Modern Railways: LNER and compulsory reservations

[cactustwirly]

A few will. Some won't. Depends on lots of factors. E.g. "simply driving" from London to Edinburgh is generally unappealing compared to just going another weekend instead. The same way people will defer plans today if the cheapest fares have sold out.

They'll fly instead since it's faster and just as much hassle if they do introduce compulsory reservations.
The whole reason why people get the train from Edinburgh to London and vice versa, is for flexibility not price or speed. Because LNER can't compete with easyJet with that.

 

[ChrisC]

I don’t think this is a “Reading commuter” issue, but more one for people making medium length journeys, and perhaps to some extent commuter journeys in areas where there isn’t a substitute operator available.

How else can one reasonably do a journey like Retford to Wakefield or Grantham to London? Or even more so something like Berwick to Newcastle?

Even more a problem for shorter local journeys between stations on the section between Peterborough and Doncaster. For Grantham, Newark and Retford, LNER is the local service. Someone travelling between any two adjacent stations on this section is doing a short local journey of only about 10 minutes. Only between Grantham and Peterborough is there any real alternative.

 

[cactustwirly]

Even more a problem for shorter local journeys between stations on the section between Peterborough and Doncaster. For Grantham, Newark and Retford, LNER is the local service. Someone travelling between any two adjacent stations on this section is doing a short local journey of only about 10 minutes. Only between Grantham and Peterborough is there any real alternative.

Grantham and Peterborough does have EMR services

 

[43066]

Not always the case with a lot of advance purchases - some people will purchase a super/off peak ticket in advance, plus from what ive been reading on other pages on here sometimes the 'advance' ticket can be either the same as a normal 'Advance'

Advanced tickets are always cheaper than walk-up fares, open returns etc., are they not?

 

[Clip]

Highways England wouldn't shut down certain motorway junctions, or force you to book your space on the motorway in advance. Neither should any TOC force people to have reservations.

However they do now have 'Smart motorways' which reduce the speed and thus increase the time to travel on said motorways

They'll fly instead since it's faster and just as much hassle if they do introduce compulsory reservations.
The whole reason why people get the train from Edinburgh to London and vice versa, is for flexibility not price or speed. Because LNER can't compete with easyJet with that.

Are you sure they will fly if they have to have compulsory reservations? i mean its not commuters doing that journey so those who are doing so will be for leisure and its not really an inconvenience to have a reservation is it? I bet most of the regular travellers will be having them anyway as a large amount of them will be using 'Advance' tickets anyway. And if you can book a reservation if you have a super/off peak ticket for your journey then whats the issue? If you will be later then cancel it and get another - 'But what if you cant' I hear you cry, well then try and stick with your itinerary - because you would have to on a plane( the thing you are saying people would instead get) in the vast majority of cases wouldnt you?

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Advanced tickets are always cheaper than walk-up fares, open returns etc., are they not?

Not all the time I believe as they do them in tiers and a quick check to see this there is an 'Advance Fare' via the west coast at £189
Which seems to be more expensive than the anytime single Via York £166

 

[DB]

Are you sure they will fly if they have to have compulsory reservations? i mean its not commuters doing that journey so those who are doing so will be for leisure and its not really an inconvenience to have a reservation is it? I bet most of the regular travellers will be having them anyway as a large amount of them will be using 'Advance' tickets anyway. And if you can book a reservation if you have a super/off peak ticket for your journey then whats the issue? If you will be later then cancel it and get another - 'But what if you cant' I hear you cry, well then try and stick with your itinerary - because you would have to on a plane( the thing you are saying people would instead get) in the vast majority of cases wouldnt you?

Sticking with your itinterary if going from Edinburgh to London on a plane is in no way comparable to not knowing exactly what time youl will finish work in Doncaster and need to get back to York (or any other cobination of nearby stations where LNER is the main/only operator). And LNER serves both markets, not just the long distance ones.

The main advantage of rail is flexibility. Take that away and it will push more people into cars and onto planes - which is the opposite of governent policy.

 

[JonathanH]

Highways England wouldn't shut down certain motorway junctions, or force you to book your space on the motorway in advance. Neither should any TOC force people to have reservations.

