dk1
Veteran Member
Seasonal to such an extent serving such a glorious destinations but you can find yourself standing for a couple of hours or more any time of year.
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UK Rail Passenger Numbers Discussion
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railfan99
Established Member
Like most railways in Western nations, commuting has dropped so your previously huge revenue from season tickets has markedly declined.
I appreciate ORR adjusts revenue for inflation as it would believe this makes for better comparisons, but have fares of all available types increased in line with what we in Australia call the Consumer price Index (CPI)?
Given the increase in WFH and how 10 per cent of calendar days in the latest quarter were adversely affected by strike days, there must be some negative effect the day before and the day after, as not all trains will operate.
So I suggest National Rail passenger numbers at about 70 per cent (excluding the Elizabeth Line and the 'technical issue' in the data source) were reasonable.
It's pleasing that some open access operators such as Grand Central (on which I travelled on an October 2022 strike day) and Hull Trains have passenger numbers higher than in the pre-COVID era. How much of this is due to passengers like me using them on days when other TOCs had no or a heavily reduced frequency?
Fantastic to see the long distance subsector at '86 per cent relative usage' of pre-COVID journeys for the year. I really enjoy travelling on most of these services. Some of you have valid criticisms but I just love the rollingstock: my major complaint is having to sit backwards.
While I didn't find the Caledonian Sleeper as enjoyable as the GWR Night Riviera, it's also very good that usage for the CS - sometimes heavily affected by strike days IIRC - is at 96 per cent of the comparable pre-COVID period.
Heathrow Express at 78 per cent seems to be doing OK even though I'd have though some might instead travel on the Elizabeth Line. Are air frequencies at Heathrow at 78pc of pre-COVID for the comparable quarter?
London Overground at 88 per cent is better than expected as wouldn't it be adversely affected by WFH? Or is weekend leisure travel just so strong that this helps to build passenger journey numbers?
Interesting that LNER passenger numbers seem to be doing way better than Avanti WC. Is this merely due to the latter having many cancellations? I didn't find that in 2022, but maybe I was fortunate in my short visit.
From a long way away, I read that UK (almost?) has a recession and consumer spending is crimped by high inflation and interest rate rises, but the trend in leisure journeys appears to have been up. I hope that can continue, although probably challenging.
Overall, congratulations even if Treasury doesn't share a positive view, and thank you to so many on this forum for giving tips to me and others on how to enjoy value for one's ticket or pass.
With the exception of some overhead line issues, the ECML services seem to be fairly reliable. Also LNER hasn't been strong-armed into any crazy decisions to ditch too much rolling stock - yet.
Adrian1980uk
Member
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Hopefully the bell will ring at the treasury that if you don't the train, you don't get the revenue from it, even more so now season tickets aren't purchased.
Broad statement but the operators running the the highest percentage of Pre COVID timetables have the highest passenger numbers.
Broad statement but the operators running the the highest percentage of Pre COVID timetables have the highest passenger numbers.
bramling
Veteran Member
The latter is an interesting point. Certainly in my own case my rail use has been heavily pared back by the post-Covid timetables. From the point of view of a GTR GN user, I will not return to making any form of peak-time use until such time as the peak extras return. Unless or until that happens I will continue to use the car, or in the case of discretionary journeys may well not make them at all and choose to do other things instead.
Not really. You might not get 1000 but the weekend away market is strong all year round these days. If you took London - Devon & Cornwall alone it would be outperforming LNER.
Failed Unit
Established Member
I do find this generally interesting, watching with the untrained eye on both LNER and EMR I can see significantly more passengers. EMR is very significant on a summer Saturday, when a 3 car 170 is often full on journeys the 153 previously ruled. GTR on the other hand seems busier off peak, but still a long way to go in the peak. Everyone gets a seat that wants one from Welwyn Garden City and that is still with a lot of trains missing from the timetable (Yes the Baldock services didn’t stop at Welwyn Garden City but it did take demand from Knebworth and Welwyn North)
Interesting all ECML operators are above 100% Lumo is already close to HTs numbers (am I missing something)
But I do wonder if some of this extra traffic is down to moving off passengers from other operators. Is LNER taking some of the Advanti passengers? Is EMR indirectly benefiting from the TPE problems? (I don’t do any journeys now that involved these operators.)
