Great British Railways: Thoughts, predictions, speculation

[Watershed]

When I used to deal with them a decade ago, at the highest level, they claimed to be ‘the fastest growing trade union’ with 95,000 members according to their website back then.

Now they are a ‘fast growing trade union with more than 83,000 members’ according to their website now.

Ah, but growth can be negative too

 

[Trainer2]

The man in the pub said it’s NR maintenance S&T, OHLE & track to be the hardest hit with job cuts

 

[Bletchleyite]

The man in the pub said it’s NR maintenance S&T, OHLE & track to be the hardest hit with job cuts

How's that going to work without reducing maintenance and electrification work? You'd think savings would be made by stripping out timetablers from TOCs, for example.

 

[The Planner]

How's that going to work without reducing maintenance and electrification work? You'd think savings would be made by stripping out timetablers from TOCs, for example.

Not sure you would find many NR planners who can diagram rolling stock etc... it could concievably be the other way round.

 

[irish_rail]

If I'm reading this correctly (debatable as slightly squiffy) 9,000 job cuts on network rail?! How on earth is that safe!? Surely the vast majority of NR people are directly employed to maintain the SAFE operation of the railway!!???

 

[Mainline421]

If they maintain the infrastructure, set the timetables, and the fares, then the TOCs will serve little purpose at that point (except Open Access of course).

 

[Bletchleyite]

If they maintain the infrastructure, set the timetables, and the fares, then the TOCs will serve little purpose at that point (except Open Access of course).

A bit like London buses, in essence you have competition at the point of tender, which should drive down costs compared to a state monolith.

Whether you think that will work is for the reader to decide, but it basically seems similar to LO. That said, "some commercial freedom" seems to be mentioned.

 

[HST43257]

Has the report been published? I need a link if possible please.

 

[JonathanH]

Has the report been published? I need a link if possible please.

Presumably 7am in the morning. There is nothing yet on the DfT website.

A synopsis of ten main points from 'Rail Business Daily' has been copied to the thread at https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...-to-replace-network-rail-more-changes.217595/

 

[Cantab26]

The document has been published and can be downloaded here

 

[WestRiding]

Same trains. Same infrastructure. Same bottlenecks. Same problems. Oh, but you'll get a shiny new livery.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Ticketing and stations will be GBR-branded, but I'm not sure about trains, certainly in the 2-year transition period.
First Group have already been given a 2-year contract for SWR and TPE, and GWR has just been extended.
GBR will have 5 Regions, presumably mapped on to Network Rail's new Regions:

Our [NR] five regions are Eastern, North West & Central, Scotland’s Railway, Southern and Wales & Western.​

​

This may mean current TOC areas may be merged (or maybe not).
What happens to Thameslink and XC region-wise?
While GBR may be added to liveries, I doubt there will be a major repainting exercise until the new TOCs start up.
Long distance may be different anyway, and more like today.

I also can't work out if the GBR double arrow will be the same as the old one, it might have some subtle "development".
Looks like Scotland and Wales can have their own branding locally, but will need to cooperate with GBR standards.
New "best in class" retail web site too.

 

[Sad Sprinter]

I wonder if this will have any implications for the train building industry. Whether the merger once more or track and train will stimulate demand for more homegrown research on rolling stock design. I hope so.

 

[RobShipway]

I wonder if this will have any implications for the train building industry. Whether the merger once more or track and train will stimulate demand for more homegrown research on rolling stock design. I hope so.

The question on implications to the Train building industry, maybe a question for the Sepeculative Area. But I think they will either have more orders or may have to be working together on orders due to the lack of them.

 

[Failed Unit]

The papers are going to lose it over the name, it’ll be changed before you know it. GB Rail or British Rail probably.

I wonder if this will have any implications for the train building industry. Whether the merger once more or track and train will stimulate demand for more homegrown research on rolling stock design. I hope so.

I think short term it will actually mean less demand for new builds (but possibly more for refurbishment) - We have a number of fairly modern classes with no homes. I can't see more DMUs for example getting built before homes are found for the 185, 222 to name 2 examples. Yes you can't use a 222 on a Leeds - York local service but a network wide strategy would be useful. Maybe we will see an electrification strategy where the 15x are replaced by EMU cascades. (But I doubt it in England)

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 May 2021 ==

Anyone checked if Brookmans Park is now going to get 18tph?

Not sure if it is going to TfL now either on condition of the next bailout - But all ECML open access operators must stop at it or they get their operators license revoked.

 

[RailWonderer]

A bit like London buses, in essence you have competition at the point of tender, which should drive down costs compared to a state monolith.

Whether you think that will work is for the reader to decide, but it basically seems similar to LO. That said, "some commercial freedom" seems to be mentioned.

In terms of advertising? What would be the point of advertising when the government is collecting all the revenue? Even paying for an ad campaign for that matter makes no sense. Unless they are referring to branding on the fleets and at stations only.

