• Our booking engine at tickets.railforums.co.uk (powered by TrainSplit) helps support the running of the forum with every ticket purchase! Find out more and ask any questions/give us feedback in this thread!

2017-2018 Estimates of Station Usage

Status
Not open for further replies.

Starmill

Veteran Member
Fares Advisor
Joined
18 May 2012
Messages
23,224
Location
Bolton
Does anybody know when the updated Estimates of Station Usage are due to be published by the ORR? I would imagine they are probably some time this week, or next week?

Thanks!
 
Sponsor Post - registered members do not see these adverts; click here to register, or click here to log in
R

RailUK Forums

Antman

Established Member
Joined
3 May 2013
Messages
6,842
Do they automatically include all of the season tickets on a 5 in 7 basis, or actual? WAT and therefore SWR will be down so so much this year. Given the sea change in habits caused by strikes and Network Rails seemingly interminable cornucopia of failure on SWR routes it could well be a lot closer to 90m than the almost 100m... that would be a huge change ....

2018 has not been a good year for passengers. And 2019 doesn’t look like being much better.
 

Dr Hoo

Established Member
Joined
10 Nov 2015
Messages
3,912
Location
Hope Valley
Do they automatically include all of the season tickets on a 5 in 7 basis, or actual? WAT and therefore SWR will be down so so much this year. Given the sea change in habits caused by strikes and Network Rails seemingly interminable cornucopia of failure on SWR routes it could well be a lot closer to 90m than the almost 100m... that would be a huge change ....

2018 has not been a good year for passengers. And 2019 doesn’t look like being much better.
The estimates normally come with a fairly comprehensive methodology report from the consultancy that has prepared them for ORR. As ‘Official Statistics’ I think they have to.
 

Esker-pades

Established Member
Joined
23 Jul 2015
Messages
3,766
Location
Beds, Bucks, or somewhere else
I was going to create a separate prediction thread, but it seems silly to duplicate:

I think the station with the lowest patronage will be British Steel Redcar. I'm predicting this as the bottom 10 (in roughly the following order):
1. British Steel Redcar
2. Teesside Airport
3. Reddish South
4. Coombe Junction Halt
5. Havenhouse
6. Stanlow & Thornton
7. Golf Street
8. Kildonan
9. Barry Links
10. Buckenham
 

whhistle

On Moderation
Joined
30 Dec 2010
Messages
2,636
Bag... Worms...
but every station that has less than 500 people a year should just close.
 

pemma

Veteran Member
Joined
23 Jan 2009
Messages
31,474
Location
Knutsford
Bag... Worms...
but every station that has less than 500 people a year should just close.

The reason that doesn't happen is because many stations which have very low usage could get a decent level of usage if they had a proper service - take Reddish South and Denton, for instance. Consequently any consultation to close stations won't go through smoothly so it's cheaper to provide a token service than to spend months or years going through the legal process of attempting to close a station.
 

PR1Berske

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2010
Messages
3,025
The Office for Rail and Road (ORR) will release the ever popular Estimates of Station Usage figures on the 11 December.

I know that the most popular used stainsst are often overlooked in favour of which stations are barely used; this year will include the All the Stations period, so some statistical quirks among the lesser used places are to be expected.
 

greatkingrat

Established Member
Joined
20 Jan 2011
Messages
2,751
The Office for Rail and Road (ORR) will release the ever popular Estimates of Station Usage figures on the 11 December.

I know that the most popular used stainsst are often overlooked in favour of which stations are barely used; this year will include the All the Stations period, so some statistical quirks among the lesser used places are to be expected.

No reason why that would make any difference. They used rover tickets rather than actually buying tickets to Berney Arms / Coombe Junction etc.
 

