Another one of my ideas for Railways...

[DenmarkRail]

I was watching BBC Question Time last night, and they started to talk about whether it was time for Britain to renationalise the railways... Someone raised a really good point that currently our railways are effectively nationalised, but with 'foreign' brands... Some others started to talk about that the FRANCHISE system doesn't work, but the private network does work... Which lead me to my new idea...

Currently, rail prices are expensive because of (gov regulation) and a lack of competition on lots of routes. The franchising system means that as standard, only one company operates on one route, which in my opinion is wrong. It is important that a market doesn't become a monopoly. Obviously there are exceptions, but the one route, one operator rule exists in general.

That is why, today, I am proposing a complete phased privatisation of the railways of Great Britain, through a FULL open access system, which would work on a 'slot' basis, with subsidies for certain stations, and services.

Let me use the East Coast for an example:
Lets say that Network Rail decide that there can be 12 trains a day between Edinburgh, and Kings Cross, one company could request 5 of those 'slots', another could request another 5, and another company could request 2. This would mean that 3 operators would be operating on a route, which would drive prices down, and increase consumer choice. This is something that the current 'partial' privatisation fails to do.

Another great benefit would be that an operator would be able to procure their own stock, rather than relying on DFT specifications, such as the 800 trains. There would no longer be requirements to paint stock in a certain way, or to create a uniformed style across ALL services.

Furthermore, another amazing benefit would be the ability to get new services across the board, rather than the current restrictive services. I hear many people here upset with the fact that Liverpool doesn't get enough services to London, well under this new system, many operators could take advantage, and open this service without franchise requirements getting in the way.

You may be asking... How would the government make money from this? Due to the new services, there would be new ways of the government making money, such as the ability to create a new train tax (replacing premiums) as well as the money for the travel rights. The increase of variety of services will create extra money for the economy, and the extra jobs through the extra services.

This system will also have huge changes for the way that stations are managed... Currently, they are included in the franchise to be operated by the operator... Now, they will be switched over to Network Rail, to ensure impartiality.

 

[EM2]

There is competition on routes, but it is in the franchise bidding stage.
The first problem that comes to mind with the 'slots' idea is that if you need to travel at a certain time, and only one operator has the slots around that time, then you're no better off than now.

 

[DenmarkRail]

There is competition on routes, but it is in the franchise bidding stage.
The first problem that comes to mind with the 'slots' idea is that if you need to travel at a certain time, and only one operator has the slots around that time, then you're no better off than now.

Yeah, I completely understand that, but when I was working on this, I was generally working on the airline principle (I guess the more metro services could work on a bus principle), which would clear the way for operators to work together, across a number of destinations and routes. I don't see this as being any different to missing a GC train to say Sunderland right now though.

Also with the "There is competition on routes, but it is in the franchise bidding stage" -> The competition I am talking about is pretty much in a nutshell, 3 of those bidders running the same route, which would directly drive prices down.

 

[Bevan Price]

It could become a nightmare if there were only "TOC specific" fares -- unless there was a mandatory requirement to accept "other TOC" tickets. Currently, with an open (non-advance) ticket, if you miss one train, you often have an alternative within the next hour or two. With TOC specific tickets, you would either have to buy a new ticket, or wait several hours for the next trin operated by the TOC that issued "your ticket" --- not exactly a user-friendly system.

 

[LAX54]

It could become a nightmare if there were only "TOC specific" fares -- unless there was a mandatory requirement to accept "other TOC" tickets. Currently, with an open (non-advance) ticket, if you miss one train, you often have an alternative within the next hour or two. With TOC specific tickets, you would either have to buy a new ticket, or wait several hours for the next trin operated by the TOC that issued "your ticket" --- not exactly a user-friendly system.

It would also cost NR a fortune with TOC on TOC delays !

 

[DenmarkRail]

It would also cost NR a fortune with TOC on TOC delays !

Don’t see why... they wouldn’t be paying out any more than currently. There wouldn’t be ‘more’ trains on the network, just more companies. Also the fact that the company gets to run their service as their own business rather than as a government franchise, would mean more investment, which should lower delays.

