First class obsolete?

[physics34]

doesnt make money off peak on non intercity routes so i can see why its being downgraded everywhere you look...but maybe they should publicise it better...make it a better service overall and then maybe people would be tempted.... unfortunately now with the lack of staff around there is no one to get a free cup of coffee off, or maybe a free news paper etc etc.

 

[physics34]

For me, I think 1st class should be offered on most if not all longer distance services, typically where journey times are over an hour or so. On shorter distance commuter services, or branch lines, I don't personally see the need for 1st class.

What I find strange is that with some operators, the 1st class offer is little different to that offered to standard class. Examples include Southern and Greater Anglia (on the 321's at any rate). If 1st class is to be provided, then (in my view) the TOC's should at least make it worthwhile in terms of comfort & ambiance.

Certainly, for the erstwhile Inter City TOC's, 1st class is a good money-spinner and it would be daft for those companies to sacrifice 1st class accommodation.

problem with southern is the usage of 377s..... a Littlehampton to London Bridge 377 in the morning peak will be found on Victoria to Sutton services later in the day. The first class on the 387s is an absolute joke though

 

[westv]

On the subject of 1st class, I wonder if we will ever see the return of dining carriages to some routes?

 

[Moonshot]

On the subject of 1st class, I wonder if we will ever see the return of dining carriages to some routes?

Only if there is a commercial demand, and a profit to be made. So I very much doubt it.

 

[duncanp]

doesnt make money off peak on non intercity routes so i can see why its being downgraded everywhere you look...but maybe they should publicise it better...make it a better service overall and then maybe people would be tempted.... unfortunately now with the lack of staff around there is no one to get a free cup of coffee off, or maybe a free news paper etc etc.

I think the answer to this is to provide low cost upgrades to first class at quiet times. Some TOCS already do this at weekends, but there is no reason the principle could not be extended to selected weekday trains.

Alternatively, offer cheap first class advance tickets at quiet times.

 

[Bletchleyite]

doesnt make money off peak on non intercity routes so i can see why its being downgraded everywhere you look...but maybe they should publicise it better...make it a better service overall and then maybe people would be tempted.... unfortunately now with the lack of staff around there is no one to get a free cup of coffee off, or maybe a free news paper etc etc.

Personally I'm not overly fussed about freebies. I'm after a reasonable price for a wider seat with a window view, ideally on the 1 side, even better if it's a single airline seat.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I think the answer to this is to provide low cost upgrades to first class at quiet times. Some TOCS already do this at weekends, but there is no reason the principle could not be extended to selected weekday trains.

Or simply price First Off-Peak tickets at a more reasonable price (and offer for all journeys where First is applicable).

 

[All Line Rover]

On regional services I would like first class to be replaced with quiet zones. More equitable and more useful, there being an actual "improvement" despite all seats on the train being identical. The segregated compartments on class 350/1s, 450s, 377s etc would be ideal for this.

 

[All Line Rover]

Basically, what Chiltern Railways already does.

 

[Chester1]

First Class should only exist on what was once the Intercity services of BR era namely some of the following:

Great Eastern Mainline (services currently run with MK3s/90s)
East Coast Mainline (any services currently using HSTs/91s or 180s
West Coast Mainline (All long distance routes - ie run by Virgin or Cross Country
Great Western Mainline (all services currently using HSTs)
Midland Mainline (all services using HSTs/Meridians)

All EMU run services should have first class removed as they are usually no improvement to comfort anyway

By EMU I assume you mean 350s etc not Pendalinos or IEPs?

Why should Chiltern remove it business zone or TPE not have First Class on its future Mark 5 and bimode services? The nature of services now matters not what they were like 20-70 years ago. I agree that TPE 350 and CAF electric (197s???) should not be allowed to have First Class unless they have a decent number of seats and there is a real difference in the nature of standard and first.

For me, I think 1st class should be offered on most if not all longer distance services, typically where journey times are over an hour or so. On shorter distance commuter services, or branch lines, I don't personally see the need for 1st class.

What I find strange is that with some operators, the 1st class offer is little different to that offered to standard class. Examples include Southern and Greater Anglia (on the 321's at any rate). If 1st class is to be provided, then (in my view) the TOC's should at least make it worthwhile in terms of comfort & ambiance.

Certainly, for the erstwhile Inter City TOC's, 1st class is a good money-spinner and it would be daft for those companies to sacrifice 1st class accommodation.

