GTR passengers numbers

andystock22 · 9 Jun 2022

Just received an email from my MP regarding GTR:

"Passenger numbers are still at only 74% of pre-covid levels"

No where near this 90% figure that I've seen quoted in the media over the past few days.

RailUK Forums

zwk500 · 9 Jun 2022

The numbers will vary depending on the length of samples, time of day, day of week, time in the year etc.
Also raw numbers do not tell the whole story. People's journeys have changed, and with that so has the revenue picture.

GordonT · 9 Jun 2022

andystock22 said:
Just received an email from my MP regarding GTR:

"Passenger numbers are still at only 74% of pre-covid levels"

No where near this 90% figure that I've seen quoted in the media over the past few days.

No surprise that GTR's turf will have significant numbers of employees now tooled up for home working for at least part of their week?

Peregrine 4903 · 9 Jun 2022

andystock22 said:
Just received an email from my MP regarding GTR:

"Passenger numbers are still at only 74% of pre-covid levels"

No where near this 90% figure that I've seen quoted in the media over the past few days.

90% was encompassing all TOC's, not specifically GTR.

skyhigh · 9 Jun 2022

andystock22 said:
No where near this 90% figure that I've seen quoted in the media over the past few days.

I haven't seen these figures, but if it's a countrywide figure an average of 90% doesn't necessarily mean that GTR can't be at 74%. Given commuting seems to be down that seems fairly reasonable to me.

ScotGG · 9 Jun 2022

Also I wouldn't have too much faith in the MPs reply. Is that 74 percent from a month ago or the end of May? Who told them that? The DFT who want to show their cuts are justified?

Jorge Da Silva · 9 Jun 2022

andystock22 said:
Just received an email from my MP regarding GTR:

"Passenger numbers are still at only 74% of pre-covid levels"

No where near this 90% figure that I've seen quoted in the media over the past few days.

90% is the overall number across the industry

So actually they arent wrong, its just that some operators are above the 90% figure (like LNER) and other operates (GTR and GA) are below it. The average is 90% but some particularly where commuting was a big part are 20-30% lower than the 90% where as some are above it (particularly where it is leisure driven)

paulmch · 9 Jun 2022

Given that GTR were the largest TOC by passenger numbers before Covid, would it be reasonable to assume that if they're 15 percentage points below the national average that there will be some TOCs that have already passed through the 100% mark?

Jorge Da Silva · 9 Jun 2022

paulmch said:
Given that GTR were the largest TOC by passenger numbers before Covid, would it be reasonable to assume that if they're 15 percentage points below the national average that there will be some TOCs that have already passed through the 100% mark?

LNER is one of them thats has surpassed pre-pandemic levels

paulmch · 9 Jun 2022

Jorge Da Silva said:
LNER is one of them thats has surpassed pre-pandemic levels

They've certainly done a very good job over the last few years. Surely there has to be some more TOCs over a hundred to make the GTR 75%/national average 90% figure viable though? LNER's pre-pandemic passenger numbers were a fraction of what GTR were carrying.

Jorge Da Silva · 9 Jun 2022

paulmch said:
They've certainly done a very good job over the last few years. Surely there has to be some more TOCs over a hundred to make the GTR 75%/national average 90% figure viable though? LNER's pre-pandemic passenger numbers were a fraction of what GTR were carrying.

Yeah many long distance operators are well above pre-pandemic levels or operators which are leisure based markets.

andystock22 · 10 Jun 2022

ScotGG said:
Also I wouldn't have too much faith in the MPs reply. Is that 74 percent from a month ago or the end of May? Who told them that? The DFT who want to show their cuts are justified?

The email included an email directly from GTR.

Bald Rick · 10 Jun 2022

For clarity, the average is NOT 90%.

The average for May was in the high 70s.

Jorge Da Silva · 10 Jun 2022

Bald Rick said:
For clarity, the average is NOT 90%.

The average for May was in the high 70s.

basically before Bank holiday week it was 90% for the last 4-5 days according the DfT, but i except the average for the whole of May is around 80ish percent but its definetley now firmly in the high 80s between 85-93% in recent weeks according to DfT

Just did the average for May, and it was 84%

starlightEXPRESS · 10 Jun 2022

Is it true that it's the middle-distance commuters who have been the slowest to come back? (I often see this assertion bandied about, without any real backup.) In the south east for example, has travel from zones 2-6 into central London recovered more quickly than from stations just outside Greater London? If it's the middle-distance commuters (who pay more than the shorter-distance commuters) who are dragging the average down, this will have more an impact on finances than the headline figures would suggest...

Jorge Da Silva · 10 Jun 2022

starlightEXPRESS said:
Is it true that it's the middle-distance commuters who have been the slowest to come back? (I often see this assertion bandied about, without any real backup.) In the south east for example, has travel from zones 2-6 into central London recovered more quickly than from stations just outside Greater London? If it's the middle-distance commuters (who pay more than the shorter-distance commuters) who are dragging the average down, this will have more an impact on finances than the headline figures would suggest...

