What would railways be like today if privatisation had not occurred?

[tony6499]

Who knows as things like internet advanced bookings and online stuff didn't exist then so impossible to predict how ticketing would have evolved under BR.

Maintenance would hopefully have still been done in house so hopefully things like Hatfield wouldn't have happened.

 

[AM9]

If you're running a business (and running a railway is just that, something BR forgot more often than not) you ensure your investment goes into proven technology, not take a punt on something home made.

If you are providing public transport, i.e. one that is an enabling service for getting people to work and leisure, simultaneously reducing pollution and environmental impact, normal business objectives, such as profit and shareholder interests do no have the same overbearing priorities. Of course, the effectiveness of equipment used has a major impact on the resulting service, but with a national service, there is considerably more purchasing clout than with a series of relatively small commercial feifdoms, each with the desire to maximise their profit whilst doing the minimum allowed in their franchise contract, (or less in some cases).
BR go it wrong much of the time, but there is still a chorus of undying love for MKIII coaches and some other effective designs that they introduced before privatisation, on this very forum.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

If BR still existed, they almost certainly wouldn't be the only operators of passenger trains on the network. In fact, some of the big winners taking over the operation of services from BR would probably be the likes of Deutsche Bundesbahn and Nederlandse Spoorwegen, along with Stagecoach and Firstgroup.

 

[Tetchytyke]

If BR still existed, they almost certainly wouldn't be the only operators of passenger trains on the network.

They largely would have been, though. I know Arriva had a limited presence in Germany and Holland (which had to be sold when DB bought them) but generally the state operator is the primary operator.

It was the same in the railfreight sector. Foster Yeoman ran some freight trains, and bought their own locos to run them, but most freight trains were run by BR.

 

[anme]

I'm no fan of privatisation of the railways (at least, in the form chosen in the UK), but I think it resulted in one big advantage which has led to improved services - the railways became politcally important again. Governments were quite happy to starve BR of investment and decline was seen as the natural way of things. In later years, I think BR did a pretty decent job for the most part, given the resources available. They delivered quite a few substantial improvements for very little money - Thameslink, Chiltern upgrade, west London line, etc.

After privatisation, having made such high profile changes, governments suddenly saw the railways as important. Subsidy was hugely increased and a lot of public investment flowed. What BR could have achieved with the money, we will never know. Certainly the current system is inefficient in many ways, does not bring in private investment, is inflexible and requires huge and continuous government intervention to operate. But the extra public money and political will have brought improvements and the system is generally in better shape now than twenty years ago.

 

[GatwickDepress]

A lack of interesting passenger liveries.

 

[yorksrob]

If you're running a business (and running a railway is just that, something BR forgot more often than not) you ensure your investment goes into proven technology, not take a punt on something home made.

And if every country had taken that attitude, we'd still be debating the merits of the horse and cart.

The fact is, evrything has to be developed somewhere. Better to be developing something, and potentially selling it, rather than always paying out to other people and relying on their capacity.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

With all the associated problems that come with short-production-run in house designs. The railfreight companies in particular applied pragmatic thinking when they went shopping for new motive power.

They could commission a short production run of completely untried locos from home suppliers and suffer all the teething troubles and design shortfalls that would entail (like most BR diesels, built in house or bought as unique designs from outside manufacturers), or they could look at what was already built and successfully working in large numbers around the world, and order something based on that technology (like the class 66, or the Pendolino).

If you consider the Southern Region, for example, there were a myriad of unit types produced during the post war period. However, because they adopted a policy of standardisation, many components were common to different unit types or even interchangeable, making maintenance and part sourcing cost effective and relatively easy.

The best examples of these are the Thumpers, which were designed to share many components with their electric counterparts.

 

[Bill Stanier]

And if every country had taken that attitude, we'd still be debating the merits of the horse and cart.

Nonsense. Nonsense on stilts!

The fact is, evrything has to be developed somewhere. Better to be developing something, and potentially selling it, rather than always paying out to other people and relying on their capacity.

Indeed, and if you're big enough (and good enough) to produce large numbers of locos (or whatever) you aren't stuck in the 'low numbers' underdeveloped area that BR was with its minuscule numbers of each type of diesel. Once you reach that level of build numbers you are in a position to become a world supplier (globalisation wasn't such a feature back in BR days - it's axiomatic now!).

