BBC Article on overcrowding- '100,000 passengers a day stand into London'

[YorkshireBear]

London-bound train overcrowding: 100,000 have to stand
Passengers on crowded train

More than 100,000 rail commuters into London have to stand in the busiest times of the morning rush hour on a typical day, new figures have shown. The government figures showed a fifth of rush hour passengers stand and some trains run at 60% over capacity. On a typical weekday in autumn last year, 535,000 passengers arrived in central London by train in the morning peak time of 07:00 to 09:59. The Department of Transport (DfT) said overcrowding in 2012 was down on 2011. On average, a total of 977,000 people travel into London by trains each day.

The rail company with the highest level of passengers in excess of capacity (PiXC) of any London and south-east England operator was First Great Western, which was 7.1% over capacity. This was lower than in 2011.

The worst service for overcrowding was the 08:27 Heathrow Connect service from Heathrow to Paddington Station which typically travelled with 786 standard-class passengers - 65% over the capacity figure of 476. The 10 worst-crowded services in autumn 2012 travelled between 49% and 65% over capacity.

Most over-crowded routes in autumn 2012

08:27 Heathrow-London Paddington
18:13 London Euston-Birmingham New Street
06:23 Manchester Airport-Middlesbrough
18:00 London Waterloo-Portsmouth Harbour
07:17 Banbury-London Marylebone
06:19 Birmingham Moor St-London Marylebone
07:32 Tattenham Corner-London Bridge
06:15 Portsmouth Harbour-London Waterloo
07:09 Henley-on-Thames-London Paddington
07:10 Haslemere-London Waterloo

'Unacceptable combination'
Outside London, the highest PiXC levels were at Leeds, Manchester and Sheffield, which all had just over 2% PiXC in the morning peak and between 1% and 2% in the afternoon peak. Richard Hebditch, campaigns director for the Campaign for Better Transport, said: "These statistics show rail is vital to the economy, getting millions of people to work every day. "But it also shows many commuters are faced with an unacceptable combination of overcrowded trains and spiralling ticket prices. "Government needs to give rail passengers a fair deal by ending above-inflation ticket price hikes and making sure franchise holders tackle overcrowding."

A spokesman for the Association of Train Operating Companies said: "Year on year, the official measure of overcrowding during peak times has fallen slightly overall. "We recognise that some services remain crowded and passengers get frustrated when they can't get a seat, which is why the rail industry is planning to increase peak time seats into and out of major cities by almost a third by 2019."

Transport Minister Norman Baker said: "Climbing on to a very crowded train is an unpleasant experience and I sympathise with passengers using these services. "I urge train operators to do what they can on these particular trains. The department is working closely with the industry to ensure this issue is tackled."

RMT rail union leader Bob Crow said nothing would change unless the railways were renationalised. "While passengers are forced to pay through the nose to stand, crammed in on sweltering, overcrowded trains, the private companies running these services are making huge profits in the safe knowledge that the whole racket of rail privatisation is a one-way ticket to the bank," Mr Crow said.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23436819

Bob Crow steps in with the usual. As ever reliable fool.

I find it very interesting Leeds, Sheffield, Manchester are the cities behind London in terms of percentages. And there seems to have been a shift in the most overcrowded services, people abandoning the GWML?

 

[swt_passenger]

...And there seems to have been a shift in the most overcrowded services, people abandoning the GWML?

I think there was extra DMU stock targeted at the GW problem services following 180 re-introduction. I think maybe some calling patterns were altered as well?

 

[WatcherZero]

If you look at the figures these cities have high morning and evening peak usage like London (though unlike London in the North theres more travellers in the evening peak than the morning peak) whereas places like Leicester have pretty much steady usage all day.

This is only the second year crowding figures have been collected outside London so not really enough data to point to a trend, though one thing to point out is they define it as the number of passengers standing passing through a city centre rather than boarding or disembarking in a city centre and they dont define what the geographic basis of the 'city centres' is outside London (in London its defined as zone 1).

 

[harry42]

maybe mr cameron might act?! No!

 

[Flamingo]

So that works out at approx 10% of passengers standing, overall. A 9/10 chance of getting a seat seems pretty good to me...

 

[W230]

maybe mr cameron might act?! No!

What do you suggest he does? Build some more rolling stock?

Seriously though, there is massive investment countrywide in the infrastructure at the moment - hopefully when all the projects are completed it will help (for a while at least).

I don't see how nationalising (or not nationalising) will make any difference though? :?

 

[cjohnson]

The Heathrow Connect service can't be that bad - assuming no-one commutes from Heathrow itself, that's a 22 min journey at most on an air-conditioned 360.

