The Sustainable Railway: a read of yesterday’s white paper

It’s a good one. There are many encouraging signs of clear analytical thinking and lots of commitments by the Government to do sensible, pragmatic things and get the other stakeholders (Network Rail, train operators, local authorities and us) to do likewise.

Things I particularly like:

• nationwide Oyster-compatible travel smartcards to be introduced;
• a requirement for train operators to monitor how full every service is that they run;
• recognition of the huge amount of capacity in the network that is currently wasted, and of the primary reasons for that wastage;
• recognition that people are travelling in new patterns (eg. commuting twice a week rather than Monday to Friday) and that they need ticketing, service and staffing provision to reflect this;
• recognition of the environmental cost of rail travel and the fact that individuals may begin to see this as a disincentive to commute (According to the report, rail accounts for less than 1% of the national emission of CO2 – road takes almost all of the 23% due to transport). The chapter on environmental concerns makes interesting reading [and it’s good news if you happen to be a ‘retention toilet’ manufacturer];
• a serious plan for freight that includes widening track clearances (‘loading gauge’) so that wagons from the rest of Europe can travel on certain routes in the UK.

Interesting factoid: ‘Increasing the maximum speed of a train from 200 km/h to 350 km/h means a 90 per cent increase in energy consumption. In exchange, it cuts station-to-station journey time by less than 25 per cent’ (page 62/171 in the PDF).

There are plenty of things in the report that are not so good; amongst them the fact that the unpleasant ‘pacer’ trains are going to have to keep going for at least another three years. And there’s an unqualified acceptance of the Eddington report’s contention that demand for international air travel is going to double by 2030; the environmental angle that’s deployed well elsewhere in the report seems to have been dropped from this part of the discussion. Of course, the forum for challenging the growing demand for long-haul flights is elsewhere.

In all, a stimulating read and something that I hope forms the foundation for significant future improvements. If you believe the figures in the report, seriously-delayed trains are becoming something of a rarity. Wonderful; but, like this report, such an achievement could have arrived considerably earlier in the day.

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)