Who says? I very much see just that as being an integral part of any future road pricing scheme with a higher price charged at times expected to be busy and people made to book their slot on the motorway. Maybe not the answer to congestion but it would go some way in that direction.

Probably off topic for this thread though and better discussed here https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...-duty-due-to-electric-vehicles.211344/page-10

 

[DB]

Not all the time I believe as they do them in tiers and a quick check to see this there is an 'Advance Fare' via the west coast at £189
Which seems to be more expensive than the anytime single Via York £166

You are comparing two different operators who go via different routes.

On the same route / operator, I can think of no occasions when I've come across an advance ticket which is more expensive than a walk up one (for the same class of travel) - there would be no sense in offering such a ticket as why would anyone buy ut?

 

[Clip]

You are comparing two different operators who go via different routes.

On the same route / operator, I can think of no occasions when I've come across an advance ticket which is more expensive than a walk up one (for the same class of travel) - there would be no sense in offering such a ticket as why would anyone buy ut?

Thats not what was asked in the post i was replying to.

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Sticking with your itinterary if going from Edinburgh to London on a plane is in no way comparable to not knowing exactly what time youl will finish work in Doncaster and need to get back to York (or any other cobination of nearby stations where LNER is the main/only operator). And LNER serves both markets, not just the long distance ones.

The main advantage of rail is flexibility. Take that away and it will push more people into cars and onto planes - which is the opposite of governent policy.

how is a plane more flexible than a train? you still have to pick a plane that has seats available do you not?

 

[DB]

how is a plane more flexible than a train? you still have to pick a plane that has seats available do you not?

It's not more flexible, but it's quicker and may be cheaper. Take away the flexibility of the train, and more people will use the plane.

 

[A0]

I don’t think this is a “Reading commuter” issue, but more one for people making medium length journeys, and perhaps to some extent commuter journeys in areas where there isn’t a substitute operator available.

How else can one reasonably do a journey like Retford to Wakefield or Grantham to London? Or even more so something like Berwick to Newcastle?

Given Retford has less than an hourly LNER service, I'd imagine knowing which train you're going to travel on and reserving a seat won't be a huge issue.

Grantham's more interesting - perhaps when you buy a London ticket you have to pick your train?

 

[Clip]

It's not more flexible, but it's quicker and may be cheaper. Take away the flexibility of the train, and more people will use the plane.

But a flexible flight on walk up wont be any cheaper will it if you need to get it there and then and you still have no guarantee there will be space on the flight you want is there?

 

[DB]

But a flexible flight on walk up wont be any cheaper will it if you need to get it there and then and you still have no guarantee there will be space on the flight you want is there?

I didn't say it would.

Flights will never be fully flexible, whereas a train is - therefore if you remove the fleibility, you remove one of the main reasons for using the train rather than the plane.

 

[A0]

They'll fly instead since it's faster and just as much hassle if they do introduce compulsory reservations.
The whole reason why people get the train from Edinburgh to London and vice versa, is for flexibility not price or speed. Because LNER can't compete with easyJet with that.

I doubt it on London - Edinburgh - it's near enough a 5 hour journey - even if you got the first train from KX you wouldn't get to Edinburgh until after 11am.

There are 6 direct trains you could get back on, on the hour from 12pm - 5pm then at 19.36 which doesn't get you back to London until 01.16.

I can't imagine too many people do out and back in a day and still less don't plan to travel back at a certain time.

People who use the train to do London - Edinburgh are more likely not to be travelling back on the same day. Whereas with any of the airlines it's more likely to be out & back on the same day because the flight is that much shorter.

 

[158756]

You are comparing two different operators who go via different routes.

On the same route / operator, I can think of no occasions when I've come across an advance ticket which is more expensive than a walk up one (for the same class of travel) - there would be no sense in offering such a ticket as why would anyone buy ut?

There's no sense in buying anything priced higher than the walk up fare. But abolishing walk up fares seems a very natural progression from compulsory reservations, thus allowing LNER to charge whatever they want. So it might be very rare that travel between York and Doncaster would be impossible, but you could pay £100 if buying on the day.

 

[Kite159]

Given Retford has less than an hourly LNER service, I'd imagine knowing which train you're going to travel on and reserving a seat won't be a huge issue.

Grantham's more interesting - perhaps when you buy a London ticket you have to pick your train?

