Which year was the lowest ebb in UK railways

[Uncle Buck]

There seems to be a considerable correlation between “the railway was at a low ebb” and “the country was at a low ebb”.

 

[nw1]

There seems to be a considerable correlation between “the railway was at a low ebb” and “the country was at a low ebb”.

Fair point. The 1991-93 low ebb coincided with the early 90s recession, though the 1985 low ebb was somewhat displaced from the 1981/82 recession. (That said, for some parts of the country most of the 80s appeared to be bleak due to Mrs T's policies, though I think London and the SE was in a relatively reasonable place by 1985).

Likewise I suspect the big improvements we saw in the mid-late 90s were more related to economically better times than to privatisation.

One economic hard time that did not appear to hurt the level of service provided by the railway, however, was the late-00s credit crunch and early 10s Cameronite austerity. I didn't notice any cutbacks in this period compared to the mid-90s to mid-00s norm: certainly in SWT- and Southern-land, it seemed to be business as usual in terms of the service offered. (On the other hand, this was sadly a period of severe retrenchment of rural bus services, as county councils were deprived of funding by central government).

 

[edwin_m]

I'd go for autumn 2000 when the aftermath of Hatfield plus severe flooding made the service pretty much disintegrate, and the defects of privatisation were becoming obvious. In all the other possible nadir years the railway did at least continue to serve the public.

 

[deltic]

I can imagine the railway would have been in a very good place indeed by now, with the only problems being overcrowding, both of passengers and of track.
SWR for example would, I imagine, be frantically trying to implement some way of squeezing still more trains into Waterloo in the peak for example - as I believe the plan was to do before Covid came along. Maybe we would have seen the start of seriously planning Crossrail 2 as a way of diverting the suburbans off the classic lines to free up more paths for additional long-distance services.

COVID only accelerated a trend that been in place for many years. Season ticket sales were declining and Thursday had already come the new Friday in terms of socialising after work. This was a concern in planning Crossrail 2 where it was being recognised that a lot of money was being asked for to solve a crowding problem that was only occurring 3 days a week.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Also agreed

Also agreed - 1981 was a freezing cold winter also , - 13 some nights in East Anglia causing even Freightliner trains berthed for short periods to become frozen to the rails. (neccesiating desperate measures to get them moving) - grim - like 1947 I suppose.

 

[ainsworth74]

Surely the question should be: "Which year was the lowest ebb of UK railways so far"?

Or perhaps I'm just feeling pessimistic for the future at the moment

 

[Pegpilot]

From the perspective of London Underground, definitely 1982. Annual ridership dipped below 500m for the first time as the infrastructure became increasingly decrepit. Shortly thereafter we had Red Ken in charge and he launched the Fares Fair initiative that effectively halved ticket prices. Although FF was short lived (successfully challenged in court by Bromley Council) the associated re-structuring of the fare system (zonal, travelcards, integration with main line ticketing etc) maintained the momentum and within 7 years demand had increased by two thirds to 815m, a level we frankly struggled with. Of course the improving economic situation contributed to this uplift and in recent years so has the JLE. Today's ridership is about 1.2 Bn, so nearly two and a half times greater than the low point.

 

[yorksrob]

But I remain by my assertion that the nadir was the decade from 1955. After the false dawn of the Modernisation Plan nothing seemed to get better or that the system was even capable of improvement. At least by the early 1980s one could see that things could be changed.

I also wonder whether it was also a case of the limitations of motor transport becoming more evident by the early 1980's as well - congestion, the OPEC crisis etc.

 

[nw1]

From the perspective of London Underground, definitely 1982. Annual ridership dipped below 500m for the first time as the infrastructure became increasingly decrepit. Shortly thereafter we had Red Ken in charge and he launched the Fares Fair initiative that effectively halved ticket prices. Although FF was short lived (successfully challenged in court by Bromley Council) the associated re-structuring of the fare system (zonal, travelcards, integration with main line ticketing etc) maintained the momentum and within 7 years demand had increased by two thirds to 815m, a level we frankly struggled with. Of course the improving economic situation contributed to this uplift and in recent years so has the JLE. Today's ridership is about 1.2 Bn, so nearly two and a half times greater than the low point.

Bet people loved Bromley Council for ending cheap fares. If I had lived in some other area of London at the time and had been an adult, I would have been absolutely fuming at them, to put it mildly.

Why should Bromley screw things up for the rest of London, including areas which don't have the affluence that Bromley has?

