"Abolish the railways!" (The Spectator)

[grove]

Published by The Spectator today...

As the country is held hostage once again by the rail unions, it’s time for the nation to ask itself: does it need trains at all? The last time anyone dared ask this question was 60 years ago when Dr Richard Beeching boldly closed more than 2,000 stations and 5,000 miles of track. The time has come to finish the job and shut down the rest of Britain’s viciously expensive, underperforming and fundamentally inefficient rail network.

Jonathan Miller lives near Montpellier and from the chosen picture that heads the article seems to think we still have steam trains too!

The full article is here https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/abolish-the-railways-

 

[Horizon22]

Some amazing quotes here. It's almost like someone mashed out whatever came to their mind at that particular time.

"Why does it cost more to take the train to the airport than to fly to Spain? And five times longer to get there on a train, than on a jet?"
Um perhaps because we are an island and the top speed of a jet aeroplane is a fair bit higher than even high speed railways... And what airport?

"The calculus for HS2 is equally brutal, as is its environmental footprint"
Because flying is so environmentally friendly...

"Today, these corridors are strikingly inefficient. They don’t lubricate mobility, they obstruct it. The railway network does not survive the most basic interrogation"
Ah yes because single occupancy cars in traffic jams on the motorway are the epitome of efficiency. I'm not even sure what the second sentence means.

 

[grove]

Some amazing quotes here. It's almost like someone mashed out whatever came to their mind at that particular time.

For The Spectator, it's amazing it got past editorial scrutiny.

 

[Mikw]

The Spectator has turned into a right wing luddite publication recently.

 

[gabrielhj07]

Struggle to believe this isn't a parody.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Some amazing quotes here. It's almost like someone mashed out whatever came to their mind at that particular time.

Or as Christopher Hitchens once said - I would have whisky diluted with Perrier water - a perfect delivery system - then begin writing and drinking.

This guy was obviously high on something. ZERO thought given to what is in there. Sad really.

Worse than (no names mentioned) some of the anti-HS2 gibberish - OK go on I will mention his name - Chris and rhymes with a railway depot ending in Ham. Pack ---- your bags.

Struggle to believe this isn't a parody.

Indeed

 

[Bletchleyite]

The idea of getting rid of large-volume mainlines or commuter routes is fanciful. But if you look at the Cambridgeshire busway it achieves far more than an hourly DMU on a branch line ever would. So there are some lines where he is talking sense, and some where he isn't. Oh for true integration.

 

[43066]

To be honest it reads like many of the more “anti railway” threads I’ve seen on here of late, certainly no less inaccurate or far fetched .

 

[geoffk]

Paul Withrington and Angus Dalgleish live on.

 

[Spartacus]

It's not just them, there's an article in the I today about long rail journeys, and amongst other journeys goes from Preston to Skipton via Manchester instead of Carnforth, when via Carnforth is an hour quicker and much cheaper and goes from Manchester to Chester via Crewe vice direct, taking 1hr 20 vice 1 hour https://inews.co.uk/news/uk-rail-journeys-tortuous-train-take-three-times-longer-than-car-1677311

Facts? I don't think most journalists bother with them!

 

[StevenF]

Yes all "journalists" never seem to bother. However, the RMT have routinely spouted out blatant lies to the public (for their own reasons and ends) and probably the same hacks repeat them.At least the hack's motives are to fill up copy/ social media etc but the RMT has no scruples.

 

[jfowkes]

The idea of getting rid of large-volume mainlines or commuter routes is fanciful. But if you look at the Cambridgeshire busway it achieves far more than an hourly DMU on a branch line ever would. So there are some lines where he is talking sense, and some where he isn't. Oh for true integration.

The busway is really busy though and probably needs upgrading to something closer to a railway - some kind of tram/metro system that Cambridge keeps talking about.

 

[yorksrob]

The idea of getting rid of large-volume mainlines or commuter routes is fanciful. But if you look at the Cambridgeshire busway it achieves far more than an hourly DMU on a branch line ever would. So there are some lines where he is talking sense, and some where he isn't. Oh for true integration.

It achieves a load of bus journeys that would have been done on the buses anyway.

It certainly doesn't replace a Whitby line or a Little North Western line for example.

As for the point more generally, the more bums on seats, the less relevant the road conversion League will be.

 

[AlterEgo]

It's just a slightly sarcastic opinion piece, no doubt blasted out in half an hour to fill space.

 

[bluenoxid]

Skipton to Preston missed the bus that would have done in around 1hr 50 mins

 

[Bletchleyite]

The busway is really busy though and probably needs upgrading to something closer to a railway - some kind of tram/metro system that Cambridge keeps talking about.

If you do that it'll be less busy because it won't then achieve what it does achieve - direct journeys from a large hinterland via the trunk route of the Busway. That or more people will drive to St Ives to connect with it.

As for the point more generally, the more bums on seats, the less relevant the road conversion League will be.

Certainly the more traffic there is, the more rail makes sense. But I'm sure we can all, with a purely rational head, think of a few examples of routes which should not be heavy rail.

