you're with. The author is travelling with a toddler. Finally, train layout has an influence; old-style compartments can create a sense of shared camaraderie, a sort of miniature temporary group just by virtue of being in one limited space.

But certainly none of those apply to travelling by car.

[Kim]

The problem with chatting to random strangers on trains is that you're stuck there with them.  Which is fine when it's someone's cute child, or a chat about your travels, or discussing the merits of Ventisit with a wheelchair user or whatever.  Not so much when it's creepy men or obnoxious/threatening drunks.  You don't get those in cars.

[Cudzoziemiec]

That's another advantage of the corridor. But doesn't apply nowadays.

[citoyen]

It also depends who you are or who you're with. The author is travelling with a toddler.

Up to a point. I don't mind social interactions with children on trains - I'll be polite if they engage with me but I won't initiate conversation with them or actively encourage them to continue.

I am just a grumpy old sod though.

I once took an overnight train with a couple of friends from Nice to Biarritz. We secured ourselves a compartment and settled down for the night. Somewhere in the middle of nowhere the train made an unscheduled stop and the whole of the French navy boarded, at least a dozen of them piling into our tiny compartment. The next few hours were sheer hell.* That's the kind of camaraderie I could do without.

But certainly none of those apply to travelling by car.

True that. I pretty much agree with everything the author says about travelling by car.



*I'm exaggerating, of course. I know people (women, mainly) who have had much worse encounters on trains home and abroad.

[DuncanM]

I travelled by train about a month ago - 4 hours to Preston to buy a (classic) car. It was far too rusty, so I got the train home again (after waiting an hour at Preston station)  . That was basically my whole Saturday!
Train travel in the time of Covid is much less of a human experience than before. You can't sit near anyone, there were no ticket inspectors, the train cleaning staff behaved like they were irritated by the presence of people on board, and there were quite a few people (close to half?) without masks. The announcement after every stop said that they were compulsory, and after that announcement one of the cleaners said to a customer that if british transport police got on then they would be fined, but obv they didn't make an appearance.

I'm doing more taxi service to ferry my wife around now because she doesn't want to use the bus. Otherwise, I go about 2 miles to the shops and back once a week.

[citoyen]

I remember one trip where the entire orthodox Jewish population of London squeezed onto the train.

I've had that experience before. I've yet to ascertain what is the particular appeal of east Kent to the orthodox Jewish community, and why they should all wish to visit at the same time.

They're perfectly welcome down here any time though - far more civilised than the usual rabble we get.

[Jurek]

Oi be dat rabble 

[Kim]

IRTA "usual rabbi"

[ian]

It's not really just the interaction, it's sharing the same space and acknowledging the existance of people outside our social milieu. Public transport makes you do that. It's the only shared social space most of us have.

Even if they're a bit mad, either on too many or too few drugs, and have questionable personal hygiene. I'm not selling this, am I?

I remember one trip where the entire orthodox Jewish population of London squeezed onto the train.

I've had that experience before. I've yet to ascertain what is the particular appeal of east Kent to the orthodox Jewish community, and why they should all wish to visit at the same time.

They're perfectly welcome down here any time though - far more civilised than the usual rabble we get.

Indeed, they were fine, but it seemed like they'd all agreed to get on the same train at precisely the same time. Honestly, it was empty when we got on with our bikes and then, suddenly, we were on the most packed train ever. It wasn't possible to even try to get off until post-Margate. I didn't even know it was a thing.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Maybe East Kent is known for its rabbi rousers.

[Cudzoziemiec]

It's not really just the interaction, it's sharing the same space and acknowledging the existance of people outside our social milieu. Public transport makes you do that. It's the only shared social space most of us have.

Even if they're a bit mad, either on too many or too few drugs, and have questionable personal hygiene. I'm not selling this, am I?

As an enjoyable experience, no you're not. But beneficial experiences aren't always enjoyable, and sometimes it might be other people benefiting from our experience, not us.

[citoyen]

Oi be dat rabble 

Well, I wasn't going to mention any names... 

[Joe.B]

We've got tickets to take the tandem from Newcastle to Liverpool with Transpennine Express on Sunday.

If the trains are as quiet as reported here it shouldn't turn out too traumatic.

[Adam]

I'm just back from the Isle of Wight.  We used the hovercraft which was fun, very easy & civilised, although I noted that unlike the outbound trip, a couple of passengers on the return leg had left their masks under their chin, so an announcement was made that masks had to worn or else pay a £100 fine.

After getting to Southsea we then cycled the mile or so to Portsmouth Harbour station and this was the first time I'd been on a train for 6 months.  Not very busy but I reckon just every passenger on the platforms was wearing a mask, compared with 3/4 of railway staff.  Before the train left the station a couple of cleaners gave some of the handles a wipe. The train probably got no more than 1/3 full but everyone seemed to have a mask on.  And the air conditioning was working.