UK General Election 2024

[AlterEgo]

The Lib Dem idea to ban (or tax!) domestic flights where there is a sub 2.5hr alternative would result in zero flights being banned or so taxed in the UK. There are no such flights. This is echoing a French proposal, and the travel time by rail is calculated from the airport vicinity, not the city centre.

An outright ban is a dumb policy anyway for lots of reasons.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Jun 2024 ==

https://www.ft.com/content/4b3e6db0-e57a-11e7-8b99-0191e45377ec is a little old, but suggests essentially naff all. £8.3m over 17 years, when government spending is around £1tn.
(Copying from FT articles is a breach of their Ts&Cs)

https://archive.is/BHDUq if people want to read the article!

 

[WesternLancer]

Agreed. I just watched that bit of the interview and Christine Jardine directly contradicted that bit of their manifesto - so I think we can deduce that she probably hasn't read their manifesto properly.

I'm not sure that a ban on flights (or even additional taxes on flights) is workable anyway if it's defined by where there is a short (<2.5 hours) train journey. People will just end up doing things like flying from London to Manchester via Amsterdam. And besides, how do you define the equivalent train journey? You might say that the train from London to Manchester takes less than 2.5 hours, but a pedant could point out that it's impossible to get from Heathrow Airport to Manchester Airport by train in less than 2.5 hours and therefore flights between those places should be allowed according to the rule.

Doesn’t France have a similar policy. I assumed that’s where they got the idea from. Not sure if that results in the outcomes you mention but it may do.

 

[jfollows]

Doesn’t France have a similar policy. I assumed that’s where they got the idea from. Not sure if that results in the outcomes you mention but it may do.

France Bans Short-haul Flights

Rail-related.... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65687665 France has banned domestic short-haul flights where train alternatives exist, in a bid to cut carbon emissions. The law came into force two years after lawmakers had voted to end routes where the same journey could be made by...

www.railforums.co.uk

A much-trumpeted ban on short domestic flights in France took effect with so many exemptions that no services will be halted.

Personally, I'd love it if Manchester-London flights were scrapped, but then the airlines wouldn't want to handle through luggage (we had four suitcases between two of us last summer) and sign up to some way of handling delays outside their control (train delays on "connecting" alternative journeys to Heathrow for an onward flight), or they'd simply not bother with any of this and lose custom because people would move away from BA to other airlines which served Manchester.

The French plan ended up riddled with compromises imposed by vested interests so didn't come to much in the end.

 

[MotCO]

Thanks for link. Yes exactly what I believed was stated in the interview.

Wider issue is Lib Dem’s pledges not really scrutinised properly because commentators do not think they would form a government so why bother doing that work. In 2015 we got cleggmania followed by near electoral wipe out when their voters discovered mr clegg was not the progressive they thought he was.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Jun 2024 ==


But the spokeswoman said there would be no ban at all. Just increased taxes on short flights. So why not state that in the manifesto? ‘We will increase taxes on short domestic flights where the journey can be undertaken by rail in less than 2.5 hours’. That would be clear and in line with what was said.

Surely that will mean the same number of flights will take off, but there would be fewer passengers on board (i.e. only those who chose to pay the extra tax. How much C02 would that save?

 

[edwin_m]

Surely that will mean the same number of flights will take off, but there would be fewer passengers on board (i.e. only those who chose to pay the extra tax. How much C02 would that save?

There is a noticeable correlation between takeoff weight and fuel burned, hence CO2 emissions would reduce immediately if the aircraft was less than fully loaded. However, the airlines would quickly move to fewer flights or smaller aircraft, which would have a bigger impact.

 

[Howardh]

The Lib Dem idea to ban (or tax!) domestic flights where there is a sub 2.5hr alternative would result in zero flights being banned or so taxed in the UK. There are no such flights. This is echoing a French proposal, and the travel time by rail is calculated from the airport vicinity, not the city centre.

While it should be applauded, there are logistical questions - where are the start and end points? You can do central Manchester to London Euston in just over 2 hrs, but what if your start point is Altrincham and end point is Hounslow?

