Hi all,

I'm doing a bit of work into events for a rail company at the moment, and need to get a bit of research into how fans travel down to Wembley, hopefully I might be able to do something beneficial for the game, the fans and my boss too.

Cheers.

Problem with the train is that, being a bank holiday, its the time train companys traditionally do line maintenence

Yep, I work on the Underground and weekends/bankholidays is chaos for people using trains.

coming from Caldecote near Nuneaton I have found my best option is to drive to Watford then get a 1-9 zone card for the underground.....

crap train times from Nuneaton on the west coast mainline

Chauffeur takes me to more or less the foot of the escalators to the Bobby Moore suite.

We've always made a full weekend of it and stayed with a mate in Upminster. We drive down there Friday and get the tube into London on the Saturday.

A friend lives in Watford so we drive there and park on his drive then get the tube into London or go straight to Wembley.
We would go on the train but it can be quite expensive and then getting back to the station from Wembley can be a pain.

Tell them as soon as it's cheaper for me to get the train, rather than fly to London, then they will have my custom. Until then, they can carry on scamming the rest of the poor saps who have to use the UK rail network.

Okay, secondary question,

Would you use the train if you got a discount on your final ticket?

Don't they still do Cup Final specials into Wembley Central? They used to years ago and it worked well.

Having been to many of the events during the Olympics and Paralympics I was amazed to find with my tickets that I got a free travel card, even for an event that I attended at the Millenium Stadium in Cardiff. Figure that one out !

I have also done the London Marathon and been told I had free travel on the Tube with my running number.

I can say in all cases that free travel was not the reason why I chose to attend / partake in the event. What I do know is that any sporting event I attend with my family other than in central London it is far more expensive for me to travel by train then it is to drive. Even with advance tickets. We are a family of 5 and despite the stress of driving it is still always cheaper to drive. Train travel in this country is still way to expensive to even contemplate even in adavance. Add to that as has been stated that engineering works take place at a weekend and you invariably run the risk of a bus replacement service which adds to the time and stress of the journey and never gets you the tickets any cheaper. Or at least thats how it seems.

Until we have a reliable and economically viable train system it will always be out of the question. I am sure train companies and the Govt will point to a massive increase in the use of the train, but I suspect the majority of this is commuters in the SE and the major hubs in the North who are faced with absolutely no alternative for their daily trek to work.

I have contemplated attending Hull games and travelling by train. I live in Hertfordshire. But other than the annoying decision to play on Friday evenings this is out of the question as you can't get back without changing or staying over. I don't trust changing as a slight delay in the first train can cause you to miss your intended train at the connection. Causing yet more delay in your journey.

So I guess in answer to your questions;

First one I travel by train and tube. Parking at Wembley is way to expensive to travel by car.
Second No.

Okay, cheers folks. Really helpful.

Interesting that the attitude of people seems to differ between Yorkshire and Lancashire, (east v west coast main lines) east coast is goosed by engineering, west is hampered but can work around it better, depending on location.

Could do with a load more votes on this so I can show a better cross reference of fans if people could vote please?
Need at least 100

Car to Stanmore Tube St.
£2.50 car park all day.
Tube into London.
Take pictures of gold pavements.
Back out to Wembley on Tube.
Job's a gud 'un.

Nice work Rich!

Last time I went we drove to Watford and got the train, but then we were heading to Welwyn Garden City after the game.

Normally we drive to Beaconsfield and stay with family, the train to Wembley is dead easy from there.

Would I choose the train if match tickets were discounted? If the fare was right, but then train fares Manchester to London have been ridiculous since Virgin restructured their fares around 2009/10ish - I used to opt for the train every time I went to London, even when it was slightly more expensive - more comfortable, less hassle, etc, but since the fares shot up I've flown every time, and that's about 15 times a year. I realise of course I'm talking about midweek, often peak travel.

That's brilliant Cronus, all this stuff will be brought up when I propose it.
What if there was an offer, something like a free 1st class upgrade with a final ticket?
Or if I could make more advance tickets available and promote them with a voucher code? Means travelling to London via Manchester could be dirt cheap?

Usually drive to an outer Tube station (eg Uxbridge) after a quick scout for car parking prices then tube. Train isn't quite worth it vs driving down with a full car.
Which does that put me under? Mostly driving I guess.

i do a bit of both. drive down to the outskirts of london then get a train in on the milton keynes and watford line. the train stops at wembley central. last year i went as far as milton keynes, parked up for free and caught the fast train in. worked out really well

Not sure Virgin would be pleased wiv a loada drunken mucky RL flat caps in t'1st Class wagon.



More advance tickets probably the way to go for volume bookings - and could also link it in with tube tickets. You can buy underground tickets online, but maybe an offer for your tube ticket to Wembley for, say, £3 (or even included).

What about group bookings? A reduced set fare for group booking over 10 people bookable until 7 days after the last semi final? Or a package aimed at amateur clubs? Try and pull people away from the coach operators.

I think 1st Class is pretty cheap to upgrade at weekends anyway - £15 each way? A free upgrade might see 1st Class overwhelmed. Maybe a £10 return upgrade would be good, that way the riff-raff might stay in cattle class.

Last year we drove down to Luton Parkway and got the train into St Pancras from there, 2 years previous we got the train down from Chesterfield to St Pancras. Midland Mainline isn't a line that most RL fans will head down on, but we've never had any issues with works, just cost. I'm getting the train down to Wembley for the NFL Game in September from Stoke, and despite a similar distance, and faster journey, the ticket price is less than half as much, for a nicer train. It was because of the train price for 4 of us last year that we drove down to Luton, as from there we got a group ticket for 20 pounds instead, about 10% of what it would have cost us from Chesterfield.

35-45 minute drive for us from North Herts, either park up (for free) just outside the match day boundary & easy 25min walk with very easy egress back home across via the A5 to the A41/A1 or you can park in IKEA for nowt also.