 

[edwin_m]

Why should Bromley screw things up for the rest of London, including areas which don't have the affluence that Bromley has?

If I recall correctly the stated reason was that Bromley residents paid into the GLC but didn't have any Tube services so wouldn't benefit from the fare cuts.

 

[nw1]

If I recall correctly the stated reason was that Bromley residents paid into the GLC but didn't have any Tube services so wouldn't benefit from the fare cuts.

Perhaps they could have had a referendum on whether they wanted to remain in London or leave, rather than screwing things up for the rest of the city. One suspects, from my understanding of the area's politics, that Leave would have got it... but when they lost their London Bus services and other perks subsequently, they would have regretted their folly

 

[edwin_m]

Perhaps they could have had a referendum on whether they wanted to remain in London or leave, rather than screwing things up for the rest of the city. One suspects, from my understanding of the area's politics, that Leave would have got it... but when they lost their London Bus services and other perks subsequently, they would have regretted their folly

They might have reckoned to join the likes of Watford and Epping, continuing to enjoy London services without paying for them. Although I think at the time the buses started charging much higher fares at the first stop beyond the boundary.

 

[ScottGallagher]

Bet people loved Bromley Council for ending cheap fares. If I had lived in some other area of London at the time and had been an adult, I would have been absolutely fuming at them, to put it mildly.

Why should Bromley screw things up for the rest of London, including areas which don't have the affluence that Bromley has?

Tory Bromley Council taking Labour controlled (Thatcher hated) GLC to court, GLC was on its way out by this point.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

One economic hard time that did not appear to hurt the level of service provided by the railway, however, was the late-00s credit crunch and early 10s Cameronite austerity. I didn't notice any cutbacks in this period compared to the mid-90s to mid-00s norm: certainly in SWT- and Southern-land, it seemed to be business as usual in terms of the service offered. (On the other hand, this was sadly a period of severe retrenchment of rural bus services, as county councils were deprived of funding by central government).

That's because the privatised railway was protected by its multi-year franchise contracts and 5-year NR control periods (NR still notionally being in the private sector).
That meant the government couldn't just turn round and cut 10% or whatever from the railway budgets, like it did in previous recessions.
We are now back in the total government control world, it will be interesting to see how the next recession is handled.
The unions demanding re-nationalisation have no idea how their privatised jobs were protected last time round (and during Covid).

 

[bramling]

Railways albeit with a slight blip during COVID seem to be at their busiest for nearly a century and that’s in spite of some pretty sky high ticket prices.

Things seem to have been steadily improving since around the late 1980s after being in decline for the previous 50 years.

I’m just wondering when people think the low point was - by that I mean a combination of poor quality trains, stations closures exceeding station openings, rationalisation exceeding increasing capacity etc.

Obviously there were the Beeching closures and the continuation of those into the late 60s and early 70s but similarly in the 70s/80s some new stations were starting to be opened and networks like Merseyrail and the Tyne & Wear Metro were being developed - but there were still notable closures and rationalisations like Woodhead, March to Spalding, (London) Broad Street, Tunbridge Wells West etc well in the 1980s.

The upturn seem to correspond with privatisation but likely inspite of rather than necessarily because of.

For me it feels like 1985 was probably the low point but I would be interested in others’ views.

Locally, for me, I would say 2025.

Hatfield for sure was an issue, but things did get sorted and essentially returned to where they were.

By contrast my local rail service has been declining since 2018, and especially since Covid, and now seems to just flapping in the wind rather than any vision for things to get better. The trains are less comfortable than they were, and reliability is the worst I can remember - even post-Hatfield generally the trains turned up at the times advertised.

Also one can add to this that behaviour in public settings is the worst I can ever remember, and (on certain routes) there are issues with certain types of aggravated crime.

So none of this makes rail travel a positive experience nowadays.

 

[The exile]

1982.

Lowest year for passenger numbers.
First full year of reduced services after the 1981 timetable cuts.
First full year after end of collect and deliver parcels.
Impact of decline in UK manufacturing on freight.
Very little new investment.
Strikes over flexible rostering and driver only operation.
Serpell Report.

And a general feeling of malaise - maybe we could do without the railways. (Or at least the ones we were likely to have in the [then] near future). THings are not brilliant now but every moan about high fares / overcrowding is in many ways a positive indication that someone wants the trains to be there and used.

 

[yorksrob]

And a general feeling of malaise - maybe we could do without the railways. (Or at least the ones we were likely to have in the [then] near future). THings are not brilliant now but every moan about high fares / overcrowding is in many ways a positive indication that someone wants the trains to be there and used.

