April to June 2023 Passenger numbers released

[yorksrob]

Accessible by car but not full of cars is going to be your optimum there, hence why pedestrianised town centres with parking on the periphery were popular in the 80s.

But we need to drive change of use - chain retail is dying or dead in small towns - we need to create other reasons for people to spend time in town centres - residential and social, plus small boutique businesses.

It is - my own home town centre is now full of cafes (some of them pretty good).

Going back on topic, electric cars are good, but just transferring railway users into electric cars and plonking them in our towns and cities will be very sub-optimal.

 

[ScotGG]

Always surprised so little discussion of housing in these type of threads.

We still have a quickly rising population and a need for mass housing growth. Much new uban housing is also car free.

Labour are also proposing new housing of various types outside of inner cities around stations.

All that is ripe for capturing by a railway industry that is attuned to change. Yet so many in the industry aren't

 

[Bartsimho]

I think there is a bit of discussion creep in this thread so getting back on topic. If passenger numbers are shown to have grown you could link it to increased economic development the railway provides. Even in an economic downturn it can be used to show that the railway is improving the situation even if the general situation is poor

 

[Adrian1980uk]

If the country went back to Pre pandemic passenger flows tomorrow , would the railway be able to handle it anyway? I'm pretty sure Cross country, Avanti etc couldn't muster up enough trains/long enough trains since retiring some of the fleet and have enough train crews.

Even Greater Anglia would struggle to add the 1 missing peak to London in the morning and back to Norwich in the evening unless the 720 supplement the stanex or the IC run, I know only one extra train but that's 600 commuters paying on average maybe £30 each, a substantial amount of revenue.

As others have said, comparison with Pre pandemic is getting less and less relevant as time passes as TOCs are now more geared up for today's traffic flows and the better run ones are beginning to pay money into the treasury.

 

[HSTEd]

As others have said, comparison with Pre pandemic is getting less and less relevant as time passes as TOCs are now more geared up for today's traffic flows and the better run ones are beginning to pay money into the treasury.

Nominally yes, but the pre pandemic merry-go-round of money flowing from the Treasury to Network Rail to TOCs to the Treasury very much still exists.

I doubt any TOCs are actually financially positive on payments once Network Rail subsidies are parcelled out.

 

[Adrian1980uk]

Nominally yes, but the pre pandemic merry-go-round of money flowing from the Treasury to Network Rail to TOCs to the Treasury very much still exists.

I doubt any TOCs are actually financially positive on payments once Network Rail subsidies are parcelled out.

Yes but that's the same as it's been for years, it depends on what the target is, a total revenue positive position is unrealistic but my point is that the Network Rail grant has remained pretty constant with the budget before the pandemic.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Imagine how much better the revenue would be if passengers weren't eligible for so many delay repay claims due to the inability of certain operators to run a service. Likewise if trains weren't running so wedged that guards couldn't get through to sell and scan tickets - if there's no scan and both stations are unbarriered the passenger may claim a refund.

and plenty do

 

[jayah]

"But no one uses trains" - The Tories

That statement is an urban myth.

It is of course true that usage is lower than 2019 and because of the loss of more expensive business and commuting travel, adjusted for inflation, the fare revenue is significantly lower.

The railway cannot support 2019 costs with 2023 revenue.

 

[Krokodil]

Nominally yes, but the pre pandemic merry-go-round of money flowing from the Treasury to Network Rail to TOCs to the Treasury very much still exists.

I doubt any TOCs are actually financially positive on payments once Network Rail subsidies are parcelled out.

Does it matter? Most trains across Europe have some level of subsidy, either directly through revenue support or indirectly because they aren't having to pay the true costs of their infrastructure. It's only certain factions in the UK that seem to consider this a bad thing.

 

[Russel]

So journeys are still 11% down on the same period in 2019 (pre-Covid), and revenue is 22% down.

I'm no expert in this sort of thing, can someone explain how, if journeys are down 11%, revenue is down 22%?

I may be missing something here, but, surly revenue should be down by roughly the same percent as journeys, rather than double?

 

[Class 170101]

Electric cars are all well and good except they take up the same amount of road space as petrol / diesel cars and the carbon emmissions are only zero at source and will only ever be zero in totality if the country stops burning fossil fuels because all electric cars do today is move carbon emmissions from the tail pipe to the power station.

