Why has Northern performance improved so much since Christmas?

[Staffordian]

There seems to have been a dramatic improvement in performance on Northern Rail this week, according to trains.im (see graphic below). For the past five days, ppm has been as follows :
Sun 29/12/19 76.8%
Mon 30/12/19 78.5%
Tue 31/12/19 84.6%
Wed 01/01/19 89.3%
Thu 02/01/19 83.2%
As I write this at 16:15 on Friday, it is running at 89.5%.

In comparison, in the whole of November and December, there were only three other days when ppm exceeded Sunday's 76.8% (03/11 81.8%, 17/11 78.4% and 24/12 80.6%). The 84.6% achieved on New Year's Eve was the highest since 12/10/19, when it was 89.2%.

Why is this ?

Possible reasons I can think of (which may or may not apply) are :
1) New/revised rosters
2) Improved weather conditions after the floods, etc. of November/December
3) Fewer sick days
4) Fewer leave days
5) Fewer training days (either not scheduled or not required)
6) Fewer passengers at peak times and hence fewer passenger-related delays
7) Fewer freight trains on the network and hence less congestion (not to mention fewer TPE trains getting in the way on the Castlefield corridor !!)
8) Software/hardware fixes to 195/331 units addressing problem areas
9) TSR's lifted as a result of engineering work over the holiday

Any suggestions ? Whatever it is, Northern need to try and recreate these conditions on a regular basis !

 

[gordonthemoron]

Perhaps because it's the end of the holiday year?

 

[GRALISTAIR]

I think the OP has summarized the reasons well.

 

[507 001]

The first few days after new year are always good. My train to and from work yesterday and today have been noticeably quieter.
I expect normal service will resume as January progresses.

 

[Bertie the bus]

There seems to have been a dramatic improvement in performance on Northern Rail this week, according to trains.im (see graphic below).
...
Any suggestions ? Whatever it is, Northern need to try and recreate these conditions on a regular basis !

It looks like a general trend. According to that website the highest national PPM between 01/11/19 and Christmas was 89.9% and it was regularly in the high 70s/low 80s. Since Christmas it has been above 90% 3 days. Very odd.

 

[DarloRich]

Never discount blind luck

 

[thejuggler]

November and pre Xmas December are the busiest times of year for commuting numbers as very few people are on holiday and there are more leisure travellers in the mix.

It only takes a few extended halts at stations to get passengers on and off for the knock on delays to quickly snowball.

Add in staff and unit shortages and those passengers are on fewer services, compounding the issue.

I was on services on 23 and 24 December and it was like travelling on a Sunday. Hardly any passengers and everything on time.

 

[3270]

10) Leaf fall season over. Weather OK at the moment, not too hot, not to cold.
11) Fewer commuters over Christmas leading to better dwell times at stations? Let's see what happens next week when people are back at work.
12) Traincrew getting more confident with the 195s and 331s and therefore being better at getting out of trouble when the units start playing up?

 

[sportzbar]

Plus training suspended until next week....

 

[Trainfan2019]

Always seems to be better on the trains this time of year, I've noticed this before. I've had better service this past week on EMR and London Northwestern. Not so many problems as normal.

 

[Malcolmffc]

PPM below 90%is still woeful. In most industries if you fail to deliver to your customers 10% of the time you lose your job and/or your employer goes bust.

 

[ChrisHogan]

PPM below 90%is still woeful. In most industries if you fail to deliver to your customers 10% of the time you lose your job and/or your employer goes bust.

Not really. Most Franchise Agreements specify a PPM standard of about 92.5% (not 100%). A 90% PPM is just 2.5% below that standard.

 

[The Joker]

All the OP’s reasons are valid but I think reason numbers 6 and 2 are the most important. There is a different distribution of passenger usage with a lot less people using rush hour services. I think delays resulting from passengers trying to board busy or overcrowded trains are possibly more significant than is possibly realised. From my own experience it can sometimes take three or even four minutes to get on a XC HST or Voyager when it is full because people are standing in either the doorway, the vestibule or at the end of carriage making it difficult for people to get past (and just stand looking at all the people waiting to get on). This is exacerbated in bad weather when additional people use the train instead of driving. So normal service is likely to be resumed in the next couple of weeks.

