From the non speculative thread:
Yes. That fact, however, doesn't mean that Wolmar is wrong to note that the coldly rational thing to do in order to realise savings at the present time would indeed be to prune services that have some of the biggest costs for the smallest returns.
Depends what you mean by prune. Could cutting frequencies on quiet branches be sensible? Possibly, the Cumbrian Coast for example only had a two hourly service on the middle bit for years with odd peak extras based on Sellafield shifts, recently upped to hourly but this is probably not necessary and could be dropped back, similarly Ormskirk to Preston could go back to its old 1h15 frequency, and perhaps Southport to hourly but with longer trains as per pre 1998. But you are not going to save all that much just by lopping one unit/crew out of a few branch lines. You would have to actually close some entirely, and that would be politically unpalatable, other than very odd examples that serve little purpose like Berney Arms. The other obvious ones are in Wales and Scotland, and so not really under their control.
The Marston Vale will become part of EWR so not that. St Albans? Well, maybe, but it is one unit and crew. S&C? No chance, the campaign would be far louder than last time. Bentham Line? Possibly, but what would that save, half a unit/crew? Morecambe? Not when the Eden Project is coming... Heysham? Yes, but very little to save with two round trips a day that just come out of the shuttle diagrams.
You would get bigger savings by destaffing, I reckon. I genuinely don't think mass ticket office closures would be that politically unpalatable given online sales are now in the majority, for instance - certainly it is difficult to argue for example that blanket staffing Merseyrail stations for full period of service is anything other than a massive waste of money, particularly if they are planning on keeping guards who could sell tickets instead, and most would use contactless or e-tickets were they offered. Even reducing them all to a single morning shift would save a packet based on the fact that most people do a day trip out in the morning and buy a return ticket then.
And there are always those three little unpopular operational letters...even if you kept an OBS style on board member of staff, the use of cameras could allow dispatch staff to be removed because unlike the Mk1 eyeball they can be used on curved platforms, so that is another cut...