That's a good point. We may have a good moan now and again (myself especially) about the service, but at least there's no current appetite for closures. That truly would be the sign of a new nadir.

 

[quantinghome]

You are both only looking at rail from a passenger perspective. In 1975 the railway was still moving huge amounts of parcels and freight, lots of which disappeared in the early 1980s.

From a freight perspective the railways had been in decline since the end of WW1. I can't see any stats readily available about how much more it declined from 1975 to the 1980s but surely the major damage had already been done?

 

[Royston Vasey]

Perhaps they could have had a referendum on whether they wanted to remain in London or leave, rather than screwing things up for the rest of the city. One suspects, from my understanding of the area's politics, that Leave would have got it... but when they lost their London Bus services and other perks subsequently, they would have regretted their folly

A red London bus with "GLC costs us £350 million pounds a week"

"Vote Broxit!"

 

[philosopher]

I guess the most obvious answer, if we're picking a single year, is surely 2020, but presumably that was a one-off due to Covid and can be discounted?

It's quite hard to be completely objective on this to be honest, as we are bringing our own experience to the table. Having missed Beeching by many years, I have fond memories of the 80s but for someone who came to the railway in the early 50s and grew up with steam and the pre-Beeching network, I can imagine that anything from 1965 onwards would have been disappointing.

In hindsight, 2020 was a temporary blip for the railways as it seems likely the railways will exceed pre Covid passenger numbers. However at the time, it did feel that the railways were facing an existential crisis as working from home and fears of infection on public transport threatened to permanently reduce passenger numbers long term and rekindle a shift towards private transport.

 

[yorksrob]

In hindsight, 2020 was a temporary blip for the railways as it seems likely the railways will exceed pre Covid passenger numbers. However at the time, it did feel that the railways were facing an existential crisis as working from home and fears of infection on public transport threatened to permanently reduce passenger numbers long term and rekindle a shift towards private transport.

Yes, it's interesting. The working from home thing seemed a bit of a threat (still is, considering the amount of times the "unsustainable subsidy" line is trotted out by the PTB).

Personally, I never doubted that the passengers would be back - simply due to being sick of being at home.

It's interesting that at my place of employment, office work has changed immeasurably compared to pre-pandemic. Compared to pre-pandemic where we all used to crowd into the office everyday, nowadays most work from home, most of the time.

Yet passenger numbers have either recovered, or are on the verge of it ! My commuter trains still seem pretty busy as well.

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

And a general feeling of malaise - maybe we could do without the railways. (Or at least the ones we were likely to have in the [then] near future). THings are not brilliant now but every moan about high fares / overcrowding is in many ways a positive indication that someone wants the trains to be there and used.

BR got as far as preparing redundancy notices for drivers and came very close to issuing them - that is how serious it got. Payments to key suppliers were also delayed in order to ease the cash flow. The strike went on for weeks - it was a right old struggle getting to work. I went on a long rail holiday to Scandinavia in the middle of it and had to get a lift to London by car with a friend - Sealink fortunately providing a coach from Victoria to Dover in lieu of the boat train.

The Serpell Report published at the end of '82 provoked such a backlash (skillfully orchestrated by BR Chairman Peter Parker) that, ironically, the investment taps were turned on again with the authorisation of further electrification and new rolling stock.

 

[Magdalia]

From a freight perspective the railways had been in decline since the end of WW1. I can't see any stats readily available about how much more it declined from 1975 to the 1980s but surely the major damage had already been done?

While the decline is still continuing the lowest ebb is yet to be reached. There was one further round of freight losses, in the early 1990s, but outweighed by the growth of imported goods in containers especially at Felixstowe and Southampton.

 

[bramling]

Yes, it's interesting. The working from home thing seemed a bit of a threat (still is, considering the amount of times the "unsustainable subsidy" line is trotted out by the PTB).

Personally, I never doubted that the passengers would be back - simply due to being sick of being at home.

It's interesting that at my place of employment, office work has changed immeasurably compared to pre-pandemic. Compared to pre-pandemic where we all used to crowd into the office everyday, nowadays most work from home, most of the time.

Yet passenger numbers have either recovered, or are on the verge of it ! My commuter trains still seem pretty busy as well.

This isn’t quite the same story everywhere. There’s still a lot of working from home in the Home Counties, no doubt due to the longer commutes in this area. I get the feeling employers are still finding it hard to drag people into work.