 

[WesternLancer]

France Bans Short-haul Flights

Rail-related.... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-65687665 France has banned domestic short-haul flights where train alternatives exist, in a bid to cut carbon emissions. The law came into force two years after lawmakers had voted to end routes where the same journey could be made by...

www.railforums.co.uk

Personally, I'd love it Manchester-London flights were scrapped, but then the airlines wouldn't want to handle through luggage (we had four suitcases between two of us last summer) and sign up to some way of handling delays outside their control (train delays on "connecting" alternative journeys to Heathrow for an onward flight), or they'd simply not bother with any of this and lose custom because people would move away from BA to other airlines which served Manchester.

The French plan ended up riddled with compromises imposed by vested interests so didn't come to much in the end.

Thanks for your comments on how the french plans worked out in practice. Sounds like a strong element of greenwash to it all...

and of course in France with an actual TGV network a 2.5 hour journey takes you a lot further and makes the idea more plausible.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Surely that will mean the same number of flights will take off, but there would be fewer passengers on board (i.e. only those who chose to pay the extra tax. How much C02 would that save?

Well, no, because the airlines are not going to throw money away by running flights that are routinely half-empty. If there are fewer passengers on board, the airlines would quickly reduce the number of flights to match demand.

But ultimately what's needed is not selectively taxing some flights, but ensuring that all flights are charged an appropriate level of tax/fuel duties that is sufficient to pay for the environmental damage caused by those flights. Polluter pays and all that. Probably not politically popular but is the fairest (and also, in a free market, the most efficient) way to get pollution down while leaving people the freedom to go about their lives.

 

[AlterEgo]

While it should be applauded, there are logistical questions - where are the start and end points? You can do central Manchester to London Euston in just over 2 hrs, but what if your start point is Altrincham and end point is Hounslow?

That's what I said, it echoes a French proposal which calculates the distance from the airport vicinity. And in any case this is a dumb thing to want to ban. Most passengers on very short domestic flights like the ones from MAN are connecting to much further afield, and they will simply fly via another hub if they are subjected to the unprotected 5+ hour time penalty of taking multiple trains to Heathrow from Manchester. (3h30 by rail, plus having to check in maybe 2h00 before departure). Taking a domestic flight to Heathrow is a time penalty of probably 3h30m - and importantly, it's protected, so if the flight is delayed, you'll be fine for the next one. Not the case if you take the train - unless you actively force the airlines to codeshare with the railways. And of course I forgot, the railways in this country have loads of spare capacity to take thousands of people and their huge bags to Heathrow every day, won't they? Oh.

Won't reduce emissions or planes in the sky. A non starter.

 

[Howardh]

That's what I said, it echoes a French proposal which calculates the distance from the airport vicinity. And in any case this is a dumb thing to want to ban. Most passengers on very short domestic flights like the ones from MAN are connecting to much further afield, and they will simply fly via another hub if they are subjected to the unprotected 5+ hour time penalty of taking multiple trains to Heathrow from Manchester. (3h30 by rail, plus having to check in maybe 2h00 before departure). Taking a domestic flight to Heathrow is a time penalty of probably 3h30m - and importantly, it's protected, so if the flight is delayed, you'll be fine for the next one. Not the case if you take the train - unless you actively force the airlines to codeshare with the railways. And of course I forgot, the railways in this country have loads of spare capacity to take thousands of people and their huge bags to Heathrow every day, won't they? Oh.

Won't reduce emissions or planes in the sky. A non starter.

Think Manchester > London is the only regular short-haul mainland flight of under 200 miles (I'll happily stand corrected!) and could be covered by the railway - but only if you could get direct to Heathrow by train from Manchester, and that line covered more towns in the Manchester area; fine if you are in Stockport or Wilmslow, not so fine if you are in Bolton, Bury (which is now metro), Rochdale etc where a change in Manchester is required.

So, yes, anyone wanting to connect at Heathrow will almost certainly fly there from the North West, why wouldn't they?? Now if HS2 reaches Heathrow that might be a different matter!!

 

[YorkRailFan]

So, yes, anyone wanting to connect at Heathrow will almost certainly fly there from the North West, why wouldn't they?? Now if HS2 reaches Heathrow that might be a different matter!!

Why would HS2 need to reach Heathrow? HS2 will stop at Old Oak Common to allow transfers to the Elizabeth Line for this exact reason.

 

[DerekC]

I couldn't resist sharing this one!



PS - and in case of possible law suits, I took it from the top of a bus!