 

[WatcherZero]

So that works out at approx 10% of passengers standing, overall. A 9/10 chance of getting a seat seems pretty good to me...

PIXC is Passengers standing in excess of capacity, i.e. more passengers than the train is rated to carry, Standing the responsibility is that noone should have to stand for more than 20 minutes.


Ooh buried in the tables it does have the definitions of City Centres after all
London: All stations in Zone 1
Birmingham: Moor St, New St, Snow Hill
Liverpool: Liverpool Central, Moorfields, Lime St and James St
Manchester: Manchester Piccadilly, Manchester Victoria, Oxford Road
Bristol: Temple Meads
Cardiff: Queen St and Cardiff Central

The count takes place on the train arriving inbound at the first station in a city centre and outbound leaving the last station in a city centre, only one count takes place on each service on a single day. Birmingham figures have been left out of this statistical release because of problems in the data supplied by London Midlan though information for other individual tocs in Birmingham is included.

Does leave some room for errors that approach for example when im on a peak into Manchester it starts emptying at Deansgate and Salford Central/Crescent so peak loading is outside what they define as the city centre, im sure theres similar in other cities where the peak crowding is outside what the Governments defining as the city centre.


Theres also some issues around standard class/first class and rated capacity of different classes, e.g. 16% of passengers are standing on Chiltern services into Birmingham but its 0% PIXC, Crosscountry 7% are standing but its 2% PIXC, Some TPE services have upto 23% standing but 3% PIXC, LO has 48% standing 0% PIXC meanwhile in Sheffield Cross Country has 8% standing 8% PIXC, ATW into Manchester has 7% PIXC and 7% standing, Chiltern into London has 9% PIXC and 11% standing.


Excluding LO because of the different seat setup (lots of standing but well within capacity), also noting a rural service will average out a metro service in TOC standing figures as its done by total seats and total standing not on individual services.

Most standing in the country in Morning (Over 10%)
Chiltern into Birmingham 16%
TPE into Leeds 22%, Northern into Leeds 12%
Into London C2C 25%, Chiltern 11%, FCC 12%, FGW 15%, GA 14%, LM 12%, SWT 28%, South Eastern 19%, Southern 25%
East Midland into Manchester 10%, TPE 23%
TPE into Sheffield 13%

Most standing in the country in afternoon (Over 10%)
TPE into Leeds 22%, Liverpool 15%, Manchester 24%, Newcastle 21% and Sheffield 22%.
Northern into Leeds 10%, Northern into Sheffield 10%, Crosscountry into Manchester 12%
C2C into London 14%, SWT into london 22%, LM into London 14%, Southern 13%, SE 10%, FGW 10%

Total average standing for city morning and peak periods combined
Bristol 6%
Cardiff 5.13%
Leeds 12.3%
Leicester 1.68%
Liverpool 4.86%
London 15.69%
Manchester 11.64%
Nottingham 2.36%
Sheffield 6.75%

 

[Dave1987]

I'm wondering whether this takes into account people who purposefully travel on a train because it takes 10 mins less to get to their destination than another service that they are likely to get a seat?

Case in point:

07.30 Colchester - London liv st - always full and standing by Manningtree but takes about 53 mins Liverpool st.

07.33 Colchester - London liv st - takes 13 mins longer but is a 12 car and usually quite a few spare seats at the rear of the train

A lot of passengers board the 07.30 even though then know it is one of the busiest trains of the day but then complain that they never get a seat.....

 

[A-driver]

I'm wondering whether this takes into account people who purposefully travel on a train because it takes 10 mins less to get to their destination than another service that they are likely to get a seat?

Case in point:

07.30 Colchester - London liv st - always full and standing by Manningtree but takes about 53 mins Liverpool st.

07.33 Colchester - London liv st - takes 13 mins longer but is a 12 car and usually quite a few spare seats at the rear of the train

A lot of passengers board the 07.30 even though then know it is one of the busiest trains of the day but then complain that they never get a seat.....

Even on the same train you find the London end rammed with spare seats at the back-people don't like to have to walk the length of the train once in London. Then you get complaints about how it is unacceptable to be crammed in and 'forced' to travel in conditions worse than cattle.

Perhaps they should get rid of the coaches at the back as they are obviously wasted capacity and add more coaches to the front of the train...?

 

[Dave1987]

Perhaps they should get rid of the coaches at the back as they are obviously wasted capacity and add more coaches to the front of the train...?

Indeed that might just work............

