How much money do cuts to services save the railway industry?

[philosopher]

There have been quite a few threads recently about timetables and the withdrawal of certain trains such as the Crosscountry HSTs where it has been debated whether they are the right thing to do given the overall poor state of government finances and the desire to encourage more passengers to use the railway.

So my question is how much money does cutting services save the railway industry?

There seems to be two main arguments here. One is that it lowers costs through reducing maintenance, staff costs, fuel / electricity costs, etc but does not harm passenger use much, perhaps as railway passengers are somewhat captive. The other argument is that cutting frequencies makes the railway less attractive due to more overcrowding, higher fares and overall less convenient which reduces passenger numbers and therefore railway revenue, thus not saving much if anything. It does seem to me that it may be case that it may be impossible to know for sure. It would be interesting if there have been any actual studies to investigate the potential savings from service cuts?

 

[zwk500]

It is certainly possible to quantify the reduction in expenditure related to service cuts - although whether or not this is done accurately is a different question.
Assessing the costs to the railway from suppressed revenue collection is much harder to do, as it's hard to say whether or not the service cut specifically is the reason for people not travelling. There are many reason why people choose to travel beyond simply the frequency of a train service.

It's further complicated because in some places cutting trains from 2tph to 1tph will suppress revenue as people lose flexibility, but in others reducing the train from 2tph to 1tph allows the service to be moved to a more convenient time for a peak flow. There is also the issue of cutting trains from route A allows a better timetable on route B and the passenger/revenue loss from route A is smaller than the gains on route B.

Any studies that have been done are likely to be confidential or internal only although I'd be very surprised if service cuts were being planned with no work at all.

 

[Craig1122]

There are numerous case studies where it can be seen that increasing frequency can increase usage by significant percentages, it therefore seems ludicrous to suggest that the opposite is not true.

However there does seem to be a lag, ie it takes time both to gain or lose customers as travel habits change. This makes cuts attractive as they will show an immediate cash saving whereas the loss to revenue may not be immediately obvious, and as has already been said the reasons may be harder to attribute.

 

[Master29]

Just spin really. The government always has a "poor state of finances" due to various reasons depending on which hat they choose to wear. I doubt "cuts" make any difference over time.

 

[zwk500]

There are numerous case studies where it can be seen that increasing frequency can increase usage by significant percentages, it therefore seems ludicrous to suggest that the opposite is not true.

Frequency *can* impact usage, but it is not intrinsically linked. In general, the longer the journey the less relevant frequencies (and service intervals) are as prominence is given to price or arrival/departure times instead.

However there does seem to be a lag, ie it takes time both to gain or lose customers as travel habits change. This makes cuts attractive as they will show an immediate cash saving whereas the loss to revenue may not be immediately obvious, and as has already been said the reasons may be harder to attribute.

This is very true.

 

[philosopher]

Frequency *can* impact usage, but it is not intrinsically linked. In general, the longer the journey the less relevant frequencies (and service intervals) are as prominence is given to price or arrival/departure times instead.

Unless trains are lengthened to compensate, reduced frequencies will reduce overall capacity which means the fewer seats can be sold at higher price. On Avanti, the very cheap advanced fares have almost been impossible to find over the last year or so. This does of mean some passengers will end being priced off the railways and may switch to other forms of travel such as coach or the car, or not bother travelling at ll.

 

[zwk500]

Unless trains are lengthened to compensate, reduced frequencies will reduce overall capacity which means the fewer seats can be sold at higher price. On Avanti, the very cheap advanced fares have almost been impossible to find over the last year or so. This does of mean some passengers will end being priced off the railways and may switch to other forms of travel such as coach or the car, or not bother travelling at ll.

There are very few routes where cuts are proposed on busy trains. There have been parallel issues with stock and crew availability unrelated to planned service cuts.

 

[notverydeep]

Basically trains railways are expensive to buy, but cheap to run.

It can be surprisingly difficult to find worthwhile savings. For the groups of services for which I undertake this sort of evaluation, it is very easy to end up reducing revenue by more than the saving in cost. This is because many people respond to poorer, less frequent services by travelling less often. The obvious illustration of this is the reduction of demand during planned closures. If there is engineering works this weekend, you'll tend not to go on a leisure trip. If there is a strike this week, you will work at home an extra day. Yes, not everyone is 'elastic' - that is to say able to change their plans but all other things being equal some people will be put off. Over the year, many of these lost passengers will make fewer trips and the railway will take less revenue.

