How does the Dutch rail network work?

Forgive me for sounding naive, but how does the national rail network operate in Holland? I have always been told that the government owned operator, Nederlandse Spoorwegen operated all services, but I see Transdev and Arriva have rail services as well.

Is it a franchsing system, similar to what we have in the UK or something totally different?

You will find practically all you need to know from the following website links.

NS

InterRail

Wikipedia article

the mainlines are all operated by NS, yet some local lines are operated by private companies when the local government grants them the contract (much like in Germany)

toerist said:

the mainlines are all operated by NS, yet some local lines are operated by private companies when the local government grants them the contract (much like in Germany)

Click to expand...

Now that sounds like a good system. I wonder if anyone who knows the Dutch railways can tell us if it works.

exile said:

Now that sounds like a good system. I wonder if anyone who knows the Dutch railways can tell us if it works.

Click to expand...

It works much the same way as the system in Germany with the local Government awarding contracts to DB or private operators with mixed success, some companies are very good, others not so good. Usually a new fleet comes with the contract though!

NS has a very simple fares system, it's idiot proof with modest walk-up fares (advances don't really exist). I like that as well as the VIRM double deckers!

Essentially the majority of NS is a franchise which is let to NS until 2015 and the smaller branch lines are let as differing franchises, very similar to France too where the Mainlines are one company and the branch lines are different franchises contracted out by local governments. Except in France the local governments own the rolling stock and the Tocs simply operate the services.

One major benefit in some areas is that local trains are tendered together with buses. This has improved integration.

WatcherZero said:

Essentially the majority of NS is a franchise which is let to NS until 2015 and the smaller branch lines are let as differing franchises, very similar to France too where the Mainlines are one company and the branch lines are different franchises contracted out by local governments. Except in France the local governments own the rolling stock and the Tocs simply operate the services.

Click to expand...

I thought SNCF had a complete monopoly of passenger traffic?

radamfi said:

One major benefit in some areas is that local trains are tendered together with buses. This has improved integration.

Click to expand...

This sounds far too organised for my liking.

There are a few things which make it a success.

Track (no stupid junctions where trains need to cross a mainline like we see in the ECML and WCML)
Timetable (a standardised repeating TT for the whole country)
High frequency metro style operating model
The right trains at the right place. (high capacity double decker stock on key routes... really, you should try it in the UK on the WCML)

The most important thing on "how does it work" is a nationwide clock-face timetable which repeats itself EVERY hour in combination with smart track laying (lots of fly-overs). Secondly, we have no headcodes but train series.

Let me try to explain:
From Amsterdam to Zandvoort you have a half hourly service departing at xx:14 and xx.44 (from 06:44 till 00:14)
In the timetable and for rail staff this is called the 5400 series. The 06:44 departure will have train identification number 5414, with the next one 5416...5418 (so every half hour you add 2 on top of the train ID, 4 for every hour)

Okay that was easy... now something more difficult, the Cross country "NorthEast" service.... Pictures taken from http://wiki.ovinnederland.nl/wiki/NoordOost


From Schiphol Airport to Groningen you have the 700 series (which runs once per hour). With the first departure being the 06:19 departure. This train might have ID 711, with the next proceeding train being the 715 one hour later. But now we get to the difficult part...

At 06:49 (Half a hour later) we have again a once hourly service. This time the 1600 series to Enschede. This train will have ID 1613 (being between the 11 and 15 of train series 700). Both the 700 and 1600 series run the same route till Amersfoort. So for this route (Schiphol to Amersfoort) there is a steady half hourly service.

Q:Why is it 1613 and not 1611 or 1615?
A: Simply because the end number 11 (used in 711) has expired, we are now half an hour later and 13 is exactly between 11 and 15. So you will have the following pattern: 711, 1613, 715, 1617, 719, 1621.... till late evening when 787 is the last departure from the Airport at 23:19.

STOP reading if you still don't get the above and read it over before we introduce you to the hard part.
To make it a bit easier to understand I present you two maps...

First and second half of the hour...
...

From Den Haag/Rotterdam to Groningen we have train series 500, which will arrive at Amersfoort at the same time as the 1600 service from Schiphol to Enschede.
Also a service from Den-Haag/Rotterdam to Enschede runs every hour.

