Back to the bad old days’: swingeing rail cuts set alarm bells ringing

[Railwaysceptic]

Perhaps not but I do feel that it fits into that quirky British category of infrastructure that has people demanding that services / lines be kept but then doing absolutely nothing to support their existence (I.e not travelling by rail).

That phenomenon is not unique to railways. Whenever anything is likely to be closed - whether it's the local library, the local repertory theatre or Woolworth's - people who have never used the facility protest against its closure.

 

[43066]

It is extraordinary that the railway, spending considerable sums (billions?) on the "digital railway" cannot provide such information to train crews, but these two sites, which I believe are run by enthusiasts from outside the industry, can do so.

Reminds me of a generation ago when in a control room the large and poorly formatted rolling stock manual stayed at the bottom of the pile on the desk, while the Ian Allan spotters' book, much more succinct, was on everyone's desk and in constant use!

Agreed - it’s a bit daft.

Drivers have a strict no electronic devices policy when in an active driving cab, for good reason, but which is arguably too inflexible nowadays when many TOCs equip drivers with iPads holding rulebook, tracks maps etc. which in theory cannot be used when most needed. The only information generally available to driver is what you can see through the windscreen and what the signaller tells you (if you can get through). Driver Advisory systems might make things better in this regard where so equipped, I wouldn’t know!

TMs have access to control logs etc. through their phones but I’m told the phones and often the logs themselves tend to be fairly rubbish, hence they often resort to the aforementioned excellent sites.

 

[Domeyhead]

The railway needs to re-invent itself. It is no good treating commuters as cash cows any longer, we need a bigger focus on leisure travel. Sadly this will mean reductions in peak time and evening services that are little used. My main points of contention are thus.

1) The unions will not be happy. However the unions are partly responsible for the rank inefficiency that plagues the industry. I stand aghast at some union decisions and thinking. If they think strikes will save the day, they are badly mistaken this time.

2) I have been stunned at how rail TOC's this past few years have continued piling on more managers whilst the essential staff they need to make the service work has been neglected. They have gorged themselves on management roles whilst they can't employ train cleaners for love nor money. It is very strange how at the peak of lockdowns when managers were nowhere to be seen the railway still ran. Even now many are still shirking from home. Try contacting many departments by phone and you are met with silence.

3) There are some evening services that should never run. They are woefully underused. There is the saying that if you don't provide it people can't use it. But some services have been provided, and they haven't been used. This reasoning cannot be used to justify running empty trains any longer.

I agree with this. In pursuit of winning (and keeping) new customers we should also start subdividing the non commuter business. Currently almost any non regular journey type is classed as "Leisure" whereas there are varying demand types. Community Rail Partnerships and similar seem to have recognised this with initiatives such as Shopper Specials, but perhaps we do need to reinvigorate ideas from the past, such as irregular Excursions, branded for anything from a day at the beach to sporting events - even rock concerts. Outr timetabling is aimed at rigid clock face services as we seek to mirror Swiss operations, but we should also be looking at freed up and potential paths for irregular services and publicising these to interested parties. The Heritage main line market shows there is demand if it is marketed properly.

 

[squizzler]

That phenomenon is not unique to railways. Whenever anything is likely to be closed - whether it's the local library, the local repertory theatre or Woolworth's - people who have never used the facility protest against its closure.

To be fair, railways often bring spendy visitors into rural areas and are contributing to the local economy, even if the residents have little interest in going the other direction. I witnessed this with the Heart of Wales line when I lived in the locality. Of course there were local regulars too…

 

[RT4038]

It is extraordinary that the railway, spending considerable sums (billions?) on the "digital railway" cannot provide such information to train crews, but these two sites, which I believe are run by enthusiasts from outside the industry, can do so.

Reminds me of a generation ago when in a control room the large and poorly formatted rolling stock manual stayed at the bottom of the pile on the desk, while the Ian Allan spotters' book, much more succinct, was on everyone's desk and in constant use!

