The coaches may be huge — but, my goodness, doesn’t the Oxford Tube pack ’em in! I recall that a year or so back, when the new vehicles were introduced, a letter to the editor of The Oxford Times pointed out that they had a less generous seat pitch than the buses they replaced, and that canny travellers ought to use the rival Oxford Espress.

This was not an option open to me on a series of recent journeys to Opera Holland Park, since I needed to alight either at Shepherd’s Bush or Notting Hill, neither of which is served by the Espress.

The first trip was no problem, because we managed to seat ourselves at a table, with a reasonable amount of space in front. The second time we boarded at Thornhill Park-and-Ride, saving the tedious slog through Oxford, but found as a consequence that the coach was already pretty full when it arrived. Crammed into one of the only spare seats, upstairs at the back, I endured an hour of profound discomfort on a bumpy, hot ride to the capital. Does Stagecoach believe all its customers are midgets?

After that, I vowed it would be the train every time — or, rather, every time I could get one of the booked-in-advance online ticket deals. This has the effect, almost always, of reducing the fare to £13 return. This is less than the cost of the coach — and the journey is faster.

How much faster was demonstrated on a trip Rosemarie and I made last Friday afternoon.

We were booked on the 3.31pm, train which we learned soon after our arrival at the station was running 40 minutes late as a consequence of a signalling problem as far away as Hereford.

A member of the station staff advised that we couldn’t use the tickets on another train — not that I felt much inclined to. The 4.01pm service, which was into the station before ours, is a three-car diesel multiple unit. I have been on it before and it gets really crowded after picking up passengers at Reading and Slough.

This train left on time, already pretty full, since many waiting for the 3.31pm had piled aboard. Only after it had gone was it announced on the station screens that ours would be the next to leave — and that it would now be running non-stop.

This decision, in effect, penalised two categories of rail customers. First, were the Reading- or Slough-bound passengers from the Hereford direction, who had endured one long delay and were now sentenced to another. Second, were those crammed on to the just-departed DMU, who were obviously going to be overtaken by our near-empty flyer somewhere along the route.

Clearly, our train was needed in Paddington as fast as possible to avoid a serious knock-on effect to the rest of the Friday evening rush-hour timetable. But why, I wondered, had the decision to run it non-stop not been announced a little earlier?

Anyway, it was all great fun for an ex-trainspotter like me. The InterCity 125 positively whizzed along, except through the obvious bottleneck of Reading station which we passed at running pace.

Our journey was accomplished — in great comfort — in just 46 minutes.

A record? Far from it.

As long ago as 1979, British Rail — remember that estimable organisation? — carried the Chinese leader Chairman Hua from London to Oxford in 39 minutes.

The summer timetable introduced in 1982 featured a service just as fast, when it was not taking advantage of the four minutes of recovery time built into the timetable.

In steam days, the best train took 60 minutes, as most services do now. Progress?