In terms of housing I think it needs to built around HS2 nodes north east of Birmingham and towards Crewe and Manchester as well as Derby / Nottingham and Sheffield to encourage its use but also to reduce building in the southeast where the housing market is overheating and public services aren't exactly of a good standard and under pressure.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I'm no expert in this sort of thing, can someone explain how, if journeys are down 11%, revenue is down 22%?

Folk paying less for their tickets, travelling mostly off peak and not so many travelling in the morning peak and paying for high priced anytime tickets.

 

[JonathanH]

I'm no expert in this sort of thing, can someone explain how, if journeys are down 11%, revenue is down 22%?

The railway used to depend heavily on long distance business travel and medium distance commuter flows in the South East. Both of these are more lucrative than the markets which have recovered, such as leisure flows and short distance commuting.

If you run a train from Brighton to London, you make more money from that train being full all the way from Haywards Heath to London, than if it just conveys the same number of passengers from East Croydon to London. Both contribute to the number of journeys, the contribution to revenue is very different.

 

[yorkie]

Is this actually true? If so I've missed out on a lot of refunds

For genuinely unused tickets, you can claim a refund but typically a £10 admin fee applies (unless you chose not to travel due to a delay, of course)

If the ticket has been used but is merely unscanned/unchecked, then obviously a refund does not apply and if you requested one, you could be facing a prosecution for fraud, as readers s of our Disputes & Prosecutions forum will be very well aware.

But any discussion of that is covered elsewhere and well beyond the scope of this thread!

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

TPE going backwards on journeys is hardly surprising and given their abysmal performance surprised its not worse. Northern are hardly anything for OLR to celebrate either.

Also biggest increase in revenue came from peak/anytime tickets so hopefully that trend continues as that is the route to closing the revenue gap.

 

[Peterthegreat]

TPE going backwards on journeys is hardly surprising and given their abysmal performance surprised its not worse. Northern are hardly anything for OLR to celebrate either.

Also biggest increase in revenue came from peak/anytime tickets so hopefully that trend continues as that is the route to closing the revenue gap.

Yes it's interesting that the three worst (in terms of growth) performers, TPE, Northern and TfW are all "nationalised" and have some of the worst reliability.

 

[30907]

Yes it's interesting that the three worst (in terms of growth) performers, TPE, Northern and TfW are all "nationalised" and have some of the worst reliability.

TPE weren't Directly Operated at the relevant time.
And the next one is LNER, which is - what conclusion would you now draw?

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

TPE weren't Directly Operated at the relevant time.
And the next one is LNER, which is - what conclusion would you now draw?

and SE is next up the list

So much for OLR being more arms length to Treasury able to react better arent delivering on the results

 

[Peterthegreat]

TPE weren't Directly Operated at the relevant time.
And the next one is LNER, which is - what conclusion would you now draw?

TPE came under DOR control towards the end of May. Therefore they were "nationalised" for around 35% of the time.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 10 Nov 2023 ==

and SE is next up the list

So much for OLR being more arms length to Treasury able to react better arent delivering on the results

Absolutely.

 

[deltic08]

Always surprised so little discussion of housing in these type of threads.

We still have a quickly rising population and a need for mass housing growth. Much new uban housing is also car free.

Labour are also proposing new housing of various types outside of inner cities around stations.

All that is ripe for capturing by a railway industry that is attuned to change. Yet so many in the industry aren't

Not entirely. East Leeds new town of 40,000 inhabitants is being built across the Cross Gates-Wetherby trackbed without future proofing for reinstating a railway. Electrified rail would be ideal to connect this settlement to Leeds city centre both by volume capability and time.
Leeds City Councils solution to the peaks is 300 double decker buses, that will need charging every night, into an already gridlocked city. That's backward thinking planning for you.

 

[yorkie]

I think there is a bit of discussion creep in this thread ....

Agreed.

Just to remind everyone that we welcome the creation of a new thread (if there isn't one already) for any other topic, rather than trying to cram multiple topics into one thread.

In particular anything of a speculative nature (e.g. the potential for rebuilding railway lines) belongs in the Speculative Discussion section please.

Thanks

 

[Krokodil]

Yes it's interesting that the three worst (in terms of growth) performers, TPE, Northern and TfW are all "nationalised" and have some of the worst reliability.