So, we have 4 series which now form a cross country network, with once per hour a direct train, and once per hour (exactly half an hour later) a service with one cross platform change at Amsersfoort.
If you understand this one you can travel in the Netherlands because I gave you the hardest one to date.


Congratulations if you understand it... There are more of these sort of examples in the Netherlands, but these prove to be less difficult.
For those who still don't have enough... here is the Cross Country "NorthEast peak time service pattern" But if you don't mind I'm not going to explain that one....



Now about operators:
In fact there are a few main line operators in the Netherlands.

- NS Reizigers, which operates all mainlines, except the High Speed Line.
- NS Internationaal (trade name is NSHispeed) which operates the FYRA trains service on the Amsterdam - Rotterdam - Breda High Speed Line on behalf of High Speed Alliance.
- ICE Internationaal which is an open access company by DB and NS Internationaal who operates the Amsterdam to Frankfurt ICE service.
- Thalys, which is an Belgium open access operator with a Dutch subsidiary in Amsterdam. Thalys pays royalty's to High Speed Alliance in order to use the High Speed Line between Amsterdam and Brussels.

A map showing ALL services and frequencies can be found here

* Fyra has been extended to Breda (not shown on map yet)
* ICE not shown on map

oattam09 said:

This sounds far too organised for my liking.

Click to expand...

Take Syntus, in the 90's NS wanted to cancell the trains between Arnhem and Winterswijk because the were operated at a loss.

A new TOC (Syntus) was formed and that TOC would also be responsible for local and regional bus services in the area. Syntus ordered new trains (Lint41) and made sure their trains and buses connected.
Originally Syntus stands for SYNergie tussen Trein en bUS which means Synergy between Train and Bus


As a result ridership increased over 400%. Today Syntus is privately funding a track doubling between Zevenaar and Doetinchem to allow 6 tph service between Arnhem and Doetinchem.

However it's not their fault, Syntus is the least punctual TOC on the network. Signalling problems and other infrastructural mess, which is the responsibility of ProRail (the Dutch equivalent of NetworkRail) count for 95% of their delays.

Wow, what a brilliant explanation of how integrated networks work! Many contributors don't approve of this type of running and prefer each train to run independently and not to connect (i.e. the British way) but I fail to convince them why the Dutch way is better. Now I can link to this post and win the argument easily!

It is a better way and it is very suited to the Dutch network with its sensibly planned flyovers and generous platform provision at interchanges.

Of course, the UK system is different. Track rationalisation means that in a lot of places that could work as interchanges, it's impossible to have trains arriving simultaneously from two routes in the same direction. As an example, would it be possible to have a train from Cardiff and Birmingham arriving in Shrewsbury every half hour, with the former travelling on to Manchester/Holyhead, and the latter continuing to Aberystwyth or Holyhead?

Simple answer... YES.

But you need to have your infrastructure sorted out to do those things.

That's what I mean, does the infrastructure and signalling at Shrewsbury allow for these simultaneous ovements with cross platform interchange? I don;t think it does, but I'm not infrastructure expert!

Given that building a proper track layout is a prerequisite for a creating a good integrated network, not having such a layout cannot be used as an excuse for not having connections. It simply needs to be done, full stop. Lack of land cannot be used as an excuse. The Netherlands is incredibly densely populated and has done it.

radamfi said:

Given that building a proper track layout is a prerequisite for a creating a good integrated network, not having such a layout cannot be used as an excuse for not having connections. It simply needs to be done, full stop. Lack of land cannot be used as an excuse. The Netherlands is incredibly densely populated and has done it.

Click to expand...

It could be argued that the desne population density means that an integrated and frequent network is desirable in the first place! We must not forget that The Netherlands network is comparable to the old Network South East in terms of area and type of operation. However, the geography of the netwrok is different.

It's easy to say 'it must be done', but that rather ignores all of the other thing sthat are wrong with the UK system and need to be done. There is simply not the money to fix most of the problems, and in my opinion building additional tracks and platforms is not a high priority, much as I admire the Dutch railways.

Apparently the money seems to be there somehow... how else do you want to pay for HS2... a line which is, in my opinion a true waste of money as long as your national network remains to be a total mess.

The reason for mentioning density is because GB's high density is used as an excuse not to improve infrastructure. Yes, GB has other important rail issues that need to be addressed, but if you don't build the full infrastructure required for an integrated network then the GB rail network will continue to be used primarily where direct services exist and will therefore continue to be not used to its full potential.

