Should PAYG fares for HS1 between St Pancras and Stratford be harmonised?

[ainsworth74]

At the moment you can use PAYG for journeys between St Pancras and Stratford International (£7.40 peak and £5.10 off-peak) whilst travelcards are not valid at all. Is it time to remove this anomaly and change the HS1 fares to be the same as as the regular Zone 1 to Zone 2 fare (£3.60 peak and £3.10 off-peak) and with travelcard acceptance? Whilst I'm not a veteran user of SEs services it does seem like there's quite a lot of churn at Stratford with lots joining heading eastbound and lots exiting heading westbound so passengers wanting St Pancras or leaving from St Pancras for further afield wouldn't be massively disadvantaged and there would still be capacity for those just doing the short hop.

To me it just looks like a slightly odd and unjustifiable pricing anomaly within what is, generally, a fairly straightforward zonal system of fares (yes yes I know there are complexities under the hood for fares within the London Zones, but in general!).

 

[Bletchleyite]

Yes I would agree. I can't see any reason why these services shouldn't be in the Travelcard/PAYG system as normal services. It is an unnecessarily confusing outlier of a train wholly within Zone 1 that doesn't accept Travelcards and isn't at normal PAYG fares for that journey.

Heathrow Express is of course the other one, but that's more obviously something separate. On the Liz there's the "Heathrow tax" but Travelcards are still valid.

I suppose in Germany you can't use IC/ICE with a "Verbund" ticket which is equivalent, but in the UK that isn't a standard policy so having only one service where that's an issue is just confusing.

 

[JonathanH]

Yes I would agree. I can't see any reason why these services shouldn't be in the Travelcard/PAYG system as normal services.

It seens to me that the premium cost is a form of rationing to prevent the trains being overloaded from St Pancras. It wouldn't be great if passengers from Kent were unable to board because of short distance travellers between St Pancras and Stratford.

It is an unnecessarily confusing outlier of a train wholly within Zone 1 that doesn't accept Travelcards and isn't at normal PAYG fares for that journey.

It isn't really confusing. It is just a train service that many wouldn't consider using. Admittedly I don't live in Stratford or have cause to travel quickly between there and the Kings Cross area, but it isn't as if there aren't alternatives.

Whilst I'm not a veteran user of SEs services it does seem like there's quite a lot of churn at Stratford with lots joining heading eastbound and lots exiting heading westbound so passengers wanting St Pancras or leaving from St Pancras for further afield wouldn't be massively disadvantaged and there would still be capacity for those just doing the short hop.

If those passengers are choosing to pay a premium price and there is still churn, wouldn't there be a much higher demand if the cost was brought into line with slower routes?

 

[Bletchleyite]

It seens to me that the premium cost is a form of rationing to prevent the trains being overloaded from St Pancras. It wouldn't be great if passengers from Kent were unable to board because of short distance travellers between St Pancras and Stratford.

Are there that many people travelling from St Pancras to Stratford? The Liz has far more catchment for going there and that is what most will use.

Maybe there were pre-Liz, so maybe the restriction has served its purpose.

It isn't really confusing. It is just a train service that many wouldn't consider using. Admittedly I don't live in Stratford or have cause to travel quickly between there and the Kings Cross area, but it isn't as if there aren't alternatives.

It is confusing to have a train service within the Zones that doesn't accept standard ticketing within the Zones. Heathrow Express is of course the other one but it does accept contactless (albeit at a higher fare) and Travelcards.

If those passengers are choosing to pay a premium price and there is still churn, wouldn't there be a much higher demand if the cost was brought into line with slower routes?

I doubt there would be now the Liz is here.

 

[ainsworth74]

If those passengers are choosing to pay a premium price and there is still churn, wouldn't there be a much higher demand if the cost was brought into line with slower routes?

Sorry I've been slightly imprecise in my language. I meant that it seems like a lot of people get on at Stratford going east for example. Rather than a load of people getting off and then a load of new people getting on. Obviously people get off at Stratford but not hoards of them.

 

[NCT]

Sorry I've been slightly imprecise in my language. I meant that it seems like a lot of people get on at Stratford going east for example. Rather than a load of people getting off and then a load of new people getting on. Obviously people get off at Stratford but not hoards of them.

This is a sweet equilibrium. Having St Pancras - Stratford carrying the same loading as east of Stratford would put additional pressure on dwell times at Stratford.

 

[Bletchleyite]

This is a sweet equilibrium. Having St Pancras - Stratford carrying the same loading as east of Stratford would put additional pressure on dwell times at Stratford.

I can't see that really mattering. HS1 is hardly intensively used compared to how it could be - we're already talking about putting 4tph of Virgin internationals on it!

 

[NCT]

I can't see that really mattering. HS1 is hardly intensively used compared to how it could be - we're already talking about putting 4tph of Virgin internationals on it!

