Overcrowding - could it be due to migration into this country?

[Class 170101]

From observation on LM and VT, no it isn't, it's mostly British people. The main cause is that (a) the trains are getting better, and (b) driving is getting worse and (apart from a temporary blip) more expensive.

I think it has, but perhaps not for the reason the OP thinks. My theory runs:

Very generally speaking, migrants tend to be younger, have less money (one of the common reasons for moving, it's not for the weather!), than the UK population on average, and for those from Europe at least, are used to using public transport.

They therefore are less likely to own a car, and come with a culture of using public transport.

So I would argue that migrants are more likely to use public transport in this country than the population as a whole; but that's not necessarily because they are migrants.

The culture of using public transport is an interesting one. I spent my formative years in Surrey and Birmingham, and from the age of 17 owned a car and used it for most travel. By the time I was 18, I knew no one who couldn't drive.

I know that if I lived in exactly the same place in Birmingham now, I wouldn't have a car, as the train service (and to a lesser extent, bus service) is considerably better. In some of the larger cities in this country (London, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham) it feels like there is a whole generation growing up with the principle that they don't need a car. I'm still surprised when we get new graduates at work who can't drive, and that number is increasing proportionately.

Technology is responsible for some of this change but also the costs of things for someone aged 17 or 18. University fees are expensive now, cars and insurance are more expensive.

 

[455driver]

If you do want to be sensitive then 'People of Colour' is the acceptable phraseology.

The last time I checked white was still classed as a colour so 'People of Colour' covers everyone in the world!

 

[radamfi]

Large family homes that remain largely unoccupied are of course left almost empty according to the whim of the owner, but naturally they are in effect losing money as a result. They could sell it and move somewhere smaller, and live off the difference, or move somewhere else and rent out the big property. So there's an obvious financial incentive to downsize.

In the longer term, because of falling family size, such homes may well find themselves converted into flats, or demolished and rebuilt as smaller houses or purpose built apartment blocks.

 

[67018]

The original statement was rather broad brush and itself specifically referred to averages:

"Very generally speaking, migrants tend to be younger, have less money (one of the common reasons for moving, it's not for the weather!), than the UK population on average"

This assumption is not consistent with the fact that migrants have a higher median disposable income than British born people.

The original quote was somewhat imprecise, although that just demonstrates the difficulty of making generalisations. It would have been better to say 'a substantial proportion of migrants'. However the quote may be consistent with migrants in general having a higher median income, as it depends on the distribution of incomes. Which I bet isn't a normal distribution.

This is going a bit off topic, though...

Do you envisage a certain age where such residents are forced to leave their homes that they had worked hard to pay and complete a mortgage agreement upon? With regard to "more suitable accommodation", do I see that you wish a mass building of care homes in order to accommodate those elderly displaced persons?

The original quote was maybe not as well put as it could have been. The fact is, though, that people living longer, often in the larger houses that they have worked hard to pay for, is one of the causes of the pressure on housing. Nobody's seriously suggesting compelling them to move, but that doesn't mean the consequences of this trend should be ignored.

Attempting to get back on topic again, at a broad guess I'd say that moving out of London saved me an amount on the cost of my house, relative to an equivalent in London, of about 100 times the annual difference in rail fare that I now have to pay. The season ticket is not cheap (and has gone up *a lot* in recent years), but the payback remains pretty good and it's no wonder so many people are doing it and filling all the trains up.

 

[Minilad]

If you do want to be sensitive then 'People of Colour' is the acceptable phraseology.

Or. You could just refer to everyone as people

 

[bramling]

It is really open to one's own opinion whether somewhere is crowded. Lots of people really enjoy living in a big, crowded city. The bigger and more crowded the better. They dismiss smaller towns as "the back of beyond" or "the middle of nowhere". Lots of people are actively choosing to move to London and other big cities. From a public transport point of view, big cities are better because it makes it more viable to build railways and metros etc.

I'd say things start to feel crowded when trains are unboardable, or roads get to the stage where there seem to be cars in your way right through the journey, even in country lanes. Parts of the south-east are now at that point.

Maybe it's rose-tinted glasses, but I tend to feel life in this country was more pleasant in the 1990s.

 

[najaB]

Maybe it's rose-tinted glasses, but I tend to feel life in this country was more pleasant in the 1990s.

You were 15 to 25 years younger in the 1990's - maybe there's a relationship?

 

[68000]

Maybe it's rose-tinted glasses, but I tend to feel life in this country was more pleasant in the 1990s.

