Rail nationalisation: ideas, suggestions, predictions etc

[JonathanH]

Well, if the incoming government takes the opportunity to make Fuel Duty ‘catch up’ with inflation not only would motoring become much more expensive (for petrol and diesel vehicles anyway) there might be scope to increase rail fares ‘in line’ with the new comparator.

It would take a very strong nerve for an incoming government to apply any increase in fuel duty, despite there being strong justification from a number of different perspectives.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Well, if the incoming government takes the opportunity to make Fuel Duty ‘catch up’ with inflation not only would motoring become much more expensive (for petrol and diesel vehicles anyway) there might be scope to increase rail fares ‘in line’ with the new comparator.

Hmm…

But nowhere near £350 Anytime Return Manchester to London. If driving went up to that sort of cost there would be serious ructions.

 

[yorksrob]

Well, if the incoming government takes the opportunity to make Fuel Duty ‘catch up’ with inflation not only would motoring become much more expensive (for petrol and diesel vehicles anyway) there might be scope to increase rail fares ‘in line’ with the new comparator.

Hmm…

That pre-supposes they'd be happy to extort motorists to the same extent as rail passengers.

 

[Meerkat]

Coaches have their market, however they aren't suitable for mass transport.

In many ways I think that they'd be better following @Bletchleyite and pegging rail fares to motoring costs, since the Government are so determined to throw away tax income on them.

Coaches seem to do mass transport already (are there still a load doing commuter runs into London from SE London/Kent because the trains are so slow?), but they don't have to take the whole load, just those who can't afford the trains.
Ignoring the vast (and unknown, which the Treasury just arent going to accept) cost if you peg rail fares how are you going to cope with capacity? You can't send more trains into Paddington from Taunton.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Coaches seem to do mass transport already (are there still a load doing commuter runs into London from SE London/Kent because the trains are so slow?), but they don't have to take the whole load, just those who can't afford the trains.

They aren't that mass. The entire capacity of the coach service for a whole day from London to Manchester would fit in one 11 car Pendolino with room to spare. And the entire capacity of the coach service from London to Scotland each day would barely tax a 2-car 158.

If the railway starts getting too expensive/bad though, you could see a bigger coach operation developing as can be found in places where the railway is already pretty rubbish, e.g. Spain, including things like 2+1 seated premium coaches.

In terms of what competes on a mass level with the railway, coaches are barely relevant. It's the car (primarily) and air (on the longer distance routes).

 

[A0wen]

They aren't that mass. The entire capacity of the coach service for a whole day from London to Manchester would fit in one 11 car Pendolino with room to spare. And the entire capacity of the coach service from London to Scotland each day would barely tax a 2-car 158.

If the railway starts getting too expensive/bad though, you could see a bigger coach operation developing as can be found in places where the railway is already pretty rubbish, e.g. Spain, including things like 2+1 seated premium coaches.

In terms of what competes on a mass level with the railway, coaches are barely relevant. It's the car (primarily) and air (on the longer distance routes).

Bit in bold - and the passenger demand on the railways for end to end London - Scotland journeys would barely fill a Cl 158 if the services were non stop. The reality is the Anglo Scottish services cover many flows, the numbers using them end to end is a minority.

 

[PMN1]

Is there actually space on the network to take all the extra passengers that lower prices would attract?

 

[JonathanH]

Is there actually space on the network to take all the extra passengers that lower prices would attract?

On a limited number of trains the answer may well be yes, but it is difficult to reduce fares on those services in a targeted way while not either cannibalising revenue or causing issues on popular services.

 

[yorksrob]

Is there actually space on the network to take all the extra passengers that lower prices would attract?

They could always start with something less ambitious, like getting rid of off-peak or introducing the national railcard.

 

[ainsworth74]

Bit in bold - and the passenger demand on the railways for end to end London - Scotland journeys would barely fill a Cl 158 if the services were non stop. The reality is the Anglo Scottish services cover many flows, the numbers using them end to end is a minority.

I don't know how big a 158 you're thinking of using but according to ORR data in 2021-22 there were 1.6m journeys between Glasgow Central/Edinburgh Waverley - London Euston/Kings Cross. So, er. No. Plenty of intermediate journeys are made, I often make them (London <-> Darlington), but it's balderdash to suggest that end to end journeys are as miniscule as you're suggesting.

 

[Jack Hay]

I wonder whether anybody else saw this article. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/labour-cut-train-services-rail-travel-uk-nr8mdfsqq In essence, someone has read to the end of the Labour proposals and they're saying that to end the problem of last minute cancellations owing to lack of a rest day working agreement, or staff shortages, Labour will ask the unions how many trains they are prepared to run, and anything more will be removed from the timetable. I can't quite believe that Labour have said that because if they did it would have got more coverage.