It is defiantly a good news story, be very interested to see the split between regional / IC on EMR. As many have pointed out however journeys made doesn’t equal increased revenue. The majority of ”Struggling” operators are not running the frequencies of pre-covid. Some of the timetable cut-backs make little sense, such as GTR reducing the evening services on Great Northern (and other areas). A lot of these are very well loaded, much more loaded than in the daytime. Keeping the evening frequency the same certainly would help increase the off-peak demand. However this reduction may be down to staffing issues of course, the evening was a lottery to if your service would run, it does seem to run now. So if it is a case of trim it and make it reliable then that is also positive (as long as it returns)
The real question the government needs to establish is what it wants the railway for. On the Nuclear option of closing them all, would the money saved on rail need to go into road infrastructure? Many of these “Shut the railways down - I don’t use them” May soon be a little upset if congestions increases. As Road use is already more than 100% pre-covid, so a lot of work needs to be done. Hopefully if we can make the service reliable again then everyone is a winner.
On the local side quite possibly, between Manchester and Sheffield especially.
Albeit the bit of EMRs operation which has bounced back the best is the IC side, which doesn’t compete with TPE. That’s likely a reflection of the general recovery of long distance traffic, and has perhaps benefited from Avanti’s issues to some extent.
Nobody seriously thinks that’s any kind of option other than a few posters on here.
Nicholas Lewis
Established Member
The biggest issue remains
If return to the office was happening it would have started to show through by Q4 but this has been the number all year. Of course this only tells half the story as clearly a huge number of those journeys are still being made but on daily tickets which they acknowledge nationally is at 107% of pre covid. Thus its extremely important that the commuter operators both in London and regional cities still need to match capacity to demand and if that means different timetables/formations on Mon/Fri to Tues-Thurs then so be it.
Data on train km and passenger utilisation show why SE and GTR had to cut back on capacity and services as they were still too far adrift of pre covid position so will be interesting when we get Jun-Sept data to see how much they've been able to close the gap.
There are positives if you look at Q4 compared to previous three quarters with Northern up 8% over previous quarters and TPE down 7% (i wonder why) and SE off 3% presumably due to Lizzie line? Most other operators were -2 to +2% range so evidence that steady state is closing in notwithstanding strikes of course distorting data.
Of course the standout issue is that Lizzie line data now massively overestimated by ORR and its data source although positively what TfL is reporting isn't being questioned so you have to wonder why they didn't do a cross check before now. Also in all likelihood it may be distorting data for SE/GWR/GA/HEX being as they are impacted by changed service patterns.
Bottom line is revenue shortfall to pre covid is -3.6B although without strikes it may have been closer to -3B. How much of that is offset by operators reducing costs through less stock and train services will only become clearer when ORR publishes the financial review for year end 31/3/23 but i would suggest 0.5B is top end so 2.5B is the ongoing passenger support needs not forgetting of course the other 6B that goes direct to NR to run the railway on a day to day basis - there is enhancement expenditure on top of this.
To my mind the Treasury needs to be persuaded to hold here for a couple of years and yes 2.5B of additional subsidy post covid buys a lot of other things for citizens but the rail industry needs a chance to consolidate from here and once free of industrial action show that it can further close the gap.
Whats worse is that revenue isn't even keeping pace with that
If return to the office was happening it would have started to show through by Q4 but this has been the number all year. Of course this only tells half the story as clearly a huge number of those journeys are still being made but on daily tickets which they acknowledge nationally is at 107% of pre covid. Thus its extremely important that the commuter operators both in London and regional cities still need to match capacity to demand and if that means different timetables/formations on Mon/Fri to Tues-Thurs then so be it.
Data on train km and passenger utilisation show why SE and GTR had to cut back on capacity and services as they were still too far adrift of pre covid position so will be interesting when we get Jun-Sept data to see how much they've been able to close the gap.