The Mk3 coach was (is) a good vehicle but it displays classic 'under developed' charcateristics, such as failing aircon (never known that on a Pendolino), failing vestibule sliding doors (never known that on a Pendolino), and unreliable brakes (never known that on a Pendolino).

These are the sort of faults that get designed out of vehicles in mass production, but the small numbers of Mk3s makes this unviable. It's cheaper to fix the faults as they occur than to design new systems that obviate the faults. Economies of scale don't just influence purchase price, they also make for cheaper running costs and better reliability.

 

[Yew]

Nonsense. Nonsense on stilts!


The Mk3 coach was (is) a good vehicle but it displays classic 'under developed' charcateristics, such as failing aircon (never known that on a Pendolino), failing vestibule sliding doors (never known that on a Pendolino), and unreliable brakes (never known that on a Pendolino).

These are the sort of faults that get designed out of vehicles in mass production, but the small numbers of Mk3s makes this unviable. It's cheaper to fix the faults as they occur than to design new systems that obviate the faults. Economies of scale don't just influence purchase price, they also make for cheaper running costs and better reliability.

How do the failure rates compare from when Mk3's where a similar age to the Pendolinos are now (not that I expect any meaningful data will be available) And also remember that the Mk3 was a 'stop gap' design, meant to be cascaded on to secondary routes fairly quickly. The APT was supposed to be BR's big hitter, which if produced, I imagine it would have had significant interest.

 

[thenorthern]

I think there are many ways privatisation has worked out better or worse than before.

An example for me is at Stoke-on-Trent there is an option of 2 operators when going to London with London Midland offering cheaper fares but Virgin Trains being quicker and having more comfortable seats.

The question is would there still be the two fare structures if British Rail still existed? Probably not

Would the faster trains be cheaper? Probably

 

[Greenback]

I think there are many ways privatisation has worked out better or worse than before.

An example for me is at Stoke-on-Trent there is an option of 2 operators when going to London with London Midland offering cheaper fares but Virgin Trains being quicker and having more comfortable seats.

The question is would there still be the two fare structures if British Rail still existed? Probably not

Would the faster trains be cheaper? Probably

Indeed. There would probably have been a simpler fare system had BR been allowed to continue. I see no reason why BR wouldn't have introduced more flexible pricing once technology allowed it, and it may well have developed along the lines that it has, with slower trains run by regional railways being a cheaper alternative to the inter city type trains.

 

[Tetchytyke]

These are the sort of faults that get designed out of vehicles in mass production, but the small numbers of Mk3s makes this unviable.

Do they? Do they really?

The 380s had terrible teething troubles when they were first launched, and they were based on a Siemens Desiro design that's been sold all over the world.

The Coradia was a model of train that was mass produced by Alstom for railway networks across Europe, yet the Juniper and the Adelante both experienced teething problems. The problems with the Juniper were so bad that SWT gave up on them and handed them back to the ROSCO in 2004.

 

[colchesterken]

I think the important thing here is funding. if BR had the amount of funding now subsiding railway companies abroad. Abelo here in the east and train builders from all over the world.We would be doing well. the problem is like all things politics, if the govenment wanted to give big subsides to rail there would be a fuss, the way we do it now is it trickles out a couple of million here and there no one notices.
If we still had Inter City and NSE . they would have ordered modest batches of trains and kept the rail building going..we still have BREL class 321s here doing well they need a refurb, look what BR did to the 302-307 series
I get angry that we lost the entire train building industry. all very well for other countries to build trains here, but they make profits and send them abroad..The govenment should have made BR and BREL not for profit state trusts and put Chris Green in charge..........Feeling better after that rant, need a cup of tea

 

[DownSouth]

The Mk3 coach was (is) a good vehicle but it displays classic 'under developed' charcateristics, such as failing aircon (never known that on a Pendolino), failing vestibule sliding doors (never known that on a Pendolino), and unreliable brakes (never known that on a Pendolino).

These are the sort of faults that get designed out of vehicles in mass production, but the small numbers of Mk3s makes this unviable. It's cheaper to fix the faults as they occur than to design new systems that obviate the faults. Economies of scale don't just influence purchase price, they also make for cheaper running costs and better reliability.

And it was this kind of stuff that forced the New South Wales state government to go for a Budd designed coach instead of the Mk3 to go into the XPT train with the locally-built power cars which took some inspiration from the HST.

