Letter: Teutonic timetables

Sir: As one Bourne to another, may I pass on some advice to Arthur and Fiona Bourne (letter, 23 December) about the hopelessness of all the website timetable information provided by UK train operators?

Facing a similar bewilderment when living in Cambridge, I followed the suggestion of a Finnish friend and looked up German railways' web site at www.bahn.de. To my astonishment, I found, in English as well as German, complete, accurate, up-to-date details of all trains in western Europe, including the UK.

It is perhaps another sign of the folly of rail privatisation in the UK that the Germans can get timetable information that is denied to the British public.

CHRIS BOURNE

Brussels