It isn't that easy to make cost savings and not simply end up even worse off. The direct variable costs of operation are low. Most of the overall cost is 'fixed' and hard to change at least in the short or medium term. The fuel / power cost is clearly saved and drivers leave all the time, so staff turnover will allow the driver cost to be saved. But reduce your fleet kms by 3% and you might save the cost of a few casualty repairs, but it will often not be possible to find 3% savings from a small fleet maintenance team, or track maintenance team. The services I plan have a variable cost per kilometre that is similar to a taxi fare; a handful of people on board, and the direct costs are covered, though it is notable how poorly this is understood by even senior industry figures or government. Having said that, the way track costs are charged in the UK National Rail network, probably makes it easier for the TOC to avoid access charges, even if Network Rail's costs are harder to save.

To make greater savings you have to start reducing your more fixed costs, such as fleet. You can sell a midlife bus fairly straightforwardly to a smaller company replacing life expired buses, but the second hand market for fairly route specific UK trains is problematic - which is why old go anywhere DMUs swiftly move to a new operator, but premature scrapping (yielding only a tiny fraction of the initial investment) awaits many of the surplus electric trains.

In the current climate, the railway ends up in a tricky position, where the higher ups, under pressure from political masters demand train planners find savings, only to find those same masters aghast at the extent of the cuts necessary to save meaningful amounts of the required subsidy and the likely impact of those cuts on their constituents and popularity! Or it simply isn't possible to save the cash demanded, without loosing an even larger sum in revenue.

It is much easier to save money by not investing or renewing infrastructure (which in the UK is weirdly considered investment rather than being a cost of operation), which is why British Rail did so little...

Frequency *can* impact usage, but it is not intrinsically linked. In general, the longer the journey the less relevant frequencies (and service intervals) are as prominence is given to price or arrival/departure times instead.

This is very true.

This isn't correct. Passenger numbers respond directly to frequency, whether they perceive it as 'waiting time' for a turn up and go service like a metro or 'opportunity to arrive at the desired time' as they would with say an hourly or less frequent timetabled service. You are far more likely to want to do a four hour journey that arrives at a reasonable time for your appointment, than have to get there half a day earlier because there are only a few trains each day. You may have to do it from time to time, some passengers are 'inelastic', but most will travel less often if you reduce the frequency.

Other factors clearly do influence passenger numbers, but compare one line in London that has an upgrade and an increase in frequency, while another that stays the same and the former will grow more than the latter, even if they are both growing because of population change or the state of the economy. Compare the off peak growth of traffic on many TfL controlled routes which have significantly improved frequency, with some NR routes that have the same or worse off peak frequency they did in the 1990s and this effect is clearly illustrated.

The relationship between frequency and traffic growth is well understood and is a fundamental component of the DfT's Transport Appraisal Guidance (WebTAG) and the industry's Passenger Demand Forecasting Handbook (PDFH) as well as TfL's Business Case Development Manual (here: https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transp.../foi-request-detail?referenceId=FOI-4306-1718)...

 

[JonathanH]

This does of mean some passengers will end being priced off the railways and may switch to other forms of travel such as coach or the car, or not bother travelling at ll.

Chasing every last passenger at bargain prices doesn't necessarily make sense, if the train can be filled with passengers making journeys at higher prices.

It isn't necessarily inclusive, but equally it isn't true that the cheapest tickets go to those people who can only afford tickets at those prices.

If some people whose journey is discretionary are priced off, that is less of an issue relative to pricing off those whose journey is necessary. People making journeys with a purpose will generally have a higher threshold on what they consider affordable.

 

[Horizon22]

To take the original point, some are better than others. For instance HSTs are now reaching the "obsolesence" part of the bathtub curve of failure and their maintenance was getting increasingly costly so seems reasonable to considerable their removal, even if there should better plans for their replacement.

 

[ComUtoR]

Just spin really. The government always has a "poor state of finances" due to various reasons depending on which hat they choose to wear. I doubt "cuts" make any difference over time.

They make a lot of difference to overtime.

 

[Facing Back]

Chasing every last passenger at bargain prices doesn't necessarily make sense, if the train can be filled with passengers making journeys at higher prices.