And Grantham does has the option of Hull Trains (when they are running) and the potential of using the EMR Norwich service to Peterborough connecting onto a Thameslink stopper as "backup".

Although I would imagine EMR won't like their train to be swamped with passengers from Grantham to Peterborough as it could reduce space for passengers going beyond Peterborough.

 

[Starmill]

Mandatory reservation other than on special charters, international trains, Sleeper services etc is just not feasible in Great Britain. Our long-distance trains carry large numbers of commuters, shoppers and other short distance passengers going from their town or suburb to a nearby large city centre, because we haven't built separate lines for long-distance trains, or comprehensive separate lines for 'metro' services, even in the South East of England. In ten years when HS2 opens things will be a bit different, but until then there's no scope to suggest that long-distance trains can just tell the short distance customers to go away. Of course, there is one solution, which is to remove most intercity services. For example LNER could have one service per hour from London to Edinburgh and another from London to Leeds, and the remaining track capacity used to run more frequent local trains. Now how well would that go down eh

 

[Bikeman78]

It's all very well saying that but if all the passengers travelling between Leeds and Wakefield, Wakefield to Doncaster etc (other local journeys also apply) have to use Northern their trains will be overwhelmed and potentially won't cope.

That wasn't what I was suggesting. Plenty of people will be happy to take their chances and get on the LNER with a walk on ticket. This will be impossible to police unless they change the ticket to "Northern only" or "not LNER." At which point the ticket would be invalid.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Advanced tickets are always cheaper than walk-up fares, open returns etc., are they not?

Often two Advances are more expensive than an Off Peak Return but would be worth buying if making a one way journey.

 

[Bikeman78]

Well perhaps it does. But they are perfectly free to return to the ticket office and get a refund if they don't like it. And certainly other people shouldn't be prevented from standing just because that person doesn't want to.

Are you seriously suggesting they would prefer to arrive at the station to find a sign along the lines of that shown in post #238?

I agree. The only time I've had to stand for a long time was Reading to Newport. It was the first train through after a fatality. It was already wedged coming in to Reading. On departure, the two carriages I could see were packed from end to end. There were around 10 people in each door vestibule and a continuous line down the aisle. I could have let it go, but the next train could have been 10 minutes later or two hours later. I was happy enough to be moving.

I've stood from Paddington to Reading many times but always got a seat after that.

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Who makes a 25 minute journey by coach? That's a bus journey.

I've stood for 25 minutes on a bus several times. I'd be well unimpressed if the driver refused to let me on and said "sorry all the seats are taken."

 

[Hadders]

Have they published anything about what happens during disruption or is this an assumption that they would leave you 'Stranded'? It woudl take a massive change in the conditions of travel for what you suggest to occur wouldnt it?

When I say disruption it could be as little as a connecting train being a couple of minutes late. Take a journey like Sandy to York. You take GTR to Peterborough and change there to LNER. What if the GTR train is five minutes late meaning the LNER train is missed. If the LNER trains for the rest of the day are fully booked then you'd be stranded. A five minute delay is not really disruption but it could cause significant issues.

This is indeed the main reason for compulsory reservations being introduced.

To put a bit more flavour on it, there have been many (pre-Covid) instances where trains leaving Kings Cross especially (and also other stations) have been grossly overbooked, with many customers having to stand for very long journeys (such as London to Edinburgh). I've seen this myself several times on Fridays and Sundays.

It goes without saying that this leads to a very poor customer experience, and a view (both by those directly affected, and those who were on the train but had a seat) that train travel is not good at all, at any price really.

But we need to ask: why did this happen? The answer was that it was because, although all reservable accommodation was fully reserved, online booking engines continued to sell tickets, even though there was no seat for the ticket holder to sit in. You might think that this is the fault of online booking engines then, but that isn't actually the case - with the old National Reservation System (NRS) it was not possible to tell whether there was no availability because the train was fully sold out, or because reservations were not set up for some reason - the response was the same.

Since the pandemic started, a new reservation system (RARS2 - Rail Availability and Reservation Service) has replaced the previous one. This is more sophisticated in a few ways, and it should be possible (so far as I know) with this to be able to distinguish between trains that are "sold out", and trains that don't have reservations set up (although they ordinarily would).

