Trans-Essex Express

Does Norwich have the worst train service of any city less than 150 miles from London? On the Wednesday before Christmas we travelled home to North Norfolk on the 16.30 from Liverpool Street which is nominally non-stop to Colchester and is the last train before the 19.00 on which day returns are permitted. The train was reduced to eight cars and lacked any form of refreshment facility (it was a suburban EMU). It also lacked a toilet (the only one open was worthy of some third world outpost). The train ran rapidly and kept our grandson amused as he watched the arcing off the pantograph reflected in the snow covered wastes. The suburban train eventually reached Norwich in slightly under two hours. Meanwhile a daughter and her family reached the City of Stafford in one hour 20 minutes from Euston and were home in Newport (Salop) before we had left Norwich (it cannot really be a "city") for West Runton.

And try to escape to Scotland, or Leeds, and do those railcars ever reach Liverpool Lime Street?