 

[Malcolmffc]

Not really. Most Franchise Agreements specify a PPM standard of about 92.5% (not 100%). A 90% PPM is just 2.5% below that standard.

OK, so not up to an acceptable standard for the customer then. Glad we agree.

 

[HH]

OK, so not up to an acceptable standard for the customer then. Glad we agree.

Let's compare with another industry shall we?

Ryanair measures its punctuality through industry standards, whereby any flight that arrives on or within 15 minutes of its scheduled arrival time is deemed to be 'on time'. In FY17, Ryanair operated over 600,000 flights and 88% of those flights arrived on-time.

And, if you've had the pleasure of flying Ryanair, you will have no doubt noticed the blatant padding of schedules that puts even the railways in the shade.

 

[Llama]

Plus training suspended until next week....

This.
And the fact that there is no block annual leave (and very few people take daily leave in early Jan) at a lot of depots.

 

[Bald Rick]

It’s mostly the annual leave / training issue.

Put it this way. You’re a driver or guard. Your leave year runs from 1st January. Some (most) of the leave is rostered in blocks, some is available at your choice. Through the year, your employer has had a very large training programme in place both for new stock and because of additional staff recruited to deal with service expansion. This has meant resources have been stretched, and overtime / rest day working has been available to anyone who wants it. Some people will have saved their ‘leave of choice’ for Christmas and the few weeks before to attend family events, parties, go shopping etc., or simply haven’t used it through the year and have to ‘use it or lose it’. This stretches resources further. The call goes out for more volunteers for OT / RDW. But many will be less inclined to volunteer at this time, because they also want to attend family events, parties, go shopping etc., and also because their wallets / purses are pretty fat from 11 months of OT / RDW. There a shortfall in available resources, leading to cancellations and delays at train crew relief points.

On Jan 1st, the clock resets. Many fewer take leave. The Christmas bills start arriving and OT / RDW looks very attractive.

It’s a regular thing with most TOCs, but becomes more obvious when a TOC is under particular strain. Northern is the best example this year. Five years ago it was Southern.

 

[hooverboy]

Perhaps because it's the end of the holiday year?

fed up with relatives and happy to get out of the house!!!

 

[hooverboy]

Let's compare with another industry shall we?


And, if you've had the pleasure of flying Ryanair, you will have no doubt noticed the blatant padding of schedules that puts even the railways in the shade.

the padding of schedules happens on all airlines though.
atmospheric and weather conditions are factored into the timings,and are extremely variable.

 

[SteveM70]

Not really. Most Franchise Agreements specify a PPM standard of about 92.5% (not 100%). A 90% PPM is just 2.5% below that standard.

So 33% worse than an already low target

(As a comparison, I work for one of the big supermarkets and we regularly achieve 96% on time deliveries to our stores despite all the vagaries of travelling on congested roads)

 

[Bertie the bus]

Let's compare with another industry shall we?


And, if you've had the pleasure of flying Ryanair, you will have no doubt noticed the blatant padding of schedules that puts even the railways in the shade.

It isn’t a great way of defending the railway by comparing it to one of the most hated companies in the country. Though it isn’t as bad as the bloke from RDG who appeared on the news over the New Year and said it isn’t all bad on the railway as about 82 or 83% of passengers says they are satisfied in the Transport Focus survey as that means nearly 1 in 5 aren’t.

 

[Raul_Duke]

So 33% worse than an already low target

(As a comparison, I work for one of the big supermarkets and we regularly achieve 96% on time deliveries to our stores despite all the vagaries of travelling on congested roads)

Excellent.

Now let the government and people with no logistics knowledge or experience micromanage you for twenty years and get back to us on how well you’re doing.