I migrated to the UK in the early '90s - must be a different type of migrant back then

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

The original quote was maybe not as well put as it could have been. The fact is, though, that people living longer, often in the larger houses that they have worked hard to pay for, is one of the causes of the pressure on housing. Nobody's seriously suggesting compelling them to move, but that doesn't mean the consequences of this trend should be ignored.

Any attempt aimed at "persuading this septuagenarian married couple to move" will be strenuously countered by legal action.....with the added possibility of a wide moat installed around the residence perimeter and a drawbridge on the approach driveway to our property...

 

[Hornet]

Any attempt aimed at "persuading this septuagenarian married couple to move" will be strenuously countered by legal action.....with the added possibility of a wide moat installed around the residence perimeter and a drawbridge on the approach driveway to our property...

We have a pretty liberal attitude to people "persuading couples to move from their homes" here in Ireland:-

http://www.joe.ie/uncategorized/new...he-right-to-physically-attack-intruders/31079

I'm certainly an advocate of it.

 

[deltic]

I'd say things start to feel crowded when trains are unboardable, or roads get to the stage where there seem to be cars in your way right through the journey, even in country lanes. Parts of the south-east are now at that point.

Maybe it's rose-tinted glasses, but I tend to feel life in this country was more pleasant in the 1990s.

I have lived in London as an adult for 30 years and would say its a much more pleasant place to live now that in the past - i feel it is a safer place than previously (I was mugged in the 80s and 90s but not in the 00s or 10s! and have lived in the same area all that time) - the transport network is no more crowded in part because of its massive expansion in terms of frequency over that time period - I remember in the 80s people able to lift my feet off the ground on the Victoria Line because we were so packed in and on both the Victoria and Northern line having to let many trains go before you could get on.

The only thing that is noticeably worse now is the crazy price of housing to buy or rent - I could not buy my present flat unless I borrowed 5 to 6 times my vastly inflated salary

 

[colchesterken]

For me it is the aggro re parking, and my OAP railcard & bus pass that has caused me to use the car less and less
Most parts of Greater London are now subject to parking restrictions I am an east end boy and I knew lots of places for free parking and a quick hop on tube or overground into the city. but over the last few years they have all gone over to res park or pay and display
Going to Blackpool next month for a short break .Petrol about £60 aggro on the M6 getting there, traffic and parking problems when I get there
Open off peak rail ticket £73 with railcard, and I get to ride on a virgin, pity cannot use bus pass on the trams!

 

[Bald Rick]

Lets stop right there and clear up this old chestnut, even the Daily Mail will tell you that the average salary of immigrants is higher than British-born people.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2085431/Average-migrant-worker-earns-year-UK-British-born.html

Oh come on.

A) don't believe the daily mail
B) Really? I know about 30 'migrants' of various origins (ie people who have moved here when of working age) and have met many, many, more, and I can only think of one of them who earns more than an average salary. And none of them own Chelsea.

Perhaps if I had said Median income rather than average...

 

[Groningen]

England overcrowded; ha, ha, ha. Is that a joke? You mean that the London area is overcrowded; yes, that is true. That is a mistake of your city planners. What is the difference whether someone is born in or outside the UK. Even someone outside the UK can speak english. Come to the Netherlands to find out and keep your beer and hooligan behavior at home.

 

[subject1]

Oh come on.

A) don't believe the daily mail
B) Really? I know about 30 'migrants' of various origins (ie people who have moved here when of working age) and have met many, many, more, and I can only think of one of them who earns more than an average salary. And none of them own Chelsea.

Perhaps if I had said Median income rather than average...

Yh, but the figures came from the Office of National Statistics, which is (somewhat) more credible than the daily mail. There is also other evidence that migrants have higher wages - which is probably due to the fact they tend to be more skilled etc.

However, your own anecdotal evidence cannot be used as fact:

Most people I know live in town X - this does not mean most people in the UK live in town X.

Even if most immigrants you know may have a lower than average salary does not mean that this is the case for the UK.

 

[Mugby]

As a fairly regular Sunday morning traveller, I've noticed a vast increase in the numbers of people using such services, not people travelling to work on local services but people of all nationalities on long distance services, If most migrants have very limited funds though, wouldn't they be more likely to use National Express coach services?

Another contributary factor is perhaps the tremendous influx of foreign students into Britain since the turn of this century (and students in general) large numbers of whom travel on Fridays and Sundays.