 

[HSTEd]

The Lib Dem idea to ban (or tax!) domestic flights where there is a sub 2.5hr alternative would result in zero flights being banned or so taxed in the UK. There are no such flights. This is echoing a French proposal, and the travel time by rail is calculated from the airport vicinity, not the city centre.

Fits with modern British politics though.

Politics based on feelings and mindless copies of policies from abroad.

 

[telstarbox]

Tory manifesto transport headlines:
£2 bus fares in England for the next parliament
Nothing about HS2
"Deliver our plan for Northern Powerhouse Rail"
"Fund the Midlands Rail Hub in full."
Electrify the North Wales Main Line
Reopen lines in Network North command paper
Ruling out road pricing

 

[WesternLancer]

Tory manifesto transport headlines:
£2 bus fares in England for the next parliament
Nothing about HS2
"Deliver our plan for Northern Powerhouse Rail"
"Fund the Midlands Rail Hub in full."
Electrify the North Wales Main Line
Reopen lines in Network North command paper
Ruling out road pricing

Bit more here - does have an HS2 mention, a bit tricky to cut and paste (seems like a bold scheme afoot to halve journey times between Nottm and Leeds by upgrading the line between Newark and Nottingham (could this be a misprint and actually mean halve journey times between Nottingham and Lincoln?)

From page 8-9 Conservative 20204 Manifesto

Labour has no plan. They neither support the second phase of HS2 nor our alternative package of investment, meaning they won’t back schemes their own local leaders say will transform their areas.

We will:
❱ Invest £4.7 billion for smaller cities, towns and rural areas in the North and Midlands to spend on their transport priorities. This will cut congestion and upgrade local bus and train stations.
❱ Invest a record £8.3 billion of investment to fill potholes and resurface roads. We will bring forward funding into this financial year and the next.
❱ Back our city regions with an additional £8.55 billion to spend on their local priorities. We will scrap rules that stop Mayors investing in strategic roads.
❱ Deliver our plan for Northern Powerhouse Rail bringing more frequent trains, more capacity and faster journeys. We have committed £12 billion on top of our HS2 savings to deliver the section of Northern Powerhouse Rail between Manchester and Liverpool. Savings from HS2 enable us to fund electrification to Hull and build a new station in Bradford.
❱ Boost rail connectivity in the Midlands, with £1.75 billion to fund the Midlands Rail Hub in full. This will improve journey times and deliver more frequent rail services at 50 stations, benefiting over seven million people. We will upgrade the line between Newark and Nottingham to halve journey times between Nottingham and Leeds.
❱ Provide an additional £1 billion to support hundreds of new bus routes across the North and Midlands.
❱ Improve accessibility at 100 train stations, starting with the 50 stations announced in May.
❱ Deliver upgrades to railways in the South West, including the line through Dawlish, the Energy Coast Line in Cumbria and the Ely Junction scheme in East Anglia.
❱ Electrify the North Wales Main Line with £1 billion of investment and alleviate pinch points on the A75 between Gretna and Stranraer.
❱ Reopen Beeching lines and stations to reconnect communities around the country, building on the success of the Dartmoor Line in the South West.

We are committed to all the schemes set out in the Network North Command Paper. This comes on top of £44 billion of funding for Network Rail over the next five years and our investment in the Transpennine Route Upgrade, laying the foundations for Northern Powerhouse Rail.

We will complete HS2 between London Euston and the West Midlands and support the growth of the rail freight sector.

We have invested £40 billion in England’s strategic roads between 2015 and 2025, with further investment to come in the next Road Investment Strategy, ensuring we can deliver major roads including the Lower Thames Crossing and the A303. This is alongside the road schemes set out in our Network North plan, including the A1 between Morpeth and Ellingham.

Automated vehicles will be on British roads in the next Parliament, thanks to our new worldleading legislation.

We will support people to choose electric cars by ensuring our charging infrastructure is truly nationwide, including rapid charging and delivering the Zero Emission Vehicle Mandate to support manufacturers to safeguard skilled British jobs.

We will support the growth and decarbonisation of our aviation sector.

We will back British Sustainable Aviation Fuel through our SAF mandate, an industry-backed revenue support mechanism and investment in future aviation technology.

We will support domestic flights including through Public Service Obligations, protecting vital routes within the UK, including to islands and remote areas.

