Putney passengers are facing fewer trains and growing disruption this summer, despite public promises of improvements.
South Western Railway’s summer timetable will reduce off-peak services on key suburban lines from 28 July, and engineering works at the end of August will further curtail direct services into central London. The cuts come even as government and local politicians celebrate the rollout of new Arterio trains and SWR’s return to public ownership.
Putney MP Fleur Anderson told the Evening Standard this week that “more trains are coming” to tackle overcrowding at Putney and Wandsworth Town stations. But South Western Railway’s new timetable and service announcements tell a different story.
Anderson said she had met with the new Chief Executive of South Western Railway (SWR) and secured a commitment to speed up the long-delayed rollout of Arterio trains, new carriages that promise more capacity and comfort.
“These new trains, which are great, have been announced several times. They’re coming,” she told the paper. “They’ve been described as ‘platform hoovers’ – which everyone in Wandsworth Town will love to hear about.” She added that “it is finally good to have them coming” and credited the public ownership of SWR for progress on the issue.
But while the MP made the case in print, the reality for passengers waiting on platforms in Putney is less encouraging.
Summer means fewer trains, not more
From Monday 28 July to Friday 29 August, SWR will operate a reduced summer timetable — specifically cutting back off-peak suburban services, including those on the London Waterloo via Richmond line, which serves both Putney and Wandsworth Town.
The company says the cuts are temporary and reflect lower expected passenger numbers during school holidays. But commuters who rely on off-peak trains — including part-time workers, carers, and students — are unlikely to see any immediate benefit from the new rolling stock.
On top of that, major engineering works around Barnes Bridge from 23 to 31 August will further reduce or divert services, with some trains starting or terminating at Kew Bridge and bus replacements operating between Barnes and Barnes Bridge.
No confirmed Arterio deployment on Putney route
While Arterio trains are indeed being rolled out — with 14 now in service and more planned “in the coming weeks” — SWR has confirmed they are running on routes to Dorking, Guildford, Hampton Court, Kingston, Reading, Shepperton, Twickenham and Windsor & Eton Riverside.
Putney and Wandsworth Town are not listed among the routes currently using the new trains, and no official timetable confirms when — or if — they will be deployed there.
Despite repeated calls – and now claims – from Fleur Anderson and Wandsworth Council Cabinet Member for Transport Jenny Yates for more services to stop at Wandsworth Town, the reality is that SWR has refused to add additional stops, citing concerns that increased dwell time at the station could cause congestion on the approach to Waterloo and disrupt the wider timetable.
We know this because there is a recording of a meeting – 33 minutes in – in March in which the SWR representative says exactly that. At the next meeting of the same group in May, a meeting with Yates and Anderson at Wandsworth Town was outlined, during which the question about trains stopping at the station was reportedly raised again. And the same answer was given.
In other words, our representatives may be asking for changes but they are not getting them. And they can’t figure out how to get them. It looks as though our MP continued pushing all the way up to the CEO of SWR – using the nationalisation of SWR to force a meeting – but even then failed to get a commitment.
Rather than admit failure, however, we are told that “more trains are coming” while omitting the pertinent fact that they are not coming to Putney or Wandsworth Town.
Comment vs. carriage
The Arterios — ordered in 2017 and initially due in service by 2019 — have been beset by delays due to technical faults, safety concerns, and driver training bottlenecks. Many of the new 10-carriage trains remain in depots, including at Clapham Junction.
What goes unsaid with the rollout is that modern technology in the new trains threatens the livelihood of both drivers and station attendants because their skills and additional attention is not needed. Faced with being replaced, or reduced in number, the workers have decided to simply delay the inevitable – to the daily detriment of rail passengers who have to cram onto outdated trains that chunter past their modern replacements in sidings.
Even after the meeting with the SWR CEO, there is no immediate increase in the number of trains stopping at Putney, and none of the planned improvements will alter the fact that the service is being reduced for the next month.
For Putney commuters, faced with our Parliamentary representative claiming success, the reality is that getting in the newspaper is not the same as getting on the train.
Quick facts: Summer service at Putney
- Off-peak cuts from 28 July to 29 August
- Engineering disruption 23–31 August with bus replacements
- No extra services confirmed for Putney or Wandsworth Town
- SWR has rejected requests to add stops at Wandsworth Town
- Arterio trains not yet in service on this route