For the train as a purely commercial organisation of course this makes sense. For the train as a pseudo public service, or as a subsidised revenue enabler for other parts of the economy I think the argument is more nuanced.

Of course, you're right at the high level - if the train is full, then the train is full.

Basically trains are expensive to buy, but cheap to run.

All very interesting, thanks for sharing that.

 

[43074]

Something like reducing train mileage by 10% equates to a 1% drop in costs.

Most costs in the industry are fixed costs, which is why rolling stock keeps being sent off lease without being replaced because otherwise the savings are minimal, often to the point of damaging revenue more than the cost saved in the first place.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

One set of costs which are very much fixed is the NR grant which was based on a service provision defined for each route which drove maintenance and renewals expenditure. Currently the heavy lifting of cost cutting is being pushed onto operators but there is little point in having gold plated infrastructure if there are limited trains running on it. If these reduced services are the new normal then in CP7 NRs funding needs to be adjusted downwards to account for that and release funds to ensure what services we have left are not further reduced.

 

[Annetts key]

Basically trains are expensive to buy, but cheap to run.

It can be surprisingly difficult to find worthwhile savings. For the groups of services for which I undertake this sort of evaluation, it is very easy to end up reducing revenue by more than the saving in cost. This is because many people respond to poorer, less frequent services by travelling less often. The obvious illustration of this is the reduction of demand during planned closures. If there is engineering works this weekend, you'll tend not to go on a leisure trip. If there is a strike this week, you will work at home an extra day. Yes, not everyone is 'elastic' - that is to say able to change their plans but all other things being equal some people will be put off. Over the year, many of these lost passengers will make fewer trips and the railway will take less revenue.

It isn't that easy to make cost savings and not simply end up even worse off. The direct variable costs of operation are low. Most of the overall cost is 'fixed' and hard to change at least in the short or medium term. The fuel / power cost is clearly saved and drivers leave all the time, so staff turnover will allow the driver cost to be saved. But reduce your fleet kms by 3% and you might save the cost of a few casualty repairs, but it will often not be possible to find 3% savings from a small fleet maintenance team, or track maintenance team. The services I plan have a variable cost per kilometre that is similar to a taxi fare; a handful of people on board, and the direct costs are covered, though it is notable how poorly this is understood by even senior industry figures or government. Having said that, the way track costs are charged in the UK National Rail network, probably makes it easier for the TOC to avoid access charges, even if Network Rail's costs are harder to save.

To make greater savings you have to start reducing your more fixed costs, such as fleet. You can sell a midlife bus fairly straightforwardly to a smaller company replacing life expired buses, but the second hand market for fairly route specific UK trains is problematic - which is why old go anywhere DMUs swiftly move to a new operator, but premature scrapping (yielding only a tiny fraction of the initial investment) awaits many of the surplus electric trains.

In the current climate, the railway ends up in a tricky position, where the higher ups, under pressure from political masters demand train planners find savings, only to find those same masters aghast at the extent of the cuts necessary to save meaningful amounts of the required subsidy and the likely impact of those cuts on their constituents and popularity! Or it simply isn't possible to save the cash demanded, without loosing an even larger sum in revenue.

It is much easier to save money by not investing or renewing infrastructure (which in the UK is weirdly considered investment rather than being a cost of operation), which is why British Rail did so little...


This isn't correct. Passenger numbers respond directly to frequency, whether they perceive it as 'waiting time' for a turn up and go service like a metro or 'opportunity to arrive at the desired time' as they would with say an hourly or less frequent timetabled service. You are far more likely to want to do a four hour journey that arrives at a reasonable time for your appointment, than have to get there half a day earlier because there are only a few trains each day. You may have to do it from time to time, some passengers are 'inelastic', but most will travel less often if you reduce the frequency.

Other factors clearly do influence passenger numbers, but compare one line in London that has an upgrade and an increase in frequency, while another that stays the same and the former will grow more than the latter, even if they are both growing because of population change or the state of the economy. Compare the off peak growth of traffic on many TfL controlled routes which have significantly improved frequency, with some NR routes that have the same or worse off peak frequency they did in the 1990s and this effect is clearly illustrated.

The relationship between frequency and traffic growth is well understood and is a fundamental component of the DfT's Transport Appraisal Guidance (WebTAG) and the industry's Passenger Demand Forecasting Handbook (PDFH) as well as TfL's Business Case Development Manual (here: https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transp.../foi-request-detail?referenceId=FOI-4306-1718)...