 

[Speed43125]

An interesting article in the Financial Times today about the impact Labour's plans for nationalisation of the franchised passenger operators may have on the freight sector.

Investment in rail freight imperilled by government and Labour plans

Freightliner boss says cargo operators must have robust rights to track access to ensure future growth

www.ft.com

I note there is no reference to electric haulage of freight services, even though Freightliner still have a fleet of Class 90s - thought plans for reactivation of 86s have long since fallen through. This is particularly interesting given the reference to fuel duty for competing road haulage.

Competing Conservative and Labour plans for a single, public body to oversee the UK railways both risk creating a “real problem” for investment in rail freight, a top industry figure has warned.
Tim Shoveller, chief executive of Freightliner, was speaking after the Labour party said that, if it wins power in elections expected this year, it would take all franchised passenger train operations into government hands as the existing contracts expired.

The Genesee & Wyoming Railroad (GWRR), Freightliner’s US parent, would not commit capital to the operation without such robust rights, Shoveller said. GWRR is owned by a consortium of the US’s Brookfield Infrastructure and GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund.
“The security of tenure of those track access rights is absolutely essential if I’m going to be successful with GWRR in asking for investment,” Shoveller said.

It's interesting the way this is framed as a question of attracting investment, with the possible implication any alterations planned or implied might soften this interest?

There is a broad political consensus in favour of shifting more freight from road to rail. But a 14-year freeze on fuel duty has made it hard for rail to compete on price.
“Any weakening of our track access rights would be a real problem in terms of leveraging private-sector investment,” Shoveller said

However, Shoveller warned GBR staff would know when planning timetables that their organisation would receive all the revenue generated by any new passenger train. They would receive only a “track access charge” from a freight service. Safeguards for the sector would have to be very robust to mitigate the potential conflict of interest, he said.
“Freight has to be evaluated in the round,” he said. “The reason the duty to grow freight is so important is that otherwise you would always default to the additional passenger trains.”

Provisions in the draft legislation would allow ministers to change the rules about accessing the network or issue instructions to the ORR as to how to interpret access rules, Shoveller said.
“Those new instructions could create a situation where the ORR have to waive my rights or weaken my rights,” he added.
However, the Department for Transport insisted his concerns were misplaced. It said ministers would be unable to change the rules about access without the consent of parliament.

The wasteful diesel paths over Shap and Beatock on the WCML are routinely highlighted on this forum as an example of inefficiencies in the freight sector affecting passeneger services. Yet this article does go someway to showcase the flipside of the argument.

 

[The Prisoner]

Wonder if there is a way to harness the best of the innovation that privatisation brought in, whilst giving the benefits of a nationalised system. I'm thinking tendering for catering contracts in particular - British Rail ofter did catering pretty poorly.

Other than that I'd like to see the base of an agreed timetable provision (so many trains between x and y per hour etc), but with the freedom for management to try new routes over and above that where stock and a potential business case permits.....I think the DfT deciding for example that all XC services operate via the East Coast was a poor decision, and would hope that a reintroduced service on the West Coast as a test would be well enough patronised for the powers that be to recognise that revenue and demand should drive such decisions rather than putting them in a straightjacket.

Will it be sectors again or operating models based on what the franchises were? Suppose it will initially be former franchise based and in the order that keys are handed back.

 

[Class450/4DES]

Wonder if there is a way to harness the best of the innovation that privatisation brought in, whilst giving the benefits of a nationalised system. I'm thinking tendering for catering contracts in particular - British Rail ofter did catering pretty poorly.

Other than that I'd like to see the base of an agreed timetable provision (so many trains between x and y per hour etc), but with the freedom for management to try new routes over and above that where stock and a potential business case permits.....I think the DfT deciding for example that all XC services operate via the East Coast was a poor decision, and would hope that a reintroduced service on the West Coast as a test would be well enough patronised for the powers that be to recognise that revenue and demand should drive such decisions rather than putting them in a straightjacket.

Will it be sectors again or operating models based on what the franchises were? Suppose it will initially be former franchise based and in the order that keys are handed back.

I am hoping for sectors.

As I mentioned before.

InterCity: Rebranded LNER.
Regional: Rebranded Northern.
NSE or just SE: Rebranded Southeastern.

Freight wont be effected I think.

So basically after franchises expire the currently government owned TOC's will take over other TOC's under the new names. So SE takes over SWR, etc.

I hope my predictions do come true.