Windermere, for instance, might be better if the interchange moved to Oxenholme then buses ran along its uncongested route then fanned out to multiple Lakeland destinations.
Blackpool South-Kirkham should be a tramway.
St Ives has been mentioned.
St Albans Abbey would be better used as a busway with buses running between the respective town/city centres and not just connecting the outskirts of one with the outskirts of the other, though light rail would also work.

I'm sure we can think of more.

 

[yorksrob]

If you do that it'll be less busy because it won't then achieve what it does achieve - direct journeys from a large hinterland via the trunk route of the Busway. That or more people will drive to St Ives to connect with it.



Certainly the more traffic there is, the more rail makes sense. But I'm sure we can all, with a purely rational head, think of a few examples of routes which should not be heavy rail.

Windermere, for instance, might be better if the interchange moved to Oxenholme then buses ran along its uncongested route then fanned out to multiple Lakeland destinations.
Blackpool South-Kirkham should be a tramway.
St Ives has been mentioned.
St Albans Abbey would be better used as a busway with buses running between the respective town/city centres and not just connecting the outskirts of one with the outskirts of the other, though light rail would also work.

I'm sure we can think of more.

Windermere is the one I'm most familiar with (of your list) and it seems to me it would be better off electrified with through services from Manchester bringing in loads of people from the urban areas, connecting to local buses at the Windermere hub.

 

[Bantamzen]

Some amazing quotes here. It's almost like someone mashed out whatever came to their mind at that particular time.

"Why does it cost more to take the train to the airport than to fly to Spain? And five times longer to get there on a train, than on a jet?"
Um perhaps because we are an island and the top speed of a jet aeroplane is a fair bit higher than even high speed railways... And what airport?

To be fair, I've flown to the south of Spain from Leeds Bradford & back again for less than the price of getting the train to London. Even with speed differentials it doesn't make good reading for the rail industry, keeping in mind that the majority of the public see only the bottom line price.

"The calculus for HS2 is equally brutal, as is its environmental footprint"
Because flying is so environmentally friendly...

Whilst HS2 is to be welcomed as a way of making journeys between Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, more environmentally robust it won't connect directly to HS1 & thus to the rest of the European network. So it is already slightly devalued as an alternative to flying to many destinations in Europe as a result. But worse still is how slow and utterly tedious are the plans to increase electrification on our rail network. Case in point, the Trans Pennine route, wires will be up soon from Manchester to Stalybridge, and from Church Fenton to the ECML, but the bit in between which goes through a city already partially wired city is still in question.

Meanwhile in aviation, engine designers are developing new power plants that can deliver 30%-40% better efficiency, and that's just the start.

Ah yes because single occupancy cars in traffic jams on the motorway are the epitome of efficiency. I'm not even sure what the second sentence means.

Perhaps you may have missed the news, but in many parts of the country services are regularly being cancelled, and in lots of cases being cut altogether. So I wonder why single occupancy car use is still a problem?

 

[Horizon22]

Windermere, for instance, might be better if the interchange moved to Oxenholme then buses ran along its uncongested route then fanned out to multiple Lakeland destinations.
Blackpool South-Kirkham should be a tramway.
St Ives has been mentioned.
St Albans Abbey would be better used as a busway with buses running between the respective town/city centres and not just connecting the outskirts of one with the outskirts of the other, though light rail would also work.

I'm sure we can think of more.

Yes some tiny branches do become somewhat questionable, although they were of course often linked up to larger network before. St Ives is very seasonal and packed in the summer.

Frequency is the issue more than anything else, and buses might be able to do that better than any rail option in these very specific locations.

 

[jkkne]

Of course its this populist sort of stuff that does gain traction with large members of the public these days, populism is indeed rife and the sort of stuff that leaks into the Sun and the Mail as authoritive unquestioned comment (and as much as we may dislike those papers they are a barometer of a more ignorant public opinion)

Every major event we get people who fly from 'point A to Spain and then to London' as its cheaper than a train ticket and the media lap it up, even the BBC are guilty of it.

 

[Horizon22]

To be fair, I've flown to the south of Spain from Leeds Bradford & back again for less than the price of getting the train to London. Even with speed differentials it doesn't make good reading for the rail industry, keeping in mind that the majority of the public see only the bottom line price.


Whilst HS2 is to be welcomed as a way of making journeys between Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, more environmentally robust it won't connect directly to HS1 & thus to the rest of the European network. So it is already slightly devalued as an alternative to flying to many destinations in Europe as a result. But worse still is how slow and utterly tedious are the plans to increase electrification on our rail network. Case in point, the Trans Pennine route, wires will be up soon from Manchester to Stalybridge, and from Church Fenton to the ECML, but the bit in between which goes through a city already partially wired city is still in question.

Meanwhile in aviation, engine designers are developing new power plants that can deliver 30%-40% better efficiency, and that's just the start.


Perhaps you may have missed the news, but in many parts of the country services are regularly being cancelled, and in lots of cases being cut altogether. So I wonder why single occupancy car use is still a problem?

