As a son of the railway you’ll perhaps be fed up of me banging on about trains – but I won’t be derailed.

I am a frequent user of services to and from Central and Upper, by day and night, to Glasgow, London and beyond. And while I can say with hand on heart that I find the services are generally very reliable and keep to timetable, it is the shorter journeys which are currently causing me some upset.

If you are a parent reading this you should be asking yourself why you allow your offspring to play on the railway, as dozens of youngsters apparently do of an evening without check.

Happily, I don’t mean they play on the track, which is of course dangerous beyond measure and something I have never seen at this end of the line, beyond the odd flash of graffiti.

Rather there seems to be great sport in getting on at Dumbarton or Craigendoran and off at Helensburgh Central, before making the return journey again. And again. It annoys me as a passenger; what it must do for the staff, I shudder to think.

Clearly if someone has a ticket for a legitimate journey and spends time at the destination, for whatever reason, before the return leg, then fair enough. But to simply trundle back and forth in numbers, running up and down the train, disturbing passengers and staff, is ridiculous.

Might it be time for ScotRail to instal a manned ticket barrier to deter these kids? I’m sure if they thought they had to buy a ticket for their games they would very quickly stop.