It could become a nightmare if there were only "TOC specific" fares -- unless there was a mandatory requirement to accept "other TOC" tickets. Currently, with an open (non-advance) ticket, if you miss one train, you often have an alternative within the next hour or two. With TOC specific tickets, you would either have to buy a new ticket, or wait several hours for the next trin operated by the TOC that issued "your ticket" --- not exactly a user-friendly system.

I don’t see a reason why new TOCs couldn’t look at an alliance type system which would result in interline tickets with other operators.

 

[NSEFAN]

Yeah, I completely understand that, but when I was working on this, I was generally working on the airline principle (I guess the more metro services could work on a bus principle), which would clear the way for operators to work together, across a number of destinations and routes. I don't see this as being any different to missing a GC train to say Sunderland right now though.

Also with the "There is competition on routes, but it is in the franchise bidding stage" -> The competition I am talking about is pretty much in a nutshell, 3 of those bidders running the same route, which would directly drive prices down.

I don't think you can so easily translate the way the airline industry works onto the railway. The limiting factor for flights is generally space available at airports, but there's plenty of empty sky. By comparison, the railway timetable is very interleaved with all sorts of pathing problems, so train operators cannot really run trains whebever they want. If the timetable is irregular then it makes planning even more difficult and can reduce capacity as the route mileage is not used optimally, which is why we have clock face timetables. These timetabling issues put a rather large spanner in the works for an airline style logistical operation.

 

[thedbdiboy]

The OP has effectively described the underlying structure of the 'privatised' railway as envisaged by the policy wonks in the 1992-97 Major government. The first hurdle they hit was that there would be competition for popular routes but large swathes of the network that were loss-making would get no trains. So to get the thing off the ground, the concept of 'franchises' were created, to be procured by government to guarantee a minimum level of service across the network....and the rest is history

 

[DenmarkRail]

The OP has effectively described the underlying structure of the 'privatised' railway as envisaged by the policy wonks in the 1992-97 Major government. The first hurdle they hit was that there would be competition for popular routes but large swathes of the network that were loss-making would get no trains. So to get the thing off the ground, the concept of 'franchises' were created, to be procured by government to guarantee a minimum level of service across the network....and the rest is history

As stated, there would be subsidies for stations which might be prone to a lessor service (Rugby, Stafford, Nuneaton) and this plan also only works for mainline franchises, therefore I can't see that stations would have a lessor service.

 

[The Planner]

How do you get the prime paths? Highest bidder wins? Where is the incentive to bid for loss makers unless you are bidding for a gold bar and a copper coin comes free?

 

[TractiveEffort]

Not sure it would be cheaper, now you have one TOC training Drivers and staff in stock and routes, add 2 more TOC’s in and they would have to fund that training to the same level. Where would the stock be fuelled, cleaned and repaired, would each TOC have to have a depot on each route, or would they just incur more costs with ECS moves to get trains to and from depots.

As has been said, the times that the trains have low passenger loadings wouldn’t be attractive, so who would run them?

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

As stated, there would be subsidies for stations which might be prone to a lessor service (Rugby, Stafford, Nuneaton) and this plan also only works for mainline franchises, therefore I can't see that stations would have a lessor service.

You can't have a plan only for mainline franchises, the non-mainlines inevitably impinge upon them and therefore require a degree of co-ordination. Think of how the Furness line affects the WCML or allowing a degree of connectivity between the Cornish mainline and its branches to name just two examples. Some sort of free-for-all may be a free-marketeer's wet dream but it will not provide any meaningful improvement for more than a small minority of existing railway customers, be they fare-paying passengers or stakeholders (mostly elected representatives). And what about freight, how does your system allow for any freight movement along the mainlines during the daytime? Would FOCs have to submit competing bids with prospective passenger operators for their paths?

 

[deltic]

The TOCs have put forward similar proposals - the idea works if all regulation on fares and minimum service requirements are lifted and the services are run purely as commercial operations. Problems arise as with the airports when company A wants Network Rail to invest to reduce journey times but company B's business model is based on cheap and cheerful and doesnt want to run faster services which require additional access charges to pay for the route improvement.

