Back to the bad old days’: swingeing rail cuts set alarm bells ringing

[Bletchleyite]

Hope so - to run longer but fewer trains.

I think "it depends".

If there are any 8/10 to 12-car extensions still pending in the South East, they may well not be necessary for now. But the 2 and 3-car platforms found all over the North definitely do.

 

[Watershed]

in the meantime we need to make easily reversible cuts such as simple frequency thinning

They're not always necessarily easy to reverse. FOCs are more than happy to take up nice faster paths when trains are removed; if they're allowed to keep them for long enough, they can acquire strong rights that would be difficult to overrule to reinstate the lost services.

 

[bramling]

Local / staff reps are company employees, who are released from their normal duties to conduct union business. Their time is paid for by the company. It is not unknown for these reps to spend more time on union business than paid work.

The unions employ ‘full time reps’, but these are relatively few in number.







That point was passed some time ago. There are many employers and employees who welcome it. Plenty of research done on it.





The trend for the last three months is important here. It is flat.




Too many variables.




Unfortunately it does matter. Simple reason - the commuters that haven’t come back are those who typically travel longer distances (>20 miles) principally to London. These typically pay higher average fares, but the crucial point is that it is much cheaper on a per passenger mile basis to provide these services than shorter distance commuting, and particularly regional commuting.

As an example (and I don’t have the detailed data) but there are roughly as many inbound commuters to Sheffield each morning peak as that can be accommodated on 3 peak trains heading to the Thameslink core. The resources needed for the former is an order of magnitude higher, and the revenue is lower.

The latter point is interesting, as it much ties in with my observations. Most provincial cities will have one or two key commuter trains on each route, mainly around the 0830 arrival and 1730 departure times. This in contrast to the south-east where there will be strings of heavily loaded trains, from 0600 right through to 0900 and from 1600 to 1900.

I struggle to think of anywhere which compares to London, and I think many people fail to appreciate this.

 

[RT4038]

They're not always necessarily easy to reverse. FOCs are more than happy to take up nice faster paths when trains are removed; if they're allowed to keep them for long enough, they can acquire strong rights that would be difficult to overrule to reinstate the lost services.

Yes, but that is just administrative details. Solve that rather, than run uneconomic services!

 

[Moonshot]

A 10% reduction in services will lead to a more reliable timetable. The idea of running fewer but longer trains is often quoted by the smart opinion on here.

 

[Peterthegreat]

A 10% reduction in services will lead to a more reliable timetable. The idea of running fewer but longer trains is often quoted by the smart opinion on here.

So do you propose to take out every tenth train?

 

[Watershed]

Yes, but that is just administrative details. Solve that rather, than run uneconomic services!

It's hardly administrative when you would need to bung the FOC a load of compensation to get them to give up their newfound competitive edge.

Thus further increasing the cost of restoring previous frequencies.

A 10% reduction in services will lead to a more reliable timetable.

Right, so how's that going to work in practice? Cancel every 10th train at random? For lines with an hourly frequency, run 9 trains at hourly intervals and then have a 2 hour gap?

 

[Bletchleyite]

The latter point is interesting, as it much ties in with my observations. Most provincial cities will have one or two key commuter trains on each route, mainly around the 0830 arrival and 1730 departure times. This in contrast to the south-east where there will be strings of heavily loaded trains, from 0600 right through to 0900 and from 1600 to 1900.

I struggle to think of anywhere which compares to London, and I think many people fail to appreciate this.

And that is why most of the possible savings are indeed to be found in London and the South East, not away from it where timetables are typically "all week" (well, Monday to Saturday) anyway.

 

[Doctor Fegg]

Not speaking with any direct knowledge, but I know that automated diagramming software looks for the most productive solution overall, rather than necessarily at individual depot level. You may find that the optimal ‘all GWR’ solution for Dec 19 (with full timetable across the board) counterintuitively required a productivity loss at Plymouth to make bigger gains elsewhere. I imagine maintaining route knowledge on all the various routes to London is challenging and would possibly complicate matters for Bristol and Exeter depots?

