Network Rail upgrade delayed by government (BBC News Article)

[pemma]

Not really surprising given the vast amounts of money spent subsidising it. The rest of the country is left to cope with largely commercial services.

Yes. Outside of London all services are commercial, except if the local authority deems there to be an economic need for a bus service which no operator is willing to run commercially. Even in those circumstances the award of a contract is subject to no other operator registering the service commercially and it can be cancelled at 8 weeks notice if that happens, even if the new commercial service will operate less frequently for higher fares.

In some villages there is no public transport other than a flexible bus which operates a shopping trip one day a week, which must be booked in advance. Even if your car breaks down on the day the bus runs, it'll probably be too late to request to use the flexible bus.
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Back to the original topic shadow Rail Minister Lilian Greenwood has come up with following response:

Three months ago today, David Cameron and George Osborne unveiled a manifesto that made this promise to voters:

“Electrification of the railways is a key part of our investment programme, with work already underway across the North [and] the Midlands.”

Yet we now know, as the BBC reported yesterday, that this pledge was already being broken. At Network Rail’s Board meeting on March 19th, senior executives agreed to:

“The decisions required jointly with the DfT re enhancement deferrals from June.”

This is the first unequivocal proof that the indefinite “pausing” of the programmes to electrify the Midland Main Line and the TransPennine between Manchester and York – which has become universally known as the Northern Power Cut – was planned before the election.

As Labour warned before the election, the Government’s rail investment plans are now in serious trouble, and there is a threat of further cuts to come. Ministers need to set out exactly what they knew and when – from the Prime Minister to the Transport Secretary, Patrick McLoughlin – as my colleague Michael Dugher has rightfully said.

Network Rail faces serious questions too. That is why I have today written to Mark Carne, the organisation’s Chief Executive, to demand answers.

I have written to Mark Carne because it is still not clear what he and other officials told Transport Ministers before the election. He was at the meeting in March when Network Rail started to prepare the shutdown of essential projects. He was also at earlier meetings, when it was warned that there were deep concerns over the “affordability” and “deliverability” of the Government’s investment programme.

Crucially, Network Rail’s Chief Executive is “personally responsible to Parliament for Network Rail’s stewardship of public funds.” When he spoke about electrification plans last week, he also said that “we have to level with the public about just how difficult this task is.”

The truth is that Network Rail levelled with neither the public nor with Parliament before the election. We now urgently need to know whether Mark Carne was acting under political instruction, or whether he withheld important information from Ministers as their public statements imply.

The “pausing” of these two projects does not just make a mockery of the Government’s commitment to building a “Northern Powerhouse” and a “Midlands Engine.” It also calls into question the conduct of senior Ministers, and the sincerity and integrity of the bargain that the Conservatives sought to strike with the electorate.

And until Ministers come clean on the extent of their involvement, Labour will not stop demanding answers.

http://labourlist.org/2015/07/rail-cuts-ministers-and-network-rail-have-questions-to-answer/

 

[HH]

As they say, lies, damn lies, and statistics.

London buses is a HUGE success story. They've gone from being a service you only used if you had to, to being one that is used by people from all walks. Their success is amply demonstrated by the large number of London Bus apps that exist.

I'll bet that they actually cost less per journey in real terms than they did when they were total crap.

P.S. It would be wonderful if Sir Peter could work the same on NR!

 

[WatcherZero]

And if you look at the total government support per passenger journey the difference is even starker:

English Metropolitan Areas = 50.7p
English Non-Metropolitan Areas = 66.3p
London = 34.7p

Total net government support per passenger journey 2013/2014 (comprising Public Transport Support, Bus Service Operators Grant and Concessionary Travel Reimbursement).

Source: DfT

See note 4, excludes London commercial tendered services for which TfL subsidises rather than Westminister directly, that's £2.85bn per year on bus services and £275m on bus facilities in 13/14 they also write in to those tenders requiring the bus companies to provide the concessionary discount so it doesn't appear on the books while outside London local authorities have to pay the bus companies on average half the difference (negotiated individually).

Total Net Support excluding concessionary travel
England 24.9p
London 25.0p
England Metropolitan 20.7p
England rural 27.9p

 

[snowball]

The Transport Secretary is appearing before the Commons transport select committee this afternoon (Monday) at 16:30 to explain what he knew when about NR's cost and schedule overruns. No doubt there's a TV feed somewhere.

 

[Starmill]

Well yes, but the country is getting a lot more railway than it did in the 80s and 90s.

There are a lot of services that operate now that did not operate back then, and pretty much all of them lose money on a pure commercial basis.

New Sunday service? Loses money
Additional late night services? Loses money
Extra frequency off peak? loses money
HS1? Loses money
All the reopened lines? lose money
Open every station first till last and have much higher standards of customer info / care like London Overground? Loses pots of money.

At the same time, the standards expected of the railway have increased considerably. Vastly improved safety has come at a price (quite necessarily) both in terms of upfront cost and maintenance. The quantity of renewal work being delivered is roughly double what it was 20 years ago, and it is all done in a much stricter workforce safety environment.

And finally, most of those working on the railway get paid much more than they did in 1994 allowing for inflation.

But those funding the railways have decided that these are all the right things to do for the country. Or at least they did decide. They may change their minds.

It's almost impossible to measure, but the rise in revenues seems like it would cover those few trivialities - particularly the increased operating costs from Huddersfield - Halifax, for example which are going to be very small. And do Aylesbury Vale Parkway and Corby operations not close to breakeven? I'd be very surprised if they were making huge losses. Fares are higher (much, much higher in some cases, and there are more people willing to pay these!) and passengers in real terms are greater. I think we can afford better.