 

[DenmarkRail]

You can't have a plan only for mainline franchises, the non-mainlines inevitably impinge upon them and therefore require a degree of co-ordination. Think of how the Furness line affects the WCML or allowing a degree of connectivity between the Cornish mainline and its branches to name just two examples. Some sort of free-for-all may be a free-marketeer's wet dream but it will not provide any meaningful improvement for more than a small minority of existing railway customers, be they fare-paying passengers or stakeholders (mostly elected representatives). And what about freight, how does your system allow for any freight movement along the mainlines during the daytime? Would FOCs have to submit competing bids with prospective passenger operators for their paths?

For your freight question: Slot / path allocation would be at the discretion of Network Rail.

The TOCs have put forward similar proposals - the idea works if all regulation on fares and minimum service requirements are lifted and the services are run purely as commercial operations. Problems arise as with the airports when company A wants Network Rail to invest to reduce journey times but company B's business model is based on cheap and cheerful and doesnt want to run faster services which require additional access charges to pay for the route improvement.

If company A wants it, then company A (or an alliance of similar minded TOCS) could pay for it without the company B getting involved.

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

For your freight question: Slot / path allocation would be at the discretion of Network Rail.

And who arbitrates in the case of the inevitable disputes? And what criteria would their decision making be based on?

 

[ChiefPlanner]

How about considering special "Club" services from say Woking to Waterloo for the exclusive use of special , well heeled passengers. As was promulgated by the likes of the Bow Society in 1992 or so.

Railways , even Metro systems , work well as an integrated single unit system with a command and control structure , minus contracts and airy-fairy "competitive" ideologies .


We used to have one in the country , albeit starved of investment ....

 

[DenmarkRail]

And who arbitrates in the case of the inevitable disputes? And what criteria would their decision making be based on?

I'm guessing the criteria would be whichever operator offers the most money.

 

[DenmarkRail]

How about considering special "Club" services from say Woking to Waterloo for the exclusive use of special , well heeled passengers. As was promulgated by the likes of the Bow Society in 1992 or so.

Railways , even Metro systems , work well as an integrated single unit system with a command and control structure , minus contracts and airy-fairy "competitive" ideologies .


We used to have one in the country , albeit starved of investment ....

If anything, I am promoting the free market of railways, where cheaper companies can rise, and offer rail travel to more people... Who knows... EasyTrain

 

[ChiefPlanner]

If anything, I am promoting the free market of railways, where cheaper companies can rise, and offer rail travel to more people... Who knows... EasyTrain

Good luck then - must be some people elsewhere you can talk to.

 

[The Planner]

I'm guessing the criteria would be whichever operator offers the most money.

And to recoup the money they have bid they will do what....

 

[6Gman]

I was watching BBC Question Time last night, and they started to talk about whether it was time for Britain to renationalise the railways... Someone raised a really good point that currently our railways are effectively nationalised, but with 'foreign' brands... Some others started to talk about that the FRANCHISE system doesn't work, but the private network does work... Which lead me to my new idea...

Currently, rail prices are expensive because of (gov regulation) and a lack of competition on lots of routes. The franchising system means that as standard, only one company operates on one route, which in my opinion is wrong. It is important that a market doesn't become a monopoly. Obviously there are exceptions, but the one route, one operator rule exists in general.

That is why, today, I am proposing a complete phased privatisation of the railways of Great Britain, through a FULL open access system, which would work on a 'slot' basis, with subsidies for certain stations, and services.

It's actually not a new idea. Indeed there was a comment piece in yesterday's Times with the same idea. And it's been suggested in the past, but there are huge practical difficulties with implementation.

For example:

1. Does the Govt retain any control on ticket policy and pricing? There are a mass of difficulties if you have 12 trains a day of which operator A runs nos. 1, 2, 5, 8 and 10; operator B runs 3, 7 & 11; Operator C 4, 6 and 12; Operator D 9.
2. The airline analogy doesn't really work. Yes, you negotiate "slots" at each airport but capacity between is pretty well infinite (to all practical purposes). On the railway you don't just need a slot at Kings Cross and at Edinburgh but also at every station, every junction, and pretty well every block section en route!
3. How does it work on the bulk of the network where there's no money to be made? Who will bid for a slot at Blaenau Ffestiniog, or Rose Hill Marple or Sheringham?
4. I hear and see lots of complaints about the railway as it runs today. Nobody has ever said to me "what it needs is for the structure to be made more complicated".