Sadly this is all too common elsewhere in the transport industry too - likely caused because those commissioning and the developers have little or no understanding of how the end product is going to be used, never use it themselves (or are so inculcated with the jargon) and have given little or no thought as to how it is going to be used.

 

[The Planner]

The recent NR presentation on planned changes at Crewe for HS2 was illustrated using "Quail" maps (now TrackMaps) as a basis.

I don't see a problem with that, Quail maps are effectively the de facto go to for an easy representation of the network. Why re-invent the wheel. If the audience requires a more detailed explanation then something would be created.

 

[WelshBluebird]

All this talk about cutting back on early morning / late evening / weekend trains seems to suggest at least some people have missed the memo from the last year. It is leisure travel that the railways must focus on in order to drive up ridership. Cutting back on services that are mostly used by leisure travelers (not so much early morning but absolutely late evening and weekend services) is absolute madness when those travelers are where your growth is going to come from! Hell it really wouldn't take that much shifting around of the timetable to make last services ever so slightly later which really would provide so many opportunities for more people to use rail (look how many people go to music concerts, comedy gigs, musicals, the theatre or even just a night out every single day of the week but can't rely on rail because of early last services). Although of course, a problem at the moment is that some ToC's just aren't in a position where they can deal with more customers because their services are currently chronically short formed or cancelled (TfW and XC to name just two).

 

[yorksrob]

That phenomenon is not unique to railways. Whenever anything is likely to be closed - whether it's the local library, the local repertory theatre or Woolworth's - people who have never used the facility protest against its closure.

Certainly in the case of the railway, they may still be benefiting from it in the form of a lack of congestion, not having to chauffer around car-less teen-agers/relatives etc.


They may still have good reason for wanting the railway to remain open.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

I don't see a problem with that, Quail maps are effectively the de facto go to for an easy representation of the network. Why re-invent the wheel. If the audience requires a more detailed explanation then something would be created.

About every meeting I used to attend , back in the day , was a Quail one , with detailed track and signalling ones for the real nitty , gritty. A brilliant innovation in it's time.

 

[dk1]

Wrong terminlnology - sorry - you need another crew to take the second portion forward to destination. (and possibly a shunter / station staff to supervise / despatch) the portions.

(one of the reasons why reducing train lengths off peak in the past was done way with , as an 8 reduced to 4 say , needs a crew / driver to dispose of the detached sets if going to sidings or a depot)

Of course and there would more likely be another driver travelling pass Kings X to Donny anyway. Savings to be made like this are pretty trivial & adds complication. I wouldn't suggest it personally.

 

[ChrisC]

Removal of certain services whilst not renumerating in themselves may well drive demand downwards. Where I live the local bus service over many years has got more frequent, run earlier in the morning and later in the evening. I imagine it is doubtful that the earlier and later services make money in themselves but as an overall package serve to encourage demand on other services and thus make money overall. The same applies to trains. Remove the early morning and late night services and watch overall demand fall as a result. This may suit those who appear to work for Network Rail who seem quite happy in my experience to want to withdraw early morning and late services for a bigger maintenance window, but remember this, if you remove those services (especially the evening ones) you will disportionately affect leisure users and these are the people the railway must seek to attract to fill the gap left by the reductions in commuters and the elasticity in demand is greater for leisure than commuting.

I think there is much to be learnt from the consequences of withdrawing evening bus services in so many parts of the country.

Like most areas outside of large urban areas, where I live the local bus service has got less frequent over the years. The service has always been basically hourly but years ago there were some additional peak time buses which were the first to be withdrawn. Next came a complete withdrawal of the Sunday service and the evening service was reduced to 2 hourly. For the past 10 years there have been no buses after 6pm. I very rarely use the bus from my village and have found myself using my car more frequently. The reason being if I go somewhere during the day I need to be able to get back again in the evening. For a number of year now there’s has been a 2 hour gap in the afternoon without a bus as the bus does a school run. I now mainly use my car for a trip into town shopping or to reach a location for a day walking because there is no bus back home between 2.30pm and 4.30pm. I know of so many people in the village who don’t use the bus because of this afternoon gap in the timetable at just the time they want to return.