HS1's timetabling is actually pretty tight (the 4tph international + 8tph domestic long-standing timetable structure), as it relies on paths of different speed profiles and stopping patterns not being overtaken.

More pressure on Stratford dwells means less reliable services or longer journey times, which would hurt St Pancras - Kent revenue. There's a risk of Stratford needing 4-minute dwells to allow an international overtake, which would be revenue destructive. Swapping yield for volume between St Pancras and Stratford is unlikely to earn SE/DfT/GBR money.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There's a risk of Stratford needing 4-minute dwells to allow an international overtake, which would be revenue destructive.

I very much doubt 3 minutes of added journey time on an HS1 domestic would be destructive of anything unless it caused an additional unit and crew to be required to maintain frequency. Ten minutes (that's about 40% longer) on the Merseyrail Ormskirk line since the mid 1990s doesn't seem to have stopped anyone using it, indeed I think you would struggle to find anyone who has actually noticed bar an enthusiast who remembers the original 25 minute running time and has an old timetable in a box to use to confirm that!

I didn't realise Paris had gone half hourly at some times of day though - it seems it has - that's impressive!

 

[NCT]

I very much doubt 3 minutes of added journey time on an HS1 domestic would be destructive of anything. Ten minutes (that's about 40% longer) on the Merseyrail Ormskirk line since the mid 1990s doesn't seem to have stopped anyone using it, indeed I think you would struggle to find anyone who has actually noticed bar an enthusiast who remembers the original 25 minute running time and has an old timetable in a box to use to confirm that!

Industry forecasting methodologies have long-established evidenced backed guidance on the effects on demand and revenue of each minute journey time saving / extension.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Industry forecasting methodologies have long-established evidenced backed guidance on the effects on demand and revenue of each minute journey time saving / extension.

It's a model but I'd say it is in some cases oversimplistic. There will be cases where a minute has more value than others. For instance 1h59 vs 2h00 is a big psychological difference. With regard to commuter services (even posh ones) from year to year there's plenty of chopping and changing around of a minute here and two there, and really nobody is going to notice. There was a bit of minor whinging, for example, when the WCML slow pattern changed from a Tring stopper and an MKC semifast to an MKC stopper and a Tring semifast, adding Apsley, Kings Langley and Bushey to the MKC services (and thus probably 5-6 minutes to the running time) but I doubt anyone has stopped using the service as a result. And of course some may have started, if there's anyone who lives in any of those three and commutes to Milton Keynes, and can now enjoy a direct journey there.

 

[JonathanH]

There are apparently around 8,600 people who live in Stratford East Village. Some presumably work in the Kings Cross area and are happy to pay for the quick connection, but DfT / Southeastern will have weighted up the positives and negatives of allowing too many people to use it for random journeys over that short distance and concluded that the current situation is a reasonable compromise.

I note that we aren't expecting people to be able to use HS2 for local journeys between Euston and Old Oak Common, nor probably to use most GWR services between Paddington and Old Oak Common either.

Heathrow Express is of course the other one but it does accept contactless (albeit at a higher fare) and Travelcards.

Heathrow Express accepts Contactless on the same basis as HS1 domestic, ie premium fare not in caps, and certainly doesn't accept Travelcards.

 

[NCT]

It's a model but I'd say it is in some cases oversimplistic. There will be cases where a minute has more value than others. For instance 1h59 vs 2h00 is a big psychological difference. With regard to commuter services (even posh ones) from year to year there's plenty of chopping and changing around of a minute here and two there, and really nobody is going to notice. There was a bit of minor whinging, for example, when the WCML slow pattern changed from a Tring stopper and an MKC semifast to an MKC stopper and a Tring semifast, adding Apsley, Kings Langley and Bushey to the MKC services (and thus probably 5-6 minutes to the running time) but I doubt anyone has stopped using the service as a result.

This isn't some newfangled enthusiast obsession. The relationship between journey time and demand is well established, well understood, with a vast body of econometric evidence, at least since the BR days.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I note that we aren't expecting people to be able to use HS2 for local journeys between Euston and Old Oak Common, nor probably to use most GWR services between Paddington and Old Oak Common either.

This is largely because HS2 has been designed to have absolutely no slack in its timings whatsoever to the point that it matters where people stand on OOC platform. This is one of the many reasons why HS2 is a good thing but the implementation of HS2 we are getting has more holes than a fine Swiss Emmental that someone has been at with a Black and Decker.

As for GWR, there's a significant difference between applying pick up/set down restrictions and thus allowing nobody to use it and not even advertising the stop so nobody can be confused and the HS1 situation, which is that you can use it but you can't use the methods of payment you usually would for a journey of that nature. (Bar enthusiasts there's probably no real reason not to just use the Lizzie for OOC because the journey time will be barely any different, indeed the frequency may make the actual time quicker at some times of the hour because there will be a train from Paddington to OOC every couple of minutes from the Liz platforms).

