Boycott of the railways

[Voyagergirl]

People are thinking of boycotting the railways, even on the television people are admitting that coach travel is cheaper. It is ridiculous how much the railways charge for travel. Customer service is terrible, EMT may have high quality service refurbished 158s on their Norwich - Liverpool South Parkway/Lime Street services but the customer service offered on that rout is appalling.

 

[BestWestern]

The railway has the luxury of a captive market; many of the 'bread and butter' punters use it out of need rather than choice. There are some good deals about if you're using trains for leisure journeys, Advance fares etc, but yes the walk-on prices can be eye watering! A 'boycott' is highly unlikely to happen to any degree that would start to worry anybody though.

 

[455driver]

How many commuters arrive at the London Terminals in the morning peak?
How many (road) coaches would it take to move them all?
What would the actual journey time be?
Would anyone else on the roads get to work on time?

I find a boycott very unlikely, okay some people will change their travel arrangements (they always have) but the fact that the trains are busier than ever despite the supposedly high fares and recession speak volumes.
Oh if anyone wants to compare us with Europe can you do it over similar distances, train frequency and journey times please, rather than compare our 2 an hour service with a European 4 times a day service.

Edit, do Europeans commute the sort of distances we do over here and if they do what sort of numbers do it, a lot of our rolling stock (especially into London) is only used in the peak periods simply to move the huge number of commuters and sits idle the rest of the (week)day and all weekend?

 

[telstarbox]

People are thinking of boycotting the railways, even on the television people are admitting that coach travel is cheaper. It is ridiculous how much the railways charge for travel. Customer service is terrible, EMT may have high quality service refurbished 158s on their Norwich - Liverpool South Parkway/Lime Street services but the customer service offered on that rout is appalling.

Could you give an example of a rail journey you think is too expensive and how much you think it should cost?

 

[BestWestern]

Could you give an example of a rail journey you think is too expensive and how much you think it should cost?

There does appear to be a belief, in some quarters at least, that rail travel should be dirt cheap. I am sometimes taken aback when you tell somebody that their return a couple of stops and back is three or four quid and they appear to quite genuinely feel that this is expensive. In many instances the same journey by bus would cost significantly more and take far longer, and the same goes for a taxi. Some people however seem to think their journey is going to cost pennies rather than pounds!

The OP does make some valid points though, particularly about customer service. It is poor sometimes, moreso in some places than others. If you are paying through the nose for your daily commute on FCC for example, being quite literally crammed into a manky 319 long overdue a refurbishment, rubbing shoulders with all the fare dodgers and without even the most basic privilege of a Guard on board the train, you may well feel short changed when it's time for the latest price increase.

 

[ANorthernGuard]

People are thinking of boycotting the railways, even on the television people are admitting that coach travel is cheaper. It is ridiculous how much the railways charge for travel. Customer service is terrible, EMT may have high quality service refurbished 158s on their Norwich - Liverpool South Parkway/Lime Street services but the customer service offered on that rout is appalling.

Customer service is generally quite high, of course there are always the odd bad apple but they are certainly the minority. I always do my best to help the passenger wherever possible but sadly I am not a miracle worker which does tend to upset the odd person. And if you book in advance fares can be incredibly cheap I have seen tickets from man picc to london under a tenner many a time

 

[tbtc]

People are thinking of boycotting the railways

Is that why passenger numbers have risen every year recently (despite motoring going down)?

Some boycot, eh?

 

[Wath Yard]

even on the television people are admitting that coach travel is cheaper.

It's cheaper to walk too. Of course rail travel is more expensive than coach travel, and it has always been that way and rightly so - the train is quicker so you pay more. Trains cost far more than coaches to purchase and operate and maintaining the railway isn't cheap either.

 

[Yew]

I'm not sure rail travel has to be more expensive than a coach. However our current system does not encourage it to be cheaper. On the other hand special offers can match those of the bus industry, look at EC's seat sale, or scotrail's bargain berths. Some very good offers are available.

 

[Wath Yard]

It doesn't have to be more expensive but it should be. The way some people talk it is as though rail travel is a basic human right and tax payers should pump unlimited amounts of money into the railway so everybody can afford to travel by trains. Sorry, but if you cant afford the train catch the bus. If you can't afford the bus buy a bike.

 

[DiscoStu]

Could you give an example of a rail journey you think is too expensive and how much you think it should cost?

One that springs to mind was when I had to travel from Northampton to Runcorn on a weekday morning for business. I purchased the ticket at the station as the meeting was planned at the last minute.

Guess how much it cost me. £115!!!

A two hour train journey is £115, and I wasn't even travelling to London!!

There's nothing that anybody can say to me to convince me that that is a fair price at any time of day. Laughable (but only because I could claim it back)

How much do I think it should cost? £40 ... tops.
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Sorry, but if you cant afford the train catch the bus. If you can't afford the bus buy a bike.

