Glen M
Member
Well there is some improvement but from an incredibly low base. And having the TOC from hell, Northern, as a lead operator ensures that standards remain incredibly low.
TOC from hell? The south has GTR?
Well there is some improvement but from an incredibly low base. And having the TOC from hell, Northern, as a lead operator ensures that standards remain incredibly low.
TOC from hell? The south has GTR?
Why can't he go on his own? Parents do not have to go to open days, and a student can get used to travelling e.g. by coach rather than rail, and stay in a youth hostel.
I similarly doubt the former story is, unless the student has a disability so can neither walk nor cycle, anything other than an "it's not fair" whine. There is always a way. You don't even have to go to open days to apply; there's enough online and printed information out there too.
Parents might want to see the university, afterall they're part funding their child's course.
Then they need to find a way to cough up to get there!
People have to make choices. Anyway, this was always the way - the grant (when that existed) was means tested.
The 'means testing' is a bit off, your parents need to be almost on the minimum wage, to get the full loan.
Surely it's only those who don't have a car and may have difficulty affording a few National Express fares to attend open days, and also can't afford a taxi to the coach station AND can't find anyone to give them a lift?
This is really the silliest one I've heard as a reason to fund local bus/rail services in my life.
And if any parent tells their son/daughter they can only go to local universities because they're the only ones where the whole family can have a weekend away to the open day, they are fools. That smacks of "t'family is poor, we need to stay poor, can't have too much of a wider horizon as nobody in t'family ever had that". It's rubbish. Chuck the kid on a Megabus, get them a £15ish YHA dorm bed (that's only a couple of packets of fags not purchased these days), and let them broaden their own horizons.
This is an important post that seems to be quietly ignored. When you go to London for the day and travel on the tube off peak as a visitor, everything seems fine, the same as my experience of rail in the North. However the reality for people commuting day to day is different. And the maxed out train lengths make improvements much more expensive than they are in the North. Don’t get me wrong, transport in the North isn’t great, but longer trains and a few platform extensions would solve many problems quite cheaply, a solution that just doesn’t work in London and the south east.I don't really get the notion that some northerners seem to have that everything down south is gold-plated; it really isn't. Round my way (home counties) the only real investment has been the Thameslink Programme, which is mainly an economic way of squeezing the last drop of spare capacity out of the existing network, or to put it another way stuffing as many trains as possible through a Victorian cross-London tunnel. Even this has been done on a shoestring, opening with bare-minimum stabling capacity provided, and schemes like the Stevenage bay platform (essential to making the plan work) deferred with services replaced by buses in the meantime. We still have 43-year-old class 313s in service, and up until the last year many services at my station were provided by 317s - early 1980s and barely refurbished since new, for many commuters their only experience of the train will have been 313s and 317s for many years. Like parts of Northern, my station has had a barely-useable weekend service for as long as can be remembered.
Meanwhile the A1(M) in one of the most heavily populated parts of the country is just two lanes each way through Hertfordshire, with a widening scheme cancelled by John Prescott in the 1990s - comparing disfavourably to the luxurious section of A1(M) through North Yorkshire - likewise other parts of the A1 have had bypasses built and roundabouts removed, unlike the Cambridgeshire section where there remain five roundabouts south of Peterborough. This means heavy congestion during the peak hours (which down here is 0600-1000 and 1500-1900), and accidents on a regular basis leading to gridlock, today being no exception.
In London we've seen extra trains for the Jubilee and Northern lines effectively cancelled for budgetary reasons, Piccadilly Line fleet replacement deferred (trains now over 45 years old), meanwhile the Bakerloo Line trains (even older) don't have a definite replacement plan. Elsewhere in my area the Croxley Link is now seemingly dead, again in an area which sees gridlocked roads on a daily basis.
I do think there's a pretty healthy dose of unrealistic expectations in places on this thread and elsewhere, some people need a bit of a reality check IMO. A certain expression about the grass always being greener on the other side of the fence springs to mind.
Back in 1969 nobody would have been seen dead with their parents on a university visit. I went through the process twice as I needed a resit to improve a grade and in two rounds of visits I didn't see a single person with their parents.
Fares are another matter, back then anytime fares were pretty reasonable. Even doing London - Manchester - Cardiff - London on successive days with three single fares (overnight with relations) wasn't totally outrageous.
Even more so in 1961...!When did attending an Open Day become part of the process of going to University?
I first set eyes on my university when I arrived to register. Having got there by train, with all my belongings in a suitcase.
Nobody /knows/ whether a particular university is what one needs or not until one gets there. You can work out whether you like the site or the buildings - but until lectures, seminars and tutorials start nobody has any idea whether the subject or the lecturers are what you expected.Did you not want to visit it and others first to decide if it met what you needed?