TfW are in the middle of renewing their entire fleet, not to mention major infrastructure work on some lines. Therefore you can't make a fair comparison until the upgrades are completed.

 

[snowball]

I'm no expert in this sort of thing, can someone explain how, if journeys are down 11%, revenue is down 22%?

I may be missing something here, but, surly revenue should be down by roughly the same percent as journeys, rather than double?

Another possibility is that people are making shorter journeys than before. You can check that by looking at the figures for passenger km, as distinct from the figures for passenger journeys.

 

[Krokodil]

Is this actually true? If so I've missed out on a lot of refunds

Only in the sense that you can walk into a shop, fill your bags with stock and walk out without paying. Just because it's possible to get away with something, it doesn't mean that a law-abiding person should. Indeed they would no longer be a law-abiding person if they did.

 

[Robcuk]

If the country went back to Pre pandemic passenger flows tomorrow , would the railway be able to handle it anyway? I'm pretty sure Cross country, Avanti etc couldn't muster up enough trains/long enough trains since retiring some of the fleet and have enough train crews.

Even Greater Anglia would struggle to add the 1 missing peak to London in the morning and back to Norwich in the evening unless the 720 supplement the stanex or the IC run, I know only one extra train but that's 600 commuters paying on average maybe £30 each, a substantial amount of revenue.

As others have said, comparison with Pre pandemic is getting less and less relevant as time passes as TOCs are now more geared up for today's traffic flows and the better run ones are beginning to pay money into the treasury.

Spot on. Round the Sutton loop in the peaks the trains were ridiculous, folk were crammed in like sardines, items trapped in doors, people running up the platform looking for space. Quite often the trains were full and standing at Streatham with 4 stops before Bfr - a 10-20% reduction would make the journey alot more palatable for the commuter I'd imagine.

 

[60159]

They aren't, there is no attempt to put strikes into context.
About 3% impact on pax journeys.

Probably insignificant but while Scotrail has the biggest passenger number increase from a fairly low base does anyone know how many passengers or what % are lost through weather cancellations.
They seem hugely more common than a few years ago. Carmont perhaps?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Nov 2023 ==

Probably insignificant but while Scotrail has the biggest passenger number increase from a fairly low base does anyone know how many passengers or what % are lost through weather cancellations.
They seem hugely more common than a few years ago. Carmont perhaps?

Another loss for the railway are bus passes. In Scotland more and more age groups are getting them.
I don’t travel that often and if I do usually to Dundee or Glasgow and I nearly always take the bus.
Off topic I know but the seats are far more comfortable generally. And they all line up with windows!

 

[CastlebarKeith]

Hanwell's figures over the years proves the "Build it, and they will come" theory to be correct.

 

[HSTEd]

Does it matter? Most trains across Europe have some level of subsidy, either directly through revenue support or indirectly because they aren't having to pay the true costs of their infrastructure. It's only certain factions in the UK that seem to consider this a bad thing.

Requiring subsidy is not in of itself a problem.
The problem is when the subsidy grows out of proportion to the social benefit.

The size of the subsidy clearly matters, or we wouldn't bother charging people to use trains!
A huge hole has been ripped in the projections made before coronavirus and it does not look likely to be closing any time soon.

The railway industry might prefer if the taxpayer simply provided a pile more money with no strings attached and no questions asked, but that is not really a reasonable expectation.

 

[yorksrob]

Requiring subsidy is not in of itself a problem.
The problem is when the subsidy grows out of proportion to the social benefit.

The size of the subsidy clearly matters, or we wouldn't bother charging people to use trains!
A huge hole has been ripped in the projections made before coronavirus and it does look likely to be closing any time soon.

The railway industry might prefer if the taxpayer simply provided a pile more money with no strings attached and no questions asked, but that is not really a reasonable expectation.

Passengers have a reasonable expectation of the service being delivered.

 

[317 forever]

That statement is an urban myth.

It is of course true that usage is lower than 2019 and because of the loss of more expensive business and commuting travel, adjusted for inflation, the fare revenue is significantly lower.

The railway cannot support 2019 costs with 2023 revenue.

Another problem is that, even if there is 10% less travel, 10% fewer services and 10% less revenue, the losses will be greater due to fixed costs such as maintaining the tracks and stations.