I agree with nearly everything you said, hence my suggestion that First Class should be a mimimum of one coach. 15 seats etc is just charging twice as much to guarentee a seat. I suspect as overcrowding gets worse West Midlands, South and South Eastern will be force to remove First Class by DfT.

 

[bramling]

I think the answer to this is to provide low cost upgrades to first class at quiet times. Some TOCS already do this at weekends, but there is no reason the principle could not be extended to selected weekday trains.

Alternatively, offer cheap first class advance tickets at quiet times.

Not necessarily worthwhile.

If there are plenty of spare seats on the train as a whole, then there's no capacity issue, so no benefit in people upgrading to enhance the odds of getting a seat. Meanwhile, if you have loads of people upgrading because it's so cheap, it could spoil the peaceful ambience of first such that your full-fare people decide it's no longer worth it. If the loss of revenue from the full-fare people is greater than the extra revenue from the cheap upgrades, it doesn't work on paper. You can probably add in some complaints to the mix too, qv the thread on noisy families in first-class from a few months back!

Intercity is different as generally there's greater availability of first class, and it's easier for the TOCs to do effective yield management through the use of advances and/or restrictive ticketing.

 

[Deepgreen]

Scrap it in commuter routes, keep it in IC and long-distance regional services.

Define 'commuter routes' - commuting is now common from, for example, York to London The problem is the huge disparity of first class offerings around the UK. Different TOCs have hugely differing ideas about what constitutes first class and about delineation/labelling and enforcement, which is just as important as the actual offering. With more and more TTIs being removed from the system and the remaining staff having little or no incentive to enforce first class, it is rapidly becoming a free-for-all.

 

[Deepgreen]

First Class should only exist on what was once the Intercity services of BR era namely some of the following:

Great Eastern Mainline (services currently run with MK3s/90s)
East Coast Mainline (any services currently using HSTs/91s or 180s
West Coast Mainline (All long distance routes - ie run by Virgin or Cross Country
Great Western Mainline (all services currently using HSTs)
Midland Mainline (all services using HSTs/Meridians)

All EMU run services should have first class removed as they are usually no improvement to comfort anyway

Far too great a generalisation.

 

[Great_Western]

In this current climate, where almost every service suffers with overcrowding, first class should be seen as obsolete. We should be more concerned about having everybody get a seat (or be able to atleast have enough space to stand comfortably) and worry about first class and other unnessicary stuff after that is achived

 

[Bletchleyite]

Far too great a generalisation.

Indeed. A Pendolino is an EMU after all

 

[duncanp]

I disagree that "..almost every service..." suffers from overcrowding.

Commuter trains such as Merseyrail, Southern etc should be standard only, but there is a case for having First Class on long distance services.

If First Class can generate extra revenue for the TOC then everyone benefits, but each TOC needs to work our whether it would get more revenue from a mixture of standard and first or standard only.

First class advance tickets can be comparable, and in some cases cheaper, than walk up standard class tickets.

 

[Polarbear]

As mentioned by others up thread - the TOC's don't always cover themselves in glory in the way First Class tickets are priced.

Whilst some TOC's do offer off peak 1st class fares, these seem to be few & far between. Also, there are very few day returns for prospective first class customers. This often means a large hike between a standard class & first class ticket.

I appreciate that TOC;s do have to protect their full fare market, as it helps the bottom line immensely. That said, I'm sure some TOC's could be a bit more inventive with their 1st class ticketing.

 

[AlterEgo]

In this current climate, where almost every service suffers with overcrowding, first class should be seen as obsolete. We should be more concerned about having everybody get a seat (or be able to atleast have enough space to stand comfortably) and worry about first class and other unnessicary stuff after that is achived

It's only a small minority of services which are full and standing.

 

[HH]

As mentioned by others up thread - the TOC's don't always cover themselves in glory in the way First Class tickets are priced.

Whilst some TOC's do offer off peak 1st class fares, these seem to be few & far between. Also, there are very few day returns for prospective first class customers. This often means a large hike between a standard class & first class ticket.

I appreciate that TOC;s do have to protect their full fare market, as it helps the bottom line immensely. That said, I'm sure some TOC's could be a bit more inventive with their 1st class ticketing.

Intercity TOCs, who actually have an offer, do market them. Commuter TOCs, the offer is essentially "a seat in the peak", which means there's not very much to tempt an upgrade in the off peak. Why is that? Because what could they offer that would be both tempting and economically viable? It just doesn't work on shorter journeys.