I agree. Back in the 1980s I visited the places that I was considering studying at, not least because, like most students, I was interviewed by them before being given an offer. Goodness know how those saying they can’t manage to visit a potential university would have coped with having to travel and be interviewed to even have a chance of a place!Surely it's only those who don't have a car and may have difficulty affording a few National Express fares to attend open days, and also can't afford a taxi to the coach station AND can't find anyone to give them a lift?
This is really the silliest one I've heard as a reason to fund local bus/rail services in my life.
And if any parent tells their son/daughter they can only go to local universities because they're the only ones where the whole family can have a weekend away to the open day, they are fools. That smacks of "t'family is poor, we need to stay poor, can't have too much of a wider horizon as nobody in t'family ever had that". It's rubbish. Chuck the kid on a Megabus, get them a £15ish YHA dorm bed (that's only a couple of packets of fags not purchased these days), and let them broaden their own horizons.
The south east may well have further needs. Fine, but they’ve had plenty met already. Get to the back of the queue and wait your turn.I don't really get the notion that some northerners seem to have that everything down south is gold-plated; it really isn't. Round my way (home counties) the only real investment has been the Thameslink Programme, which is mainly an economic way of squeezing the last drop of spare capacity out of the existing network, or to put it another way stuffing as many trains as possible through a Victorian cross-London tunnel. Even this has been done on a shoestring, opening with bare-minimum stabling capacity provided, and schemes like the Stevenage bay platform (essential to making the plan work) deferred with services replaced by buses in the meantime. We still have 43-year-old class 313s in service, and up until the last year many services at my station were provided by 317s - early 1980s and barely refurbished since new, for many commuters their only experience of the train will have been 313s and 317s for many years. Like parts of Northern, my station has had a barely-useable weekend service for as long as can be remembered.
Meanwhile the A1(M) in one of the most heavily populated parts of the country is just two lanes each way through Hertfordshire, with a widening scheme cancelled by John Prescott in the 1990s - comparing disfavourably to the luxurious section of A1(M) through North Yorkshire - likewise other parts of the A1 have had bypasses built and roundabouts removed, unlike the Cambridgeshire section where there remain five roundabouts south of Peterborough. This means heavy congestion during the peak hours (which down here is 0600-1000 and 1500-1900), and accidents on a regular basis leading to gridlock, today being no exception.
In London we've seen extra trains for the Jubilee and Northern lines effectively cancelled for budgetary reasons, Piccadilly Line fleet replacement deferred (trains now over 45 years old), meanwhile the Bakerloo Line trains (even older) don't have a definite replacement plan. Elsewhere in my area the Croxley Link is now seemingly dead, again in an area which sees gridlocked roads on a daily basis.
I do think there's a pretty healthy dose of unrealistic expectations in places on this thread and elsewhere, some people need a bit of a reality check IMO. A certain expression about the grass always being greener on the other side of the fence springs to mind.
The south east may well have further needs. Fine, but they’ve had plenty met already. Get to the back of the queue and wait your turn.
I don’t even have to mention the North to give examples of places that aren’t doing that well. Stoke on Trent. (Neither Midland not Northern). Holyhead, inland Cornwall, such as Redruth and Camborne.
And the average includes countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia and so exceeding 90% is not necessarily a fantastic achievement. As I'm sure you realise.In fact, the only regions of the UK that are considered "less developed" when it comes to EU Regional Policy (and thus qualify for the most EU cash) are Cornwall, West Wales and the Valleys. Greater Manchester, Cheshire, West Yorkshire, North Yorkshire and Northumbria are considered "more developed". They have a GDP of over 90% of the EU average.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_policy_of_the_European_Union
And the average includes countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia and so exceeding 90% is not necessarily a fantastic achievement. As I'm sure you realise.
And the average includes countries such as Bulgaria, Romania and Croatia and so exceeding 90% is not necessarily a fantastic achievement. As I'm sure you realise.
Of which 3 are local public sector who fund through additional local tax raising (council tax levy for GLA/TfL (which bill payers see documented to the nearest penny on their bills), business rates increments) not central government funding pass through.
The DfT non loan contribution (e.g. excluding loans to cover cost overruns) is only 27% of the total current cost estimate.
Crossrail should be profitable (including covering all debt repayments) about 15-18 months after opening.
TfL - has massive fares income, & future income from Crossrail, that it can borrow against. Nowhere else comes close.
CIL - nicely overheated London property market
Business Rate Supplement - all those HQs paying it out of income earned elsewhere in the UK
Please don't link the Daily Mail on this forum again. Ta
A very motor-centric point of view. What is there for those who are either too young, or too old to drive, or who can't afford to drive.
