Passenger numbers vs revenue

[Kite159]

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Impressive stuff.

90-93% of usage, but what sort of percentage of revenue compared to 2019?

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

90-93% of usage, but what sort of percentage of revenue compared to 2019?

Not 90-93% is for sure as season ticket revenue is still down 60% but got to wait till early Oct for next ORR update on revenue.

 

[Kite159]

Not 90-93% is for sure as season ticket revenue is still down 60% but got to wait till early Oct for next ORR update on revenue.

And I dare say number of people on Anytime tickets would have dropped (i.e. business people who don't care about the cost as they will charge it as expenses).

I suspect for some lines, some commuters will be buying advance tickets, at least for the morning direction with an off-peak ticket coming back, rather than an anytime (day) return

 

[Dr Day]

An interesting metric to compare with pre-covid would be passenger miles divided by seat miles, by route. Preferably also by time of day, day of week and direction. I'm not aware of anything like this in the public domain although I'm sure it could be relatively easily derived from data held within various railway industry systems.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

And I dare say number of people on Anytime tickets would have dropped (i.e. business people who don't care about the cost as they will charge it as expenses).

I suspect for some lines, some commuters will be buying advance tickets, at least for the morning direction with an off-peak ticket coming back, rather than an anytime (day) return

For sure but all my railway career we were told how expensive it was to run the high peak so if only the industry can remove those resources and thus cost base the change in travelling pattern ought to be good news. Of course not so easy to remove those resources especially operators with captive rolling stock fleets.

 

[Bald Rick]

And I dare say number of people on Anytime tickets would have dropped (i.e. business people who don't care about the cost as they will charge it as expenses).

I suspect for some lines, some commuters will be buying advance tickets, at least for the morning direction with an off-peak ticket coming back, rather than an anytime (day) return

Anytime is much the same, as a lot of people who were on seasons are now buying these instead. And I doubt many are charging them to expenses!

 

[Kite159]

Anytime is much the same, as a lot of people who were on seasons are now buying these instead. And I doubt many are charging them to expenses!

Some routes, especially those which don't have PM restrictions (i.e. from Waterloo) I suspect some will be on anytime singles to get to work in the morning (assuming they can't get cheaper advance singles) then buying an off-peak single (with maybe even a Network railcard discount) for the way home, as that can work out cheaper than an Anytime day return.

Or even changing the hours they are in the office from 9-5 to 11-7 to benefit from off-peak fares, assuming their office allows flexi time

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Or even changing the hours they are in the office from 9-5 to 11-7 to benefit from off-peak fares, assuming their office allows flexi time

plenty are doing that at my local station but biggest indicator is how much the station car park is chocka mid week but half full Monday/Fridays. Im curious whether they still buy daily car park tickets or have gone back to a car park season ticket

 

[Jimini]

To resonate with the last few posts -- that's certainly my experience when talking to colleagues and friends. Three clear alternatives are very much in play:

1) Advance single in the peak, then (sometimes railcard discounted) off-peak tickets home again, or even slower and cheaper options (think LNR vs. Avanti, for example).

2) Flexi hours deployed, so simply buying an off-peak return for their travels and starting / finishing later.

3) Weekly season tickets purchased, but spread over a two week period for part-time attendance at offices in town (think Thu and Fri, then Mon and Wed for example). There's a ~50% reduction in revenue, right there. And I know a lot of people doing this.

 

[Stephen42]

The numbers are linked here: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/transport-use-during-the-coronavirus-covid-19-pandemic

It may be me, but taking the 21 June 2022 for example, they say that passenger numbers were 78% of pre-pandemic levels. That was an RMT strike day. Is that a serious possibility? They have the Underground at 4% which seems to me more likely given that was also on strike.