I can't speak at all knowledgeably of automated diagramming software, but I can about the routing optimisation used by couriers, which is ultimately the same problem (combinatorial optimisation, and various relatives of the Travelling Salesman Problem).

The result is only as good as the rules that govern it - which is to say, not very. There are massive inefficiencies inherent in the modelling used by couriers, which is a much bigger and more lucrative market. I would be very surprised if that wasn't also true of automated diagramming.

The courier companies are of course continually refining their algos, but my experience is that the ones with the best customer satisfaction are those that give a certain amount of flexibility to their drivers rather than forcing them to slavishly follow an automated plan. In particular, the algos generally won't find permutations that almost fulfil the requirements but not quite, so they'll drop an efficient potential solution because it's 1% off some target or other – whereas a human will intuitively think "oh, that'll be all right" and choose that.

 

[RT4038]

So do you propose to take out every tenth train?

A 10% reduction in train mileage, preferably aimed at where the cost savings are highest. With longer trains it could even by a 20% cut in timetabled trips with trains doubled in length. Or somewhere in between.

Wake up - smell the coffee. Costs need to be reduced and cuts in services are going to be happening. No point in coming up with excuses as to why Govt. should be pouring money into running underutilised trains.

 

[43066]

A 10% reduction in services will lead to a more reliable timetable. The idea of running fewer but longer trains is often quoted by the smart opinion on here.

Yes but on lower intensity parts of the network any reduction will mean the service goes from half hourly to hourly or hourly to two hourly and will put people off travelling because the service becomes less useable. Longer trains won’t help with that.

A 10% reduction is plucked out of thin air and will make no real saving. All you will end up doing is put more people off using the railway just at a time when we want to encourage them to return.

 

[baz962]

ERTMS will reduce (not eliminate) reliance on route knowledge over time as it’s gradually rolled out, but that won’t be happening overnight, in fact it will take decades and the current financial woes will slow that down if anything. DVDs are already used in some situations but are far from ideal. I have no idea what an in cab rolling road is (a treadmill for the driver?!).

Reducing route knowledge also reduces flexibility - as per the current GTR woes. You can end up with drivers at one depot sitting around when another depot is short, because drivers cannot cross other depots’ work.




Who is “they”? For about the fifty millionth time on here, the unions are in favour of full staffing and zero overtime. On here the view seems to be that staff are either greedy for working rest days or lazy for not doing so.

For the record there are some drivers and guards who probably are too reliant on overtime. Ultimately it is never guaranteed so if it’s taken away and they can’t rely on their basic salary to live they will have no cause for complaint.



Indeed so.

Off topic , but I would love to see you on a treadmill.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Right, so how's that going to work in practice? Cancel every 10th train at random? For lines with an hourly frequency, run 9 trains at hourly intervals and then have a 2 hour gap?

10% lopping out of diagrams would just be silly. You would retimetable things to remove roughly 10% of diagrams, which would involve a lot of things, but for instance removal of some peak extras as no longer required, and combining services. It does require a replan, but if it's for the long term this is not a bad thing.

For instance, the LNR current weekday "standard hour" appears to be thus, from Euston:
xx03 Tring
xx15 Brum
xx24 Northampton
xx33 Tring
xx46 Crewe
xx54 MKC

Interestingly on a Saturday it's higher, with the above plus another xx49 Northampton.

On Sundays it's:
xx08 Birmingham
xx33 Northampton
xx43 Crewe
xx50 MKC

In essence that's the weekday service but with the Trings lopped and the calls put into other services (though the times are obviously different with regard to pathing).

If usage is low enough to run "all week Sunday" but with everything 12-car south of Northampton and maybe a couple of peak Trings added, that's a decent level of cut. And we know it fits around the Avanti service as that's the same all week.