Thank you for a very interesting post

One set of costs which are very much fixed is the NR grant which was based on a service provision defined for each route which drove maintenance and renewals expenditure. Currently the heavy lifting of cost cutting is being pushed onto operators but there is little point in having gold plated infrastructure if there are limited trains running on it. If these reduced services are the new normal then in CP7 NRs funding needs to be adjusted downwards to account for that and release funds to ensure what services we have left are not further reduced.

There is no “gold plated infrastructure”. The infrastructure is maintained at either defined service intervals, or depending on its condition.

For items maintained at either defined service intervals, the normal service intervals are defined at national level. For example, currently facing point lock (FPL) safety tests are performed at 13 week intervals regardless of how many, if any trains use that set of points. Under BR, it was done once per month.

Some assets have a different service interval depending on age, condition and type. For example, “older designs” of signalling equipment cupboards are maintained more frequently than “more modern” types.

Note that I have put older designs and more modern in quotes because this change in type started in BR days, but BR maintained them all at the same service interval.

For items that are maintained depending on its condition, for example rails, there are inspections at defined intervals. But maintenance, repair work or replacement is only performed if the condition drops below a threshold.

Hence reducing the train service makes very little difference to the short term maintenance costs unless a line is actually closed to all traffic.

The second problem is that if not enough maintenance is carried out, the failure rate may (and eventually will) increase. If a failure causes enough delay or enough cancellations, the saving in doing less maintenance is eclipsed by the cost of paying the train operator(s) for the delay/cancellations.

Longer term, lack of maintenance will likely result in a reduction in the useable life of the equipment. Hence the long term renewal costs will increase. And renewals are very expensive compared to routine maintenance.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Thank you for a very interesting post


There is no “gold plated infrastructure”. The infrastructure is maintained at either defined service intervals, or depending on its condition.

For items maintained at either defined service intervals, the normal service intervals are defined at national level. For example, currently facing point lock (FPL) safety tests are performed at 13 week intervals regardless of how many, if any trains use that set of points. Under BR, it was done once per month.

Some assets have a different service interval depending on age, condition and type. For example, “older designs” of signalling equipment cupboards are maintained more frequently than “more modern” types.

Note that I have put older designs and more modern in quotes because this change in type started in BR days, but BR maintained them all at the same service interval.

For items that are maintained depending on its condition, for example rails, there are inspections at defined intervals. But maintenance, repair work or replacement is only performed if the condition drops below a threshold.

Hence reducing the train service makes very little difference to the short term maintenance costs unless a line is actually closed to all traffic.

The second problem is that if not enough maintenance is carried out, the failure rate may (and eventually will) increase. If a failure causes enough delay or enough cancellations, the saving in doing less maintenance is eclipsed by the cost of paying the train operator(s) for the delay/cancellations.

Longer term, lack of maintenance will likely result in a reduction in the useable life of the equipment. Hence the long term renewal costs will increase. And renewals are very expensive compared to routine maintenance.

OK fair point about signalling assets but track maintenance is driven by EMGTPA ( Equivalent Million Gross Tonnes per Annum) so for less train movements that will reduce the EMGTPA and that has the potential for a route to drop a track category and possibly delay renewals. Of course there maybe consequences but if we keep loading all savings through reducing train services then we will have a lot of expensive infrastructure being poorly utilised. My view remains that NR need to be challenged to lower costs in CP7 to maximise money available to support services as without passengers we dont need trains and thus why do we need infrastructure.

 

[Annetts key]

OK fair point about signalling assets

Also D&P (E&P) assets.

I’m not sure about OHL maintenance.

My view remains that NR need to be challenged to lower costs in CP7 to maximise money available to support services as without passengers we dont need trains and thus why do we need infrastructure.

IMHO, Network Rail is good at spending money but poor at getting value for money in lots of areas out with maintenance of signalling, D&P, OHL, P.Way etc.

And that’s part of the problem. The amount of materials left unused but after lying around any hence becoming useless or unnecessary work done during renewals due to daft decisions or poor oversight of large contracts and the contractors, as well as many other things all adds up.

Even simple things, such as no one inspecting buildings. Yes, it costs money to replace the washers in the toilet cisterns, but all that water that is being lost is clocking the water meter around. Having water damage done inside buildings because no one removes the weeds that grow and block the drains and down pipes.