Am also curious about this, both for that date and how useful the figures are in general. The methodology note hasn't been updated for some time (despite showing as updated whenever the data is) so it may have changed since, but the data quality for the National Rail section has some big caveats including seemingly based on when tickets are sold than used:

Whilst fit for purpose for monitoring overall change in usage trends, there are a number of quality issues with the LENNON journey data when using it for this purpose that should be borne in mind. These are mitigated to some extent by reporting the 2020 data as a percentage of 2019 rather than reporting journey numbers themselves:

• Data delay: The latest daily data covers ticket sales received up to the previous day, and generally includes 75–90% of the eventual sales receipts that will be included for that day. Whilst the most recent week of data is adjusted in the published series based on an assessment of recent levels of missing data, updates may subsequently be made to previous days’ data from the start of each month. After 7 days the data is about 95% complete for a given date. Therefore, we recommend looking at trends rather than interpreting the exact figures.
• Journeys using annual season tickets are allocated an uplift of around 480 journeys (the estimated use over the course of the ticket’s validity, i.e. 240 return journeys) while a weekly ticket’s weighting is 10 journeys (5 return journeys). This could be an over or underestimate of usage, especially in the current climate
• Journeys in LENNON are estimated based on the date of ticket sale, rather than the date of intended travel. This includes journeys made with season tickets, which would all be recorded as being made on the date of the ticket purchase. There is therefore a risk of overestimating the number of journeys for season tickets and advanced tickets on a given day (and conversely underestimating them at other times)
• LENNON does not cover some Passenger Transport Executives, local government bodies responsible for public transport in their areas
• LENNON daily passenger journey estimates and ticket sales are sensitive to occasional lump sum adjustments. For example, TfL issue zonal season tickets which allow travel on National Rail. Earnings from these journeys are passed between TfL and train operating companies via LENNON. When these earnings are reported and dropped into LENNON, this could look like a considerable change in journeys or sales on a given day. Again, this supports looking at rolling weekly totals and comparing to the equivalent week in 2019

By contrast the TfL numbers are calculated based on entry/exit and bus taps which may explain the difference on that day.

 

[modernrail]

It doesn’t seem unreasonable to see a world where there is reduced peak demand at peak prices but equally no need for peak capacity and more people more spread out justifying a good steady state all day timetable.

Maybe that could lead to a world where pricing is more even through the day. If it does, the morning peak will be busy enough again and the rest of the day will be plenty busy too.

The question is how quickly the railway can adjust to this and get rid of all the really off putting stuff like awful reliability and strikes and overcrowding because stock is not in the right place doing the right job.

It could be great. The end of seats being rammed in to maximise peak seating, space for luggage, seats lined up with windows!

Any asset manager would surely tell you they could only dream of being able to take something that bad so much pressure at two short periods of the day and spread it over the whole day.

 

[dctraindriver]

It’s great to see the numbers back, but as some say on here, how much is revenue down compared to 2020?

 

[yorksrob]

So, car parks are full Tuesday - Wednesday, but nowhere near Mondays and Fridays.

Perhaps the simplist reform would be to remove all peak restrictions ...... from Mondays and Fridays. The benefits would be twofold:

- They would encourage leisure travel on these days amongst those working a shorter week.
- They would encourage some commuters to switch to Mondays and Fridays, helping to spread demand across the working week.

 

[Bald Rick]

So, car parks are full Tuesday - Wednesday, but nowhere near Mondays and Fridays.

Perhaps the simplist reform would be to remove all peak restrictions ...... from Mondays and Fridays. The benefits would be twofold:

- They would encourage leisure travel on these days amongst those working a shorter week.
- They would encourage some commuters to switch to Mondays and Fridays, helping to spread demand across the working week.

The busiest day on the railway is Friday. The car parks may not be full, but the trains are the fullest (outside the morning peak). Mondays are not very far behind.

i have no doubt that removing peak restrictions on Mondays and Fridays for commuter routes would be very, very detrimental to revenue, and would not be offset by increased leisure travel. I’m not aware of many leisure travellers who want to travel between Chelmsford and London at 0700 on a Monday.

