Network Rail & TOCs - funding crisis & cost saving ideas (article dated 4 April 2017)

[yorksrob]

Then they'd probably stop happening, because local authorities are mostly strapped for cash.

There's no such thing as the road budget. There's the trunk roads budget and there are local authority budgets. But there are virtually no level crossings left on trunk roads.

Then the DfT should pay for them out of it's trunk road budget regardless.

I don't see why the railway should be paying to resolve a problem primarily caused by motorists, and what's more I never will.

 

[mcmad]

Then the DfT should pay for them out of it's trunk road budget regardless.

I don't see why the railway should be paying to resolve a problem primarily caused by motorists, and what's more I never will.

Because the railway caused the original problem by installing a level crossing over the public road rather than building a bridge?

 

[edwin_m]

At the time the road traffic was only the occasional horse and cart, and the trains of the time were probably as dangerous to them as today's trains are to occupants of motor vehicles.

However, with the approach some recent government announcements have show to the truth, you'd probably find if the government transferred level crossing funding to the highway authorities that they also transferred a chunk of Network Rail's funding. So we'd end up no better off overall, with an extra participant introduced into all level crossing discussions.

 

[yorksrob]

Quite. The cart tracks of yore had far fewer vehicles which themselves posed less of a risk to the railway. The non-motorised road transport can't IMO be regarded as a forerunner to the modern motoring economy.

 

[yorksrob]

At the time the road traffic was only the occasional horse and cart, and the trains of the time were probably as dangerous to them as today's trains are to occupants of motor vehicles.

However, with the approach some recent government announcements have show to the truth, you'd probably find if the government transferred level crossing funding to the highway authorities that they also transferred a chunk of Network Rail's funding. So we'd end up no better off overall, with an extra participant introduced into all level crossing discussions.

Even if Government did transfer a chunk of funding from NR to elsewhere to pay for it, it would still mean a smaller headline figure for NR's infrastructure costs and contribution to the national debt, so this should in theory lead to less political pressure on the railway.

 

[edwin_m]

Even if Government did transfer a chunk of funding from NR to elsewhere to pay for it, it would still mean a smaller headline figure for NR's infrastructure costs and contribution to the national debt, so this should in theory lead to less political pressure on the railway.

True, but I wouldn't put it past them to "lose" some of the amount during the transfer, or to "forget" to make the roads authorities dedicate it to level crossings. There is also the complication that the roads in question are split between dozens of authorities, which will have variable numbers of both problem level crossings to address, and people with the ability to do so.