In my town there’s still a lot of people working on laptops in cafes, taking work calls whilst goofing around in the gym, or sitting at home becoming alcoholic (in the case of my neighbour).

 

[yorksrob]

This isn’t quite the same story everywhere. There’s still a lot of working from home in the Home Counties, no doubt due to the longer commutes in this area. I get the feeling employers are still finding it hard to drag people into work.

In my town there’s still a lot of people working on laptops in cafes, taking work calls whilst goofing around in the gym, or sitting at home becoming alcoholic (in the case of my neighbour).

I don't think that my colleagues are engaging in such shenanigans !

But as you say, there are still a lot of people working from home who wouldn't have been before the pandemic - yet the passenger numbers are, if not up - still pretty bouyant.

 

[nw1]

I don't think that my colleagues are engaging in such shenanigans !

But as you say, there are still a lot of people working from home who wouldn't have been before the pandemic - yet the passenger numbers are, if not up - still pretty bouyant.

I'm guessing that the people who are working from home more often than not are the same people who have to deal with a longer commute when they do go in - which will presumably be still hurting the railways as they rely on those long commutes to keep the money coming in.

I generally only work from home 1 or 2 days/week but I am lucky to just have a short (bus) commute so the advantage of a change of scene far outweighs the inconvenience of the commute.

 

[yorksrob]

I'm guessing that the people who are working from home more often than not are the same people who have to deal with a longer commute when they do go in - which will presumably be still hurting the railways as they rely on those long commutes to keep the money coming in.

I generally only work from home 1 or 2 days/week but I am lucky to just have a short (bus) commute so the advantage of a change of scene far outweighs the inconvenience of the commute.

From what they say, it fits more easily with family duties - which if they still get the work done seems reasonable (some of them work on evenings and weekends), which I don't have an issue with.

I work in the office five days - but an early Friday morning means an easy launch to the railway network.

 

[bramling]

I'm guessing that the people who are working from home more often than not are the same people who have to deal with a longer commute when they do go in - which will presumably be still hurting the railways as they rely on those long commutes to keep the money coming in.

ISTR it was pointed out on here a while ago that while passenger journeys were rising, revenue had not risen at the same rate, which will no doubt be down to what you say - longer commutes and business journeys not not being made, or being made but via cheaper fares. I presume that still applies to at least some extent.

 

[tbtc]

I'm amazed to see mention of 1991, I thought the Received Wisdom on here was that this was the perfect era? Lots of colorful liveries but without actual privatisation, I thought that was what people on here liked?

I'd agree with the early eighties being the lowest point, pretty much the lowest annual passenger numbers, BR were still closing lines (e.g. Woodhead), the Sprinterisation of the Provincial network had not happened yet (or Pacerisation?), the HSTs had been introduced but that only affected a small number of services, there seemed little light at the end of the tunnel

I can't comment about earlier periods with any memory, however there were still more passenger/freight than the early eighties - it's hard to believe that these years were the lowest point

Yes, nationwide passenger numbers bounced back post-Covid, but the Elizabeth Line is covering a lot of 'problematic' routes - and the lack of predictable Business/ Season Ticket revenue means overall revenue is a problem (whilst costs keep going up)

On any thread about potential demand between two places (e.g. Liverpool to Brighton), there'll be someone pointing out the low passenger numbers between the two... Then someone else will say "ah, but the huge number of split tickets masks that"... Yet when we talk about nationwide passenger numbers, the same people are conveniently happy to gloss over the double counting...

One economic hard time that did not appear to hurt the level of service provided by the railway, however, was the late-00s credit crunch and early 10s Cameronite austerity. I didn't notice any cutbacks in this period compared to the mid-90s to mid-00s norm: certainly in SWT- and Southern-land, it seemed to be business as usual in terms of the service offered. (On the other hand, this was sadly a period of severe retrenchment of rural bus services, as county councils were deprived of funding by central government).

Agreed - I think a lot of people complained A LOT about that decade, showing very little perspective on how bad things were in previous decades

I can criticize Cameron for MANY things but he kept throwing huge sums of public money on heavy rail (and Greater Manchester), even whilst swinging cuts affected most public services

A red London bus with "GLC costs us £350 million pounds a week"

"Vote Broxit!"

 

[Mcr Warrior]

I'd go for autumn 2000 when the aftermath of Hatfield plus severe flooding made the service pretty much disintegrate, and the defects of privatisation were becoming obvious.

Good shout, sir! I'd echo that. Seemed to take forever to get anywhere when making medium distance journeys, this because of all the various speed restrictions imposed across the network.