 

[6Gman]

As stated, there would be subsidies for stations which might be prone to a lessor service (Rugby, Stafford, Nuneaton) and this plan also only works for mainline franchises, therefore I can't see that stations would have a lessor service.

How do you subsidise "stations"? Surely you can only subsidise services.

Who gets the subsidy for Stafford, or Nuneaton?

 

[Hadders]

Airline comparisons don't really work as many of our inter-city trains also double up as outer suburban services, especially at places like Reading, Milton Keynes and Peterborough.

Consider the 0616 Euston to Manchester service. It pretty quiet until it calls at Stoke on Trent at 0800 where it becomes wedged with commuters as it has an 0828 arrival time in Manchester. Clearly season ticket holders need flexibility to use their tickets on any train. Making them book specific trains would be totally unfeasible.

You could ban Stoke commuters from using the 0800 service to get to Manchester but which service would they travel on instead. There's no capacity to run any more services. If you made them travel on other services there'd be complaints that they were packed like sardine while inter-city trains sped past carting fresh air around.

There's no simple solution but I don't think your plans will work.

 

[6Gman]

If anything, I am promoting the free market of railways, where cheaper companies can rise, and offer rail travel to more people... Who knows... EasyTrain

I can see what you're aiming at but I just don't think it's practical. The low-cost airline model is, for example, based on using obscure (and therefore cheaper) airports often some distance from their nominal cities - a bit like offering Finsbury Park - Falkirk as a low-cost alternative to your Kings Cross - Edinburgh services. But it won't work on the railway (generally) because both services have to use (pretty well) the same tracks!

A more practical option would be to extend franchise overlap in the way that Liverpool - London passengers can choose between VTWC (fast and - cough - comfortable but expensive) and LNW (slow, less "comfortable" * but cheaper). But not every route can support multiple operators and operator-specific tickets already cause angst.

* Comfort is subjective of course.

 

[tbtc]

Currently, rail prices are expensive because of (gov regulation) and a lack of competition on lots of routes

I'd suggest that there are a lot of reasons why railways seem expensive when compared to buses/ coaches/ planes/ driving (presumably these are the things you'd use as a benchmark?).

Should train tickets be equivalent to just the cost of petrol (in a car that you are driving yourself)?

Train tickets should (theoretically) include the cost of the driver and the guard but also the signalling staff, the infrastructure costs, the British Transport Police etc?

Some of those staff are relatively well paid compared to bus/coach drivers (especially when you take the Final Salary pension, the "free" travel etc into account). I don't have a problem with that, necessarily, I don't think that rail should be dumbed down to the cheapest possible, I have no problem with a quality product attracting a quality price (if you want the best staff, you pay for the best staff).

But also, look at the infrastructure costs. Look at how much it costs to wire a mile of single track railway? Look at how expensive one platform at a station costs to build. Infrastructure costs a fortune nowadays - look at the THREE MILLION POUND cost of upgrading Breich station (which only gets a handful of passengers a week)!

If you introduce competition on InterCity routes, you'll maybe reduce prices on those routes, at the cost of lower premiums to the Government (premiums which currently pay for the Provincial network). Are you saying that we should be using the money for cheaper fares and to hell with the Local Trains For Local People?

3. How does it work on the bulk of the network where there's no money to be made? Who will bid for a slot at Blaenau Ffestiniog, or Rose Hill Marple or Sheringham?

I think this is the most important point on the thread.

Most train services run at a loss (the profitable services may be ten/ twelve coaches long compared to the loss making services run by one/two/three carriage trains, but the majority of actual services require subsidy).

Just because operators will want to fight for lucrative paths on the ECML/ WCML doesn't mean that they are going to fall over themselves trying to serve backwaters like Colne.

 

[Bald Rick]

Currently, rail prices are expensive because of (gov regulation) and a lack of competition on lots of routes. The franchising system means that as standard, only one company operates on one route, which in my opinion is wrong. It is important that a market doesn't become a monopoly.

And therein lies the fundamental mistake.