It was not the build quality (the Mk3 design would have been locally built by the same factories which had managed the strict standards required to hold the Budd license for over 20 years) but the design quality that made the difference - there are still Budd RDC's from the 1950s in regular revenue service today.

 

[gordonthemoron]

didn't BR self insure? Do TOCs/Network Rail self insure or purchase insurance? What effect does this have on ticket prices?

 

[Bill Stanier]

The APT was supposed to be BR's big hitter, which if produced, I imagine it would have had significant interest.

APT was a brave attempt, but it was flawed. There was the APT-E gas-turbine powered 'Exprimental', then the APT-P electric powered prototype. Problem was, almost no technology from the E made it into the P! Hardly the way to run a development program. The 'P' had different power, body mounted motors instead of axle hung so different transmission, completely different bogies, different brakes, and an entirely different tilt system to the 'E'.

The 'P' had fundamental flaws.

1) The hydro-kinetic brakes were unreliable and even when working created drag when 'off' through residual water in the system. Regenerative would have been the real answer.

2) The power cars divided the train into two, so two sets of catering, two guards, and two coaches with no pax capacity.

3) The body-mounted motors and control system not only took up space in the train which otherwise would have been passenger carrying, but meant only the power car wheels were powered.

So I don't think it would ever have been a success even if there'd been time to sort out the faults into a production train. It wasn't until the advent of compact traction motors and traction control that all that stuff could be put under-floor. That also allowed most of the train's wheels to be powered for high acceleration rates and resistance to slipping.

 

[Oswyntail]

A lack of interesting passenger liveries.

Sorry, but isn't this thread about what might have happened, not what has?

 

[Buttsy]

didn't BR self insure? Do TOCs/Network Rail self insure or purchase insurance? What effect does this have on ticket prices?

BR did self-insure, whereas I understand that the TOCs, ROSCOs and NR contractors have to fully insure. NR may even have to insure as well as they were a 'private' company. No doubt the cost of the insurance is covered by the subsidy and fares.

 

[krus_aragon]

A lack of interesting passenger liveries.

Why, what liveries do you wear when you travel by train? :P

 

[AM9]

To return to the OP's question:

from a passenger's point of view, (not this customer rubbish which implies that they are just a source of profit) a main difference is:
what happens at scheduled connections when things go wrong -
with a national undertaking, the local control staff have the ability to hold a connection, or allow an unscheduled stop of a passing service etc. to minimise the impact of a late arrival.
with pseudo-competition between carriers, where passengers on a late arriving train can see their connection operated by another TOC departing from the next platform. They become pawns in a financial blame game where the connecting service cannot be held for fear of financial penalty. The only staff accessible to passengers stuck at the station might hand out a delay repay form, if they are lucky. Then a costly bureaucratic machine grinds into action to determine who was at fault and who pays. Well, we know that the passenger pays, either through increased fares, or from public funds. The passenger just wants to complete their journey in a reasonable time allowing for inevitable mishaps.

 

[Bill Stanier]

This business of holding trains after their scheduled departure time in order to make a connection with a late running incoming service cuts both ways. It's great if you need to make that connection, but frustrating if you are on the 'held' train and you are on a tight schedule where the delayed departure causes you a problem.

If you were on a late-running train into Heathrow would you expect the airline to hold your flight to give you time to catch it, thus delaying all the other passengers on the plane? Of course not. Why should it be different for trains?

 

[gordonthemoron]

I don't recall BR being terribly good at holding connections either

 

[Manchester77]

I'd guess that 319s coming off Thameslink replaced by 371s would have been used to replace some of the southern slammers maybe operating more suburban services.
InterCity 250 would have gone ahead since privatisation was one of the main factors in its scrapping.
More sprinters would have been built for regional railways.

 

[455driver]

I may be wrong but I worked for BR from the end of 1989 til 96 and I don't recall a total national shutdown due to a strike during that time until fairly soon after Railtrack took over when the signalmen held several strikes pretty much shutting most of the system down for about 24 hours each time

Please dont let facts get in the way of some berk having a dig at railstaff!
Just because their statement is a load of cowmanure doesnt mean they cant have their say.:roll:
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

With all the associated problems that come with short-production-run in house designs. The railfreight companies in particular applied pragmatic thinking when they went shopping for new motive power.

They could commission a short production run of completely untried locos from home suppliers and suffer all the teething troubles and design shortfalls that would entail (like most BR diesels, built in house or bought as unique designs from outside manufacturers), or they could look at what was already built and successfully working in large numbers around the world, and order something based on that technology (like the class 66, or the Pendolino).

