With the latest round of rail maintenance announced, do you feel the leisure traveller is a bit of a hindrance

Question

With the latest round of rail maintenance announced for the Easter holidays, do you feel the leisure traveller is more of a hindrance to the railways than an asset.

I realise that the companys that run the trains are independant from the company that maintains the track, but for the traveller who simply wants to get from A to B over the holidays, what's the point of even thinking of going by rail

Answer 1

The trouble is the railways are still run with a "Train Set" mentality. Paying passengers are a barely tolerated nuisance and life would be so much easier without them

Answer 2

Because of the stupid way that British Rail was broken up for privitisation, we now have a fragmented rail industry.

The Train Operating Companies (those who actually carry you and me) greatly value leisure travellers. In fact, leisure travellers are more valuable than commuters, because commuters add costs in the need for additional rolling stock in the peak which is under-used in the off-peak.

BUT, Network Rail (who maintain the track, and not as well as they ought) has a different viewpoint. Their job of maintenance would be far easier if they were not bothered by trains (and, therefore, passengers). It is clear from the track possession plans of Network Rail (which usually over-run, often seriously) that they have absolutely no concern about the effect on passengers.

What makes it worse is that Network Rail is state-owned, so, in effect, it is the Government who are showing contempt for passengers.

Answer 3

The railways DO value their customers...But you have to remembefr that over the Christmas & Easter Holidays there is at a guess 50% less people traveling than during the rest of the year, and this is the only chance that Major engineering can take place without affecting the public as badly.

The other reason that there is so much engineering taking place over the holidays is because over the last 30 years or so there has been a major lack of investment with the goverment and Railtrack. Now Network Rail are trying to reverse this b y getting the track & station up to the highest possible standards, and once this has been completed we will hopefully have a railway that the rest of the will be enviouse of.

Answer 4

I sometimes get the impression that ANY traveller is a hindrance to the smooth running of the network; it'd all run a lot better without those darned passengers . . .

Answer 5

As a train driver let me assure you lovely people that I get as p****d off  as much as you.

Answer 6

With the emphasis on serving the commuter 1st,Networkrail concentrates on having major work possessions during bank holiday periods when there are less full fare paying customers travelling.

Got to have the railway up and running for the first class business traveller and commuter..thats where the money is.

During large blockades when we had a real railway in BR days we used to run trains even though we had large/long possessions using single line working...we dont now it's all buses on rail replacement services.

Would this be because the bus companies are owned by the train companies as well?

How long before they replace trains on certain routes/services because running a bus is more cost effective?

Answer 7

No the rail industry greatly values the leisure traveller if for no other reason that they bring in a huge amount of revenue, and this is why leisure advance purchase fares and discount railcards are so heavily promoted. The infrastructure of our railways was neglected for many years towards the end of the British Rail era and again under Railtrack from 1996 until

its abolition, so holiday periods are the obvious time to tackle much needed engineering projects that require 3 to 4 day closures of track. However there are many unaffected lines where normal services will operate over Easter. Check at www.nationalrail.co.uk

Answer 8

I can see your point. I have felt equally frustrated by the system as a leisure traveller and as a commuter taking  First Late Western trains, if they arrive at all.

I completely agree that you might want to re-consider taking the train over the holiday period just in case.

Network Rail and rail design consultancies regularly take possessions, not just during the holiday period but during the week and at night, however this sometimes goes unnoticed because in these cases the disruption is minimal. Track possessions vary - sometimes it is only a section of one line, more often than not people are expected to work on the line whilst trains are running. They often need to have a safety team working with them -  a controller of site safety and  strategically positioned lookouts to warn them of an approaching train by waving a flag or sounding a horn. I regularly do surveys of these types. I have fortunately managed to get out of doing overnight surveys (so far) as they seem pretty scary, and forget passengers, they cause disruption to my life!

The type of possession that causes the most disruption is a blockade i.e. all lines are closed between two points A and B. This is the safest way to carry out work on the tracks but the reason for a blockade is not likely to be safety, is more likely to be the practicalities of installing new p-way and equipment. Blockades are scheduled into a maintenance or commissioning programme well in advance and engineers and installation contractors have to work around the clock to complete the work within these set hours as there is no way they can overrun.

Whilst it is annoying, this work has to be done for a reason. Sometimes it is track maintenance, other times it is part of a larger enhancements scheme that will ultimately improve services in the future e.g. constructing new depots so that more trains can be put onto the network, or in the next few years Crossrail.

The engineers who design new infrastructure, or have to do surveys of existing track and equipment, have to go through lots of red tape in order to secure a possession. Blockades aren't granted easily - it's only for work that cannot be carried out in any other way i.e. staging the work around a possessions programme (taking possession of one or two tracks, then a few more), or doing a bit every night for x weeks. It's completely unavoidable and that's why it tends to be scheduled for holiday periods.

The view is, over Christmas and Easter, most people will be at home with their families. Except for the poor people who have to be on site! I suppose what they forget is some people will be trying to get to their families. However, if they can't schedule this work for these short periods, and really put themselves out to do it in that time, when can they do it?

Answer 9

No Passengers and Trains are a Hindrance to Network Rail.  It does not matter who travels, unfortunatley somewhere, somewhen the line has to be fixed and when there is a long gap due to Bank Holidays, when there is less traffic on the rails, less travellers and more chance of access the work has to be done.  It is no good saying we will close the track during the week and open it for the weekend trade, because how many buisnessess are going to suffer as a result??