EWS 58038 said:

Apparently the money seems to be there somehow... how else do you want to pay for HS2... a line which is, in my opinion a true waste of money as long as your national network remains to be a total mess.

Click to expand...

I am broadly against HS2, although I recognise that it will address capacity issues north of London.

I'm not so sure that I'd go so far as to describe the UK netowrk as a total mess. Yes, it has a lot of problems, and there are a lot of imrpovements I;d liek tos ee made if we had a more enlightened view of railways from our governments, but millions of people do manage to make journeys from one end of the country to the other by changing trains at places like Salisbury, Cheltenham, Peterborough and Preston.

radamfi said:

The reason for mentioning density is because GB's high density is used as an excuse not to improve infrastructure. Yes, GB has other important rail issues that need to be addressed, but if you don't build the full infrastructure required for an integrated network then the GB rail network will continue to be used primarily where direct services exist and will therefore continue to be not used to its full potential.

Click to expand...

The fact is that the UK railways have been used as a political football for far too long. There are also geographical constraints to improving some locations due to contours, valleys and high ground, which are rather less in evidence in The Netherlands.

Geographically, the UK is not so suitabe for the operation of a true hub and spoke network. This is due to both natural geography and population densities, and the history of rationalisation which has left long branches like Aberystwyth, Pwllheli, Skegness, Whitby and Matlock, to name just a few.

How do the geographical/geological constraints compare to Switzerland which also has an interconnecting network?

radamfi said:

How do the geographical/geological constraints compare to Switzerland which also has an interconnecting network?

Click to expand...

What constrains are you talking about? Last week I used the Lotschberg base tunnel 5 times and in just 25 minutes your from one end of the Alps to the other.... North/South travel in Switzerland has exploded since the tunnel opened with two intercity trains per hour of which one is a twelve coach double decker...

So that geographical excuse is hereby crushed and thrown into the bin.

And next project, the Gothard base tunnel will now open in 2016 rather then 2017 and will crush travel time to the Italian part of Switzerland by 1,5 hours... I can only imagine what for effect that tunnel will have on the geographical constrains....

EWS 58038 said:

What constrains are you talking about? Last week I used the Lotschberg base tunnel 5 times and in just 25 minutes your from one end of the Alps to the other.... North/South travel in Switzerland has exploded since the tunnel opened with two intercity trains per hour of which one is a twelve coach double decker...

So that geographical excuse is hereby crushed and thrown into the bin.

Click to expand...

Not really if you look at things in the context of the UK and how the railway system developed in victorian times.

What I'm talking about is more about the location of stations and junctions, where, for historical reasons, they have been built in a place that makes them hard to expand due to adjacent rivers, cliffs or other geographical obstructions.

There is also the fact that a lot of railway land has been sold off, and many stations that originally had extensive goods yards and many platofrms have now had their footprint reduced,a nd are squeezed in beside roads, supermarkets and other developments.

I suspect that in countries like Switzerland railways were built a bit later than in the UK, and were also constructed with integration and connections more in mind than here, where there was a great deal of competition during the yars of the 'Railway Mania'.

If I use my local city as an example, it will hopefully illustrate the piecemeal development of Uk railways withina geographical context.

Swansea once had four main line terminal railway stations. One approached from the west down a small valley and ran along the seafront to Swansea Victoria. This was closed in 1964. A leisure centre now stands on the site.

A different company approached form the east along the shoreline. The prime motivation for this line was to take coal from the Rhondda Valley to the docks at Swansea. There was also a limited passenegr service which terminated at Swansea East, but this was withdrawn in the 1930's.

A third company ran down the Swansea Valley, and was constructed to take coal from the valley to the docks. It later joined up with other lines to provide a means of access from the Midlands to the port, in competition with the GWR lines from the East. This line served Swansea St Thomas, where passenger trains were withdrawn in 1950.

The final piece in the jigsaw was the South Wales Main Line, absorbed by the GWR later, which approached form the east over a huge viaduct over the river valley. The line into Swansea itself was originally a branch that followed the riverside down to what was then the main business district of the town.

All of the different line slinked up through a system that ran across the town on brick viaducts, but all oeprated their own stations. The lines were used to exchange freight wagons ot the various parts of the docks system, and were under the control of the Harbour Trust, a seperate organisation again.