Train operators are not in the rail business. They are in the transport business. There is competition for every route, however most of the competition is by different modes, whether it be car, bus, air, boat, cycling, walking, skateboarding etc. In this market, rail wins in only two circumstances:

a) where the combination of speed, convenience and comfort (and for a few, enjoyment) by rail is better than the competition, and the user is prepared to pay a higher price than an alternative mode.

b) where the rail service attracts sufficient subsidy to lower the price to a point where users are prepared to accept a lower combination of speed, convenience and comfort by rail than an alternative mode.

In broad terms a) is ‘inter city’ travel and commuting to the largest cities, b) is everything else.

If the aim of on rail competition is to bring down fares, I suggest that proponents investigate (i) the cost base of the railway, but also (ii) the pricing methodology and price elasticities of demand for rail. To reduce fares there’s only two ways: reduce costs (i) or increase income (ii). Proponents need to demonstrate how either can be achieved, and (crucially) also demonstrate how an on rail competition system can achieve it better than the existing system. Proponents must also demonstrate how the (b) category can be retained to provide the service that is required by the Governemnt, on behalf of the public.

Finally, on rail competition exists on the GB network - it’s called freight. Over the past 20 years the freight network has become unquestionably more efficient and thus lowered prices as a result of this competition. Almost all of that benefit has gone to the end users, with the power generators being particularly thankful. The ‘railway’ has lost considerable income, which was used to help subsidise passenger services. This lost income is now provided by the taxpayer direct to the passenger operators.

Note that with minimal direct subsidy, all freight falls into the (a) category above. Note also that coal, aggregates and containers don’t require comfort, don’t have opinions, and crucially, don’t vote.

 

[deltic]

For your freight question: Slot / path allocation would be at the discretion of Network Rail.



If company A wants it, then company A (or an alliance of similar minded TOCS) could pay for it without the company B getting involved.

How does that work in reality? Company A wants Network Rail to spend £100m upgrading a length of track to bring in 125mph running. Company B says I dont need it. Network Rail upgrades the track and increases track access charges - are you saying company B gets to pay the original track access charges because it doesnt want the upgrade but gets the benefits - or it has to run its trains at previous line speed only and therefore negates the improvement because company's A train are now stuck behind its slower train?

 

[B&I]

Isn' this absolutely unworkable because the complete lack of slack in the infrastructure will make it impossible to run enough services to permit competition ?

 

[higthomas]

The OP has effectively described the underlying structure of the 'privatised' railway as envisaged by the policy wonks in the 1992-97 Major government. The first hurdle they hit was that there would be competition for popular routes but large swathes of the network that were loss-making would get no trains. So to get the thing off the ground, the concept of 'franchises' were created, to be procured by government to guarantee a minimum level of service across the network....and the rest is history

Whilst I don't think the general policy is sensible, this specific issue shouldn't really matter. Surely it's just that for an 0730 Guildford-Waterloo slot, people might pay the government (or whoever sorts out the slots) ££ for, the 2245 Blaenau Ffestiniog to Llandudno they might 'pay' -££ for. i.e. In the same way one pays for premium slots, one gets paid for bum slots.

Another point is that I think one would still have to have inter-available fares as well as TOC specific ones (but at a premium) or else a late-running meeting would become a lot more expensive for the commuter.

 

[Bald Rick]

Whilst I don't think the general policy is sensible, this specific issue shouldn't really matter. Surely it's just that for an 0730 Guildford-Waterloo slot, people might pay the government (or whoever sorts out the slots) ££ for, the 2245 Blaenau Ffestiniog to Llandudno they might 'pay' -££ for. i.e. In the same way one pays for premium slots, one gets paid for bum slots.

Well, yes, but...

1) there’s around 23,000 ‘slots’ per weekday, and another 30,000 or so on a normal weekend. That’s the hell of an administration exercise, both in terms of tendering and letting the ‘slots’ and post contract management of performance. For economy of scale it’s probably best to package them up into sizeable chunks. Oh look, a franchise!

2) having premium / subsidy identified for each individual ‘slot’ would have, I fear, rather unfortunate consequences for many services after 8pm, and on some lines altogether.