My local rail service currently has a much reduced service due to the EMR temporary timetables. I used to use it fairly regularly but have rarely used it during the past 6 months because of poor connections. The trains that are left in the timetable, on arrival in Nottingham, miss all the important connections for leisure journeys. I don’t want to have to wait in Nottingham for almost an hour for a connection both on my outward and return journey.

Cutting evening and off peak journeys from the timetable make leisure travel by public transport less attractive or even impossible. Cutting services from the timetable without considering the onward connections, and facilities for people having to wait on stations for long periods, also discourages people from travelling.

 

[AndyY]

That blows the argument for HS2 out of the water - no need to increase capacity if rail services are being cut left, right and centre.
Scrapping this vanity project should more than meet the budget cut target.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Of course and there would more likely be another driver travelling pass Kings X to Donny anyway. Savings to be made like this are pretty trivial & adds complication. I wouldn't suggest it personally.

Neither would I wearing an operations planning and management cap

 

[Bletchleyite]

That blows the argument for HS2 out of the water - no need to increase capacity if rail services are being cut left, right and centre.
Scrapping this vanity project should more than meet the budget cut target.

HS2 is not building for now, it's building for 20 years' time.

 

[Clip]

But you keep claiming London commuting is dead so that capacity isn't need any more then? Now or in 20 years

HS2 is not building for now, it's building for 20 years' time.

For the record even though I live in Lancashire I still think HS2 is a good idea

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

That blows the argument for HS2 out of the water - no need to increase capacity if rail services are being cut left, right and centre.
Scrapping this vanity project should more than meet the budget cut target.

It wouldn't because the post-Covid cost problem is with current, short-term operating expenditure, not long-term capital spend.
But reduced WCML/MML services do affect the wider HS2 business case, especially now ECML services will not be using it.
It's also too late to have any meaningful effect on Phase 1, with tunnelling and station build in progress.
NPR also needs the Manchester leg of HS2, which is a different business case entirely (levelling up etc).

 

[Bletchleyite]

But reduced WCML/MML services do affect the wider HS2 business case, especially now ECML services will not be using it.

Only if you think they'll be reduced for the next 50+ years. My bet is that they won't; we have to reduce the number of car journeys massively and to basically stop domestic flying entirely, and buses won't cut it for medium and long distance. Also, regarding the south WCML bit, MK continues to grow - in 20 years' time it will be an average sized city (would be surprised by then if it hadn't obtained city status, but that's largely irrelevant) and in 50 years it is quite likely it will be one of the biggest settlements in England, quite possibly only behind the big three, i.e. London, Manchester and Brum.

HS2 is a great piece of long-termism and is so of very limited relevance to these cuts which are short to medium-term.

 

[ac6000cw]

All the big US freight railroads (UP, BN and others) are profitable, and are investing vast sums in upgrades and renewals.
They have a huge transcontinental container business unknown in Europe.
The same is true of Canadian Pacific, increasingly a cross-border operation.
But coal could be an achilles heel from decarbonisation, like it has been here, but on a much larger scale.

US railroad coal traffic has been falling for years - the falloff is just getting more precipitous recently. In particular, old coal-fired electricity generating plants are/have been steadily replaced with ones using natural gas (a cheaper - thanks to large-scale fracking - and cleaner fuel) and renewables.

As you allude to, North American railroads have economies of scale (long haulage distances, much longer trains, 32+ tonne axle loads, structure clearances to allow double-stacked containers etc.) which don't exist in Europe and some of which are essentially incompatible with running a useful passenger service on a mixed-traffic railway. Just think about the junction/loop entrance/loop exit clearance times for a two mile long freight train climbing a gradient at 15 mph...

 

[A0wen]

To be fair, railways often bring spendy visitors into rural areas and are contributing to the local economy, even if the residents have little interest in going the other direction. I witnessed this with the Heart of Wales line when I lived in the locality. Of course there were local regulars too…

Wrong argument - a place *has* to have a reason for people to visit it - and IF it has a rail link people *might* use it to get there.

