Passenger numbers after the holiday period

[JonathanH]

Because while several European governments have recognised the need for modal shift as climate change threatens and have brought in various unlimited travel offers, this one swans about in helicopters.

Working from home is interesting from that perspective. It means more home energy use, but less travel. Difficult to pitch where that stands as a contribution to reducing consumption.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Why is there (deliberately?) no mention in the above about the additional billions needed to pay the increased interest on the Network rail debt?

That is where the real deficit now is.

HMT are paying that separately from DfT account

 

[dk1]

Because while several European governments have recognised the need for modal shift as climate change threatens and have brought in various unlimited travel offers, this one swans about in helicopters.

Couldn’t make it up

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Traveling up to Scotland from the west country for the bank holiday weekend plus a bit more, and despite it being the day after a strike and warnings plastered all over every ticketing site going my 5-car voyager is rammed full to standing and is borderline dangerously full. Good thing they’re not binning off some 7 coach trains with no replacement lined up! The capacity along the Exeter-Bristol route I regularly use is pitiful and only getting worse.

The railways are being used, and in good numbers, but no one seems happy about doing so. The passenger experience is shocking and the value is awful. It’s a great opportunity to establish rail as the norm and as a comfortable eco-friendly means of travel, and the government have absolutely no interest in taking the chance (as no government has for decades).

Indeed on certain routes there is plenty of demand in excess of capacity but on other routes capacity is still significantly ahead of demand. BR could easily move stock around to find the right balance but the modern railway is utterly inept at doing so. The government doesn't help i accept but the industry itself is utterly failing to address the situation it finds itself in and seems just content to sit back and take the management fees and not attempt to address the issues.

 

[bramling]

The big missing element is the missing business travellers expensing peak open fares.
The is a big difference between recovery in commuters and business travellers post Covid.

The thing is the industry was probably lucky to get away with charging those business travel fares for as long as it did. This shouldn’t really be used as a justification for not providing a decent rail service now.

Of course, if we hadn’t wasted how many millions and more on the extended Covid response, and some of the theatre measures…

 

[TAS]

The big missing element is the missing business travellers expensing peak open fares.
The is a big difference between recovery in commuters and business travellers post Covid.

I'd like to be doing my part and transferring some money from my employer's coffers to the railway, but the ongoing industrial action is making this hard. There's an event on Friday I realistically can't get to and I'll be pulling out of. My attendance at that was more of a nice-to-have, so I was prepared to leave it in the hands of the railway. Anything more business critical and I can't necessarily plan my or others' diaries around the two weeks' notice given of strikes, so either it is planned as virtual or I arrange an alternative way of getting there. Either way, the railway is getting less money than in a scenario where the dispute was resolved.

 

[12LDA28C]

the industry itself is utterly failing to address the situation it finds itself in and seems just content to sit back and take the management fees and not attempt to address the issues.

Do you have any evidence of this? Or is it more likely that the industry as a whole is hamstrung by the DfT calling the shots and doing whatever it likes in order to cut costs, such as withdrawing stock on key routes with no replacement. What exactly would you like the industry to do in that kind of situation?

 

[Horizon22]

Seriously, Are that many people still trotting out the Working from home line after 2 years?

Yes. Hybrid culture is heavily embedded in many work places and is here to stay.

I know of many friends and family who go to the office only several days a week and a not inconsiderable amount who don't really have to go in at all and might do once a month or so.

 

[Jonny]

Sssshhhh don't tell anyone. The "governemnt" don't want anyone to know train travel is doing well! Makes it harder to deny the staff a payrise after 4 years of none whatsoever!

Ah, but what milage are they travelling, and are they on or off peak (versus before)?

 

[Horizon22]

Much of Europe seems to be coping with changing travel patterns. Why are the UK government making such a song & dance about it?

Probably because they don't see public transport as a social good like many other countries do, and also because they seem to want to get into quasi culture-wars about green policies and car usage. Although it's odd they've extended £2 bus fares for so long.

We're a more car-centric country culturally, which is unfortunate.