Journeyman

Established Member
Joined
16 Apr 2014
Messages
6,295
I was going to create a separate prediction thread, but it seems silly to duplicate:

I think the station with the lowest patronage will be British Steel Redcar. I'm predicting this as the bottom 10 (in roughly the following order):
1. British Steel Redcar
2. Teesside Airport
3. Reddish South
4. Coombe Junction Halt
5. Havenhouse
6. Stanlow & Thornton
7. Golf Street
8. Kildonan
9. Barry Links
10. Buckenham

You forgot Breich!
 

underbank

Established Member
Joined
26 Jan 2013
Messages
1,486
Location
North West England
Bag... Worms...
but every station that has less than 500 people a year should just close.

That would depend on numerous things though wouldn't it? I.e. such as how accurate those figures are - are there genuinely fewer than 500 people using that station or is it an estimate with a high margin of error? Also, who are these 500 people - is it the odd passenger throughout the day, or are there peaks, i.e. would one or two stopping trains at peak times cover it with off peak services not stopping? Does the station serve a particular attraction? What are the alternatives for those passengers and how much would it cost the taxpayer if funded alternatives were needed? How much growth potential is there if train services were improved? What would be the knock on effect - i.e. does the network as a whole gain more due to it being an access point to the main line that would otherwise lose business if people travelled by a different means. I really don't like the idea of such raw/simple data being used for fundamental changes - we need "the story" behind the figures.
 

Ken H

On Moderation
Joined
11 Nov 2018
Messages
6,272
Location
N Yorks
I was going to create a separate prediction thread, but it seems silly to duplicate:

I think the station with the lowest patronage will be British Steel Redcar. I'm predicting this as the bottom 10 (in roughly the following order):
1. British Steel Redcar
2. Teesside Airport
3. Reddish South
4. Coombe Junction Halt
5. Havenhouse
6. Stanlow & Thornton
7. Golf Street
8. Kildonan
9. Barry Links
10. Buckenham
Roman bridge?
 

Kite159

Veteran Member
Joined
27 Jan 2014
Messages
19,157
Location
West of Andover
I think a lot of people will have visited in the period when it was under the threat of closure.


I don't think it will have declined far enough.


No.

It will be interesting to see if IBM has declined

As for Breich, when did the announcement come out that Network Rail wanted to close the station? As it might have been after the cut-off for the stats [so might see a boost next year from both those wanting to visit in case it did close, and those visiting to see the shiny new platforms]
 

Skie

Member
Joined
22 Dec 2008
Messages
1,070
I'm interested in seeing what impact the new Mersey Gateway bridge will have had on Runcorn, now that it is a tolled crossing and not as convenient to get to the station from.
 

Esker-pades

Established Member
Joined
23 Jul 2015
Messages
3,766
Location
Beds, Bucks, or somewhere else
It will be interesting to see if IBM has declined

As for Breich, when did the announcement come out that Network Rail wanted to close the station? As it might have been after the cut-off for the stats [so might see a boost next year from both those wanting to visit in case it did close, and those visiting to see the shiny new platforms]
This period is April 2017 to April 2018. Breich was scheduled to close in December 2017.

IBM will have declined, but not by enough to drop into the top 10. Or, that's what I predict.
 

LNW-GW Joint

Veteran Member
Joined
22 Feb 2011
Messages
19,555
Location
Mold, Clwyd
The slight decline year by year in North Wales continues (-5.7% at Wrexham General).
Slight increase at Chester (0.8%), well up at Shrewsbury (5.9%).
Merseyrail (Wirral) numbers are down, but will have been affected by the extended periods of tunnel/loop closures during the year.
Liverpool South Parkway is up 13.9%, and there is a comment on increasing passengers at Liverpool Airport.
Not sure I believe that (airport numbers are up 3%).
More likely to be due to the Lime St engineering closures sending more people via Parkway.
 

Kite159

Veteran Member
Joined
27 Jan 2014
Messages
19,157
Location
West of Andover
Least Used:

1 - British Steel Redcar
2 - Barry Links
3 - Denton
4 - Tees-Side Airport
5 - Stanlow & Thornton
6 - Breich
7 - Reddish South
8 - Elton & Orston
9 - Thorpe Culvert
10 - Coombe Junction

---------

No surprise at British Steel Redcar falling to least used on grounds that it is a station which sadly lacks any purpose since the steel works were closed, how long until it keeps 2 trains a day in each direction?

