Too many passengers!

I’ve just returned from the User Group Meeting in Edinburgh by train. Ok I have a masochistic streak that maybe I should see a shrink about, but when my last connection didn’t turn up, today’s journey ended up being an 8.5 hour nightmare.

My first two trains ran on time, and although they were a bit crowded I managed to get a seat and read my book. I did note that I could have travel to London on my first train in two hours less than my planned journey time.

On the third connection people were standing up the length of the train. This was a two unit train when four would have been a better size. Running trains and computing have a lot of similarities they are both networks and you can learn a lot by not following the example of Network Rail and the train providers.

When we came into the station, the guard announce that he was “Sorry for any inconvenience to passengers who had had to stand for their journey” which was kind of nice although he could have sounded a bit more sincere, “The problem is due to too many customers on the service”.