 

[dk1]

Probably because they don't see public transport as a social good like many other countries do, and also because they seem to want to get into quasi culture-wars about green policies and car usage. We're a more car-centric country culturally, which is unfortunate.

Such a shame.

 

[Clarence Yard]

Let’s face it, successive governments and BR in particular used business travel and commuters as a cash cow because they were in effect distress purchases with no available alternative. Now that bubble has been burst, probably for ever, the railway is financially struggling.

As for rolling stock, this isn’t pre-sector BR. We are now operating at 85%-90% availability levels, not 75% or less so there isn’t spare stuff to be had - the rest is under maintenance/repair/overhaul. The days when I worked at the Oak and we were sending our commuter Mk 1 & 2 stock as well as Readings DMU’s all over WR and elsewhere at weekends are long gone. Nobody can spare stock at weekends like that now.

I’m not sure what the poster who is ranting about the ineptness of the current industry in moving stock around expects the industry to do. We have plenty of punters, travelling relatively cheaply but in a limited amount of stock that we are being allowed to deploy to carry them.

 

[Purple Train]

Is that true at all times of the day on all days of the week. It would be great for CrossCountry to one day have a capacity upgrade, but is it genuinely busier than it was in 2019 at an overall level?

I don't know, but my perception is that the days when it is much busier outweigh the quieter days considerably.

Either way, it should not be acceptable to force people to sit on the floor/sit in the luggage hold/stand for four hours, even on the busiest mainline service of the day/diagram. It should not be acceptable to have a service terminate 23 minutes late due to delays caused during station dwells by trying to cram loads of people into four carriages. Even with highly seasonal traffic - such as the Great Western, or XC south-west trains - capacity should not be trimmed to the bone so that it is unable to cope with higher loadings.

I don't feel the need to subscribe to a London-is-selfish-and-gets-all-the-cake conspiracy theory (TfL's organisational solipsism excepted), but I can see why people gravitate to it based on my experience at Stockport waiting for this Paignton-Manchester that my friends had endured for hours. In comes an 11-coach Euston train, comfortably soaking up its passengers, off it goes. In comes a Shrewsbury-Manchester service, absolutely rammed to the rafters of a two-coach 75mph Class 150 - the oldest unit class in operation on National Rail once the 507s and 508s go. While this unit is standing at platform 3, 20ish miles away by rail, two of its classmates are calling at Daisy Hill working to the bustling metropolis of Rainford - and, judging by my experience about 45 minutes previously at Salford Crescent, a single 150 could happily work that service then.
I am not saying that running four coaches on Blackburn-Rainford might not be justified at certain times of day - I am not qualified to say - but running two units there and one unit on the Marches mid-weekday-afternoon doesn't strike me as the most efficient use of resources. Nor do I deny that four- or five-coach XC formations may be justified on some routes at some times. But inflexibility helps no one - including the railway. It can't get it right every time - some diagrams will over- or under-cater but a better balance could be sought, and the extremes could be ironed out.

The railway knows the travel patterns emerging after COVID. It needs to adapt to them. It must serve the needs of its passengers and reshape itself for them. It is not the job of the passenger to reshape their life to fit the railway's wants. Unfortunately we are stuck with a DfT that seems to want to ignore the plebs who don't travel by helicopter (except possibly the less-scummy ones who use a nice, big car instead).

Probably because they don't see public transport as a social good like many other countries do, and also because they seem to want to get into quasi culture-wars about green policies and car usage. Although it's odd they've extended £2 bus fares for so long.

We're a more car-centric country culturally, which is unfortunate.

Indeed.
I was speaking with a friend of mine who has recently been to France and she was telling me about how, on a train she was on, there was a system to allow lone children (as young as five) to be checked in and supervised and picked up by other relations at the end of the journey. Imagine that over here...

 

[yorkie]

What the hell have these people been doing the last 2 years when everyone else has gone back to work. This can't all be "working from home"

Don't worry, so long as the work shy south east is used as a justification, the rest of us can all wollow.