 

[yorksrob]

The busiest day on the railway is Friday. The car parks may not be full, but the trains are the fullest (outside the morning peak). Mondays are not very far behind.

i have no doubt that removing peak restrictions on Mondays and Fridays for commuter routes would be very, very detrimental to revenue, and would not be offset by increased leisure travel. I’m not aware of many leisure travellers who want to travel between Chelmsford and London at 0700 on a Monday.

But that's the point if you're saying that trains are at their fullest outside the morning peak as those passengers won't be paying peak fares anyway !

As for mondays being far behind, they've got to be the quetest day of the week by a long chalk.

People might not want to travel between Chelmsford and London at 7:00 in the morning on Monday for leisure, but they might want a day out at the seaside or in the Lakes for example. These sorts of journeys are all caught up with onerous peak restrictions in the week, just as much as your London commuter example.

 

[Kite159]

plenty are doing that at my local station but biggest indicator is how much the station car park is chocka mid week but half full Monday/Fridays. Im curious whether they still buy daily car park tickets or have gone back to a car park season ticket

Or in the case of Grateley parking on the side of the road just outside the controlled parking zone to avoid paying.

Guess it will depend on the price saving a weekly car park season ticket has over 4/5 days.

 

[Bald Rick]

As for mondays being far behind, they've got to be the quetest day of the week by a long chalk.

Sunday is the quietest day, with Saturday close on its heels. Monday is only a few % off the rest of the week.

the point is that Mondays and Fridays still have lots of people on anytime fares. Removing them on Mondays and Fridays will lose a significant amount of revenue (well into 7 figures). That will be impossible to replace with leisure traffic at the time the leisure traffic wants to travel.

 

[yorksrob]

In that case, perhaps they ought to restrict the peak fare to trains entering London before a certain time, since that's where they think most revenue has been lost.

I don't see the point in charging a peak fare for people who might want to take a day trip to Margate.

This is the problem. We seem to be sacrificing all potential future leisure traffic on the altar of the ever-diminishing number of people prepared to pay stupidly overpriced peak fares.

 

[E27007]

It may be me, but taking the 21 June 2022 for example, they say that passenger numbers were 78% of pre-pandemic levels. That was an RMT strike day. Is that a serious possibility? They have the Underground at 4% which seems to me more likely given that was also on strike.

Worth reading the methodology notes, they explain an annual season ticket is deemed to be equivalent to 480 journeys, and a weekly ticket equivalent to 10 journeys, if the 480 journeys are amortised over the 365 day calender year, then I think 2 journeys of season ticket usage would may very well appear in the data table as travel on a strike day, even though the ticketr holder did not even set foot on a train, and may actually claim a refund for the lost day. Similarly for the weekly ticket. That is the only explanation I can think of , the data table methodology fills the table with "ghost" passengers on strike days, from the statisticians quota of 480 journeys it must allocate in full.

 

[Bald Rick]

It may be me, but taking the 21 June 2022 for example, they say that passenger numbers were 78% of pre-pandemic levels. That was an RMT strike day

no, that’s incorrect.

 

[Mikey C]

In that case, perhaps they ought to restrict the peak fare to trains entering London before a certain time, since that's where they think most revenue has been lost.

I don't see the point in charging a peak fare for people who might want to take a day trip to Margate.

This is the problem. We seem to be sacrificing all potential future leisure traffic on the altar of the ever-diminishing number of people prepared to pay stupidly overpriced peak fares.

Agreed, the current system is pretty inflexible in differentiating between London commuters "cramming" into packed trains to get to the office by 9, and leisure travellers going the other way on pretty empty trains.

 

[JonathanH]

Agreed, the current system is pretty inflexible in differentiating between London commuters "cramming" into packed trains to get to the office by 9, and leisure travellers going the other way on pretty empty trains.

It also has to allow for contra flow commuters heading out from London as well. Many of those cram into packed trains as well because until about 8am, the trains haven't arrived in London to go back out again.

