Oxymoronic: an ambitious UK rail route strategy?

Following the Government’s announcement of a thirty-year plan for the rail network today (white paper; report, gloom about fares) I thought I’d stick down some thoughts of mine that relate specifically to my local chunk of the network, the former Great Western main line stretch from London to Reading, and more widely to the rail network in that they’re ideas about how to make good use of an asset – a well-engineered railway line on a popular travel path – that people want to use.

These are notes off the cuff. They reflect my ignorance in matters financial and managerial – and the strange world of the railway. But perhaps despite that, they’ll be provocative.

What I would like to see some organisation do:

• buy all track capacity (perhaps better, buy the infrastructure) on the fast lines Reading-London Paddington
• electrify the whole route (currently it’s electrified for about 20% of the route) and invest in new electric passenger trains to proven design, rather than all-new design
• make 80% of intercity services to terminate at Reading
• the remaining 20% would be slotted in between high-speed local shuttle electric services running all day every 10 or 15 mins on an unvarying schedule, calling at Twyford, Maidenhead, Slough, West Ealing.

These measures would improve travellers’ experience by avoiding long waits outdoors for crowded trains, and give them something to appreciate while travelling. Longer trains don’t really do much for travellers and they are awkward to handle on the network; frequent trains are welcome on cold, wet days and spread the load across several services even at peak times. Owning the track? OK, perhaps leasing is safer in these uncertain times. It does grant the ability to make strategic decisions about routing, timing and the allocation of space and time for each type of service. These decisions should not be made with a lottery or an auction.

In addition:

• sell off any spare overnight capacity on these tracks 6 days per week to express freight with a minimum average speed of 60mph
  
• discount fares off-peak, rather than adding to the cost and time period of peak fares
• provide lower pre-peak fares in the morning between 6 am and 7 am
• abolish first class, but make standard class first-rate and keep staffing levels on board high, eg with a cafeteria

Then find partners to assist with key projects that will maximise the investment in infrastructure and stock:

• providing top-quality catering (with inducements such as free wi-fi and newspapers in the morning)
• maintaining the rolling stock to ambitious-but-feasible standards of availability, with significant rewards to all staff and the company for reaching/exceeding expectations and innovating in the process
• developing (express) freight traffic through the corridor, by tendering for parcels and letters shipment that has reverted to road or air (exploiting environmental consciousness/carbon taxation against those transport systems), developing European freight traffic over the North London line into the redundant empty train ‘paths’ from Waterloo to North Pole depot, and developing intermodal (containers or drive-on/off) freight handling at the North Pole Eurostar depot site to offset its closure as a Eurostar maintenance facility
  

More ambitiously

• exploit the failure of Crossrail to be delivered by running services from Reading to Stratford (E London) over the North London line (Richmond-Willesden-Hampstead-Dalston-Stratford).

Quite a lot of this is probably/definitely forbidden for the franchise-holders in each franchise area. But Network Rail could give it a try. Or the Government could move the goalposts a little, to answer the deafening roar of complaint that comes from having a larger number of people attempting to use the rail network than ever before, plus an ever-lowering level of tax subsidy and higher and higher prices. The trains are now very crowded and expensive; I see no reason why that should be allowed to continue indefinitely.

Background on British main-line electrification strategy of the past

Electrification petition (about to close)