Trust Bob Crow to make another dig at the TOCs. How would a renationalised railway possibly solve the problem overnight? He offers no real solution at all.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

No mention of FCC into St Pancras .....try one of the fast trains from St Albans after 0700 - or a semi fast after Radlett for a "great experience" ......somehow always escapes the radar as the users are so ground down with standing as a matter of course.

 

[big_dirt]

I take a FCC from Tulse to Elephant every day. I never get a seat but it's ok. It's my choice. I could go to London Bridge, get a seat, pay double for my season ticket and spend an extra ten minutes in each direction.

When I used to live in Ireland, I would take a train each day from Donabate to Pearse. I have never experienced anything so crowded, and I have travelled peak timeline Yanamote.

 

[dk1]

Congratulations to Chiltern for getting in on the act. How sad that thanks to 12-car operations West Anglia get even less attention than before.

 

[12CSVT]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23436819

Bob Crow steps in with the usual. As ever reliable fool.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but on what basis is Bob Crow being a 'fool' ?

No doubt if he didn't speak out on this there would be posters accusing him of ignoring the needs of the passenger.

 

[F Great Eastern]

Trust Bob Crow to make another dig at the TOCs. How would a renationalised railway possibly solve the problem overnight? He offers no real solution at all.

It's the usual crap, everything must be down to the TOC's who are not using the rolling stock they have, and are too greedy to buy or lease any more, of which there of course, is plenty available to lengthen every train almost overnight if they really wanted to, but they are not doing it because they want to line their pockets with an enormous profit margin.

Of course, in reality the overcrowding isn't helped by the DFT cutting back train orders and abandoning some altogether, then wondering why the likes of TPE is overcrowded, projects like the Thameslink and Intercity Express programme which are years behind schedule when it comes to trolling stock, and other interference which the TOC's can do little or nothing about.

The whole way rolling stock works is my biggest bug-bear when it comes to the system we have here, the system is dysfunctional when an operator predicts passenger growth and then wants to order more trains to help deal with that, only for the DFT to turn around and say, actually you don't need that many, then go and publish statistics which show that there is too much over-crowding that they contributed to.

It's ridiculous, and I actually feel sorry for some of the TOC's, since at the end of the day they're seen as the big bad boys, even if the delay or cutting back of rolling stock is completely out of their hands.

Even on the same train you find the London end rammed with spare seats at the back-people don't like to have to walk the length of the train once in London. Then you get complaints about how it is unacceptable to be crammed in and 'forced' to travel in conditions worse than cattle.

Stansted Express was notorious for this. At the escalator end nearest to the entrance to the station during peak you used to be able to see the first four coaches so tightly packed, with the first one or two barely able to move in them. I'd walk down to the second lot of four coaches and often could have a coach to myself or just 2-3 others, I'd get off at Liverpool Street and I'd hear someone ranting about the overcrowding!

 

[hs2critic]

18:13 London Euston-Birmingham New Street

Worth pointing out that's an LM service. Doesn't say how quickly it empties out, but they usually do by Milton Keynes.

Perhaps they should get rid of the coaches at the back as they are obviously wasted capacity and add more coaches to the front of the train...?

I think that is a wonderfully cunning plan, but it still doesn't solve the problem of people who just slump themselves down in the vestibule and don't even bother to look for a seat, when plenty are available in that very coach.

So bring back the old slam doors too

 

[The Barlow Boy]

Maybe I'm missing something here, but on what basis is Bob Crow being a 'fool' ?

No doubt if he didn't speak out on this there would be posters accusing him of ignoring the needs of the passenger.

Bob Crow simply fires from the hip in sound bites that are in a loop. He and his cohorts - and, sadly a lot of others - think that nationalising is the answer. Yep, let's go back to indifferent staff, dirty old trains and grotty dirty unwelcoming stations. Some of us are old enough to remember what B.R. is like and don't wear rose tinted spectacles.

 

[Cherry_Picker]

Worth pointing out that's an LM service. Doesn't say how quickly it empties out, but they usually do by Milton Keynes.

All of them are like that though. I think it is safe to assume that all the London bound services are full when they reach the capital but it would be more interesting to know where they fill up. I think that Manchester Airport - Middlesbrough was on last years list too and I'm curious at to where that is at it's most overcrowded. I doubt it is in either Manchester or Middlesbrough, but it passes through Huddersfield at 07:25, Leeds at 07:47 and York at 08:20 which I imagine is the stretch where it is absolutely rammed.

 

[Silv1983]

I'm wondering whether this takes into account people who purposefully travel on a train because it takes 10 mins less to get to their destination than another service that they are likely to get a seat?

