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Northern franchise to end 1 March 2020 with Operator of Last Resort to take over

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Goldfish62

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Different management (senior level), direction etc.
whilst overnight nothing would change they can re-prioritise the organisation, instill, manage & challenge behaviours and they can also review timetable, maintenance plans and finances.
Agreed. When Connex Southeastern was temporarily nationalised the new management team completely refocused things. Externally only the name changed (it obviously had to). Livery and other aspects of the branding remained unchanged, but the refocusing resulted in a gradually improved service.
 
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Llama

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The TOCs still prepare their train plans in line with all planning regs and with their traincrew and traction unit diagrams fully accommodated. The infrastructure projects being delayed is a smokescreen.
 

LNW-GW Joint

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Is that an EU Rule? Not sure that the EU even say you have to franchise, or even privatise. I think they do say that if you put out tenders for contracts as large as a rail franchise, it must be open to EU bidders.
Edit: Ah, I see I was wrong. There are EU rules about the max length of a franchise (15 years) although I was right that there is no requirement to franchise.
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/en/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32007R1370

Transport service contracts (ie TOCs) have to be competed for under EU rules (some countries are still in the process of doing this, but they will do so over 5 years or so).
The UK view of this, dating back to 1993, is to franchise them out commercially to the private sector (world-wide, not just EU).
Other countries have mostly gone for localized operating contracts, much like our Merseyrail or London Overground, with no revenue risk or fares control.
Public sector TOCs also exist abroad, but we currently don't allow that (though Scotland has the powers to let a public sector contract, but it must still be competed for).
All this could change with Williams.
 

Robertj21a

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The dreadful Arriva statement including "largely because of external factors" just seems to me to demonstrate their denial of their responsibility.

Or, perhaps more likely, they've been badly let down by other organisations ?
 

mmh

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Agreed. When Connex Southeastern was temporarily nationalised the new management team completely refocused things. Externally only the name changed (it obviously had to). Livery and other aspects of the branding remained unchanged, but the refocusing resulted in a gradually improved service.

They didn't go over the top with branding changes, but there were minor ones - they changed the livery to the lilac door one still commonplace on Southeastern today, and got themselves a logo (a square of four geographic squares with the south east one highlighted)
 

transmanche

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Well, for the time being, the operator remains the same until 1 March. I'd imagine the new branding will be unveiled then.
I'm confident there will be no new branding. (Other than white stickers to cover up the 'by Arriva'.)

To be honest, looking at the FAQs, they appear to been drawn up rather hurridly simply to provide reassurance to passengers. It's the kind of thing that almost anyone here could have done knocked up over lunch.
 

TT-ONR-NRN

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Surely they need new branding, to differentiate the new company from Arriva? Customer association? Customers will associate the current brand with rubbish service, hostile staff and dirty trains, even if it does improve under the government
 

superkev

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It's a pity the other perpetrators of this fiasco I.e. The DFT (dept of twirps); the Government, Network rail and probably the unions are unlikely to be held to account.
As regards problems with new trains being an excuse Northern did choose CAF presumably on price.
K
 

Goldfish62

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It's a pity the other perpetrators of this fiasco I.e. The DFT (dept of twirps); the Government, Network rail and probably the unions are unlikely to be held to account.
As regards problems with new trains being an excuse Northern did choose CAF presumably on price.
K
If a manufacturer meets the specification then going on price is the obvious approach. CAF isn't exactly some second-rate ramshackle outfit.
 

Horizon22

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It was inevitable although certainly a risk. Read into Shapps' statement into detail and obviously he's got awareness / been told what the core issues are and may give some insights into Williams review. Identifying them isn't too hard; its the commitment to solve them that has so far been lacking from all involved.

Now it's the "government" who will be to blame for any future problems, however what has been notable about several franchises recently (such as Southern - although yes a management contract) is they go through a terrible 12-18 months and then recover. Suspect Northern may go a similar way. It's almost as if the contracts were too ambitious, too early...
 

matacaster

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The following article is from today's Huddersfield Examiner. See news feed below at 13:42.

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/government-
announces-train-operator-northern-17651747

"New operator makes bold promises

According to Mr Shapps, the new state-owned operator will:

  • Get rid of all Pacer trains in Yorkshire “by the spring”
  • Move electric trains from other parts of the network to the north so they can “boost capacity” for passengers travelling between Leeds and Manchester
  • Trial new technology to “identify crowding pinch points”
  • Extend platforms at 30 stations on the Northern network to accommodate longer trains
  • Deep clean all trains and “review the cleaning pattern”
  • Prioritise improving Sunday services"

These are indeed worthy objectives as Sunday services are awful, the trains are filthy and there is a severe capacity shortage. I'm not sure whether its necessary to trial new technology to spot crowd pinch points - just travel around on trains for a week and you'll likely find out all you need to know.

Is he suggesting boosting capacity between Leeds and Manchester by transferring electric trains to northern routes, with existing diesels on these routes being transferred to transpennine route? if so, which current routes will the diesels be replaced by electrics? Surely the simplest fix is to keep the 185's which were to go off-lease and double up all 185 diagrams on north transpennine. Whilst transferring additional electrics may help on West side of Pennines, There are limited places east of Manchester where they could be employed at present - Ilkley, Bradford, Skipton, Doncaster, but these are already slated to receive or indeed have received additional electric trains. The rest is not electrified.