Having to spend large amounts on repairs for brick and stone structures because the railways let the vegetation grow into the mortar.

Failing to insulate buildings, or keep them in a good state of repair, so that the heaters are trying to warm up the outside air…

At least they have started to tackle the part of the organisation that is not part of operations or maintenance. Lots of people have left or moved elsewhere, apparently saving £100 million.

And they are discontinuing renting or leasing office buildings where significant numbers of staff are now working from home. Or are able to use alternative buildings.

But, the biggest problem as I see it, is the cost of servicing the large debt that they have.

 

[Facing Back]

But, the biggest problem as I see it, is the cost of servicing the large debt that they have.

What could NR do about those debt costs?

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Basically trains are expensive to buy, but cheap to run.

I'm not sure that's true.
If you own the asset it's a sunk cost and yes, cheap to use.
But the railway doesn't work like that now, with train leasing meaning you "pay by the hour" essentially.
Peak frequencies are also very expensive as the resources (trains and staff) are sitting around most of the day/week unused.
Much expensive railway infrastructure is also provided for those peak situations.

The railway was expanding to meet continuing growth in usage, until Covid.
It's still trying to work out what is the right size for the future.

 

[zwk500]

IMHO, Network Rail is good at spending money but poor at getting value for money in lots of areas out with maintenance of signalling, D&P, OHL, P.Way etc.

It's wider than that, IMO. NR spends a defined amount of money but doesn't really know what it's actually paying for. Most significantly, NR doesn't properly know what the costs are of NOT paying for something (e.g. not upgrading a system or not replacing a part that later fails).

 

[John R]

What could NR do about those debt costs?

Not a lot, unless the govt sticks its hand in its pocket and pays to extinguish it. Which might mean it has to borrow more itself. It’s essentially all one body anyway, so apart from where the debt interest is charged to, I’m not sure it would make much overall difference, other than NR looking better financially.

 

[notverydeep]

I'm not sure that's true.
If you own the asset it's a sunk cost and yes, cheap to use.
But the railway doesn't work like that now, with train leasing meaning you "pay by the hour" essentially.
Peak frequencies are also very expensive as the resources (trains and staff) are sitting around most of the day/week unused.
Much expensive railway infrastructure is also provided for those peak situations.

The railway was expanding to meet continuing growth in usage, until Covid.
It's still trying to work out what is the right size for the future.

As a glib first comment, I was really meaning that 'railways' in totality are expensive to buy and cheap to run rather than simply rolling stock. That said, the services I work on do work like that and are not fragmented in the way that National Rail (NR) services are (and only a handful of trains have been sold for further use after withdrawal). However, I do think that under the financial complexity, the point remains fundamentally true of NR services. The TOC might have a little more scope to cut costs by returning trains to the leasing company, but losses on today's leases are likely to lead to higher future costs as the risk of early termination is priced in. In the end the saving to the public purse / subsidy is diminished by this.

Looking at the services I work on which have significantly increased off peak frequency and in consequence generated substantial off peak traffic and revenue growth, it is clear that the National Railway network has missed a huge opportunity to become less reliant on peak traffic and make far more efficient use of the infrastructure and train fleets. Staff are only surely employed for services that actually operate, with a mix of short and long shift lengths to roster efficiently across peak and off peak times.

Off peak traffic has almost fully recovered and shows potential for further growth. The industry needs to look to see where there are opportunity to grow revenue by improving services where there is demand, especially where no additional rolling stock or infrastructure are needed, such on Saturdays and (cough) Boxing Day. Even peak traffic has recovered to levels that were 'normal' in (say) 2008-2012 depending on day of the week. Most of us who remember those times did not think of trains as particularly quiet in those years, so it probably isn't a good idea to cut to service levels lower than in those times, especially with traffic recovery continuing.

 

[Krokodil]

Frequency *can* impact usage, but it is not intrinsically linked. In general, the longer the journey the less relevant frequencies (and service intervals) are as prominence is given to price or arrival/departure times instead.

VXC found that increasing frequency (among other changes as part of OP Pumpkin) had a dramatic impact on passenger numbers. Whether you consider XC to actually be a true long distance TOC is another matter. Some might argue that it really mostly carries a series of medium-distance flows linked together.

There are very few routes where cuts are proposed on busy trains.