There has also been a large increase in the number of people of oriental origin using Britain's trains, somehow you tend not to think of them as migrants in the same context as the ones currently in the news.

 

[GatwickDepress]

Personally, I think the influx of travel from all ethnic backgrounds, social classes, and age groups is due to how simple it is to plan journeys and purchase tickets on the internet.

In under fifteen seconds on the National Rail Enquires website, I can see that there's an Advance ticket from Hastings to Glasgow costing £23.10 on the 12th of November. I can then buy that ticket through a train company and have it sent to me or collect from a station at my leisure.

Before the advent of internet ticketing, I would have had to go down to the ticket office or use telesales - I wonder how long it would've taken me after I ummed and ahhed over dates, times, routes, train companies, prices...

 

[deltic]

Personally, I think the influx of travel from all ethnic backgrounds, social classes, and age groups is due to how simple it is to plan journeys and purchase tickets on the internet.

In under fifteen seconds on the National Rail Enquires website, I can see that there's an Advance ticket from Hastings to Glasgow costing £23.10 on the 12th of November. I can then buy that ticket through a train company and have it sent to me or collect from a station at my leisure.

Before the advent of internet ticketing, I would have had to go down to the ticket office or use telesales - I wonder how long it would've taken me after I ummed and ahhed over dates, times, routes, train companies, prices...

I agree - I have made trips on foreign rail systems I dont think I would have tried if it wasnt for the ability to buy on line or via TVMs which have English language pages. The removal of the language barrier and knowing in advance how much the trip will cost makes it far easier to travel in a location where you may not be so familiar with the language.

 

[Robertj21a]

.
Quite agree with these points. The number of students here nowadays, and the growth of internet sales, must have had a massive impact on volumes. I doubt that migration in itself has had too much impact other than the London area.

 

[orpine]

The short answer is: No.
Unless you're Welsh when it's: Yes.

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/guide-met...tatistics/population-and-migration/index.html

Net migration (as in, the number of people leaving the country minus the number of people moving in to the country) was about 178,000 for the UK in 2012. That's about 0.3% of the population. So the question is - are trains overcrowded by around only 0.3%? Exactly.

By contrast, "total population, annual growth rate", which I take to mean number of births (they're not clear on that):
England: 323,400
Ireland: 7,200
Scotland: 15,900
Wales: 9,300

So while yes, it's possible that it's the migrants, given that the people of the UK are breeding at a rate double migration, the problem is 66% parents, not migrants.

-------


Of course, maybe the original poster is Welsh, in which case yes, it probably is the migrants: 21.8% of people in Wales were born in England/Wales/Scotland. Anyone want to tell the Daily (Hate)Mail or Torygraph?

Aren't statistics fun?

 

[gimmea50anyday]

Overcrowding has always been issue. The growth could arguably that we have become better at collecting the revenue and therefore sell more tickets. There is no doubt it is much easier now to purchase tockets and the increase in frequency has resulted in more people travelling. Yield analysis is also helping to price people onto trains where there is capacity. Sunday mornings are the quietest times but popularity is booming for precisely that reason, as sunday lunchtime into the evenings are ridiculously busy now. What we really need to be doing now is lengthening trains right across the network, as there is no capacity for more trains. A lesson network management or government still hasnt learnt!

 

[Andrewlong]

On the Reading to Passington route during morning rush hour it's really busy, but you catch a train about 8am to Bristol or Cheltenham and you will find that there are plenty of seats. The 0812 Reading to Cheltenham is empty and you wonder why it warrants the use of HST stock when an Adelante would do the job just as well!

 

[fowler9]

Have immigrants helped cause overcrowding? No. If they are here and travelling on public transport it is probably because they have a job or some other reason to be here. Their job or other reason to be here will generally be contributing to the economy. If this is causing a problem with overcrowding on trains then the employers or service providers need to find a way of re distributing the people around the country (Less jobs in the south east that really don't need to be there for example). With modern technology the only businesses that really need to be in London are tourist related.

There is of course another option. Stop market growth. Pay isn't going up in line with inflation so all of the money from the immigrants who are apparently flooding the country must be going somewhere, I would suggest the people at the top of the pile. They wouldn't like growth stopping much though I imagine.

 

[30907]

On the Reading to Passington route during morning rush hour it's really busy, but you catch a train about 8am to Bristol or Cheltenham and you will find that there are plenty of seats. The 0812 Reading to Cheltenham is empty and you wonder why it warrants the use of HST stock when an Adelante would do the job just as well!