 

[Towers]

Likewise I don't see why Bristol have so many turns over the B&H (TM's), we had an incident at the end of 2019 at a crossing between Taunton and Tiverton Parkway (which you'll no doubt remember!) and two trains were stranded near Castle Cary, one ended up getting sent back to Westbury as it was a Bristol guard who didn't sign the route via Yeovil, yet the train behind had Exeter crew and went immediately down that route. I seem to remember that one train that had made it to Taunton got sent back to Castle Cary (or Westbury? Not sure what shunt involved at Castle Cary) and then down Via Yeovil.

Also daft how you guys no longer sign Taunton to Bristol!

Although I digress it is relevant to the conversation as there does seem to be many unproductive turns at some depots

The flip side of your scenario is something shutting Box (for those not familiar, the route from Paddington to Bristol via Swindon), whereupon the B&H is a major diversionary route. Many, many Bristol services have been diverted via the B&H over the years at very short notice to keep trains moving. West country crews aren't able to assist a great deal with that, as there will never be a great many of them available at Paddington or Bristol, and they are constrained by the need to get them home again before their hours are up.

It's an interesting point; good diagramming needs to strike a balance, avoiding unnecessary route knowledge but also allowing for effective, workable contingencies.

 

[Ken H]

I am unsure of the economics of fewer and longer trains
We know running too many trains in a busy are causes unreliability, but how much does that unreliability cost?
We know that running 2 short trains rather than 1 long one will cost more (crew costs for a start) but how much
What are the costs of longer trains. Longer platforms at some places? How much? Any signalling issues? maybe platform end signals may need moving.
Platform extensions seem to be incredibly difficult on a live railway. Is there a way to make their erection quicker and easier and cheaper? Prefabrication perhaps?
But then we have platform capacity problems at large stations (leeds?) that make longer trains a problem.
One thing is for sure. While commuters will put up with crowded trains and standing, you can be sure leisure travellers won't.

 

[Starmill]

White collar commuting is still "on pause".

While I don't necessarily disagree with this at all, I think that time to wait around has also plainly run out. The Treasury will absolutely not agree to the current sort of funding for as long as is necessary to have better data on this.

 

[Bletchleyite]

While I don't necessarily disagree with this at all, I think that time to wait around has also plainly run out. The Treasury will absolutely not agree to the current sort of funding for as long as is necessary to have better data on this.

I think you are probably right, but it does still point towards the more reversible cuts where possible. That is, cut diagrams, bin off some of the older ex BR stock (replaceable with new later) and destaff, but don't single routes, remove platforms or knock down station buildings.

 

[43096]

This is a bit of a 1990s view. In those days there was extra rolling sitting around, as your London area off-peak service would have shorter train lengths as well as no peak extras. In the two decades since then the first of these has tended to vanish, with all-day 8 cars being rather more common in place of shortening to 4-cars. Many of the remaining rolling stock will be undergoing maintenance during the day.

That has taken up some of the slack but there were also more peak additionals running than back then. As an example, there was still plenty of stock stabled on Wimbledon depot and Clapham Yard between the peaks pre-covid.

 

[O L Leigh]

Sorry to pour cold water on this, but this is old news that has been discussed repeatedly over the past 18-24 months. Indeed, this is just a newer version of the years-old proposal to shift the burden of funding away from the taxpayer and placing it more on the passenger. It contains nothing new and still no concrete idea about what proposals might be tabled never mind passed. That certain ideas seem to make sense to us is immaterial.

The only thing I will add is that both the TOCs and the Treasury need to be getting out and seeing exactly what the picture is in terms of usage before formulating their plans. It concerns me that I've heard reports that a certain TOC MD has been suggesting that his trains have been running at lower capacity in spite of the fact that they frequently leave people behind due to excessive crowding.

 

[Starmill]

A 10% reduction in train mileage, preferably aimed at where the cost savings are highest. With longer trains it could even by a 20% cut in timetabled trips with trains doubled in length. Or somewhere in between.

Wake up - smell the coffee. Costs need to be reduced and cuts in services are going to be happening. No point in coming up with excuses as to why Govt. should be pouring money into running underutilised trains.

The funny thing is, the opposite of this is what is currently happening in many parts.