We will back our maritime sector, including shipping and ports, as it decarbonises. Recognising the current challenges with cross-Solent transport, we will establish a review to explore all options to provide more choice and drive down fares. We will foster our science and innovation expertise in the space industry.

There is stuff on roads / motorists / driving in a separate section

 

[AlterEgo]

Fits with modern British politics though.

Politics based on feelings and mindless copies of policies from abroad.

Yes it’s a very “vibes” policy isn’t it?

 

[Thirteen]

Reversing ULEZ expansion ain't going to happen, it's proven to be a success.

 

[Meole]

Reopening the Beeching line closures will be expensive.

 

[PGAT]

Reversing ULEZ expansion ain't going to happen, it's proven to be a success.

I think it’s estimated 98-99% of cars are compliant now

 

[YorkshireBear]

More stuff thrown at Farage today. Why? It plays right into Farage's hands...

 

[renegademaster]

That's what I said, it echoes a French proposal which calculates the distance from the airport vicinity. And in any case this is a dumb thing to want to ban. Most passengers on very short domestic flights like the ones from MAN are connecting to much further afield, and they will simply fly via another hub if they are subjected to the unprotected 5+ hour time penalty of taking multiple trains to Heathrow from Manchester. (3h30 by rail, plus having to check in maybe 2h00 before departure). Taking a domestic flight to Heathrow is a time penalty of probably 3h30m - and importantly, it's protected, so if the flight is delayed, you'll be fine for the next one. Not the case if you take the train - unless you actively force the airlines to codeshare with the railways. And of course I forgot, the railways in this country have loads of spare capacity to take thousands of people and their huge bags to Heathrow every day, won't they? Oh.

Won't reduce emissions or planes in the sky. A non starter.

The French scheme doesn't apply to connecting flights iirc

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Bit more here - does have an HS2 mention, a bit tricky to cut and paste (seems like a bold scheme afoot to halve journey times between Nottm and Leeds by upgrading the line between Newark and Nottingham (could this be a misprint and actually mean halve journey times between Nottingham and Lincoln?)

Well massively faster journey times between Nottingham (Toton) and Leeds is one of the things that was lost when the full HS2 was scrapped so it seems plausible that the Tories might be trying to promise faster journeys there in an attempt to dispel some anger about HS2. Running Nottingham to Leeds via Newark could theoretically get close to halving journey times: It's currently 2 hours on the direct Nottingham-Leeds trains. On the other hand, Leeds-London trains typically take about 50-60 minutes to get from Leeds to Newark. It's then about 15 miles Newark to Nottingham, so a reasonable upgrade should allow trains to do that in <15 minutes, for a Leeds-Nottingham journey time of not that much more than an hour. Of course that doesn't help the good folks of Sheffield or Derby, and also doesn't help Nottingham-Birmingham journeys, which have all also suffered due to HS2 being cut back. And I suspect you could shave a fair bit off the current 2-hour journey times Leeds-Nottingham anyway by simply running faster trains on the existing route.

 

[WesternLancer]

We will upgrade the line between Newark and Nottingham to halve journey times between Nottingham and Leeds.

Given the current need to walk across Newark, how fast would services need to be between Nottm and Newark to halve a journey time between Nottingham and Leeds? Any possibility they would have to be accelerated to TGV style speeds...?

Does this mean a new chord to connect Newark Castle to the ECML?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Jun 2024 ==

Well massively faster journey times between Nottingham (Toton) and Leeds is one of the things that was lost when the full HS2 was scrapped so it seems plausible that the Tories might be trying to promise faster journeys there in an attempt to dispel some anger about HS2. Running Nottingham to Leeds via Newark could theoretically get close to halving journey times: It's currently 2 hours on the direct Nottingham-Leeds trains. On the other hand, Leeds-London trains typically take about 50-60 minutes to get from Leeds to Newark. It's then about 15 miles Newark to Nottingham, so a reasonable upgrade should allow trains to do that in <15 minutes, for a Leeds-Nottingham journey time of not that much more than an hour. Of course that doesn't help the good folks of Sheffield or Derby, and also doesn't help Nottingham-Birmingham journeys, which have all also suffered due to HS2 being cut back. And I suspect you could shave a fair bit off the current 2-hour journey times Leeds-Nottingham anyway by simply running faster trains on the existing route.

Thanks - our posts crossed - some helpful comments here.