I wonder why Denton suddenly dropped to the bottom 10, less folk buying Stockport - Denton tickets to take them over the 09:30 start of a TfGM Rail Ranger product when doing the Denton flyer on Fridays?

----

5% fall in passenger numbers at my local, probably more to do with lack of parking driving commuters away (and a poor Sunday service)
 

DH1Commuter

Member
Joined
28 Jun 2018
Messages
57
The estimates must be very rough, given the number who appear to travel ticketless on lines where revenue collection is not enforced well. That said, the least-used 10 contains no surprises.
 

PR1Berske

Established Member
Joined
27 Jul 2010
Messages
3,025
Outside the bottom 10 are stations which perhaps benefited from publicity stunts, local promotion, and staged visits, of I can put it that way.
 

Kite159

Veteran Member
Joined
27 Jan 2014
Messages
19,157
Location
West of Andover
Outside the bottom 10 are stations which perhaps benefited from publicity stunts, local promotion, and staged visits, of I can put it that way.

Agreed.

I would put 10p on Shippea Hill returning to the bottom ten by the time the 2019-2020 estimates are released.
 

DavidGrain

Established Member
Joined
29 Dec 2017
Messages
1,233
There is always an argument about accuracy of estimates. For example last week I made three return journeys from my local station to Birmingham Snow Hill, That means that my footfall at each station was 6 but because I have a pass and there are no barriers at my local station the only time that I was counted was as I passed through the barriers at Snow Hill and about half the time the barriers were open and unattended so I probably just counted as 3 passengers at Snow Hill for the whole week.
 

Mojo

Forum Staff
Staff Member
Administrator
Joined
7 Aug 2005
Messages
20,382
Location
0035
There is always an argument about accuracy of estimates. For example last week I made three return journeys from my local station to Birmingham Snow Hill, That means that my footfall at each station was 6 but because I have a pass and there are no barriers at my local station the only time that I was counted was as I passed through the barriers at Snow Hill and about half the time the barriers were open and unattended so I probably just counted as 3 passengers at Snow Hill for the whole week.
That is not how station usage is calculated in these statistics.

The following is an extract from the ORR webpage on station usage (http://orr.gov.uk/statistics/published-stats/station-usage-estimates/frequently-asked-questions) and explains where its data comes from.
As Britain does not have a fully gated rail network, a complete recording of passenger flows through stations is not possible. As a result, use of stations has to be estimated and there are some limitations on the data.

The estimates of station usage dataset is derived from the Origin Destination Matrix (ODM), a comprehensive matrix of passenger flows between stations throughout Great Britain.

The ODM is largely based on data produced for the MOIRA2.2 rail planning tool, which is produced for the rail industry by Resonate. MOIRA2.2 is a matrix that provides an estimate of journeys in the rail network in Great Britain for the duration of a financial year (1 April to 31 March). It is predominantly based on information from LENNON, the rail industry’s ticketing and revenue system. MOIRA2.2 includes all journeys associated with point to point flows and includes additional information to reflect travel on other products, such as London Travelcards and multi-zonal tickets in other major urban areas.

The production of the ODM requires some further adjustments to address known issues with the MOIRA2.2 data. These include an allocation of tickets sold to ‘London Terminals,’ allocation of demand between individual stations in group stations outside of London, such as Manchester group stations and a number of cases where adjustments are made to selected stations to account for specific known issues, for example Digby & Sowton.

A complete overview of the methodology can be found in the executive summary of the methodology report.
I think it's more likely that the figures will be skewed on lines where customers buy tickets to/from a station that has a longer journey because its the same price; this will be especially likely on routes where tickets are issued by staff on-board trains.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Top