 

[infobleep]

I will only travel on first class if it's cheap or the quality of first class makes it worth paying. I wouldn't call the quality of first class offered on some TOCs worthy of paying a lot more for. I'd rather stand.

 

[infobleep]

Getting rid of First Class would not solve any problems. At best a few more seats would be created. But revenue would drop considerably so don't expect this to happen anytime soon.

Over the years I've commuted in Standard and First, including annual tickets. Once my kids leave home I'll be back in First. And the train company will get an extra £2K in revenue.


The best way to increase capacity is to use longer trains. On my route (King's Cross) only a handful of trains are 12 coaches. There are plenty of trains that can be lengthened. And the cost of trains/platforms is far cheaper than building new tracks. In the evening peak there are a number of 4,5 and 6 coach trains going across the Welwyn viaduct. This is a massive under utilisation of capacity. The TOCs should be told anything less than 8 must go via Hertford.

Well they are considering it for Southeastern. Therefore if that was approved, the only reason it wouldn't happen anywhere else, anytime soon, is that other franchises would have been recently let without the requirement and it will be sometime before they get let again.

 

[Great_Western]

It's only a small minority of services which are full and standing.

However it seems that trains with excess First Class provison, such as on Crosscountry and Transpenine for example, have an endemic overcrowding problem.

 

[sheff1]

However it seems that trains with excess First Class provison, such as on Crosscountry and Transpenine for example, have an endemic overcrowding problem.

The problem on XC & TPE is not excess First Class provision (both seem well used throughout the main body of the day), but under provision of standard. Whoever specified 2 - 5 carriage trains for routes linking the major provincial cities in the country got it badly wrong.

 

[yorksrob]

However it seems that trains with excess First Class provison, such as on Crosscountry and Transpenine for example, have an endemic overcrowding problem.

XC and TPE don't seem to have an excess proportion of 1st to me. One carriage on a Voyager and half a carriage on a 158, and these are rarely empty (the whole train being too short is the problem here).

In my student days I had to walk past about four empty 1st class carriages at Euston to get to standard. That seemed like an over-provision, however that was twenty years ago, so maybe they've filled it up a bit more these days.

 

[Great_Western]

XC and TPE don't seem to have an excess proportion of 1st to me. One carriage on a Voyager and half a carriage on a 158, and these are rarely empty (the whole train being too short is the problem here).

In my student days I had to walk past about four empty 1st class carriages at Euston to get to standard. That seemed like an over-provision, however that was twenty years ago, so maybe they've filled it up a bit more these days.

The issue is, first class might have people using it, but you could fit twice as may standard class in the same space, thus generating the same amoung of revenue whilst making the train a more tollerable environment. That in turn could make the service mlre desirable

 

[All Line Rover]

Converting first class to standard class on a Voyager wouldn't double the number of seats in that coach. It would increase the number of seats from 26 to 42. An additional 16 seats would have a negligible impact on overcrowding.

And the average fare paid by a first class passenger on XC is, I am sure, considerably more than double the average fare paid by a standard class passenger (or passengers) travelling an equivalent distance.

 

[SpacePhoenix]

Even if the removal of 1st class doesn't double the number of seats in a coach, the extra standing room would help to increase capacity

 

[Clip]

People mention that commuter trains shouldnt have them but services from citys should.

So how does that work for Citys that are also commuter towns? Brighton & Hove, Canterbury and the others across the south?

If you look at it that way - and these places are an hour or more from London , then why shouldnt they have first class provision? As those who do commute in 1st on these services do pay a fortune for their tickets so it generates lots of revenue for the TOC

 

[Polarbear]

The issue is, first class might have people using it, but you could fit twice as may standard class in the same space, thus generating the same amoung of revenue whilst making the train a more tollerable environment. That in turn could make the service mlre desirable

Unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. First off, the difference between first class fares & standard fares is often much greater than the 50% mark up suggested, so the revenue loss would actually be greater. Also, you would have to increase the lower level of advance standard class fares to redress the imbalance.

Secondly, it's assumed that you can always squeeze twice as many seats into the space occupied by 1st class seating. Certainly, you couldn't do that on the London Midland 350's for instance, nor on say the Greater Anglia 360's.

 

[physics34]

Personally I'm not overly fussed about freebies. I'm after a reasonable price for a wider seat with a window view, ideally on the 1 side, even better if it's a single airline seat.

I also would certainly expect a more comfortable bigger seat with a table and a good view. Sadly 387s dont offer this and you fear its gonna become more commonplace to not have these.

Like you sayl, some people would pay for quality.