I think you're a bit out of touch! Primarily 'work from home jobs' have actually existed for quite some time and were a growing thing before COVID. It's not just people in the south east who do these jobs.

Some people have multiple jobs too, including a mixture of WFH and in-person jobs. I know members of this forum who do three jobs.

Unfortunately for the railways, a big revenue generator of charging £300+ for peak time travel isn't really working any more, and the reasons for this are complex and eventually this would have happened without COVID; the pandemic just accelerates trends which were already there.

 

[telstarbox]

There was also a wave of people taking early retirement just after COVID so that will have dented the commuting population.

 

[JonathanH]

There was also a wave of people taking early retirement just after COVID so that will have dented the commuting population.

Yes, but equally there will have been other people who have needed to start commuting. New workers who have graduated from University could be among those starting to commute to work this September, and indeed starting to work from home.

 

[Snow1964]

Unfortunately for the railways, a big revenue generator of charging £300+ for peak time travel isn't really working any more, and the reasons for this are complex and eventually this would have happened without COVID; the pandemic just accelerates trends which were already there.

I was asking around few weeks ago, and seems companies have restarted physical business meetings, but the difference is the now hold them at regional locations, not London.

One of my neighbours used to travel weekly to London for meetings, now it is fortnightly to Bristol, (and others in his company meet at Manchester, Leeds, etc) with once a month at Birmingham. London has apparently fallen out of fashion as place to hold the meetings.

So his £150 ticket once a week to London, is now £20 to Bristol fortnightly (GWR doesn't offer First class from Wiltshire to Bristol), and drive once a month to Birmingham (because XC is slow and unreliable).

The Railway is still being London centric, it is not responding well to changes, my nearest big station (Bath Spa) has 9 or 10 coach trains to London, and 2, 3 or 4 car trains on my line, and not uncommon to see more waiting to get on the short trains (often having to stand) than get on the long London trains. But do they rebalance the train lengths, not so far.

Just more evidence that the railway is not adapting to new normal, or whatever you want to call it. Lots of trains, but in wrong places and too inflexible.

 

[irish_rail]

I don't know, but my perception is that the days when it is much busier outweigh the quieter days considerably.

Either way, it should not be acceptable to force people to sit on the floor/sit in the luggage hold/stand for four hours, even on the busiest mainline service of the day/diagram. It should not be acceptable to have a service terminate 23 minutes late due to delays caused during station dwells by trying to cram loads of people into four carriages. Even with highly seasonal traffic - such as the Great Western, or XC south-west trains - capacity should not be trimmed to the bone so that it is unable to cope with higher loadings.

I don't feel the need to subscribe to a London-is-selfish-and-gets-all-the-cake conspiracy theory (TfL's organisational solipsism excepted), but I can see why people gravitate to it based on my experience at Stockport waiting for this Paignton-Manchester that my friends had endured for hours. In comes an 11-coach Euston train, comfortably soaking up its passengers, off it goes. In comes a Shrewsbury-Manchester service, absolutely rammed to the rafters of a two-coach 75mph Class 150 - the oldest unit class in operation on National Rail once the 507s and 508s go. While this unit is standing at platform 3, 20ish miles away by rail, two of its classmates are calling at Daisy Hill working to the bustling metropolis of Rainford - and, judging by my experience about 45 minutes previously at Salford Crescent, a single 150 could happily work that service then.
I am not saying that running four coaches on Blackburn-Rainford might not be justified at certain times of day - I am not qualified to say - but running two units there and one unit on the Marches mid-weekday-afternoon doesn't strike me as the most efficient use of resources. Nor do I deny that four- or five-coach XC formations may be justified on some routes at some times. But inflexibility helps no one - including the railway. It can't get it right every time - some diagrams will over- or under-cater but a better balance could be sought, and the extremes could be ironed out.

