How does the lack of direct train services between large towns in Northern England compare with the South?

[matacaster]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax then bradford 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

 

[RJ]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

There's no direct service between Croydon and Bromley either. Some journeys require interchange, that's the nature of the beast.

 

[Magdalia]

Journeys between many towns and cities on the north side of London are difficult by public transport, with no direct rail services.

For example Harlow-Chelmsford, Luton-Stevenage, Cambridge-Milton Keynes, Peterborough-Northampton.

 

[RT4038]

There's no direct service between Croydon and Bromley either. Some journeys require interchange, that's the nature of the beast.

Luton and Milton Keynes? Luton and Reading? Guildford and Croydon? Luton and Cambridge?

 

[CaptainHaddock]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax then bradford 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

It's not really a levelling up thing though, is it?

As the lines between the stations you mention already exist it's down to Northern to determine what service to offer and how frequently to run it. You can't really blame the government for that!

 

[AM9]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

Route 503 bus every 15 minutes. That's station to station -'ish

As others have said, it's the same even in the leafy south-east, but the fares are much higher:
Huddersfield to Halifax, 10 miles, £5.80 anytime return, - 1 direct and two indirect services per 2 hours
St Albans to Watford Junction: 6.4 miles, £8.60 anytime return, - i direct service every 40 minutes of every hour. (no trains today)
Is that what you want from 'levelling up'?

It's not really a levelling up thing though, is it?

As the lines between the stations you mention already exist it's down to Northern to determine what service to offer and how frequently to run it. You can't really blame the government for that!

Isn't Northern currently DOR?, i.e the government?

 

[swt_passenger]

So the consensus seems to be that you can find samples of the OP’s issue all over the country. Not a levelling up or down aspect to it at all.

 

[matacaster]

Route 503 bus every 15 minutes. That's station to station -'ish

As others have said, it's the same even in the leafy south-east, but the fares are much higher:
Huddersfield to Halifax, 10 miles, £5.80 anytime return, - 1 direct and two indirect services per 2 hours
St Albans to Watford Junction: 6.4 miles, £8.60 anytime return, - i direct service every 40 minutes of every hour. (no trains today)
Is that what you want from 'levelling up'?


Isn't Northern currently DOR?, i.e the government?

The indirect trains (via Leeds) from hudds to Halifax / Bradford unfortunately do not appear on the information screens so your average person wouldn't know of the possibility. The hudds to Halifax / Bradford was 1 hourly before covid. The direct hudds Wakefield has simply disappeared.

 

[AM9]

The indirect trains (via Leeds) from hudds to Halifax / Bradford unfortunately do not appear on the information screens so your average person wouldn't know of the possibility. The hudds to Halifax / Bradford was 1 hourly before covid. The direct hudds Wakefield has simply disappeared.

Well I just entered the journey into NRE and got this. Hardly complicated, it took less than 30 seconds. 'Average persons' are continually being advised to check their journeys that way.

 

[Horizon22]

There’s very little orbital railways in the south - generally the connections were built for routes into London via various means. There are a few exceptions (e.g. North Downs line).

London is particularly bad for this as either it’s a) change in Z1/London terminal or b) a slow Overground service or c) hop off the rail network, bus, back on the rail network and a significant chunk of the population doesn’t own a car.

The gaps between key towns in SE where they exist are normally plugged by the bus network, sometimes with express services. Or people just drive.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The North is far, far better interconnected than the South, particularly the North West which looks a lot more like a cheapo, partly diesel version of SBB or Nederlandse Spoorwegen than the South East's railway, which is pretty much entirely set up to get people to London. And other (bus) public transport in the SE outside London is utterly derisory as a whole.

Grass always greener?

East West Rail will be an improvement, but I doubt it'll get past Bedford.

 

[A S Leib]

East West Rail will be an improvement, but I doubt it'll get past Bedford.

I wouldn't feel secure in placing a large bet on the Aylesbury branch opening for passenger use or direct Oxford - Swindon services returning either.

 

[TUC]

Route 503 bus every 15 minutes. That's station to station -'ish

As others have said, it's the same even in the leafy south-east, but the fares are much higher:
Huddersfield to Halifax, 10 miles, £5.80 anytime return, - 1 direct and two indirect services per 2 hours
St Albans to Watford Junction: 6.4 miles, £8.60 anytime return, - i direct service every 40 minutes of every hour. (no trains today)
Is that what you want from 'levelling up'?


Isn't Northern currently DOR?, i.e the government?

It is a good example of the kind of business opportunity that Northern misses all too often. Huddersfield to Halifax by bus takes 52 minutes. By rail it takes 21 minutes. It's hard to think there isn't an opportunity to grow a market there, and offer significant improvements for passengers.