So whilst the HoWL has places like Llandrindod on it which may attract some tourists, people also visit places like Llangollen or Builth Wells which don't have a mainline rail link. Do either of those fare any the worse for not having a mainline rail link ?

A couple of weeks ago I spent the weekend in the Cotswolds - and visited Bourton on the Water, Broadway and Stow on the Wold - all doing steady tourist business, not one of them with a mainline rail-link. No evidence they're doing worse than Moreton In Marsh which does have a mainline rail link.

Only if you think they'll be reduced for the next 50+ years. My bet is that they won't; we have to reduce the number of car journeys massively and to basically stop domestic flying entirely, and buses won't cut it for medium and long distance. Also, regarding the south WCML bit, MK continues to grow - in 20 years' time it will be an average sized city (would be surprised by then if it hadn't obtained city status, but that's largely irrelevant) and in 50 years it is quite likely it will be one of the biggest settlements in England, quite possibly only behind the big three, i.e. London, Manchester and Brum.

HS2 is a great piece of long-termism and is so of very limited relevance to these cuts which are short to medium-term.

BIB - which excuse for that argument is being used this week ? Is it still the one about greenhouse gas emissions which EVs and Hydrogen are dealing with or has some other excuse for trying to crack down on motorists now been identified ?

 

[Bald Rick]

That blows the argument for HS2 out of the water - no need to increase capacity if rail services are being cut left, right and centre.
Scrapping this vanity project should more than meet the budget cut target.

You’re assuming services on the WCML will be cut left, right and centre.

And the cash for phase 1 is largely committed now. Nearly a third of it has already been spent!

 

[Bletchleyite]

BIB - which excuse for that argument is being used this week ? Is it still the one about greenhouse gas emissions which EVs and Hydrogen are dealing with or has some other excuse for trying to crack down on motorists now been identified ?

Private motoring has many negative effects, not just pollution. Take your pick of whichever you prefer.

 

[A0wen]

Private motoring has many negative effects, not just pollution. Take your pick of whichever you prefer.

So let's limit people's freedoms..... don't you think people have had enough of their freedoms being limited over the last 18 months ?

As ever it's the anti-freedom of choice brigade shifting the goal-posts - for years it was the emissions argument, now that fox is being shot it's something else.

Why not just be honest, you don't like people being able to travel using private transport ?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Why not just be honest, you don't like people being able to travel using private transport ?

I would like there to be a considerable reduction in the use of private motor cars, yes. There are many, many arguments in favour of such a change, from reduction in pollution (you've got to generate the electricity, remember) to fewer road deaths, better health and fitness and cities designed for people rather than tin boxes.

Cars will never go away, but we really do need to use them much, much less.

The Netherlands have this spot-on. Yes, it's flat, but e-bikes and e-scooters even that up nicely. Cars still play a role, but they are used much less day to day.

 

[Greybeard33]

Agreed - it’s a bit daft.

Drivers have a strict no electronic devices policy when in an active driving cab, for good reason, but which is arguably too inflexible nowadays when many TOCs equip drivers with iPads holding rulebook, tracks maps etc. which in theory cannot be used when most needed. The only information generally available to driver is what you can see through the windscreen and what the signaller tells you (if you can get through). Driver Advisory systems might make things better in this regard where so equipped, I wouldn’t know!

TMs have access to control logs etc. through their phones but I’m told the phones and often the logs themselves tend to be fairly rubbish, hence they often resort to the aforementioned excellent sites.

^This. Airline pilots can fly to any airport, anywhere in the world, with no more "route knowledge" than provided by the charts and Notices to Airmen (NOTAMs) on their iPads. Yet our railway timetables remain hamstrung by the 20th century requirement for weeks or months of in-cab training programmes, before introduction of service changes that require driver depots to support different combinations of route and traction knowledge to those signed by the existing links.