Or is he hinting the North Transpennne route might be electrified throughout (although many years hence)?
-
 
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Goldfish62

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The following article is from today's Huddersfield Examiner

New operator makes bold promises
According to Mr Shapps, the new state-owned operator will:

  • Get rid of all Pacer trains in Yorkshire “by the spring”
  • Move electric trains from other parts of the network to the north so they can “boost capacity” for passengers travelling between Leeds and Manchester
  • Trial new technology to “identify crowding pinch points”
  • Extend platforms at 30 stations on the Northern network to accommodate longer trains
  • Deep clean all trains and “review the cleaning pattern”
  • Prioritise improving Sunday services

These are indeed worthy objectives as Sunday services are awful, the trains are filthy and there is a severe capacity shortage. I'm not sure whether its necessary to trial new technology to spot crowd pinch points - just travel around on trains for a week and you'll likely find out all you need to know.

Is he suggesting boosting capacity between Leeds and Manchester by transferring electric trains to northern routes, with existing diesels on these routes being transferred to transpennine route? if so, which current routes will the diesels be replaced by electrics? Surely the simplest fix is to keep the 185's which were to go off-lease and double up all 185 diagrams on north transpennine. Whilst transferring additional electrics may help on West side of Pennines, There are limited places east of Manchester where they could be employed at present - Ilkley, Bradford, Skipton, Doncaster, but these are already slated to receive or indeed have received additional electric trains. The rest is not electrified.

Or is he hinting the North Transpennne route might be electrified throughout (although many years hence)?
-
He can get away with saying all that and not be held to account. Apparently he's told Bozo he wants to move in the forthcoming reshuffle.
 

matacaster

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Transport service contracts (ie TOCs) have to be competed for under EU rules (some countries are still in the process of doing this, but they will do so over 5 years or so).
The UK view of this, dating back to 1993, is to franchise them out commercially to the private sector (world-wide, not just EU).
Other countries have mostly gone for localized operating contracts, much like our Merseyrail or London Overground, with no revenue risk or fares control.
Public sector TOCs also exist abroad, but we currently don't allow that (though Scotland has the powers to let a public sector contract, but it must still be competed for).
All this could change with Williams.

I suspect that the EU rules problem may be a technicality by the end of 2020, we could simply ditch any such clauses in contracts.
 

YorkshireBear

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Be interesting if the commiment for X number of 170 style extra carriages is kept as northern had that as a franchise commitment.
 

Carlisle

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Indeed - however, other TOCs manage it better that Northern do. Since I presume that passengers in their area are not any more messy than in other areas it is presumably a question of resources, management and skill / motivation.
It won’ have helped having trains start & terminate at rather obscure places like Morpeth which are probably largely devoid of cleaning & support staff anyway, even if there’s sufficient turnaround time, which at some locations under the present timetable, there isn’t
 

hexagon789

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New operator makes bold promises
According to Mr Shapps, the new state-owned operator will:

  • Get rid of all Pacer trains in Yorkshire “by the spring”
  • Move electric trains from other parts of the network to the north so they can “boost capacity” for passengers travelling between Leeds and Manchester
  • Trial new technology to “identify crowding pinch points”
  • Extend platforms at 30 stations on the Northern network to accommodate longer trains
  • Deep clean all trains and “review the cleaning pattern”
  • Prioritise improving Sunday services

It's not bad for a start, let us hope that those objectives can indeed be accomplished.
 

oscarthecat92

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Have they released which 30 platforms they will be extending? My bets are on the Airedale line, where Northern proposed 6 car trains via SDO which is impractical for such a heavily used route
 

Djgr

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Spot on. Whist faced with a large number of factors, many outside their control, they failed to manage any of them and their engagement with customers and the press was dire. "Never our fault" was the mantra until very recently when Shapps said he was going to take things away. And even now,there's only a grudging acknowledgement that some of the chaos might be down to them.

Agreed. Will join the North dancing in the streets after the trauma these shockers have given them.
 

nidave

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It's not bad for a start, let us hope that those objectives can indeed be accomplished.
How may of these "bold promises" would have happened anyway and are just re-announcing things already announced multiple times
 

hexagon789

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How may of these "bold promises" would have happened anyway and are just re-announcing things already announced multiple times

No idea, if Northern mentioned any of them I think they've been rather hidden by all the bad press they've been getting during their tenure
 

CdBrux

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Arriva has issued a statement on loss of the franchise, including this apology:

https://news.arriva.co.uk/news/statement-on-northern-franchise

Looks like they are not going to argue.
Even so, the financial settlement will be interesting, given there are claims and counter-claims on the reasons for financial failure.

I can imagine both sides would like to avoid a protracted and complex argument where they both could end up with worse outcomes than may have been agreed between them, take up a lot of effort doing so and the only people who win are the lawyers
 

CHAPS2034

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Surely they need new branding, to differentiate the new company from Arriva? Customer association? Customers will associate the current brand with rubbish service, hostile staff and dirty trains, even if it does improve under the government

Quite honestly, the travelling public will know very well that this iteration of Northern is different to what went on before. There has been so much coverage of the issue up here and the press and politicians will be watching like hawks to ensure that things do improve.

Passengers just want their service to improve and be reliable. I'm sure there would be an outcry if a serious amount of money was spent on re-branding everything to the detriment of just getting a reliable service running.
 

LNW-GW Joint

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I suspect that the EU rules problem may be a technicality by the end of 2020, we could simply ditch any such clauses in contracts.

Maybe. But you aren't going to get a Tory government to dump competition completely, and even WTO rules have provision for foreign access and competition for domestic business.
The rail sector is not a reserved/protected sector like defence.
 
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