As I hope can be seen, the history of railway development and the geography of the area combined to ensure that seperate companies gained access to the industry and port faiclities of the town from different directions and different routes. There was no integration, no planning and no foresight. Each independent company wanted access to the riches that could be found within the coal and metals industry and the port, and they built their lines to achieve that at the lowest cost.

The one remaining station can't be expanded due to the fact that it is part built on a viaduct, and is surrounded by offices and roads. This situation is replicated all across the country, and should illustrate why it is not a simple or cheap matter to improve the infrastructure in so many places.

Not simple and not cheap indeed... nor has the Dutch system been. But if you don't spend the money you'll never get to the point we are.

And we still continue to improve the rail system. Currently two large projects are carried out.

- Lelystad to Zwolle (new line for 200 km'h running)
- Delft tunnel, which will replace the current mainline viaduct to four track tunnel under the city.

EWS 58038 said:

Not simple and not cheap indeed... nor has the Dutch system been. But if you don't spend the money you'll never get to the point we are.

And we still continue to improve the rail system. Currently two large projects are carried out.

- Lelystad to Zwolle (new line for 200 km'h running)
- Delft tunnel, which will replace the current mainline viaduct to four track tunnel under the city.

Click to expand...

I know, I am a great admirer of the Dutch system, and I wish we had more of your vision here!

Antwerpen looked like a hopeless case with its central station in a dead end. But now thanks to a huge tunnel it is now on a through route. Things can be done if you really want. Britain isn't that less wealthy than Belgium and Netherlands but chooses to spend its money in a different way (e.g. defence)

radamfi said:

Antwerpen looked like a hopeless case with its central station in a dead end. But now thanks to a huge tunnel it is now on a through route. Things can be done if you really want. Britain isn't that less wealthy than Belgium and Netherlands but chooses to spend its money in a different way.

Click to expand...

Yes, rail transport has always been a low priority for any government. They prefer to have nuclear missles. The printed media are also less supportive of railways, which does tend to have an impact on people;'s thinking, and therefore on government policy.

Even so, when you look at something like the main line in Cornwall, it's hard to see how it can ever be made clockface unless the stopping pattern of every train is made identical, and every service is operated by trains that have an identical acceleration and braking profile. Plus you'd need to completely rebuild Largin viaduct.

Even if you do all that someone will then complain that having departures from Penzance hourly at xx33 or whatever means that they will miss their train home from Redruth or Truro, and be delayed by an hour! And of course, increasing the service to half hourly would result in more subsidy!

Greenback said:

Even so, when you look at something like the main line in Cornwall, it's hard to see how it can ever be made clockface unless the stopping pattern of every train is made identical

Click to expand...

No, because you will still be able to operate local, semi-fast and InterCity trains on your network. You only need to re-timetable them so that at key points some trains can tke over. Like a local being taken over at Newton Abbot where it connects with the Intercity to/from London.

and every service is operated by trains that have an identical acceleration and braking profile.

Click to expand...

No, you can add slack time in a time table to prevent this. Even the Swiss do that.

Plus you'd need to completely rebuild Largin viaduct.

Click to expand...

I don't see why you can't have one or more single track sections and still operate a clock face timetable... We have single track sections as well and still manage to get a decent volume of trains through it.

Even if you do all that someone will then complain that having departures from Penzance hourly at xx33 or whatever means that they will miss their train home from Redruth or Truro, and be delayed by an hour!

Click to expand...

That train from Redruth or Truro can connect on the xx33 or whatever departure from Penzance

And of course, increasing the service to half hourly would result in more subsidy!

Click to expand...

That might indeed happen, but the benefit of it is having a more frequent service and higher passenger volumes because the train is a lot more attractive to use. Now... connect your local bus network to it and in a few years you will see a 400 percent increase in use on local services.

EWS 58038 said:

I don't see why you can't have one or more single track sections and still operate a clock face timetable... We have single track sections as well and still manage to get a decent volume of trains through it.

Click to expand...

Yes. I have been surprised by the amount of single track that exists in NL. For example, I didn't realise the line to Den Helder is mostly single track. We are actually pretty well off with the amount of double and 4 tracking in GB.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

EWS 58038 said:

No, because you will still be able to operate local, semi-fast and InterCity trains on your network. You only need to re-timetable them so that at key points some trains can tke over. Like a local being taken over at Newton Abbot where it connects with the Intercity to/from London.