Revenue is behind I think because business travellers are very slow to recover. Not sure about middle distance commuters

paul1609 · 10 Jun 2022

paulmch said:
Given that GTR were the largest TOC by passenger numbers before Covid, would it be reasonable to assume that if they're 15 percentage points below the national average that there will be some TOCs that have already passed through the 100% mark?

GTR before Covid depending on how you measured it were something like LNER + AWC + 1/2 GWR.
LNER were (just) smaller than Southeastern which was the smallest of the SR dc tocs.

starlightEXPRESS said:
Is it true that it's the middle-distance commuters who have been the slowest to come back? (I often see this assertion bandied about, without any real backup.) In the south east for example, has travel from zones 2-6 into central London recovered more quickly than from stations just outside Greater London? If it's the middle-distance commuters (who pay more than the shorter-distance commuters) who are dragging the average down, this will have more an impact on finances than the headline figures would suggest...

From what I've seen in the Southeast the boundary is further out probably the first station outside the M25. HS1 and the Brighton Main Line have recovered well. Some of the others are basically ghost train lines.
Theres some oddities too the Eastern End of Marshlink from Rye to Ashford is the busiest I've ever seen it. I think the commuting to London has all but gone but incoming leisure traffic day trippers and stay cation particularly at the lower end of the market pontins/caravan parks/camping to Camber/ Romney have gone through the roof to the extent that the 4 cars 171s taken from Uckfield line since covid are now full and standing.

Bald Rick · 10 Jun 2022

Jorge Da Silva said:
basically before Bank holiday week it was 90% for the last 4-5 days according the DfT,

but that was comparing 2019, which was a BH week and depressed numbers, with 2022, which wasn’t.

May wasn‘t 84%. You can’t average the numbers on the DfT website due to different loadings on each.

Jorge Da Silva said:
Revenue is behind I think because business travellers are very slow to recover. Not sure about middle distance commuters

commuting from outside London into London is less than half of 2019.

starlightEXPRESS · 10 Jun 2022

Bald Rick said:
commuting from outside London into London is less than half of 2019.

Thanks Bald Rick, that's what I have heard too. Just to be clear, when you say "outside London", do you mean outside "Greater London" and/or outside the the travelcard zones? Has zone 2-5 to central London travel generally recovered more?

Bald Rick · 10 Jun 2022

Outside the 1-6 travel card area

commuting within London is higher.

andystock22 · 10 Jun 2022

On Monday evening at around 18:00 (tube strike day) I saw an Moorgate to Welwyn Garden City train between New Barnet (Zone 5) and Hadley Wood (zone 6) and the train was next to empty. Only 3 or 4 people in each carriage. It felt like we were back in Lockdown again!

I appreciate it was on a tube strike day and many commuters decided to work from home.

GordonT said:
No surprise that GTR's turf will have significant numbers of employees now tooled up for home working for at least part of their week?

I expect this is the case, especially on the Great Northern metro routes which call at Old Street (tech sector) and Moorgate (financial services / legal sectors).

MikeWM · 10 Jun 2022

Anecdotal and only covering a very small part of GTR's network, but my observations would be:

- Weekends are entirely back to normal on the London-Cambridge-Ely-Kings Lynn trains.

- My 'usual' morning late-commute train is probably seeing a similar number of passengers getting on at Ely as 2019, maybe a bit less. It's a little hard to tell as it is 8 carriages (up from 4) and starts from Ely rather than back at Kings Lynn.

- The 1739 Kings Cross-Kings Lynn usually looks rather cosy at 8 carriages now. It probably needs to go back to being 12 as far as Cambridge. Between Cambridge and Ely it probably has similar loads to 2019 (though also not 100% easy to tell - it used to split at Cambridge into an incredibly busy 4-car for Kings Lynn and an almost empty 8 car that terminated at Ely, but the overall numbers do appear similar).

- Cambridge North is seeing a *lot* more passengers board southbound/alight northbound than pre-2020, both on weekdays and weekends. It appears to have really taken off for leisure travellers, rather more so than commuters.

On an average week I'd have made 5 commuting round trips Ely-Cambridge and 1 leisure round trip Ely-London. Now it is probably 3 and 1, so 67% in terms of journeys made.

JonathanH · 10 Jun 2022

MikeWM said:
The 1739 Kings Cross-Kings Lynn usually looks rather cosy at 8 carriages now. It probably needs to go back to being 12 as far as Cambridge.

I'd imagine that GTR's seemingly long-term fleet plan for 35 units will be set up for there not to be any scope for trains to run with 12 car formations.

I wonder whether passengers will look at other options or continue to put up with the crowding. Removing the Letchworth and Royston stops might be the first step but that begs the question as to where those passengers go.

Nicholas Lewis · 10 Jun 2022

The real issue for the likes of GTR is season ticket revenue is sub 50% on many routes with increased use of trains after 9.30 off peak fare threshold supporting the increase in numbers of people using the trains but the revenue/passenger is lower. The other thing im seeing in the evening is how much busier the trains are into mid evening now compared to pre covid. How the industry squares the circle of reduced season ticket to its fixed cost base is yet to be fixed unless DfT is going to accept more support will be required for the foreseeable future.

GTR passengers numbers

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