(discussion of those wider flaws for another thread if you want to! )

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Thursday at 14:11 ==

As an aside it'd be quite interesting to see what impact the opening of the Liz had on the use of the HS1 domestics for London<->Stratford travel. My hunch would be a significant reduction. The Liz is 8 minutes Liverpool St-Stratford Domestic, HS1 is 7 minutes St Pancras-Stratford Intl. Thus you could probably add those extra few for whom HS1 is more convenient without flooding it with passengers, as for the majority of central London the Liz will win out on convenience because of the much wider possibility of a direct journey.

 

[Mikey C]

The current arrangement works fine, it's akin to InterCity type services from Euston picking up passengers at Watford Junction, but not allowing Euston to Watford journeys.

If you really want to pay the premium, fine, but it's not a journey that should be encouraged, as it would slow down HS1 journeys and potentially cause overcrowding issues, just because people want a quicker route to West Ham games or Westfield.

 

[Gaelan]

Some numbers for anyone curious:

Stratford International currently sees 1,172 passengers per day (in each direction, if I correctly recall how this data works; but the absolute numbers don't matter that much) to St Pancras. Adding up the next few most popular destinations, all in Kent, gets something on the order of 2,000, so there's scope for a substantial increase in ridership between Stratford International and St Pancras before seats become an issue. (This assumes travel patterns remain consistent throughout the day, or at least the two flows are peaky in the same way; the former is quite risky but the latter is believable, I think?)

Stratford, on the other hand, sees 7,117 passengers to Liverpool Street, 5,895 to Tottenham Court Road, 2,437 to Bond Street, 2,090 to Whitechapel, 1,971 to Farringdon, and 1,279 to Paddington.

It's going to be difficult to tell how many of those passengers would move to Stratford International if reasonably priced - it'll depend heavily on where they're going before and after, as Stratford to any station on the Elizabeth Line core offers significantly more interchange options than Stratford International to St Pancras.

As an aside it'd be quite interesting to see what impact the opening of the Liz had on the use of the HS1 domestics for London<->Stratford travel.

This'll be a royal pain to measure, as the Elizabeth Line opened in the midst of post-COVID travel pattern changes.

 

[NCT]

Some numbers for anyone curious:

Stratford International currently sees 1,172 passengers per day (in each direction, if I correctly recall how this data works; but the absolute numbers don't matter that much) to St Pancras. Adding up the next few most popular destinations, all in Kent, gets something on the order of 2,000, so there's scope for a substantial increase in ridership between Stratford International and St Pancras before seats become an issue. (This assumes travel patterns remain consistent throughout the day, or at least the two flows are peaky in the same way; the former is quite risky but the latter is believable, I think?)

Stratford, on the other hand, sees 7,117 passengers to Liverpool Street, 5,895 to Tottenham Court Road, 2,437 to Bond Street, 2,090 to Whitechapel, 1,971 to Farringdon, and 1,279 to Paddington.

Are there stats on Stratford Regional - St Pancras? Thanks

There will also be OD pairs recorded as an LU journey so won't appear on NR stats.

If, from the stats you quote, the headroom for St Pancras - Stratford International on Southeastern is in the order of 800 passengers per day, and Stratford Regional - Central London is in the order of 10,000 a day, then even a small proportion of the latter transferring the former could completely overwhelm Southeastern HS.

 

[Gaelan]

Are there stats on Stratford Regional - St Pancras? Thanks

There will also be OD pairs recorded as an LU journey so won't appear on NR stats.

If, from the stats you quote, the headroom for St Pancras - Stratford International on Southeastern is in the order of 800 passengers per day, and Stratford Regional - Central London is in the order of 10,000 a day, then even a small proportion of the latter transferring the former could completely overwhelm Southeastern HS.

The stats I quote are NR data; St Pancras doesn't appear in the top hundred from Stratford Regional.

The NR data does use slightly funky assumptions to infer the correct station for paper tickets to London Terminals. In theory there's no reason they would need to do this on Oyster, but I wouldn't rule out the possibility of some anomaly in the data here, where Oyster taps from Stratford to St Pancras are converted into "Stratford to London Terminals", then a later step assumes the relevant London terminal must have been Liverpool Street.

I'd be interesting to look at the TfL data; I believe it's public as well, but I'm not familiar with it.

 

[Merle Haggard]

I have found the St Pancras to Stratford International link a quick and easy way to get from an arrival at Euston or EMR St Pancras (and King's Cross) to the GE main line. Much easier than LUL.

The walk through the shopping centre is short, the only downside is finding the GE main line platforms at Stratford - LT/LUL aren't very helpful with signposting, imo.

 

[squingo44]

I use this route fairly frequently. It’s a few minutes faster than going via Farringdon, provided you time your arrival at the station with one of the services. I’d love for the fares to be harmonised, i think it would be useful.