There are positives if you look at Q4 compared to previous three quarters with Northern up 8% over previous quarters and TPE down 7% (i wonder why) and SE off 3% presumably due to Lizzie line? Most other operators were -2 to +2% range so evidence that steady state is closing in notwithstanding strikes of course distorting data.
Of course the standout issue is that Lizzie line data now massively overestimated by ORR and its data source although positively what TfL is reporting isn't being questioned so you have to wonder why they didn't do a cross check before now. Also in all likelihood it may be distorting data for SE/GWR/GA/HEX being as they are impacted by changed service patterns.
Bottom line is revenue shortfall to pre covid is -3.6B although without strikes it may have been closer to -3B. How much of that is offset by operators reducing costs through less stock and train services will only become clearer when ORR publishes the financial review for year end 31/3/23 but i would suggest 0.5B is top end so 2.5B is the ongoing passenger support needs not forgetting of course the other 6B that goes direct to NR to run the railway on a day to day basis - there is enhancement expenditure on top of this.
To my mind the Treasury needs to be persuaded to hold here for a couple of years and yes 2.5B of additional subsidy post covid buys a lot of other things for citizens but the rail industry needs a chance to consolidate from here and once free of industrial action show that it can further close the gap.
Failed Unit
Established Member
I have heard that before, I remember a Central trains manager saying the Lincoln Christmas Market actually loses them money compared to normal Saturday because when passengers are paying circa £10 per person each, it doesn’t cover the cost of the units / staff on the extras.
On the other hand although it didn’t make the railway any extra money, that was a significant amount of car off the road.
However are the rural railways a good use of taxpayers money is a debate I am sure everyone can spin to make their point. How much is social inclusion worth? Does Great Yarmouth needs all these extra car? What is the cost of congestions, maintaining the roads with more traffic on them etc. I suspect the answer that this is probably nobody really knows. When people start then debating about costs of accidents etc (more likely / frequent with more traffic) then we have a lot of numbers to debate.
I will take the good news, as EMR despite their faults seem to generally be doing a good job. Just hope they can one-day implement the December 2022 timetable. Their figures are very good when you consider Peterborough - Lincoln has still got lots of gaps in the timetable. Will watch with interest to see how the increase of service (in May) has helped the numbers.
Very good news on the IC side. I guess it is possible that passengers from London - Stoke on Trent are changing at Derby, but on a normal day I can’t see too many doing that. Same with London - Manchester, I have gone via Sheffield in the past, but people who use this site do strange things compared to normal customers. I wasn’t in a hurry and enjoy the route.
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We (and the treasury!) need to move on from constantly comparing to pre Covid, or to what the situation “should be” now had the pandemic not happened. Hopefully once we have a more sensible government in place that process will start.
Very good news on the IC side. I guess it is possible that passengers from London - Stoke on Trent are changing at Derby, but on a normal day I can’t see too many doing that. Same with London - Manchester, I have gone via Sheffield in the past, but people who use this site do strange things compared to normal customers. I wasn’t in a hurry and enjoy the route.
A pleasant journey but, exactly as you say, your average traveller will generally go for the quickest/most straightforward route.
Nicholas Lewis
Established Member
Agree comparing to pre covid is not potentially useful but the bottom line remains how much subsidy any govt is prepared to provide.
Don't bank on it Reeves is sounding ever more paranoid about how Labour needs to prove itself as being fiscally more regarded than the Torys which to my mind wont lead to anymore money being put on the table. Best you will get is Louise Haigh telling unions there is no more money instead of Steve Montgomery.
I’m not so sure. Remember we aren’t dealing with a “normal” conservative government, but the most right wing in living memory. We’re now beyond the point where the fiscally conservative and sensible thing to do would be for the government to stop blocking a settlement, and allow the industry to move on!
I don’t want to sidetrack the thread into a discussion of politics/IR issues, though!
Robertj21a
On Moderation
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No way is the Treasury going to agree 2.5B additional subsidy.
