Ticket office hours could be cut at West Dunbartonshire train stations

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Ticket office hours could be slashed at railway stations across West Dunbartonshire and Helensburgh in a move dubbed “ridiculous”.ScotRail is consulting on proposals to dramatically cut opening hours at Alexandria, Balloch, Cardross, Dumbarton Central, Dalreoch and Helensburgh Central.The plans include changes to opening times at Alexandria which would operate between 9.15am and 2.45pm on a Saturday as opposed to the current times of 6.30am until 11.30pm, if proposals go ahead as planned.Dumbarton Central’s office, which is open until midnight Monday to Saturday, would shut at 8pm, while on Sundays it would close at 4pm instead of the current 11.10pm.Passengers at Helensburgh Central would see the ticket office hours slashed from 5.55am until midnight to 7am until 7pm on a Saturday under proposals.ScotRail say more passengers are buying their tickets online or using ticket vending machines – with a 50 percent drop in the use of offices.However, Dumbarton MSP Jackie Baillie slammed the plans and called on the Scottish Government to step in.She said: “This is absolutely unacceptable.

My constituents deserve better than a second-rate service which they have experienced for a number of years under the SNP’s watch.“All of this is happening while fares have risen again this month and routes are being drastically cut back.“ScotRail are representing this as ‘delivering a better level of service to customers’ which is a gross misrepresentation of the truth.

These cuts will hit passengers, threaten jobs and compromise station safety which is vitally important to people in my constituency.“We won’t get people back on trains by cutting rail services to the bone.“I am appalled at this proposal and I urge the Scottish Government to