The railways SHOULD be a means that everybody can afford to travel by. Look at India's railways. A 400 mile journey in second class costs quite literally pennies, and that makes it accesible for all.

The Government shouldn't tax the ***** out of people in order to get them off the roads, and then allow the railways to charge the ***** out of people when they decide to catch the train. That mentality only makes long distance travel available to the rich ... which I'm guessing is what you want?

 

[Nym]

One that springs to mind was when I had to travel from Northampton to Runcorn on a weekday morning for business. I purchased the ticket at the station as the meeting was planned at the last minute.

Guess how much it cost me. £115!!!

A two hour train journey is £115, and I wasn't even travelling to London!!

There's nothing that anybody can say to me to convince me that that is a fair price at any time of day. Laughable (but only because I could claim it back)

How much do I think it should cost? £40 ... tops.
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The railways SHOULD be a means that everybody can afford to travel by. Look at India's railways. A 400 mile journey in second class costs quite literally pennies, and that makes it accesible for all.

The Government shouldn't tax the ***** out of people in order to get them off the roads, and then allow the railways to charge the ***** out of people when they decide to catch the train. That mentality only makes long distance travel available to the rich ... which I'm guessing is what you want?

Do I have to be the first one to point out that £40 would be less than an Off Peak YP Return from Liverpool to London? For a peak journey.

How much would it have cost you to drive from Northampton to Runcorn in the AM Peak?

Or buy a walk up fare on National Express?

How much extra do you value your time by?

 

[455driver]

I'm not sure rail travel has to be more expensive than a coach.

Of course rail is going to be more expensive, does the coach have to pay towards maintaining every road it travels on during the year covering for all the wear and tear plus incidental costs such as traffic lights, bridge repairs etc?
The trains do.

 

[Skimble19]

Customer service has actually improved in many places IMO.. As an example, my local station is now staffed on the platforms for the first time in who knows how many years (Pre-ECML electrification!), and the ones I've seen have all been perfectly friendly and helpful, especially during disruption!

 

[AeroSpace]

Remember that the train only pays for half the infrastructure, and that road vehicles contribute excise duty.

One advantage of the train that is easily forgotten is that your chances of survival are orders of magnitude better than on a coach. How much do you value your life?

 

[WestCoast]

Oh if anyone wants to compare us with Europe can you do it over similar distances, train frequency and journey times please, rather than compare our 2 an hour service with a European 4 times a day service.

Edit, do Europeans commute the sort of distances we do over here and if they do what sort of numbers do it, a lot of our rolling stock (especially into London) is only used in the peak periods simply to move the huge number of commuters and sits idle the rest of the (week)day and all weekend?

'Europe' isn't anywhere near specific enough, depends entirely on the country you're comparing to. I've found they can be cheaper and dearer than UK trains, but the ticketing systems are almost always more transparent and less complex.

 

[DiscoStu]

Do I have to be the first one to point out that £40 would be less than an Off Peak YP Return from Liverpool to London? For a peak journey.

How much would it have cost you to drive from Northampton to Runcorn in the AM Peak?

So you use an already over inflated fare to justify another? Well done.

It would cost about £50 in fuel if I drove.

 

[SF-02]

The real test that should be done is to check how much comparable journeys cost in comparable European countries. If there is a difference then analyse every facet of where that difference comes from, and then do what is necessary to reduce the difference. If passenger and subsidy costs are higher (and havn't studies of equivalent services shown they are?) then study where and why and alter. This does become difficult when factoring in services such as real time platform electronic boards and online services which in the UK are brilliant and may not exist to the same extent in other places.

Of course this real push for change probably wont happen as it would step on too many toes and effect a few ideologies along the way.

 

[DiscoStu]

'Europe' isn't anywhere near specific enough, depends entirely on the country you're comparing to. I've found they can be cheaper and dearer than UK trains, but the ticketing systems are almost always more transparent and less complex.

A return from Koln to Frankfurt (Main) would be 68 euros (£55), and is a similar journey time to the Northampton to Runcorn fare I mentioned in a previous post (£115).

 

[michael769]

The fact that passenger numbers are continuing to increase suggests that the view that fares are too high is mistaken. People are clearly willing to pay current fares and in increasing numbers. If fares were too high people would simply refuse to pay them in the numbers that they do.

Poor customer service is not something I recognise on our railways as whole. Yes they have the odd person who has no business in a customer facing role. but they are not representative of the vast majority of rail staff who do an excellent job every day looking after their passengers, often with little thanks or even basic courtesy in return.

There are only two systemic weakness on the customer service front that remain:

Firstly how the ToCs deal with disruption, where a far to large minority of incidents are plagued by late, inaccurate or non existent information and advice with line managers all to often leaving individual staff members to deal with large numbers of distressed passengers on their own with no support or access to useful information.