I still think it's a misprint and means halving Nottingham Lincoln times - as isn't that some part of the Midlands Hub promises that have been previously announced.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Given the current need to walk across Newark, how fast would services need to be between Nottm and Newark to halve a journey time between Nottingham and Leeds? Any possibility they would have to be accelerated to TGV style speeds...?

Does this mean a new chord to connect Newark Castle to the ECML?

A new chord is how I interpreted it - since there's no other way that the idea could be feasible. I guess it would also have the advantage of directly connecting Nottingham to Doncaster, for connections to the North-East. Although to be honest, since this is something that was probably thrown in at the last minute by a party that is not going to form any part of the Government after the election, there's probably not a lot going to come of the idea.

(EDIT: Although pondering it more, a chord to allow fast Nottingham-Retford-Doncaster-Wakefield-Leeds trains - or Nottingham-Doncaster-York-Newcastle trains - does actually seem not a bad idea, even if it's possible that you're right and the whole thing is a misprint).

 

[Grimsby town]

A new chord is how I interpreted it - since there's no other way that the idea could be feasible. I guess it would also have the advantage of directly connecting Nottingham to Doncaster, for connections to the North-East. Although to be honest, since this is something that was probably thrown in at the last minute by a party that is not going to form any part of the Government after the election, there's probably not a lot going to come of the idea.

(EDIT: Although pondering it more, a chord to allow fast Nottingham-Retford-Doncaster-Wakefield-Leeds trains - or Nottingham-Doncaster-York-Newcastle trains - does actually seem not a bad idea, even if it's possible that you're right and the whole thing is a misprint).

Yes its a chord at Newark to allow trains to head north up the ECML from Nottingham. It was mentioned in the Network North proposals. There's no information on where the capacity is coming from for such a service but Andrew Gilligan doesn't think there's capacity issues on north south routes, so that probably explains the proposal.

The £2 bus cap is being paid for by savings from rail reform which tells you all you need to know about this government and rail. I welcome a £2 bus cap extension but that shouldn't be an the expense of another sustainable mode. Allow fuel duty to rise to pay for it.

 

[dangie]

Never mind the £millions/billions to be spent on the UK transport network, Rugeley Trent Valley platforms 1&2 still have no disabled access. Impossible for wheelchair users to access these platforms.

**Unless of course they first catch a train from Rugeley Town to Rugeley Trent Valley.

 

[YorkshireBear]

Yes its a chord at Newark to allow trains to head north up the ECML from Nottingham. It was mentioned in the Network North proposals. There's no information on where the capacity is coming from for such a service but Andrew Gilligan doesn't think there's capacity issues on north south routes, so that probably explains the proposal.

The £2 bus cap is being paid for by savings from rail reform which tells you all you need to know about this government and rail. I welcome a £2 bus cap extension but that shouldn't be an the expense of another sustainable mode. Allow fuel duty to rise to pay for it.

For capacity on the ECML for it you'd need HS2 surely to release fast paths..... Ironic.

 

[infobleep]

Because it's part of a series of interviews with party leaders that are going out to a particular schedule. The interview happened yesterday because that is the time that was offered to ITV and they had to take it

Schedules can be changed. The BBC seem to be doing this.

For example, tonight's Panorama being cancelled has lead to programmes that were after it being shifted 30 minutes earlier, rather than showing a different Panorama episode instead.

 

[HSTEd]

The £2 bus cap is being paid for by savings from rail reform which tells you all you need to know about this government and rail. I welcome a £2 bus cap extension but that shouldn't be an the expense of another sustainable mode. Allow fuel duty to rise to pay for it.

The cost of the bus fare cap is negligible, however.
I'm not sure you can really claim that £60m a year makes any difference at all to the rail industry.

Increasing fuel duty to raise that sum of money would probably cause disruption vastly in excess of the sums involved in any case!

 

[Grimsby town]

The cost of the bus fare cap is negligible, however.
I'm not sure you can really claim that £60m a year makes any difference at all to the rail industry.

Increasing fuel duty to raise that sum of money would probably cause disruption vastly in excess of the sums involved in any case!

The manifesto suggests that it's £1.5 billion per year in savings put towards bus fare capping but I suppose it could only be a partial transfer.

They could just stop freezing it which would be a good start. They've spent over a decade making public transport less competitive as they boast about in the manifesto. I doubt that is good for public finances.