 

[tbwbear]

The papers are going to lose it over the name, it’ll be changed before you know it. GB Rail or British Rail probably.

I wonder if this will have any implications for the train building industry. Whether the merger once more or track and train will stimulate demand for more homegrown research on rolling stock design. I hope so.

The Telegraph headline is "British Rail" returns as government tightens grip on trains....

 

[GrandCentral]

I think that this plan is very short sighted and being put in place to please the public for short term gains rather than any real logistical advantages. The public have been increasingly vocal about "re-nationalising" the railways. The usual arguments include that they want to cut ticket prices, more trains, more intergration with other transport, want to get rid of pacers etc without any understanding of how the system actually works. I think that many are going to be bitterly disappointed when they realise that this renationalising probably won't deliver any of the advantages that they expect, especially cheaper tickets and long term it might even make things more expensive.

 

[YorkshireBear]

There isn't any renationalisation really though. Currently trains are run by private companies, and they will continue to be so.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I think that this plan is very short sighted and being put in place to please the public for short term gains rather than any real logistical advantages. The public have been increasingly vocal about "re-nationalising" the railways. The usual arguments include that they want to cut ticket prices, more trains, more intergration with other transport, want to get rid of pacers etc without any understanding of how the system actually works. I think that many are going to be bitterly disappointed when they realise that this renationalising probably won't deliver any of the advantages that they expect, especially cheaper tickets and long term it might even make things more expensive.

Because it reduces duplication of roles I can't see any likelihood of that happening unless DfT decides to change the fares-subsidy balance, which has very little to do with the structure.

 

[Bald Rick]

The man in the pub said it’s NR maintenance S&T, OHLE & track to be the hardest hit with job cuts

Don’t listen to the man in the pub.

If I'm reading this correctly (debatable as slightly squiffy) 9,000 job cuts on network rail?! How on earth is that safe!? Surely the vast majority of NR people are directly employed to maintain the SAFE operation of the railway!!???

To put it in context, NR has something like 12000 more people than it did a decade ago.

 

[ainsworth74]

As a reminder this is a large topic with many threads already running covering different areas. Please do not use one thread to try and discuss everything.

Here are some useful links:

• Great British Railways: Potential effects on new trains orders?
• Great British Railways: is revenue neutral fare reform possible?
• Great British Railways: Replaces Network Rail & more changes - updates only (non-speculative)
• Great British Railways: Livery, branding and appearance?
• Great British Railways: Implications of a single unified brand on schematic mapping

 

[Wolfie]

Same trains. Same infrastructure. Same bottlenecks. Same problems. Oh, but you'll get a shiny new livery.

The current lot have forgotten that one of the reasons that a previous Govt was so keen to get rid of BR was that blame for problems landed straight in minister's desks. Shapps better get used to being blamed in the media for everything that goes wrong just as Khan is in London.

 

[Philip]

I don't think conjecture about potential job cuts and where is helpful or appropriate right now. Besides it looks like being 2023 at the earliest before any 'cuts' are made.

 

[Vespa]

I remember sectorisation, it was an improvement in terms of attitude, customer service and service level.

We should have.....
Through ticketing
Single complaint and delay repay refund procedure
Unified timetable
Less diversified rolling stock for more route availability and cheaper unified spare parts system

The old BR surly "take it or leave it" attitude is a thing of the past and hopefully will not make a return.

 

[CptCharlee]

So every train will carry a Great British Railways livery? Hmmmm. Thats what schapps seems to have alluded to in interviews.

The idea/possibility that local partnerships and schemes can bid for separate branch lines is intriguing. I could see branch lines in Devon and Cornwall being run locally.

 

[Bletchleyite]

So every train will carry a Great British Railways livery? Hmmmm. Thats what schapps seems to have alluded to in interviews.

The idea/possibility that local partnerships and schemes can bid for separate branch lines is intriguing. I could see branch lines in Devon and Cornwall being run locally.

That's a model that has worked very well in Germany, FWIW. Their private "TOCs" are much smaller than ours.

See also Merseyrail, and Greater Manchester will no doubt want some of their self-contained ones.

And we do also have one very small one - the Stourbridge Shuttle is run by Pre-Metro Operations Ltd (a child company of Parry Associates, though I don't think the latter exists any more on its own) as a subcontract from WMT, it's not run directly by the TOC.

 

[rjennings]

From someone working within delays this report made for some rather unsettling reading - more or less implied to me thats where 400 or so jobs are either a) going or b) being ‘reformed’ as a starter.

 

[Seehof]

Is there anybody on here from Network Rail? Has anything been said to you officially about the report and GBR? Thanks

 

[The Planner]

Is there anybody on here from Network Rail? Has anything been said to you officially about the report and GBR? Thanks

Only what has been put up on the company intranet and via an initial FAQ, more will happen over the coming weeks.