And Secondly the unwillingness to invest in adequate ticket issuing facilities in many areas. Or indeed on train with well documented (on these forums) issues with the Avantix machines - most notably the issues with card acceptance.

 

[Nym]

Remember that the train only pays for half the infrastructure, and that road vehicles contribute excise duty.

One advantage of the train that is easily forgotten is that your chances of survival are orders of magnitude better than on a coach. How much do you value your life?

I'm sorry, how many passengers have been killed in rail accidents in the last 15 years with an incident speed not exceeding 110km/h?

So you use an already over inflated fare to justify another? Well done.

It would cost about £50 in fuel if I drove.

So why didn't you just drive then?

 

[DiscoStu]

We have by far the highest rail fares in Europe.

Some bullets points from an article I found :

• A commuter travelling between 10.6 miles (17km) and 25 miles (41km) each morning to London spent an average £1,859.96 on an annual season ticket, compared with £990 in the next most expensive country, France, and £443,69 in the cheapest country, Italy.

• A passenger travelling between 25 miles (41km) and 50 miles (80km) to London faced an average annual ticket cost of £3,188.68 compared with £1934.89 in the second most expensive country, Holland, and £683.20 in the cheapest, Italy.


• Unrestricted day returns to London for a trip of between 10.6 miles (17km) and 25 miles (41km) cost an average £11.57 but a similar journey was £6.88 in Germany and £3.63 in France.

• A walk-up day return to London, from up to 50 miles (80km) away, could cost more than £250, whereas no similar fare in France would exceed £100.


How can any of you try and justify these extortionate prices?

 

[WestCoast]

A return from Koln to Frankfurt (Main) would be 68 euros (£55), and is a similar journey time to the Northampton to Runcorn fare I mentioned in a previous post (£115).

Yes, but of course advance fares could mean that the journey would be cheaper in the UK. In the Netherlands, there are essentially three types of ticket; single, day return or season. Longer journeys can be pricey.

One that can't be argued with is the DB Bahncard 100, which offers almost unlimited travel for 1 year across the whole of Germany including all express trains, priced at 4,090 euros (£3,330). How much would that cost with back-to-back ALRs?

 

[tbtc]

We have by far the highest rail fares in Europe

....and some of the highest wages/ highest cost of living too. Rail travel is therefore reflected by that (a ticket in Portugal may cost a fraction of the price, but then the hourly wage is only a fraction of the UK equivalent).

 

[DiscoStu]

Yes, but of course advance fares could mean that the journey would be cheaper in the UK. In the Netherlands, there are essentially three types of ticket; single, day return or season. Longer journeys can be pricey.

One that can't be argued with is the DB Bahncard 100, which offers almost unlimited travel for 1 year across the whole of Germany including all express trains, priced at 4,090 euros (£3,330).

People shouldn't be shafted because they have to travel at the last minute.

Wow, that's incredible value. I almost want to move to Germany just so I can get one!

 

[michael769]

....and some of the highest wages/ highest cost of living too. Rail travel is therefore reflected by that (a ticket in Portugal may cost a fraction of the price, but then the hourly wage is only a fraction of the UK equivalent).

Indeed I do not think it is useful to try to compare prices with other countries for several reasons

* Exchange rates react to factors such as exports, debt, sentiment not the relative value of consumer goods in respective countries
* Income is different
* Costs of living is different
* EU train services do not compete directly with UK services.

The only fair comparison is to compare fares with the railways "competition" mostly air, car, bus and coach. It is fair to say that the railways for the most part compares poorly on cost grounds, but with many rail journeys being faster door to door one must remember the old adage "you get what you pay for".

To my mind the only competitor the railways compare poorly with is internal air travel. But even then one one takes checkin/out times and travel to and from airports the journey time advantage is often marginal. But there one must consider that the railways do offer an ad-hoc walk up service something air travel lacks.

 

[DiscoStu]

....and some of the highest wages/ highest cost of living too. Rail travel is therefore reflected by that (a ticket in Portugal may cost a fraction of the price, but then the hourly wage is only a fraction of the UK equivalent).

But our salaries and cost of living aren't double what they are in Northern Europe (incl Germany, Austria, France)

(I haven't got time to search for evidence, but I highly doubt I'm wrong)
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So why didn't you just drive then?

Because I don't have a car.

 

[455driver]

A return from Koln to Frankfurt (Main) would be 68 euros (£55), and is a similar journey time to the Northampton to Runcorn fare I mentioned in a previous post (£115).

How frequent is the service on each line?

 

[Nym]

Because I don't have a car.

So would you like to revise your previous answer of how much it would cost you to drive, since you also have all of the additional capital and running costs of the vehicle to now take into account...

 

[AeroSpace]

I'm sorry, how many passengers have been killed in rail accidents in the last 15 years with an incident speed not exceeding 110km/h?

Don't know, but surely much less than on coaches...?

Did you misread my post?