...

No, you can add slack time in a time table to prevent this. Even the Swiss do that.

Click to expand...

I have been arguing for this on forums for years but the average British forum poster doesn't like this idea and criticises this practice when they discuss their travels in, say, NL or Germany.

Let me give a couple of examples of highly criticised timetabling, by both passengers and enthusiasts.

When Midland Mainline had a lot of 170s, they introduced a cunning timetable in which 170s from the north would arrive in Leicester and get looped by fast HSTs which would run non-stop to St Pancras. The intention was that passengers would connect onto the HSTs and get a fast overall journey time. However, most passengers didn't understand this and continued on the 170 stopping at all stops into St Pancras. This timetable was quickly abandoned and the traditional British style timetable reintroduced.

The stopping London Midland service from Crewe to London Euston is designed to arrive in Rugby in time for a non-stop Virgin service to London. This gives an hourly fast overall journey time from most Trent Valley stations which is far better than what most places had. However, this has come in for severe criticism especially from Nuneaton passengers who previously had an hourly direct service. Many people sit on the local train for the whole journey even if they have a ticket that allows interchange.

These initiatives are some of the few times good European timetabling practice has been used in this country but it is not appreciated by the locals. Either by passengers or forum posters. But when you see local trains being overtaken by long distance trains in the Netherlands or elsewhere, passengers happily shuffle between the two trains. I don't know how we can get over this cultural difference.

It would be far easier to timetable traisn to overtake local services at Newton Abbott if the fourth platform had not been removed!

Clearly you can operate a clock face timetable with single track sections, but only if those sections are in 'the right place'. Singling in Cornwall was carried out in the 9180's and was based on the timetable and traction in operation at that time. In the 21st century it does impact on train planning, which in turn impacts on the connectional possibilities.

It's also difficult to plan the timetable on a route like the Cornish Main Line, as there are local flows to consider as well as the long distance traffic. It is much easier to plan a robust timetable if you have a half hourly frequency, but the line, with its relatively low population density and lack of big towns or cities doesn't justify that level of service. Therefore the hourly train has to be all things to everyone.

Many proposals have been made for fast hourly services from Penzance calling at Redruth, Truro, St Austell, Bodmin Parkway and Liskeard only, along with slower hourly services calling at every stop. But it's money that prevents it at the end of the day. There simply isn't enough demand or revenue to justify such services.

If such a line existed in the Netherlands, would it have a half hourly service with hourly connections at the smaller junctions like St Erth and Par? Would the fast trains continue on alternately to Bristol and London?

radamfi said:

I have been arguing for this on forums for years but the average British forum poster doesn't like this idea and criticises this practice when they discuss their travels in, say, NL or Germany.

Let me give a couple of examples of highly criticised timetabling, by both passengers and enthusiasts.

When Midland Mainline had a lot of 170s, they introduced a cunning timetable in which 170s from the north would arrive in Leicester and get looped by fast HSTs which would run non-stop to St Pancras. The intention was that passengers would connect onto the HSTs and get a fast overall journey time. However, most passengers didn't understand this and continued on the 170 stopping at all stops into St Pancras. This timetable was quickly abandoned and the traditional British style timetable reintroduced.

The stopping London Midland service from Crewe to London Euston is designed to arrive in Rugby in time for a non-stop Virgin service to London. This gives an hourly fast overall journey time from most Trent Valley stations which is far better than what most places had. However, this has come in for severe criticism especially from Nuneaton passengers who previously had an hourly direct service. Many people sit on the local train for the whole journey even if they have a ticket that allows interchange.

These initiatives are some of the few times good European timetabling practice has been used in this country but it is not appreciated by the locals. Either by passengers or forum posters. But when you see local trains being overtaken by long distance trains in the Netherlands or elsewhere, passengers happily shuffle between the two trains. I don't know how we can get over this cultural difference.

Click to expand...

Which is all very good because the likes of NS tend to be proper railways run for the passenger - have a connectional policy and will actually hold trains. Our TOCs very rarely do because it will affect the figures or is just too much effort - when it is written policy not to hold anything even for your own passengers let alone those off other TOCs such timetables are useless far too often.