As you say, there's rather a lot of other issues, probably far more deserving and benefiting a far greater proportion of the country.
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No. In Britain rail fares have traditionally risen inline with the Retail Price Index, RPI. This is a somewhat dated measure of inflation, and almost everything else is related to the Consumer Price Index, CPI.
Since January ‘20, regulated rail fares have risen by a compound 14% IIRC, RPI by 28%, and CPI by 18%.
Failed Unit
Established Member
For interest. Do we still have the load factors of the operators train recorded. I suspect TPEs will still be very high because of the reduced timetable compared to 2019.
Quite. People are demonstrating that they want and will use the trains, just as they are bottoming out what price for fares they are prepared to countenance.
If our Establishment is sensible, they will adapt to this market, try and grow revenue and utilise the railway as an enabling force to enable people to participate in the economy, as sensible countries are doing.
Alternatively, they could continue down the half-witted, proven not to work fantacy of a "commercial" railway which should pay its way through the farebox as much as possible, regardless of cuts.
Nicholas Lewis
Established Member
With something like 15B handed to NR and the operators every year its way off being a commercial railway on the terms BR was expected to deliver to. Its was correct for the industry to trim at the margins but now it needs to be given the space to show that it can improve things further.
Yes, giving it some headroom to grow the business would help.
I can't help but think that we need to re-think the purpose of the passenger railway and run it accordingly - along the lines of Germany, Austria, South Australia etc.
Killingworth
Established Member
Possibly, but on the Sheffield - Manchester section TPEs loadings look greatly down on pre-Covid. This afternoon I saw a 3 car TPE 185 with plenty of space following a crowded Northern 3 car 195 stopper with many standing. TPE weekday commuting westbound services are probably carrying less than 50% of pre-Covid whereas the stoppers have benefitted and EMR too.
The quality of TPE service is doing it severe harm and distorts comparisons across time, operators and routes.
Is that not just because no one expects a TPE to turn up so they descend on the Northern.
It's certainly no reason for a declining passenger usage narrative.
Killingworth
Established Member
On this route it's an increasing passenger usage on two TOCs offsetting declining on the third but hard to tell if the overall result is one way or the other.
You certainly need to be an optimist if wanting to go to/from Liverpool or Cleethorpes and that is a factor in seeing lower loaded trains through the centre.
As a PP says, until the current period of high inflation, the government raised fares by RPI which is generally higher than CPI. Not just by RPI, mind, there was an escalator in place that for many years meant that RPI+1 was used - indeed briefly it was RPI+3.
And a few lunatics in SW1.
Prolonging this dispute is more expensive than settling it. Many of the "reforms" that are the sticking point in the negotiations (it's not about the payrise, most would accept 4%+4%) offer very little in the way of financial return.
Absolutely. Rail passengers have endured inflation busting fare increases for years.
All to support the fantasy of the "commercial" passenger railway.
I suspect not even there. They’re happy to let the dispute bubble along for various reasons, but actual line closures haven’t been mooted anywhere other then the wilder threads on here.
It’s clearly your first rodeo
. The poster you’ve quoted there is a bus enthusiast who always says the same things re. railway IR issues, and has been doing so for many years.
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railfan99
Established Member
I don't want to go OT, but 'South Australia' as a state in Oz only has suburban trains in small Adelaide. Did you mean 'southern Australia' as in my city of Melbourne and state of Victoria with Metro Trains and V/Line respectively?
Ah, you could have me there.
Southern Australia might be a better description of the area I aspire to.
railfan99
Established Member
A few posts above yours, Bald Rick said "...Since January ‘20, regulated rail fares have risen by a compound 14% IIRC, RPI by 28%, and CPI by 18%."
So if he's correct, rail fares have risen by less than the UK's measure of inflation.
Only in the last couple of years. Before that they rose well above inflation. That's just the regulated fares, operators can do what they like with the unregulated ones. That's why some Anytime Returns don't cost much less than the equivalent 7DS.
Only in the last year (BaldRick is quite right of course for this year) We've endured above inflation rises for decades. We have an overpriced system in comparison to peer group countries
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