 

[Bletchleyite]

InterCity: Rebranded LNER.

Hopefully without the fares rubbish. But I would agree the branding works - replace lNer with iNtercity (i.e. with the same flash N and livery) - and other than the fares stuff it is a well-run TOC.

Regional: Rebranded Northern.

Northern is so utterly dysfunctional and institutionally rubbish that perhaps it would be a better idea to start a totally new organisation with a totally new management structure.

NSE or just SE: Rebranded Southeastern.

I wouldn't say Southeastern is particularly good either.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

Northern is so utterly dysfunctional and institutionally rubbish that perhaps it would be a better idea to start a totally new organisation with a totally new management structure.

I came up with the name "Northern Intercity" a while ago, which could be applied on the longer Northern services: Chester to Leeds, Nottingham to Leeds etc.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I came up with the name "Northern Intercity" a while ago, which could be applied on the longer Northern services: Chester to Leeds, Nottingham to Leeds etc.

INTERCITY shouldn't be diluted as a brand - all the primarily long distance stuff should take the full brand and full service concept, including e.g. TPE Liverpool-Newcastle and the TfW Mk4 operated services (but probably not the rest, and not any of those Northern services).

There should additionally be a national inter-regional express brand and service concept* for the sort of service you're talking about.

* By service concept I mean standard of accommodation, catering etc. To make INTERCITY a strong brand, it should be the same across all services so people can see at a glance what they're getting, even if that means "loss leader" catering on some services to maintain the strength of the brand.

 

[Class450/4DES]

Hopefully without the fares rubbish. But I would agree the branding works - replace lNer with iNtercity (i.e. with the same flash N and livery) - and other than the fares stuff it is a well-run TOC.



Northern is so utterly dysfunctional and institutionally rubbish that perhaps it would be a better idea to start a totally new organisation with a totally new management structure.



I wouldn't say Southeastern is particularly good either.

I see.

 

[JonathanH]

Hopefully without the fares rubbish.

Very unlikely to be the case in my view. A single unified Intercity could well adopt the fare structure in the LNER trial, as it is RDG policy and the direction of travel, particularly if it could then promise no standing passengers. A commercially run Intercity operation would want to charge high prices at times when it can fill its trains.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Very unlikely to be the case in my view. A single unified Intercity could well adopt the fare structure in the LNER trial, as it is RDG policy and the direction of travel, particularly if it could then promise no standing passengers. A commercially run Intercity operation would want to charge high prices at times when it can fill its trains.

I would hope they could come up with a better version of that without some of the unnecessary bad stuff, and possibly with the flexible tier being flexible in a better way, e.g. refundable before departure and changeable to any day/time with no change fee, just fare difference (even if it does also offer +/- 70 at no cost at all). I get that a yield managed IC operation is likely to be the future (much as I hate it), I don't get why it has to be quite so inflexible when fully-commercial Eurostar have just taken a big step in the direction of more flexibility, and Lumo have done it more like the above too. LNER is a premium operation with premium pricing, which IC probably needs to be as a whole, yet it is pushing for a low cost airline fare structure with almost Ryanair-like catch-outs - it's ironic that alleged low-cost operation Lumo has a friendlier structure!

Crikey, even Premier Inn refund the difference if you change to a cheaper night and charge no change fee even on the cheapest* tier! (Though I suspect that has in part to do with the way hotels operate with franchised properties - not holding onto the difference is probably easier to account).

* OK, not quite the cheapest, there's a totally non-flexible tier, but it's very rare to see it, only really during bargain basement offers - their cheapest is normally the Standard tier which is changeable but not fully refundable - though if you genuinely don't need it you can get much of it back by changing to a Thursday/Sunday night a long way in the future.

 

[LUYMun]

InterCity: Rebranded LNER.
Regional: Rebranded Northern.
NSE or just SE: Rebranded Southeastern.

Not sure the railways would go back to sectors, given that Transport Authorities would want more devolved powers over infrastructure and operations (West Midlands, Greater Manchester, South Yorkshire etc). Perhaps a combined regional passenger "Network" name with geographies added next to it - Network South East, Network West Midlands, Network North West, etc?

 

[irish_rail]

Not sure the railways would go back to sectors, given that Transport Authorities would want more devolved powers over infrastructure and operations (West Midlands, Greater Manchester, South Yorkshire etc). Perhaps a combined regional passenger "Network" name with geographies added next to it - Network South East, Network West Midlands, Network North West, etc?

I agree regionally sectors will be difficult or impossible as every Mayor wants their own fiefdom to control and it seems Labour support this. Intercity however should be attainable and that's what Labour should be aiming for in my view.