The railway knows the travel patterns emerging after COVID. It needs to adapt to them. It must serve the needs of its passengers and reshape itself for them. It is not the job of the passenger to reshape their life to fit the railway's wants. Unfortunately we are stuck with a DfT that seems to want to ignore the plebs who don't travel by helicopter (except possibly the less-scummy

I think your example at Stockport is spot on. The imbalance of what services are actually being used and those that are not is now completely skewed to where we where 10 years ago. In my view, it further undermines the need for HS2.

 

[uglymonkey]

I don't know, but my perception is that the days when it is much busier outweigh the quieter days considerably.

Either way, it should not be acceptable to force people to sit on the floor/sit in the luggage hold/stand for four hours, even on the busiest mainline service of the day/diagram. It should not be acceptable to have a service terminate 23 minutes late due to delays caused during station dwells by trying to cram loads of people into four carriages. Even with highly seasonal traffic - such as the Great Western, or XC south-west trains - capacity should not be trimmed to the bone so that it is unable to cope with higher loadings.

I don't feel the need to subscribe to a London-is-selfish-and-gets-all-the-cake conspiracy theory (TfL's organisational solipsism excepted), but I can see why people gravitate to it based on my experience at Stockport waiting for this Paignton-Manchester that my friends had endured for hours. In comes an 11-coach Euston train, comfortably soaking up its passengers, off it goes. In comes a Shrewsbury-Manchester service, absolutely rammed to the rafters of a two-coach 75mph Class 150 - the oldest unit class in operation on National Rail once the 507s and 508s go. While this unit is standing at platform 3, 20ish miles away by rail, two of its classmates are calling at Daisy Hill working to the bustling metropolis of Rainford - and, judging by my experience about 45 minutes previously at Salford Crescent, a single 150 could happily work that service then.
I am not saying that running four coaches on Blackburn-Rainford might not be justified at certain times of day - I am not qualified to say - but running two units there and one unit on the Marches mid-weekday-afternoon doesn't strike me as the most efficient use of resources. Nor do I deny that four- or five-coach XC formations may be justified on some routes at some times. But inflexibility helps no one - including the railway. It can't get it right every time - some diagrams will over- or under-cater but a better balance could be sought, and the extremes could be ironed out.

The railway knows the travel patterns emerging after COVID. It needs to adapt to them. It must serve the needs of its passengers and reshape itself for them. It is not the job of the passenger to reshape their life to fit the railway's wants. Unfortunately we are stuck with a DfT that seems to want to ignore the plebs who don't travel by helicopter (except possibly the less-scummy ones who use a nice, big car instead).

Indeed.
I was speaking with a friend of mine who has recently been to France and she was telling me about how, on a train she was on, there was a system to allow lone children (as young as five) to be checked in and supervised and picked up by other relations at the end of the journey. Imagine that over here...

We used to do that, my Mum once travelled at about 9 from Plymouth to St Albans, "care of the guard". This was just after WW2.

 

[Krokodil]

I think your example at Stockport is spot on. The imbalance of what services are actually being used and those that are not is now completely skewed to where we where 10 years ago. In my view, it further undermines the need for HS2.

I disagree. The case for HS2 is still there because it frees up paths for other services as well as speeding up London trains.

It also covers the Birmingham-Manchester market being discussed, and if built in full drastically speeds up Birmingham-Leeds/Newcastle (totalling 3tph between the two destinations, compared with 1tph now). This would all be operated with 400 seat EMUs rather than Voyagers which may have as few as 200 seats.

If they had any sense they'd connect Curzon St to Bromsgrove and Coventry, with electrification south to Oxford/Bristol to allow XC services to be integrated into the HS2 network. The first five words of that paragraph however show why it won't happen.

 

[Xavi]

HMT are paying that separately from DfT account

Though ministers like to quote it as a cost of the railway. Not the same for National Highways where it’s grants for Capex and Opex.

 

[nw1]

Don't worry, so long as the work shy south east is used as a justification, the rest of us can all wollow.

"Work shy south east" !!??

Sounds like something from the mouth of Lee Anderson!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 28 Aug 2023 ==

Probably because they don't see public transport as a social good like many other countries do, and also because they seem to want to get into quasi culture-wars about green policies and car usage. Although it's odd they've extended £2 bus fares for so long.

