Do we spend the money wisely?

[daccer]

In light of the recent open letter from the TOC chairmen and also Network Rail's generous CP4 settlement i was wondering what we all thought about how the rail budget is spent in this country. It strikes me that we may be spending too much on the infrastructure of the network and not enough on extra carriages to boot capacity. There has definitely been a change in emphasis in recent years towards major spending on station upgrades etc. A case in point being New St where a nice birhgt new station will be built but it will actually not be able to handle any more trains than the current eyesore. It also seems that rolling stock orders are slowing down to a crawl and if growth does continue on the railway we are facing bleak times ahead.

So my question is this. We have a limited budget (it is also probably going to get squeezed going forward) so should we be concentrating on new trains or new infrastructure (both would be better of course) or is the spending at the moment about right. If you know where money has been wasted put in your two pennies worth. For me I am still battling with Crossrail as a concept considering its price tag but that horse has maybe bolted.

 

[TW7]

To be short, but to the point we need to get rid of the TOC's. They only improve the rolling stock as and when the franchise agreement requires it. If all train running was nationalised into a not-for-dividend company. similar to Network rail, you would see money being spent on new rolling stock and not filling the pockets of the shareholders of stagecoach etc.

 

[Oswyntail]

It's a good question (and i agree with your reservations about Crossrail).
IMHO, the biggest spanner in the works is time, a problem that is made worse by the multiple franchise system, regardless of length of franchise. A piece of desirable kit, like an extra coach for a 185, takes a hefty chunk out of the funds. This can be amortised over a working life of, say, thirty years, so it can be justified. However, that working life will probably see improvements in technology, rendering the kit obsolete or sub-standard - and that's not to mention the possibility of electrification. [This is less of a problem for road suppliers] So there is a strong pressure to wait and see, exacerbated by the small size of the franchisees doing the purchasing - Northern, for instance, are quite justified in holding back on stock improvement pending possible electrification, because they do not want to a) have extra costs in replacement when that happens and b) be lumbered with non-standard stock that may be hard to offload.
It is much the same with infrastructure. Electrification, new tracks and reopenings are very much a punt in the dark, depending on forecasts for decades in the future, and cannot be undertaken without the support of the eventual users - who, for reasons given above, will tend to wait and see. Station refurbs and rebuilds are much easier to guarantee benefits, and so are much more attractive to put in place. But this will detract funds and managerial energy from the longer term schemes.
IMHO, the way to square this circle was thrown out when multiple franchises were introduced. Under BR, there was an attempt to standardise stock so that, when it was moved out of one area, other areas would be familiar with it and take it (contrast the flexibility in the 150/156/158 fleets with the 180s). What I believe would help, and, to answer the OP, save money, would be for the ROSCOs to have a continual build programme of a few standard types (eg inner and outer suburban/inter urban/inter city) which would be cascadable. This would, IMHO, reduce overall costs with economies of scale, and reduce hiring charges as the risk of unacceptability later in the stocks life would be reduced). Similarly, infrastucture work should be carried out on an overall plan, without reference to TOCs (ie a policy that was driven by, eg, "all inner suburban lines should be electrified", "all mixed traffic trunk routes should be quadrupled"). This would lead to a genuine rolling programme, with, again, economies of scale and continued use of resources.
As a slightly smaller scale observation, I also think one area that costs could be managed better is in teh use of fixed-formation sets with appropriate locomotives, diesel and electric. Eg, a Class 91 equivalent diesel waiting at Waverley to take the set on to Aberdeen, or even at Crewe to take the set on to Holyhead.
But all this really need far fewer TOCs to be manageable.

 

[whoshotjimmi]

I would agree with oswyntail to an extent. There are many ways in which substantial savings could be made on rolling stock.

However, we have forgotten that growth depends almost entirely on spending. Certain infrastructure improvements have to be made in order for growth to be able to occur. Until that infrastructure improvement is made and said growth does begin occurring, spending on stock is not justified.

Let us take a number of examples:

WCML upgrade - faster services up and down the west coast; pendolinos now lengthening to 11 cars.

Leeds/Bradford - Skipton/Ilkley - electrification scheme; faster, more comfortable journeys = increased passenger use. Class 333 was then lengthened to 4 car when growth was apparent.

There is no doubt that a rebuilt New Street will entice the public to move to the railway. When this becomes apparent, certain other schemes (train lengthening and more services to the end of the line on cross city) can begin, as justification for this will be available.

In my opinion, there are few areas where growth would occur purely by the lengthening of trains. (The obvious argument to this is the trans pennine route. However, this route is currently undergoing extensive consultation as to its future - both as part of the franchising process and in the context of infrastructure, so further spending on stock cannot be justified at this time.) The truth of the matter is that the infrastructure has to improve before services can be improved. If trains are lengthened, many platforms across the country would have to be first. To get more passengers at certain stations, the car park would have to be made much bigger or conncecting bus services would have to be improved or introduced. Even then, you may still find yourself on a slow service where electric trains would be much quicker and more appealing.

In essence, you could make every train 20 carriages long, but the same problems would still exist.

There would still be bottlenecks. There would still be capacity constraints. There would still be poor public transport connections. Some journeys would still be ridiculously slow. There would still be people who prefer stepping into their car rather than standing on a dingy, unappealing station waiting for an equally unappealing train to take them to another unappealing station.

And then, we have to consider freight movement. The reason the railway was invented. The infrastructure would have to be able to support the transport of this and any possible growth.

The infrastructure is the most important part of the system. If it doesn't work well, there is no point having the train at all. If it does work well, longer, better trains are easy to justify at cost.

The OP certainly raises a very interesting point. Doubtless, many of us could discuss it for years. But we MUST start looking at the long term solution and not the short term fix. Extra carriages would be great for a couple of months. But we might as well do it properly.

We might as well improve the railway as a whole.

 

[Greenback]

Historically, a lot of the problems now with capacity, and by this I mean both the numbers of passengers bieng carried in 2 or 3 carriage units in some parts of the UK, and the capacity of the infrastructure to deal with increased numbers of trains, was pared to the bare minimum under BR, due mainly to having to cut its costs. No one at the time could foresee the increase in rail passenger numbers that has been caused by the economic boom, road congestion, environmental awareness and, to a lesser extent, privatisation.

Those customers who have a choice may well be put off by the overcrowding of services that is prevalent in some parts. Additional rolling stock, so that people do not have to stand at all, will probably attract some of those customers who have sampled the current service offering and not been impressed, back to the rails. At the same time, for longer trains, as well as additional services, infrastructure improvements are necessary. what we are seeing now, however, is a situation where large amounts of money are being spent on stations where the customers often then have to get on older trains which are bulging at the seams with other passengers already - it could be argued that the additional travellers attracted to the railway by the improving stations may be pointless, as such people are unlikely to return once they see the state of some of the trains!