You're definitely right that London Overground and Merseyrail waste money by the bucketload. Staffing a shack like Aughton Park with 78k passengers a year from 0540 to 0020 every day? Staffed stations are money well spent. But in this case, I'm 100% certain that that money could be better spent (almost anywhere else in the whole country, this would be an unstaffed station).

 

[pemma]

Regarding Sunday services some Northern Rail routes see over 4 times the number of Sunday passengers than they did pre-December 2008 timetable changes (and no I don't mean the Atherton line which had no Sunday service.)

While if the Oldham Loop was a basket case for Network Rail as has been suggested by TfGM, then surely a significant amount of money has been saved by it no longer being National Rail.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

It's almost impossible to measure, but the rise in revenues seems like it would cover those few trivialities - particularly the increased operating costs from Huddersfield - Halifax, for example which are going to be very small. And do Aylesbury Vale Parkway and Corby operations not close to breakeven? I'd be very surprised if they were making huge losses. Fares are higher (much, much higher in some cases, and there are more people willing to pay these!) and passengers in real terms are greater. I think we can afford better.

You ought to be right, but the paradox of the much-maligned McNulty report was that more passengers actually means a proportionately larger cost, the opposite of what you would expect.
The railway keeps finding ways of increasing its costs to counteract revenue gains.

 

[snowball]

No doubt there's a TV feed somewhere.

Here, in fact

http://www.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/21006886

 

[pemma]

Patrick McLoughlin earlier photographed boarding the cab of a 222. Maybe the EMT drivers refused to take him.

 

[snowball]

Well he opened the A453 near Nottingham today

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/transport-secretary-opens-widened-a453-remembrance-way

so he must have got back to London somehow.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Here, in fact
http://www.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/21006886

A master class in seeming to explain what is going on in great detail, without actually saying much at all.
The most telling moment was when Patrick McLoughlin carefully avoided saying that GW electrification would not meet the original dates.
Unlike earlier grillings of this sort, McLoughlin and Rutnam had all their ducks in a row, and were not floored by the committee.

The TP pause rationale is that the previous plan required two successive upgrades, one for electrification and the other for capacity/line speeds, so they are going for a single upgrade plan instead.
MML loses out to GW on passenger benefits and the IEP programme. I take that as meaning "Swindon or bust".
East-West was confirmed as not being "paused".
All eyes must now be on the next Network Rail statement of progress.
The June update of the CP5 plan is still not published.
I bet it will be September (if then) before we know much more.

 

[WatcherZero]

I think the telling thing was when he said he signed off the Control period with a cost estimate of £12bn and the expectation that GRIP3 would descope some projects and save £200m of that, instead the costs have increased but by how much he doesn't know yet.

I.e. he was expecting/relying on project coming in under budget when he approved them.

 

[67018]

You ought to be right, but the paradox of the much-maligned McNulty report was that more passengers actually means a proportionately larger cost, the opposite of what you would expect.
The railway keeps finding ways of increasing its costs to counteract revenue gains.

I would guess (as a total non-expert) that there isn't a linear relationship between the profitability of a rail line and its usage. Up to a point, more passengers fill up empty space and so revenue increases ahead of costs. When more trains are needed, there's a step increase in costs but revenue should keep up if the new capacity is used. But there then comes a point where demand is so high that there is a need for very expensive infrastructure, tight headways, heavier staffing etc. so costs could well escalate. This is made worse if demand is peaky so the capacity goes unused half the time, and also by the fact that major upgrade to existing lines can't be done overnight and the lines can't be closed in the meantime.

Then there are things like tighter safety procedures and disabled access that, desirable as they are, imply further cost increases.

 

[shinkansen1966]

BBC Radio 4's File on Four recently investigated the state of Network Rail's projects including Birmingham New Street, London Bridge and the Great Western electrification.

Listen here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b060zvnd

Among the ongoing problems are the new Hitachi electric trains. DfT asked for the carriages to be 26 metres long and they won't fit on the tight curves at Bristol Temple Meads station.

 

[D365]

Among the ongoing problems are the new Hitachi electric trains. DfT asked for the carriages to be 26 metres long and they won't fit on the tight curves at Bristol Temple Meads station.

Which was taken into account on planning the GW upgrade, and is being dealt with accordingly... We've had plenty enough threads discussing it.

 

[shinkansen1966]

Which was taken into account on planning the GW upgrade, and is being dealt with accordingly... We've had plenty enough threads discussing it.

Can you give me the links, please ? I want to get up to speed on this. I dislike being out of the railway loop.

 

[AdamHewitt]

I think the telling thing was when he said he signed off the Control period with a cost estimate of £12bn and the expectation that GRIP3 would descope some projects and save £200m of that, instead the costs have increased but by how much he doesn't know yet.

I.e. he was expecting/relying on project coming in under budget when he approved them.

It sounded to me like he said the original cost estimate for enhancements was £12bn, but that had risen by £2bn (to £14bn) by September 2014. But through de-scoping and post-GRIP 3 ECAM, it was hoped that £2bn 'overspend' would be reduced to £200m.

Verbatim transcript is here:
http://www.railtechnologymagazine.c...t-true-size-of-cp5-enhancement-over-spend-2bn

I'll correct if I've misinterpreted his meaning.

 

[WatcherZero]

Different part, where he was talking about initial signing off not reducing the overspend.