Case in point:

07.30 Colchester - London liv st - always full and standing by Manningtree but takes about 53 mins Liverpool st.

07.33 Colchester - London liv st - takes 13 mins longer but is a 12 car and usually quite a few spare seats at the rear of the train

A lot of passengers board the 07.30 even though then know it is one of the busiest trains of the day but then complain that they never get a seat.....

I'm with you there on a certain level...

The Buxton to Blackpoool North (is it?) which stops at Heaton Chapel at 07:41 gets absolutely rammed with people at Stockport, Heaton Chapel and Levenshulme only to disembark at Manchester Piccadilly. It's a special service consisting of a 2 car 150 on a good day. Thing is, if people got out of bed 8 minutes earlier they could get the nice spacious 323 which stops at Heaton Chapel at 07:33 to Piccadilly instead. Commuter mentality for you!

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Putting in extra capacity also stimulates more growth - in my day - once the West London line went from a very poor 2 car 117 service to a 30 min 3 car 313 , traffic shot up. Ditto on the North London line with short workings Camden - Stratford full and standing within a week.

12 car 377 sets on Thameslink North are now the worst crowded peak trains - regular standing southbound from Harpendon , and from City Thameslink northbound pm peak - though the treat of air con in this weather may further influence traffic ...

 

[tsr]

As a snapshot of further overcrowding on Southern Metro services...

It's a pity they haven't managed to include the 0748 Tattenham Corner - London Victoria... there have been some joyous times where I have commuted on this service daily and I can tell you it gets absolutely rammed in all coaches. It'll happily beat some peak-time Tube trains for overcrowding, especially if a service in front (such as the one mentioned in the article) has been cancelled. You have no hope if a coach gets locked out of use...

(I have only once got a seat on this service after it left East Croydon. Ever.)

 

[jimm]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23436819 And there seems to have been a shift in the most overcrowded services, people abandoning the GWML?

I think there was extra DMU stock targeted at the GW problem services following 180 re-introduction. I think maybe some calling patterns were altered as well?

It wasn't just that the Turbo fleet was reshuffled to allow more coupled formations to operate in the Thames Valley peaks as a result of several sets being freed up by the 180s returning - which, with four sets in action daily, also put more than 1,100 extra seats out there each weekday - 16 or 17 of the high-density seven-car HSTs got an extra 80-seat traller standard coach last year to take them back to eight-car length, with a seating capacity of about 580. Chuck those into the mix as well and you can see why overcrowding has fallen.

Problem is that if growth keeps going as it has done in recent years in the Thames Valley, even that reduction in overcrowding will be short-lived, very likely quite some time before GWML electrics and Crossrail happen.

 

[Cherry_Picker]

What are your thoughts on the Oxford - Marylebone link's impact on Thames Valley overcrowding?

 

[Old Hill Bank]

What are your thoughts on the Oxford - Marylebone link's impact on Thames Valley overcrowding?

Well that all depends on the Chiltern strategy for resourcing rolling stock to run it and all of thier existing services.

 

[Cherry_Picker]

I strongly suspect it will be four car class 168s on most services.

 

[Old Hill Bank]

I strongly suspect it will be four car class 168s on most services.

So where does the stock come from to replace the diagrams they currently cover?

 

[bronzeonion]

I don't understand why the majority of commuters seem to expect a train in the rush hour to be quiet?

 

[BestWestern]

I don't understand why the majority of commuters seem to expect a train in the rush hour to be quiet?

Indeed.

BBC in shock 'Rush hour trains are busy' discovery :roll:

 

[A-driver]

One area which always seems to be ignored when the overcrowded trains articles come out every year is the constant stream of housing development which goes on- far quicker than the railways can cope with. New estates of flats and houses spring up in a few months and are advertised as '5 mins from xx station which is 30mins from London' etc, just look at the back of the metro or evening standard at the adverts for such places. Plus add the number of houses in the southeast which are bought and converted into flats.

This leads to a situation that 500 new homes could be built within months and opened in a couple of weeks leading to hundreds of new people descending on the trains which arrive into London at 9ish almost overnight. The railways can't begin to cope with that under any system. Adding extra coaches is only part if the solution to overcrowding anyway-the infrastructure alterations can be far more complicated.

Regarding bob crows comments, whilst I don't want to always look like I'm defending him (although I would like to see some justification for calling him a 'fool' please), I think his point is largely that the privatised system makes getting more rolling stock a far more long and complicated procedure than an 'in house' system such as the one under BR. Lets face it, under BR it wouldn't have taken anywhere near as long to sort the thameskink fleet out for example.