Cynically, keeping the cheap single bus fare in some form until next October/June/May (delete as appropriate) might make more people vote Tory.

(Don't get me wrong, I welcome it, but would like it to be offered for longer than the next 12 months or so! In the very unlikely event of a Tory victory, I would expect it to be dropped in an instant post-election).

 

[gazzaa2]

Given the peak trains are fairly busy at the moment while a number of people are on holiday, I've been thinking commuting September/ October times will be packed Tuesday/Wednesday/Thurs as I expect another push from employers to get people back in the offices at least 2 days a week.

Is anyone else noticing trains are pretty busy at the moment

They're always busy, bar odd times such as the middle of the day on a Tuesday during term time.

 

[Horizon22]

Cynically, keeping the cheap single bus fare in some form until next October/June/May (delete as appropriate) might make more people vote Tory.

(Don't get me wrong, I welcome it, but would like it to be offered for longer than the next 12 months or so! In the very unlikely event of a Tory victory, I would expect it to be dropped at an instance post-election).

As a (large) generalisation I’d say that rail users rather than bus users are more likely to be Tory voters demographically and as the Conservatives polling is in decline they need to hold onto their core vote more so. So not having a better plan for a reform of rail fares is somewhat surprising.

 

[JonathanH]

So not having a better plan for a reform of rail fares is somewhat surprising.

Is 'reform of rail fares' a euphemism here for making them cheaper? Reforming rail fares on a neutral basis could easily backfire if they got it wrong.

I note that the flexi-season was a step towards fare reform that some people suggest is one of the reasons people haven't returned to their office in large numbers, but suspect the reality is that people just have to take whatever the offer is.

 

[route101]

Much of Europe seems to be coping with changing travel patterns. Why are the UK government making such a song & dance about it?

I thought the rest of Europe are not as keen on WFH. I could be wrong.

 

[Krokodil]

As a (large) generalisation I’d say that rail users rather than bus users are more likely to be Tory voters demographically and as the Conservatives polling is in decline they need to hold onto their core vote more so.

And those Tory voters who do use buses will mostly have free travel anyway.

So not having a better plan for a reform of rail fares is somewhat surprising.

Nothing surprises me about the current rabble.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 28 Aug 2023 ==

I thought the rest of Europe are not as keen on WFH. I could be wrong.

Or their governments prefer public transport to helicopters.

 

[JamesT]

I thought the rest of Europe are not as keen on WFH. I could be wrong.

Indeed https://www.theguardian.com/comment...rom-home-capital-europe-make-sure-do-it-right

A recent survey showed UK employees work from home for an average of 1.5 days a week, compared with an international average of 0.9 days.

https://think.ing.com/articles/european-public-transport-recovers-but-commuting-has-changed/ is slightly old, but does show some other European countries where public transport usage didn’t immediately bounce back.

 

[wimbledonpete]

My experience living on the Kent Coast with the office in Central London is that pre-Covid I was paying £7k a year for a season ticket. My choice, a trade-off for cheaper property prices. Post-Covid, with a flexible employer, I'm travelling in twice a week, off-peak, paying roughly £2.5k a year. My work still gets done to my employer's satisfaction, sometimes with a wash on, sometimes with a supermarket delivery arriving, sometimes with lunch at one of the local cafes. Why would I go back to the old grind, standing on the platform at 7am five days a week? I appreciate this is just my experience but I can't be alone judging by the amount of people leaving on peak trains (can see the station platform from the house).

 

[387star]

Yes. Hybrid culture is heavily embedded in many work places and is here to stay.

I know of many friends and family who go to the office only several days a week and a not inconsiderable amount who don't really have to go in at all and might do once a month or so.

My other half works from home. She can drink on work nights and can even lie in thanks to flexible working hours.

Personally I'd hate to work from home but I can see it's a big draw for some who in many cases are still getting pay rises without the costs of travelling to work.