Only because TOC management have had to fight tooth and nail to stop the DfT lobbing axes at anything that moves. @Clarence Yard has said before that the DfT wanted to cut the summer service in the South West because it didn't see why extra resources should exist mainly to serve seasonal flows. Some of those cuts will likely go ahead regardless.

 

[yorksrob]

The cuts might not save much, but they're contributing to the railway service being a national embarrassment.

 

[geordieblue]

The cuts might not save much, but they're contributing to the railway service being a national embarrassment.

Bit hyperbolic surely, Britain has one of the best railway systems in the world.

 

[A0]

There are numerous case studies where it can be seen that increasing frequency can increase usage by significant percentages, it therefore seems ludicrous to suggest that the opposite is not true.

However there does seem to be a lag, ie it takes time both to gain or lose customers as travel habits change. This makes cuts attractive as they will show an immediate cash saving whereas the loss to revenue may not be immediately obvious, and as has already been said the reasons may be harder to attribute.

Bit in bold - the key word is *can* not *does*.

It doesn't always work like that - and a service reduction of 50% say, from 2tph to 1tph, may only result in usage dropping by 25% - in that case you're actually better utilising the 1tph than the 2tph.

To turn those percentages into numbers, let's say 300 people use 2 tph, so an average of 150 / train - if you drop that to 1tph, you're reducing your costs by up to 50% (there will be some fixed costs which won't reduce, but staff costs, energy use etc potentially will drop by that amount), but if your passenger numbers only drop by 25%, you'd be carrying 225 passengers. Your income would only drop by 25% which may be less than the cost saving, resulting in any deficit being less and your average use of the train would be 50% higher - 225 vs 150.

 

[Annetts key]

long distance TOC

So, some questions:
1, In railway terms, what is long distance? Are we measuring time taken or miles/ km covered?
2, Is this for the total line of route, the distance for the longest schedules service, or some other measure?
3, How is XC different to a say GWR? Lots of GWR services to London Paddington also are local services to large numbers of passengers throughout their route. Including commuters for Bristol and Bath areas as well as other nearby towns.

Bit hyperbolic surely, Britain has one of the best railway systems in the world.

The U.K. railways are not even managing to meet their own service requirements, so they definitely are not one of the best railway systems in the world. And with the cuts to funding, are going backwards if anything.

 

[geordieblue]

The U.K. railways are not even managing to meet their own service requirements, so they definitely are not one of the best railway systems in the world. And with the cuts to funding, are going backwards if anything.

This depends on what the service requirements are. How many countries worldwide have a similar size of network with a similar or higher level of service?

 

[Annetts key]

This depends on what the service requirements are. How many countries worldwide have a similar size of network with a similar or higher level of service?

I don’t dispute that the U.K. network is busy, it is a very busy system. But that’s not the same as “best”.

Today the PPM is in the red at only 85.9%.

Overall punctuality is at 65.5%. CrossCountry (54.5%), Southeastern (50.7%), East Midlands Railway (50.1%), TPE (48.4%), Avanti West Coast (47.2%) being the worst.

Cancellations are at 3.6%. LNER (6.7%), Southeastern (6.7%), Transport for Wales (6.8%) and the Elizabeth line (7.4%) being the worst.

That’s an absolutely shockingly poor performance.

Please note, these figures taken from a live page on an internal company site. Figures will change over the day and hence may improve or not.

 

[The exile]

I don’t dispute that the U.K. network is busy, it is a very busy system. But that’s not the same as “best”.

Today the PPM is in the red at only 85.9%.

Overall punctuality is at 65.5%. CrossCountry (54.5%), Southeastern (50.7%), East Midlands Railway (50.1%), TPE (48.4%), Avanti West Coast (47.2%) being the worst.

Cancellations are at 3.6%. LNER (6.7%), Southeastern (6.7%), Transport for Wales (6.8%) and the Elizabeth line (7.4%) being the worst.

That’s an absolutely shockingly poor performance.

Please note, these figures taken from a live page on an internal company site. Figures will change over the day and hence may improve or not.

Whilst agreeing that those figures are poor -and certainly not arguing that the UK’s railways are “the best”, statistics alone do not tell the full story. ATo rake an extreme, a railway that has 10 trains and 10 sets of crew to run a single journey of 2 miles every week timetabled to take 2 hours, even though the infrastructure and stock is capable of 100mph throughout is likely to return punctuality and reliability figures of 100% - but be of no use to anyone.