As a result, it should also be possible for online booking engines (and also station TIS and TVMs) to indicate that a service is fully booked and that, although you can buy a ticket for it, you are not guaranteed to get a seat, and that you should consider getting a different service instead; this is quite a manageable UX challenge really.

So that's it, really. There isn't actually any need for the very blunt approach of compulsory reservations for all inter-city services in order to solve the problem that I mentioned at the start. (There was a year ago, when we were on the old reservation system, but that problem has gone away now.) It's a problem that can be resolved through understanding and using the available data, to nudge customers' behaviour in the right way. And it isn't even that difficult to solve, really.

Most importantly of all, the context that we find ourselves within at the moment must be appreciated. The railway desperately needs to attract back previous customers and to win new customers (the latter to fill the revenue hole left by a drop in commuters and, probably, business travel). And to do that it has to avoid unnecessarily creating situations where customers have every right to be aggrieved, and are likely not only to not travel again, but also to tell others about their experience (both through social media and through their own social networks). If the railway doesn't solve problems like this, then revenue won't get to the levels we need it to get to, and even more cutbacks and closures will happen.

Excellent post summing up the position very well.

Mandatory reservation other than on special charters, international trains, Sleeper services etc is just not feasible in Great Britain. Our long-distance trains carry large numbers of commuters, shoppers and other short distance passengers going from their town or suburb to a nearby large city centre, because we haven't built separate lines for long-distance trains, or comprehensive separate lines for 'metro' services, even in the South East of England. In ten years when HS2 opens things will be a bit different, but until then there's no scope to suggest that long-distance trains can just tell the short distance customers to go away. Of course, there is one solution, which is to remove most intercity services. For example LNER could have one service per hour from London to Edinburgh and another from London to Leeds, and the remaining track capacity used to run more frequent local trains. Now how well would that go down eh

Agreed!

 

[Starmill]

On the same route / operator, I can think of no occasions when I've come across an advance ticket which is more expensive than a walk up one (for the same class of travel) - there would be no sense in offering such a ticket as why would anyone buy ut?

It is in fact not particularly rare. And as to why you'd buy it... There aren't really any good reasons. Here's an example this coming Tuesday morning going from Crewe to Wolverhampton. An Off Peak Single is £20.60, or you can choose an Advance ticket from £40.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It is in fact not particularly rare. And as to why you'd buy it... There aren't really any good reasons. Here's an example this coming Tuesday morning going from Crewe to Wolverhampton. An Off Peak Single is £20.60, or you can choose an Advance ticket from £40.

There are some TOCs that offer free Advance changes but would charge £10 to refund a walk-up if you wanted to change that for another day - that's all I can think of!

This arises on "evening peak" Avanti services northbound from MKC where Anytime fares don't apply, but they do from Euston; the Advances, when they pop up, are priced based on an Anytime fare being the walk-up.

 

[Starmill]

even if you got the first train from KX you wouldn't get to Edinburgh until after 11am.

It's always struck me as a little odd that you can arrive in Glasgow at 1038, but not in Edinburgh until 1112.

 

[Bletchleyite]

It's always struck me as a little odd that you can arrive in Glasgow at 1038, but not in Edinburgh until 1112.

That's called "handing the airlines business", of course, because you can fly and arrive before 0900. OK, there's the Sleeper, but I'd imagine there are quite a few people for whom an 05something off Kings Cross would be much more attractive than not sleeping on that.

 

[Starmill]

There are some TOCs that offer free Advance changes but would charge £10 to refund a walk-up if you wanted to change that for another day - that's all I can think of!

This arises on "evening peak" Avanti services northbound from MKC where Anytime fares don't apply, but they do from Euston; the Advances, when they pop up, are priced based on an Anytime fare being the walk-up.

Indeed. Avanti do it very regularly, in the two examples given and elsewhere and have for some years. I suppose now you might get automated Delay Repay rights too. If you'd consider paying more for that...

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That's called "handing the airlines business", of course, because you can fly and arrive before 0900. OK, there's the Sleeper, but I'd imagine there are quite a few people for whom an 05something off Kings Cross would be much more attractive than not sleeping on that.