Check out the loading on its previous working into Padd. If THAT'S half empty then FGW have got it wrong. Somehow I doubt it.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

"total population, annual growth rate", which I take to mean number of births (they're not clear on that):
England: 323,400
Ireland: 7,200
Scotland: 15,900
Wales: 9,300

Aren't statistics fun?

Its the excess of births over deaths. Basically, we're living longer (and travelling more because we've got our railcards).
There has been a significant dip in the death rate recently (ask any undertaker!) - which will begin to turn as us baby-boomers go to meet our Maker.

 

[67018]

With modern technology the only businesses that really need to be in London are tourist related.

So one of the world's most successful 'clusters' is all an illusion then? Seems strange when governments all round the world are trying to copy this sort of model, and the proportion of people living in urban areas continues to rise. You ever tried to work on something where the people involved don't meet face to face? Believe me, it is hard, technology or no technology.

And of course if we ever got to the stage where location really was that irrelevant, you can forget about most of the rail network which would no longer be viable (or needed).

Of course, that doesn't mean that the over-concentration of economic activity in one area is a good thing, and distributing it more widely has been the policy of successive governments of all colours for years. It turns out it's easier said than done though.

 

[Tubby Isaacs]

They're not anti-immigration at all as they state on their website they welcome it. They are in favour of managed and sustainable migration something which we don't have in any shape or form.

They can say what they like about themselves. They're serial misleaders. See Jonathan Portes for details.

 

[fowler9]

So one of the world's most successful 'clusters' is all an illusion then? Seems strange when governments all round the world are trying to copy this sort of model, and the proportion of people living in urban areas continues to rise. You ever tried to work on something where the people involved don't meet face to face? Believe me, it is hard, technology or no technology.

And of course if we ever got to the stage where location really was that irrelevant, you can forget about most of the rail network which would no longer be viable (or needed).

Of course, that doesn't mean that the over-concentration of economic activity in one area is a good thing, and distributing it more widely has been the policy of successive governments of all colours for years. It turns out it's easier said than done though.

I'm not saying that it is an illusion or that everyone is wrong. I'm just expressing an opinion. Having everything centralised works very well for big business and in some ways the customers. In other ways it doesn't, especially for the customer. Working in complaints I hear all the time from the end user that I/we don't understand the problems that are happening on a local level. I kind of agree with this, however, it would cost a lot more to manage everything and get things done on a more local level. In general people (Myself included) are quite happy to pay less for their services but not quite so happy that they aren't getting that personal top quality service.

Take for example a repair that is required, I can't go in to too much detail about what my company does, a customer will ask why we can't send someone down to a local shop for parts they could probably get quite easily. We just can't. We don't have a contract with the supplier and they don't have the relevant security clearance.

I apologise for straying a bit off topic there but the same constraints that confine the business I work in cover the TOC's to an extent. The tenuous connection in my opinion is that the cause of overcrowding in some parts of the country is the requirement for people to be working there, not that foreign people have invented a need to be there. Hence immigration has not caused overcrowding, the markets have, including the markets focusing their business in one part of the country. The markets created the immigration and the overcrowding. Of course the government played its own part in creating a market of immigrants looking for a country to escape to.

 

[TOCDriver]

A hell of a lot of weekend travellers in my experience are young, BRITISH people with trolley cases as big as they are! Most migrants couldn't afford the fares anyway! A lot of our Japanese friends do seem to travel the Manchester to Chester line a lot though, especially on Sundays

 

[67018]

I apologise for straying a bit off topic there but the same constraints that confine the business I work in cover the TOC's to an extent. The tenuous connection in my opinion is that the cause of overcrowding in some parts of the country is the requirement for people to be working there, not that foreign people have invented a need to be there. Hence immigration has not caused overcrowding, the markets have, including the markets focusing their business in one part of the country. The markets created the immigration and the overcrowding. Of course the government played its own part in creating a market of immigrants looking for a country to escape to.

This is a good point although blaming something as abstract as 'the markets' obscures the fact that clustering is just the way things work, which is why cities exist in the first place. The success and size of cities if often critically dependent on the ability of the transport systems to supply them and move people around, and in many ways congestion is one of the penalties of success.

The challenge is to work out how best that transport can be supplied - especially when demand is subject to peaks and troughs - and how success can be further spread round the country. Which, although I hesitate to mention it, is (I think) one of the stated objectives of HS2