There are cheaper fares in many cases for the outbound commute from London beyond a certain distance, but absolutely no one can expect off-peak fares until mid-morning.

 

[yorksrob]

It also has to allow for contra flow commuters heading out from London as well. Many of those cram into packed trains as well because until about 8am, the trains haven't arrived in London to go back out again.

There are cheaper fares in many cases for the outbound commute from London beyond a certain distance, but absolutely no one can expect off-peak fares until mid-morning.

A random look at my old stomping ground in Kent shows a myriad of trains heading out from Charing Cross and Victoria towards Tonbridge and Faversham before 8:00 respectively.

 

[JonathanH]

A random look at my old stomping ground in Kent shows a myriad of trains heading out from Charing Cross and Victoria towards Tonbridge and Faversham before 8:00 respectively.

Indeed, but the full off peak timetable and longer train lengths doesn't happen until close to 8am. At that time there are still commuters to places like Bromley, Orpington and Sevenoaks. As I noted already, the fares from London to places beyond a certain distance are cheaper than in bound fares. Mind you, not everyone is travelling from Central London. To the extent they are crossing London, they would still be with the peak flow.

 

[yorksrob]

Indeed, but the full off peak timetable and longer train lengths doesn't happen until close to 8am. At that time there are still commuters to places like Bromley, Orpington and Sevenoaks. As I noted already, the fares from London to places beyond a certain distance are cheaper than in bound fares. Mind you, not everyone is travelling from Central London. To the extent they are crossing London, they would still be with the peak flow.

Presumably a lot of these will be on the suburban services anyway, so people traveling to the countryside for leisure will have less impact.

 

[L401CJF]

Still see quite a few weekly seasons up my way (North West), but see a lot more Multiflex tickets.

 

[mike57]

Really the problem for the railways is not so much will commuting ever return to the pre covid level, it won't, the WFH genie is well and truly out of the bottle, but where will it settle. Everyone has their own theory, mine is that where we are are now is pretty well where it is going to continue. Companies are finding it difficult to get people to spend potentially 100s or even 1000s of pounds and hours to commute into an office to do a job they can do equally well without commuting. The current you must attend the office 2 or 3 days a week is already being eroded, as companies realise that they can save money by reducing office space, and trips to the office become much more to do with face 2 face meetings or hands on work which needs a physical presence. Thats certainly the way my work goes. I negotiated a WFH 100% unless needed physically in place of a rate increase this year, saves me money and time, saves them money, we both come out ahead. I must be one of a growing band.

My view is the railways need to move away from the peak/off peak model, its not going to work. Then a political decision, do you try and squeeze the same revenue out the current usage, or not. One thing the railways need to understand and quickly is that lesiure travellers have more choices both of mode and and even if they undertake the journey in the first place.

I think the next 12 months or so will be critical. what ever the political complexion governments are going to need to have to come to terms with the question 'How do you fund the railways'

 

[yorksrob]

To an extent the answer we should be aiming for is that yes, they still need to find the railways as a loss-leading enabler for the rest of society and the economy to go about its business. That really means getting bums on seats though, rather than having empty trains in the morning because peak fares are too expensive for leisure travelers.

What is the logic behind peak fares anyway ? London Underground is a commuter railway and they don't have them.

In the past they might have been useful to spread travel away from the peak to avoid overcrowding, but now they seem to be causing crowding at other times, just to rinse an ever decreasing contingent of expense account holders.

The peak off-peak model as it stands isn't for for purpose for post COVID times.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

It may be me, but taking the 21 June 2022 for example, they say that passenger numbers were 78% of pre-pandemic levels. That was an RMT strike day. Is that a serious possibility? They have the Underground at 4% which seems to me more likely given that was also on strike.

no, that’s incorrect.

There's an explanation for the figures in reply #190 last night.

 

[class 9]

If office working is dying, why are new office blocks still being built in many cities?