Before the pandemic there was a 0557 Crewe to Glasgow Central service, which called everywhere you'd expect plus Lockerbie and arrived at 0916. Presumably it wouldn't be beyond the wit of man for it to start back from London Euston, but it may be difficult. And even without stops it'd probably need to be leaving London at 0400. TransPennine Express have a path from Preston to Glasgow that leaves an hour earlier, and that generally started at Manchester Piccadilly.

 

[gaillark]

Currently LNER are asking for compulsory reservations. At first when they started this I obtain resevations online or in person but what a waste of time it is. Have not bothered since.
As said previously I won't use the train anymore if they insist on compulsory reservations but drive instead. I only use flexible tickets because I need flexibility.

Lets be realistic. Very few trains are packed to the rafters and with "world class trains and increased comfort introduced by LNER" that are anything but world class they claim to have increased seating but how many trains out of all that are operated each day are 100% full: A handful now and then.
As said earlier reservations should be optional but not compulsory.

British Rail managed demand quite well at high peak times by creative thinking by changing maintenance schedules in order to allow a relief trains to be run at high peak times. Alterating schedules like LNER has done recently by removing certain stops from the schedule such as making York and Newcastle pick up only in the down direction for Inverness and Aberdeen trains.
The other tool in the toolbox is simply to raise advance purchase fares on high peak services or remove them completly. Yield Management can work both ways - in other words price people off. Governments told British Rail to do this to dampen down demand. Friday travel was always more expensive than other days.

There are no trains that are packed to capacity to/from Kings Cross or Euston when anytime fares are in operation. The problem is concentrated on some Friday afternoon off peak services where too many lower priced advance fares have been sold eating up capacity rather than shifting the cheaper priced tickets after 2000hrs.
I know some people will find that unpleasant but you have to strike a balance when 800 people turn up to travel on say the 1500 to Newcastle whereas the 2200 to Newcastle will only have 50 at the same price.

 

[Class 170101]

If you don't allow standing on LNER services then revenue will have to be gained from elsewhere.

Maundy Thursday has been mentioned as a busy day and I imagine the same on Easter Monday. Most Friday and Sunday Afternoons, the same and the period leading upto and after Christmas.

I don't think therefore reducing revenue by limiting loading will assist the government in its attempt to balance the books.

 

[gaillark]

If you don't allow standing on LNER services then revenue will have to be gained from elsewhere.

Maundy Thursday has been mentioned as a busy day and I imagine the same on Easter Monday. Most Friday and Sunday Afternoons, the same and the period leading upto and after Christmas.

I don't think therefore reducing revenue by limiting loading will assist the government in its attempt to balance the books.

Exactly!

 

[Watershed]

Before the pandemic there was a 0557 Crewe to Glasgow Central service, which called everywhere you'd expect plus Lockerbie and arrived at 0916. Presumably it wouldn't be beyond the wit of man for it to start back from London Euston, but it may be difficult. And even without stops it'd probably need to be leaving London at 0400. TransPennine Express have a path from Preston to Glasgow that leaves an hour earlier, and that generally started at Manchester Piccadilly.

Even if you assumed a zero pathing, non-stop run on the fasts to Crewe, you'd need to depart Euston no later than 04:25 to make a 05:57 departure off Crewe. Of course in reality you'd need to depart more like 03:55 to allow for running on the slows south of Hillmorton/Rugby.

I have to say, I hardly think that an 03:55 departure would attract many customers. Certainly it's not an attractive alternative to flying if you want to get to Glasgow for an early meeting. There are no Tube connections at that hour of the day so you're entirely reliant on either getting a night bus, taxi or lift to Euston, or staying in a hotel nearby.

I think it would be more plausible to run such a service from, say Birmingham or Wolverhampton.

The problem is concentrated on some Friday afternoon off peak services where too many lower priced advance fares have been sold eating up capacity rather than shifting the cheaper priced tickets after 2000hrs.
I know some people will find that unpleasant but you have to strike a balance when 800 people turn up to travel on say the 1500 to Newcastle whereas the 2200 to Newcastle will only have 50 at the same price.

This has been a perennial problem caused by the conflict between maximising revenue and maximising the number of passengers carried (both overall and seated).

The lack of half-price Off-Peak singles has meant that affordable travel meant choosing between having flexibility, but only after "peak" times, and being able to travel at peak times, but only on one specific service.