Are trains on the right track?

The short answer is no. South West Trains has just had its franchise renewed and is said within the railway industry to be highly profitable.

No one really wants "seats out and standing room in", except probably South West Trains which stands to increase profits by the move.

Edward Davey MP does not help by banging on about using the Waterloo platforms to be released by Eurostar for local trains to New Malden, Kingston and Surbiton, because Waterloo station is vast, and the Richmond and Windsor lines are on one side of the station (the Eurostar side) and largely operationally seperate from the Wimbledon and Woking lines through New Malden.

What is required are longer trains, which do not increase track occupancy - 12 cars should be the rush hour norm, and the powers that be, pushed hard by the likes of Edward Davey should get on with it.

While on the job, the "Richmond loop" junction at Twickenham should be altered so that trains from Kingston area could run into Heathrow where the current end of the Heathrow Express at Terminal 4 is very close to Feltham, and the whole Kingston area railway network.

A touch of real rail infrastructure planning would help Kingston by relieving the road traffic, and similarly help Heathrow.

Stephen Duncan New Malden