 

[Undiscovered]

Some TOCs also offer incentives to work OT/RDW over certain holiday periods.
The bonuses attached to these are only, usually, paid out if an employee remains 'productive' ie doesn't book sick or have a safety incident, for the whole duration.
Suddenly, working that extra day to avoid the inlaws/traipsing around the sales/awful TV programmes, looks quite appealing...

 

[Bald Rick]

So 33% worse than an already low target

(As a comparison, I work for one of the big supermarkets and we regularly achieve 96% on time deliveries to our stores despite all the vagaries of travelling on congested roads)

And your logistics contractors / in house planners will build in large amounts of contingency time into those store deliveries, much the same as airlines do.

Unfortunately, this isn’t possible on the railways.

 

[AndrewE]

This.
And the fact that there is no block annual leave (and very few people take daily leave in early Jan) at a lot of depots.

When I worked on BR our leave year ran from the anniversary of when we joined, which I thought was very sensible as it evened out the rush of requests at the end of the leave year for those who had to "use it or lose it." (However I was clerical/salaried and it may have been that with different conditions of service the footplate staff had the calendar year even back then.)
Later, in the Civil Service which followed the calendar year I think we could carry a certain (limited) amount of leave forward as long as it was taken by the end of February, which was also relatively sensible.
It seems crazy for a railway (which knows that it has its period of heaviest use coinciding with its greatest stress (weather etc)) to set itself up to have the maximum need for people to take holidays during this period.

 

[CaptainHaddock]

PPM below 90%is still woeful. In most industries if you fail to deliver to your customers 10% of the time you lose your job and/or your employer goes bust.

Well exactly. An improvement in performance that results in a jump from 40 per cent to 90 per cent of your trains being on time should not be a cause for celebration, it should beg the question 'Why aren't 100 per cent of trains on time'?

 

[Llama]

When I worked on BR our leave year ran from the anniversary of when we joined, which I thought was very sensible as it evened out the rush of requests at the end of the leave year for those who had to "use it or lose it." (However I was clerical/salaried and it may have been that with different conditions of service the footplate staff had the calendar year even back then.)
Later, in the Civil Service which followed the calendar year I think we could carry a certain (limited) amount of leave forward as long as it was taken by the end of February, which was also relatively sensible.
It seems crazy for a railway (which knows that it has its period of heaviest use coinciding with its greatest stress (weather etc)) to set itself up to have the maximum need for people to take holidays during this period.

On Northern (West) if you apply for leave and are within the guaranteed minimum number permitted daily leave at each depot (which is maybe based on about 4-5% of establishment) you get the day granted. If you apply for leave and are outside the guaranteed few, but when that days roster is prepared 72 hours in advance your job is found to be able to be covered by spare drivers etc you will get the day granted but only find out that when the roster is posted at your depot three days prior. If you are outside the guaranteed numbers but your job can't be covered your leave will get declined three days before the day in question with the same amount of notice.
If you have leave declined in this way you can carry it over to the next calendar year. It's not the case that drivers 'must take' all their leave before Dec 31st, what a lot of drivers will do if they've got a day left to take is chuck it in for Xmas Eve knowing they've got no chance of it being granted (eg they're 80th on the list or something ridiculous) so that with it being declined they are able to carry it over to the next year.

 

[Kilopylae]

And your logistics contractors / in house planners will build in large amounts of contingency time into those store deliveries, much the same as airlines do.

Unfortunately, this isn’t possible on the railways.

That being said, it's not as though other T.O.C.s are all regularly below eighty per cent. The national average is 87.1%

 

[ChrisHogan]

So 33% worse than an already low target

That is what the DfT specifies; it could have a higher percentage if it was willing to pay for it. More tracks, more trains and more staff, etc.

 

[HH]

That is what the DfT specifies; it could have a higher percentage if it was willing to pay for it. More tracks, more trains and more staff, etc.

More trains would mean worse performance...

In recent years, railway performance, which had been on the rise over time, has gone backwards. A key component of that degradation is an increasingly congested network.