For example, in a week's time Leeds to Knaresborough trains at 1tph are being extended to York, service from Severn Beach is being increased to 1tph and a second from Avonmouth towards Bristol, and

I'm not trying to be disparaging of Severn Beach trains beyond Avonmouth, or the aspiration to go up to 2tph between Harrogate and York, but the new services certainly not going to be very busy from the get go, especially not in current circumstances.

 

[Bald Rick]

White collar commuting is still "on pause". It's too hard to say what will happen to it once COVID is a distant memory. If it comes back as a "two day a week" thing using Anytime Day Returns, as I illustrated above, that isn't much of a revenue drop.

That assumes that all commuters were on season tickets. They weren’t. A surprisingly large number of commuters were already travelling fewer than 5 days a week, and were already buying daily tickets. The revenue numbers speak for themselves (which I am obviously unable to share) but long distance commuting revenue is a long, long way behind the average revenue of c65%.

 

[Starmill]

The only thing I will add is that both the TOCs and the Treasury need to be getting out and seeing exactly what the picture is in terms of usage before formulating their plans.

This isn't really how they work. The Treasury civil service will inform the Department for Transport what their budget is. Ministers can then try to have this changed but invariably they are told no by the Treasury Ministers. The civil service in the relevant department then works out how to make the cuts. It's not only transport which will be affected of course.

 

[O L Leigh]

This isn't really how they work. The Treasury civil service will inform the Department for Transport what their budget is. Ministers can then try to have this changed but invariably they are told no by the Treasury Ministers. The civil service in the relevant department then works out how to make the cuts. It's not only transport which will be affected of course.

Yes I know. But the question "How much rail can we afford?" is not the same thing as "How much rail do we need?". Addressing that second question will help them to work out how to deliver the first.

I know I'm hoping for the impossible, but given that everyone else is airing their own views I thought I'd add mine to the pile.

 

[Moonshot]

So do you propose to take out every tenth train?

I don't propose anything. I'm simply pointing out that the smarter opinion has often said reducing the number of trains to provide a more reliable timetable is the way to go. Far too many services are carrying fresh air.....that is the reality whether anyone likes it or not. Purse strings are being tightened.

 

[Starmill]

Yes I know. But the question "How much rail can we afford?" is not the same thing as "How much rail do we need?". Addressing that second question will help them to work out how to deliver the first.

I know I'm hoping for the impossible, but given that everyone else is airing their own views I thought I'd add mine to the pile.

Well, yes. That is quite fair enough.

 

[O L Leigh]

Far too many services are carrying fresh air.....that is the reality whether anyone likes it or not.

I don't think I've carried fresh air at any time since the first lockdown last spring. Anyone else...?

 

[dk1]

I don't think I've carried fresh air at any time since the first lockdown last spring. Anyone else...?

Been very busy indeed. Recent peak journeys into Liverpool St also getting busier.

 

[Goldfish62]

I don't think I've carried fresh air at any time since the first lockdown last spring. Anyone else...?

I've been travelling extensively by train all over the country this year and can only assume that anyone who makes such claims about fresh air doesn't travel by train much if at all.

Sure, peak hours trains aren't quite as rammed as they used to be, but there are plenty of people travelling by train.

 

[dk1]

I've been travelling extensively by train all over the country this year and can only assume that anyone who makes such claims about fresh air doesn't travel by train much if at all.

Totally agree but the armchair experts always know better.

 

[lammergeier]

Problem is revenue just walking away - huge numbers of passengers at New St yesterday due to the Christmas Markets and whatever else but barriers left wide open. I had stop orders in both directions for Tamworth/Burton due to passengers being left behind on previous services and we were full and standing in both directions despite both services being double voyagers.
The government thinks nobody is travelling, no wonder if people are travelling for free

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 6 Dec 2021 ==

I don't think I've carried fresh air at any time since the first lockdown last spring. Anyone else...?

Nope. Morning peak quieter than it used to be but still plenty of people travelling. Off peak as everyone else says is completely rammed