Booking train ticket in the UK can be complicated. However, on most train services you can reserve a seat as part of the ticket cost. Some train companies don’t allow seat reservations, for example, I have never been able to reserve a seat on Northern or South Western.

Apart from local trips most of the train trips we take I buy the tickets well in advance and so we’re booked onto a specific train with reserved seats. For example, you can request if you want a seat at a table, or near the window, and also the direction you want to face.

In other countries you’ll normally have to pay for a seat reservation (e.g. in Germany on Deutsche Bahn) so it is good that it is free in the UK. But is does surprise me that some people don’t like to reserve train seats.

It is possible that it can be hard to find your reserved seat when you board the train if you get on a coach far away from it. Or, that you feel too shy to ask people to move out of your reserve seat if it is occupied when you find it.

Also, it does happen that technology can get in the way as the IT system on the train which puts the reservation information into the digital display at each seat might not be working properly (i.e. it can’t download and display the right information). That is a pain, but from experience you can show people your ticket and they are happy to move elsewhere.

But even with all those possible challenges it doesn’t cost anything and in our experience almost all of the time you just go and sit in your reserved seat – no problem. So in car-free-dom, particularly as in getting on the train you’ve been walking between other modes of transport, take the weight off and make some reservations.