 

[JonathanH]

It is a good example of the kind of business opportunity that Northern misses all too often. Huddersfield to Halifax by bus takes 52 minutes. By rail it takes 21 minutes. It's hard to think there isn't an opportunity to grow a market there, and offer significant improvements for passengers.

How much money can actually be made offering services between Huddersfield and Halifax on a more frequent basis? Rail isn't really competitive for short journeys when they aren't part of a longer distance operation - eg Huddersfield to Halifax isn't as remunerative as Huddersfield to Leeds.

 

[yorksrob]

In the southeast, the services along the coast are pretty good and well used, but there are some very obvious missing parts elsewhere.

Kent has an amazing network which makes it extremely easy to get between towns. Think of all the main towns, Ashford, Canterbury, Maidstone, Dover, the North Kent conurbation, you can go in almost any direction. This is the legacy of British Rail's excellent Kent electrification scheme which enabled the survival of the network.

Poor old Sussex on the other hand, had its network largely destroyed in the disastrous closure programme. You have the BML, the coastal route and a few others but that's it. Try getting from Crowborough or East Grinstead to the coast. Tunbridge Wells to Brighton, or Hailsham to anywhere by train.

 

[TUC]

How much money can actually be made offering services between Huddersfield and Halifax on a more frequent basis? Rail isn't really competitive for short journeys when they aren't part of a longer distance operation - eg Huddersfield to Halifax isn't as remunerative as Huddersfield to Leeds.

The frequency of the bus service suggests that there is money to be made,

 

[yorksrob]

R.e. earlier comments on Castleford to Huddersfield, I very much miss the direct train. Schlepping it via Leeds can be a PITA.

 

[Killingworth]

How much money can actually be made offering services between Huddersfield and Halifax on a more frequent basis? Rail isn't really competitive for short journeys when they aren't part of a longer distance operation - eg Huddersfield to Halifax isn't as remunerative as Huddersfield to Leeds.

This discussion takes me back almost 50 years to when a colleague was given promotion to an office in Halifax, Calder Valley. He and his family lived in the Colne Valley to be near his previous position based in Huddersfield. It wasn't far to travel so he started commuting by car. Public transport wasn't convenient because he'd have taken almost as long to get into Huddersfield station as into the centre of Halifax by car. Similar for buses.

It had an unhappy ending. His boss insisted he moved to Halifax so he could become part of that community. They fell out and he went back to his previous job. Anyone unfamiliar with the geography and customs of older West Yorkshire folk may find that hard to understand.

The numbers wanting to travel from town centres to town centres often won't be great. Over the last 70 years we've built up leafy suburbs designed for cars and not public transport. Warehouses, new industries and shopping centres also get built out of towns

 

[RobShipway]

Seaford to Haywards Heath is an example from the South. Years ago there used to be a Seaford to London Victoria service in the morning and a return service in the evening. Now, you have to change at Lewes whatever time you leave home. There is also no direct bus services. You would have to change buses in Brighton I believe to get to Haywards Heath which would take about 2.5 hours, yet you can drive from Seaford to Haywards Heath in an hour.

In the southeast, the services along the coast are pretty good and well used, but there are some very obvious missing parts elsewhere.

Kent has an amazing network which makes it extremely easy to get between towns. Think of all the main towns, Ashford, Canterbury, Maidstone, Dover, the North Kent conurbation, you can go in almost any direction. This is the legacy of British Rail's excellent Kent electrification scheme which enabled the survival of the network.

Poor old Sussex on the other hand, had its network largely destroyed in the disastrous closure programme. You have the BML, the coastal route and a few others but that's it. Try getting from Crowborough or East Grinstead to the coast. Tunbridge Wells to Brighton, or Hailsham to anywhere by train.

I have to totally agree with Yorksrob, as my example above shows.

 

[AM9]

It is a good example of the kind of business opportunity that Northern misses all too often. Huddersfield to Halifax by bus takes 52 minutes. By rail it takes 21 minutes. It's hard to think there isn't an opportunity to grow a market there, and offer significant improvements for passengers.

Which is more a function of Northern's failure to address potential needs rather than an English north vs south contrast.

 

[zwk500]

Poor old Sussex on the other hand, had its network largely destroyed in the disastrous closure programme. You have the BML, the coastal route and a few others but that's it. Try getting from Crowborough or East Grinstead to the coast. Tunbridge Wells to Brighton, or Hailsham to anywhere by train.

In Sussex Brighton and Hove buses do a fairly good job of filling in the gaps of the rail network. The 27, 28 and 29 routes are particularly good examples of this (Brighton-Lewes-Ringmer/Uckfield/Tunbridge Wells), offering 2 or 3 buses and hour off-peak and getting right into the towns rather than skirting their edges. http://www.busatlas.uk/busatlas05_sussex_2022_05.pdf

 

[Busaholic]

The North is far, far better interconnected than the South, particularly the North West which looks a lot more like a cheapo, partly diesel version of SBB or Nederlandse Spoorwegen than the South East's railway, which is pretty much entirely set up to get people to London. And other (bus) public transport in the SE outside London is utterly derisory as a whole.