Route learning training could surely be greatly shortened by universal deployment of in-cab iPads with satnav-type displays, showing track layouts, speed restrictions, signal positions, braking points etc. This could enable each driver to sign a wider portfolio of routes, improving productivity and minimising the need for overtime and rest day working. Consequently fewer service cuts would be needed to achieve a given level of operational cost savings.

 

[Bletchleyite]

^This. Airline pilots can fly to any airport, anywhere in the world, with no more "route knowledge" than provided by the charts and Notices to Airmen (NOTAMs) on their iPads. Yet our railway timetables remain hamstrung by the 20th century requirement for weeks or months of in-cab training programmes, before introduction of service changes that require driver depots to support different combinations of route and traction knowledge to those signed by the existing links.

Route learning training could surely be greatly shortened by universal deployment of in-cab iPads with satnav-type displays, showing track layouts, speed restrictions, signal positions, braking points etc. This could enable each driver to sign a wider portfolio of routes, improving productivity and minimising the need for overtime and rest day working. Consequently fewer service cuts would be needed to achieve a given level of operational cost savings.

It's of note that Deutsche Bahn has used this approach for absolutely years. Originally it was the "Buchfahrplan", a ring-bound book which the driver has in front of them and pages through as they drive. It's been electronic since the mid 2000s. It seems a good idea to me.

 

[Taunton]

we have to reduce the number of car journeys massively and to basically stop domestic flying entirely

Who says? Railway unions and enthusiasts with their own axe to grind, and those incapable of driving or are greedily envious of those with nice cars, but who else? The vast majority of the population make the vast majority of UK travel journeys by car. This is twisted by travel surveys etc which say if I drive from my house to the station, then get a train into the city, it's just a rail journey. TfL are particularly good at this bending of statistics, for example sometimes excluding people who live outside London. Likewise London to various Scottish cities and Northern Ireland is the preponderance of UK domestic air passengers nowadays, because for that distance and relative to where people actually want to start from and go to it's much the better way to go.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Who says? Railway unions and enthusiasts with their own axe to grind, and those incapable of driving or are greedily envious of those with nice cars, but who else? The vast majority of the population make the vast majority of their journeys by car. This is twisted by travel surveys etc which say if I drive from my house to the station, then get a train into the city, it's just a rail journey. TfL are particularly good at this bending of statistics, for example sometimes excluding people who live outside London. Likewise London to various Scottish cities and Northern Ireland is the preponderance of UK domestic air passengers nowadays, because for that distance and relative to where people actually want to start from and go to it's much the better way to go.

May I ask, if you're so anti-rail (this is aimed at everyone who seems to be on here) why do you gain anything from being on a railway forum?

 

[Meerkat]

I would like there to be a considerable reduction in the use of private motor cars, yes. There are many, many arguments in favour of such a change, from reduction in pollution (you've got to generate the electricity, remember) to fewer road deaths, better health and fitness and cities designed for people rather than tin boxes.

Cars will never go away, but we really do need to use them much, much less.

The Netherlands have this spot-on. Yes, it's flat, but e-bikes and e-scooters even that up nicely. Cars still play a role, but they are used much less day to day.

How true is that? AIUI car ownership has risen pretty dramatically in the Netherlands and when I have been there I have been quite shocked by how dense the road network is - they have a lot of motorways and dual carriageways.

 

[Bletchleyite]

How true is that? AIUI car ownership has risen pretty dramatically in the Netherlands and when I have been there I have been quite shocked by how dense the road network is - they have a lot of motorways and dual carriageways.

Lots and lots of cycling. Anyone riding a bike isn't driving a car.

 

[Robertj21a]

May I ask, if you're so anti-rail (this is aimed at everyone who seems to be on here) why do you gain anything from being on a railway forum?

If I can partly answer. When I first came on this forum (some years ago) I was amazed at the attitude of some rail staff, the unions, and the apparent naivety towards the needs of the travelling public. Little has happened to change that view and I believe that there should always be an alternative means to question any issue spouted from the majority.