Just like that untried technology that went into the class 56 you mean!
Oh hang on that was a class 47 bobyshell with a tried and tested engine which can trace its ancestry back to 10000 and 10001 (and beyond) wasnt it!

 

[dannypye9999]

under BR I don't think there would be the hi-frequency of services, but trains would be a lot longer than ever perhaps 23/24 cars on XC routes and of course longer platforms would have been built by now.

 

[cjmillsnun]

If Privatisation had never happened the 411s, 421s and 423s (3rd rail EMUs) would have been replaced by the late 1990s by the classes 371, 381 and 471. Depending on availability of funding, the Southampton to Salisbury line, the Oxted branch, and the Marshlink line would have been electrified by then.

Agree with all of this.

It would have been interesting to see what would have happened to XC services. MK2 coaches on XC services might have been replaced by MK3s displaced from the WCML when the WCML was completed, and either the 47s would have been re-engined or they would have been replaced outright by new diesel locomotives. Alternatively, BR might have ordered a long distance DMU for such services - say either a lengthened 158 with a micro-buffet or a new design outright.

All of the below is an educated guess based on what could've been accomplished in 20 years using the late 80s management of BR and how they were upgrading the railway at the time.

I suspect that IC250 would've happened and been deployed to both the ECML and WCML. The Mk3s and 90s would've gone from the WCML to the GEML as well as Gatwick Express. Electrification of the GWML to Bristol and the SWML would've gone ahead, releasing HSTs to XC to replace the Mk2s as they would've got the 225s. Thus giving a Mk3 or newer fleet throughout InterCity.

The displaced 159s from the WEML (if electrification had gone ahead) would've gone to Regional Railways and be worked in Multiple with 158, thus increasing capacity on certain routes.

 

[gordonthemoron]

under BR I don't think there would be the hi-frequency of services, but trains would be a lot longer than ever perhaps 23/24 cars on XC routes and of course longer platforms would have been built by now.

only if they'd used TALGOs

 

[cjmillsnun]

APT was a brave attempt, but it was flawed. There was the APT-E gas-turbine powered 'Exprimental', then the APT-P electric powered prototype. Problem was, almost no technology from the E made it into the P! Hardly the way to run a development program. The 'P' had different power, body mounted motors instead of axle hung so different transmission, completely different bogies, different brakes, and an entirely different tilt system to the 'E'.

The 'P' had fundamental flaws.

1) The hydro-kinetic brakes were unreliable and even when working created drag when 'off' through residual water in the system. Regenerative would have been the real answer.

2) The power cars divided the train into two, so two sets of catering, two guards, and two coaches with no pax capacity.

3) The body-mounted motors and control system not only took up space in the train which otherwise would have been passenger carrying, but meant only the power car wheels were powered.

So I don't think it would ever have been a success even if there'd been time to sort out the faults into a production train. It wasn't until the advent of compact traction motors and traction control that all that stuff could be put under-floor. That also allowed most of the train's wheels to be powered for high acceleration rates and resistance to slipping.

1. Evidence for this? The braking faults were mainly with the tread brakes from what I have read and seen.

2. ATP-S was to have had the power cars (locomotives) at either end of the train (or gone for a Loco/DVT combo). P train was a prototype and they learned from this mistake. The Loco/DVTs would probably not have tilted. There being no reason for them to do so.

 

[anme]

One thing that I think would have happened under BR is print-at-home tickets being available for most journeys. They exist in many European countries and offer big advantages to operators and passengers. However, they require investment and roll out across the network. In the UK, 26ish TOCs would need to agree a system and spend the money rolling it out - not something they are likely to do given their short franchises, and the fact that it would benefit some of them more than others. Even if the government decided to impose a system now (which is the only way it will happen), it would be unlikely to be universal until all franchises had been renewed (5-7 years, longer in some cases). Without being universal, it's much less useful of course.

BTW, I think this would have happened both under a nationalised BR, or under a 'BR plc', had British Rail been privatised as one, or a small number of companies.

 

[Bill Stanier]

1. Evidence for this? The braking faults were mainly with the tread brakes from what I have read and seen.

It's in this book, well worth a read if the APT interests you:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Advanced-Passenger-Train-Promise-Unfulfilled/dp/0711014744

The tread brakes were even more troublesome, but any production train would have used disc brakes instead (also in the book).