right does anyone know why......?

[n863dwt]

does anyone know why the sra are looking for a new franchise holder to replace scotrail......?

[bjdick]

The SRA are not "after" a new operator per se.

They have launched a competition,open to all,to determine who will be the operator of Scotrail services,after the present franchise expires in April 2004.This also includes the services of the SPT.

This being so,and Scotrail being one of the best run,and punctual of services,the chances of the present operator being retained look pretty high.

However,business being business,and government being government,this now requires one or more competitive tenders being considered,instead of giving the present operator an extension of the the franchise on a plate,so to speak.

[Kevo00]

Surely the present operator have been quite complacent and could well do with some rival proposals to get them thinking. The Turbostars are all very nice, and I'm sure a quater hour service between Glasgow and Edinburgh is very nice.

Now do something for the rest of us, like run longer or more frequent trains.

[bjdick]

What services do you suggest need the longer,more frequent trains?There's only one service south of the border,apart fom the Caledonian Sleepers,and that's mainly for Stranraer ferry services.

The Glasgow area services are run by Scotrail on behalf of the SPT,a public body,that had invested in rolling stock,and track upgrades,on behalf of the public,for many years before privatisation was even thought of.

So much so,that when it was thought of,no private company was willing to pay SPT the market price for this stock and other assets.

Politically too,as Glasgow was,and still is,a Labour stronghold,no Conservative government would contemplate such a monetary cash windfall going to the people of Glasgow,by such a sale.

Even though the railways were nationalised,this scenario of public,municipal owned stock had grown over many years under the SPT.

All this was going to go to court,to be fought for,by the SPT,at the proposed privatisation of the Scottish railways.

However,fearing the inevitable outcome,the government left SPT in charge of their services,as long as a private franchisee ran them on the SPT's behalf,and to their timetables.
The only services that Scotrail run on their own behalf,are the ones outside the Glasgow SPT area.

Being from the Glasgow area,I find this arrangement immensly satisfying.Especially as for £7.50,I can travel on the whole SPT rail network and their connecting buses,underground and ferries too,Clocking upwards of 300 miles on an eventfull day trip.

[Kevo00]

I know that the SPT have done good work in the Glasgow area, but I was talking about the services that Scotrail do run on their own behalf, outside of the Glasgow area.

Up here in the Dundee area the perspective is a little different. While the services are relatively frequent there is little differentation between stopping and express services and track space is wasted by using DMUs on inter-city services. Not only this but the turbostars have no corridor connectors which must make working those trains pretty nightmarish for train staff, that is on the rare occasions when 2 or more units work together.

Otherwise many Scotrail services are badly overcrowded, especially on Saturdays when large amounts of people move around for the football. So longer trains, or if they insist on using DMUs, more frequent trains are nessescary. As for frequency, some stations in quite big settlements such as Invergowrie and Broughty Ferry are almost totally ignored by Scotrail, Broughty Ferry being a big town with substantial potential commuter traffic to Dundee, yet it gets no real service to take account of this - only about 4 trains at day at the most on the present timetable. Others such as Carnoustie get a 2 hourly service. If Scotrail is to offer a decent alternative to the car in Scotland it will have to do better than this as the present service is really quite limited outside of the Glasgow region (although they are improving in the Edinburgh area, and the Fife circle is well served). Perhaps what we need are Forth, Tay and Grampian PTEs to work on a similar agenda to SPT.