You rely on friends and family, or you just don't go anywhere.
In large parts of the country you apply for your provisional licence when you're 16 so you can take your test as soon after becoming 17 as possible. Because you need to.
Crossrail is mostly being paid for by London. I have no problem with your plan just as long as London is not expected to pay a single penny for it.London is highly subsidised in terms of capital expenditure compared to the rest of the country. Look at all the investment poured down the drain on Crossrail. Look at all the money on new carriages and extra trains, and still Londoners complain that more needs to be spent. The best way forward would be ‘no investment for London for the next five years’ and spend an equivalent amount elsewhere.
A bit of knitting and the odd new hospital might do a bit of good, but to have more sustained balance, we need to invest in our talented kids up here, and keep them here. Not have them feel they have to go down London or abroad to get decent jobs. The North is finally starting to speak with one voice, but there are plenty of other areas needing the help and it would be more appropriate to say it’s London/Home Counties vs Rest of UK than North/South.
Sorry to all on here from the SE but you are harming the fabric of our country
One of the DJ’s on Radio 5 said after moving to Manchester he was shocked at the absolute poverty up here compared to down south.
This is an important post that seems to be quietly ignored. When you go to London for the day and travel on the tube off peak as a visitor, everything seems fine, the same as my experience of rail in the North. However the reality for people commuting day to day is different. And the maxed out train lengths make improvements much more expensive than they are in the North. Don’t get me wrong, transport in the North isn’t great, but longer trains and a few platform extensions would solve many problems quite cheaply, a solution that just doesn’t work in London and the south east.
The North is finally starting to speak with one voice
Sorry to all on here from the SE but you are harming the fabric of our country, even if it isn’t directly your fault, and you really need to get out to the places I’ve mentioned if you don’t buy it, to see it with your own eyes
I suspect this is also true for @DarloRich?
These threads always get predictable reactions from the usual suspects where someone from the Home Counties usually comes on bleating about how a 313 trundling about somewhere in the SE somehow equates to the North not being that badly done to. So I’m not going to get all Zen and above it all, I shall wade in feet first and say that the SE is seriously unbalancing the whole of the rest of our country with its incessant demands to be funded because that where the investment is. Well it has to look beyond itself for once and actually take one for the rest of the UK.
I’m sorry but I’ve done some trekking around parts of the South and I’m not convinced that the likes of Berkhamstead, Canterbury, Oxford, Milton Keynes or Slough are somehow hard done by. I don’t even have to mention the North to give examples of places that aren’t doing that well. Stoke on Trent. (Neither Midland not Northern). Holyhead, inland Cornwall, such as Redruth and Camborne. I can throw various de-industrialised towns like mine (St Helens) they have been just left to rot, and there’s plenty similar, Burnley, Heavy Woollen districts in West Yorkshire, Castleford, etc etc. A bit of knitting and the odd new hospital might do a bit of good, but to have more sustained balance, we need to invest in our talented kids up here, and keep them here. Not have them feel they have to go down London or abroad to get decent jobs. The North is finally starting to speak with one voice, but there are plenty of other areas needing the help and it would be more appropriate to say it’s London/Home Counties vs Rest of UK than North/South. Sorry to all on here from the SE but you are harming the fabric of our country, even if it isn’t directly your fault, and you really need to get out to the places I’ve mentioned if you don’t buy it, to see it with your own eyes. One of the DJ’s on Radio 5 said after moving to Manchester he was shocked at the absolute poverty up here compared to down south.
No they are not. Everything is focused on Manchester, a bit on Leeds, a tiny bit on Liverpool and sod the rest. The North East is barely mentioned when taking about investment.
Even then the conversation is based on petty jealousy rather than focus on what would actually benefit communities.
Cheers. How do you think an argument about damaging the social fabric of our country would have gone down with the judge looking at giving me a CCJ or dealing with the bailiffs at the door? That's right none. Nonsense about "social fabric" wont keep food on the table or a roof over your head. It wasn't by choice that i gave up my family and friends to move to an area where i knew no one and the beer was terrible. It was because i was desperate. You, frankly, have no idea what you are talking about.
As for the last sentence. God. it is almost as if you think moving south deletes all memories or family connection with some of the really poor areas in the North East that I lived in and my family still live in. I know what goes on. Thanks.
Scotland's quite lucky in all honesty. For all of us who give ScotRail a hard time just remember that nothing....nothing is as bad as Northern Rail. Nothing!
@DarloRich, quite right the NE never gets anything invested. The last best thing they got was the Newcastle Metro. Since then and all.
ECML electrification too.
And upgrade of most of the A1 (to the south) as motorway.