Grass always greener?

East West Rail will be an improvement, but I doubt it'll get past Bedford.

You are absolutely right, for the simple reason that almost all railway lines in London and the inner part of the Home Counties are dedicated to getting people into Central London, and no further. Thameslink is now an exception, but one pair of tracks with two conflicting power systems could only be a British 'answer' to the problem after so many years and so much money!

What is needed (but will never happen) is an M25 type circular rail line linking many of these main lines, not necessarily by trains doing the complete loop (indeed, almost certainly never doing so.) There could be two or three terminal interchange points like East Croydon and Watford Junction. Enough speculation, just pointing out that the North and Midlands are much better off in this regard.

 

[Bevan Price]

It is a good example of the kind of business opportunity that Northern misses all too often. Huddersfield to Halifax by bus takes 52 minutes. By rail it takes 21 minutes. It's hard to think there isn't an opportunity to grow a market there, and offer significant improvements for passengers.

Halifax has a problem in that the station is several minutes walk from the town centre - and up a steep hill for passengers travelling into Halifax.
The buses also have an advantage in that they can serve the centres of Elland & West Vale, whereas Elland station - if it ever reopens - would be very much on the fringe of the town centre.

 

[neilmc]

London and the South-East suffers from the curse of large capital cities in that everyone wanted to build lines into the city but no thought was given to the idea that people might wish to travel ACROSS the city, so the network was left with a ring of terminals which had to be connected by other means (bus, tube, horse, walk, taxi, etc).

Northern towns in the Leeds/Manchester/Sheffield areas tend to have not done too badly in that they are served mostly by one central station with some through lines (sorry Bradford) so there are some direct services and, where not, the change is not too onerous. Where the North seems to have been badly served is by idiot closures in lesser populated areas which have damaged the inter-connectability and resilience of the network (e.g. Scarborough-Whitby, Harrogate-Northallerton, Hull-York, Colne-Skipton, Penrith-Keswick-Workington) whereas in the South-East quite small villages often have maintained a direct rail service into London because of the popularity of quite long commutes from nice rural locations to well-paid jobs in the City.

 

[RobShipway]

You are absolutely right, for the simple reason that almost all railway lines in London and the inner part of the Home Counties are dedicated to getting people into Central London, and no further. Thameslink is now an exception, but one pair of tracks with two conflicting power systems could only be a British 'answer' to the problem after so many years and so much money!

What is needed (but will never happen) is an M25 type circular rail line linking many of these main lines, not necessarily by trains doing the complete loop (indeed, almost certainly never doing so.) There could be two or three terminal interchange points like East Croydon and Watford Junction. Enough speculation, just pointing out that the North and Midlands are much better off in this regard.

Isn't the M25 for trains there already though in the form of the lines used by London Overground trains?

 

[childwallblues]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax then bradford 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

Huddersfield to Wakefield Westgate had an hourly service and was well used by passengers changing for GNER/XC services. The service was then cut back to Wakefield Kirkgate which rendered the service useless due to the layout there. Huddersfield passengers now have to change at Leeds and use the overbridge. Lack of passengers to Kirkgate gave Northern the excuse to withdraw the service.

 

[TUC]

Huddersfield to Wakefield Westgate had an hourly service had an hourly service and was well used by passengers changing for GNER/XC services. The service was then cut back to Wakefield Kirkgate which rendered the service useless due to the layout there. Huddersfield passengers now have to change at Leeds and use the overbridge. Lack of passengers to Kirkgate gave Northern the excuse to withdraw the service.

Another example of Northern having so little commercial nous.

 

[Surreytraveller]

It's not really a levelling up thing though, is it?

As the lines between the stations you mention already exist it's down to Northern to determine what service to offer and how frequently to run it. You can't really blame the government for that!

Of course its the government. They decide what services are offered

 

[TUC]

Of course its the government. They decide what services are offered

In reality it is surely more iterative than that. It is perfectly possible for TOCs to make a case to DfT for a certain package of services.

 

[DarloRich]

Huddersfield to wakefield no direct service.
Huddersfield to Halifax then bradford 2 hourly.
How does that compare with services between similar sized towns down south?

What point are you trying to make here?

From where I am there are no direct trains from Mk to Bedford. That is a 25/30 minute drive

MK to Luton is three trains for a 30 minute drive

Until E-W opens anything Oxford/Bicester way is a trip via Brum or London

MK to Cambridge is a massive ball ache via London but a direct run un the car of less than an hour ( on a good day)