Flying is also to some extent subsidised (ridiculously) and there's a lot fewer fixed costs (the air being generally free for example). The railway will always have more fixed costs and if various governments continue to put the cost onto the farepayer well the result is inevitable.

HS2 getting continuously scaled back is a massive shame, but even internally within the UK, London-Birmingham & Manchester are big flows; just look at how busy HS1 has gotten, despite the premium rates.

The point made was about space usage, not necessarily cancellations so not sure why that has been brought in. Even a half-loaded IET for GWR would take hundreds of single-occupancy cars off the M4 as an example. Roads aren't space efficient generally, which seemed to be what the article was saying - the writer seems to have equated empty platforms at Waterloo to an inefficient rail network, which is an odd take. You can fit about 20-30x as many people on a train, and even buses are 3/4x better, although of course less useful for a point-to-point journey

 

[Bletchleyite]

Yes some tiny branches do become somewhat questionable, although they were of course often linked up to larger network before. St Ives is very seasonal and packed in the summer.

Frequency is the issue more than anything else, and buses might be able to do that better than any rail option in these very specific locations.

I don't know the Cornish branches well - I've only done one of them (Falmouth) - but I expect these might be further examples of where a properly integrated bus network using the branch as a bus only road would serve things better than the railway.

However, it is edge cases - mostly shortish branch lines - where this might be true. The Conwy Valley would be a further outlier - that would potentially be best replaced with a cycleway with electric buses on the largely uncongested main road as part of a revised "Sherpa'r Wyddfa" network - there is no nice way to cycle those journeys.

 

[ScotGG]

It's simply clickbait and designed to do exactly what it's done here.

Start a thread, include a link and the Spectator hope to then obtain advertising revenue from people clicking.

The more "out there" the better from their viewpoint.

Best to ignore the drivel.

 

[yorksrob]

The price of going to the airport, versus the cost of going abroad point is something I have a bit of sympathy for.

Yes, the railways are never going to have the non-existent infrastructure cost that the airlines have, but the railways should be better value for the passenger, and not just for "whenever the railway fancies it" advance purchase fares, but for more walk on travel. That it isn't is a long standing political decision (no doubt supported by publications such as The Spectator).

 

[Horizon22]

Of course its this populist sort of stuff that does gain traction with large members of the public these days, populism is indeed rife and the sort of stuff that leaks into the Sun and the Mail as authoritive unquestioned comment (and as much as we may dislike those papers they are a barometer of a more ignorant public opinion)

Every major event we get people who fly from 'point A to Spain and then to London' as its cheaper than a train ticket and the media lap it up, even the BBC are guilty of it.

It is always funny those - I don't know why its such a surprise that such a circuitous journey often flying at unsociable hours can be cheaper that the most expensive rail ticket available. Fares should be more affordable and reactive quicker to demand, but capacity is also finite and time = money. Plus getting to the airport, often requires a railway/coach/bus without a car.

 

[100andthirty]

Remember, the Spectator isn't a magazine for factual reporting. It's an opinion magazine aimed at stimulating discussion. Never take what it says too literally!

 

[Wyrleybart]

"The time has come to finish the job and shut down the rest of Britain’s viciously expensive, underperforming and fundamentally inefficient rail network."

So if they think it is viciously expensive and they want to close it all down, presumably all the extra roads and motorways to carry all the ex passengers would not be quite so viciously expensive ? Presumably all those redundant railstaff would end up on the dole and be drawing "viciously expensive" social funding.

Couldn't make it up

 

[yorksrob]

I see the author refers to "railroad" anoraks, which should set alarm bells ringing !

 

[43066]

It is always funny those - I don't know why its such a surprise that such a circuitous journey often flying at unsociable hours can be cheaper that the most expensive rail ticket available. Fares should be more affordable and reactive quicker to demand, but capacity is also finite and time = money. Plus getting to the airport, often requires a railway/coach/bus without a car.

The flying v train comparison is often a misleading one between (eg) your standard anytime walk up fare and the cost of a flight booked well in advance. If you turned up at Gatwick or LCY and booked the first available airfare to Glasgow or Edinburgh for that day you’d likely find prices a lot more closely matched to the railway anytime fare. Plus of course you’d take the risk that the flights would be fully booked so you’d be unable to travel that day which wouldn’t ever be the case with the railway.

 

[158756]

It's not just them, there's an article in the I today about long rail journeys, and amongst other journeys goes from Preston to Skipton via Manchester instead of Carnforth, when via Carnforth is an hour quicker and much cheaper and goes from Manchester to Chester via Crewe vice direct, taking 1hr 20 vice 1 hour https://inews.co.uk/news/uk-rail-journeys-tortuous-train-take-three-times-longer-than-car-1677311

Facts? I don't think most journalists bother with them!

If you search Preston to Skipton on NRE it says there are no fares available for the journey via Carnforth. So to the average member of the public that is not an option. Not that a route which only operates a handful of times per day will offer a reliable connection anyway. (Journeys routed via Burnley are also cheaper than via Manchester though)