the sra.. what a bunch of wasters

[johndibben]

MODERATORS NOTE

Concern has been expressed at UKTS Roadshows at the language used on these forums.

The title of this thread has therefore been amendened to remove w***ers and replace it with wasters which I'm sure was what was meant

[markw]

the 50k commuters have been travelling in 50 year old mark 1 trains, that proved their flimsiness at clapham, and have been due for replacement for nearly 20 years now. Voyagers are new, and though they're pretty pants (In terms of fit-for-purpose, at least, I reckon they'd be good on different duties), improving/replacing them is not going to be a top priority whilst there are still mark 1 trains rattling around.

Thanks to the EU, Vertical Integration is now Illegal. What the hell that's about, I do not know, but there's some ridiculous directive that states that VI is forbidden.

Otherwise I agree, The railways have been run on a shoestring for far too long, and the sellotape will only last for so long.

Vertical Integration is NOT illegal. All the EU Open Access directive states is that the operating accounts should be kept and managed seperately from the Infrastructure accounts so that any open access operators can be seen to be charged a fair rate for access and not disadvantaged by the "in-house" operator. Most railways across Europe have set up seperate organisations to comply with this, but for example neither NIR or IE in Ireland have, or are likely to, but comply with the Directive by keeping the accounts seperate. In any case, the Netherlands, which has a semi-detached Infrastructure organisation, doesn't have any of the problems we seem to have with seperate operators and track companies - in fact open access is far moe extensive across there. It's the UK's contractual system at fault and vertical integration is not the answer everyone thinks it is.

I also think the SRA should tie in their strategy more closely with that of Government. The Government wants to reduce car use and increase rail use. Fine. That means that money should be targeted at areas where people can use cars without congestion, and chose to do so, which means outside London and the South East. I can understand why the SE feels it should get the most money, as it is a larger rail market than the whole of North America combined, but given the numbers of people using the network in the South East, and the effective lack of choice, if the rail funding situation wasn't such a mess it ought to be largely self funding - some of the Network SouthEast routes were breaking even before privatisation. Also, is it really strategic thinking to spend millions on upgrading the power supply so trains with less capacity than at present, and fewer services following "reliability" cuts, can consume more electricity? Again, set against Government policy on energy consumption this is contrary to Government policy.

The replacement of Mk1 stock should not be a Government funded issue. The rail operating companies knew about the deadline before privatisation, and the whole point of the privatisation exercise was to remove rolling stock funding from the Treasury and move it to the private sector. The TOCs in the South East have a captive audience paying the highest fares in the world, which is exactly the kind of funding stream Banks love. Replacing stock in the South East should be entirely privately funded given the rules we are playing to in the rail industry. Of course the stock needs replacing, but it should be funded by others, and the SRA money used to really tackle the growth in car use for optional journeys in provincial areas where people, if the rail product is lousy, will just get into their car as the levels of congestion are generally not as bad as they are in the south, where no-one would think of driving to work in London, - or for that matter to shop. That is still not the case even in Birmingham and Manchester where over half the commuters, and nearly three-quarters of leisure journeys are made by car.

Unless the SRA thinks it is not about meeting Government targets, in which case it can do without Government funding.

[crosscountry]

Quite right.
The Southern railway SHOULD be self funding.
The replacement of Mk1 stock is quite necessary but to spend millions on a power upgrade so extra air con carriages can be operated is not a good allocation of cash.
Somebody from the Southern Rail Authority (for whom nothing exists north of Rugby) should spend a few days commuting from Bolton to Manchester...sharing a 2 car 158 or 175 with airport passengers.
Or maybe they should try travelling from Carlisle to Bristol on a Sunday on a 4 car voyager packed with twice as many people as there are seats.
It takes an hour to travel from Brighton to London...not too long to stand.
From Blackpool North to manchester on a packed weekday morning is a longer journey and Carlisle to Bristol...lucky to be sub five hours... but we see a tiny fraction of the money thrown at London to keep commuter fares subsidised.
Of course this is all because some very big companies have made themselves very rich on the maintenance side...but why not...the tories left rail privatisation open to be raped by the fatcats and that is exactly what happened.
It angers me that the North always gets the rough deal on rail when infact this is where the most investment is needed.

[slipdigby]

It takes an hour to travel from Brighton to London...not too long to stand.
From Blackpool North to manchester on a packed weekday morning is a longer journey...

What train do you have in mind? I've been commuting from Blackpool to Manchester for the past 12 months and hardly ever had to stand. On the few occasions I have in a morning, it has never been further than Preston. Plus the entire journey is about an hour and 20 mins

..... and Carlisle to Bristol...lucky to be sub five hours... but we see a tiny fraction of the money thrown at London to keep commuter fares subsidised.........

............It angers me that the North always gets the rough deal on rail when infact this is where the most investment is needed.

To be fair there are 16.7 odd million people in the South East and Greater London situated in a rather small corner of the British landmass. In the combined area of everything north of the Dee and Humber estuaries as far as the Scottish border there are only 13.8 million flat cap wearing whippet racing souls in roughly twice the area. Especially considering the fact that the South East makes a contribution to the national coffers greater than the per capita average it seems only fair that on a regional basis the SE deserves to recieve at least it's fair share of rail money.

Bear in mind that the journey you mention between Manchester and Blackpool, fares only account for 48% of the costs of operating the service. The rest comes from subsidy. This route is one of the most "profitable" in the entire North of England. Food for thought.

I agree with decentralisation and increased emphasis on regional sustainability. However the north continuing to hold it's begging cup out and putting on its hard done by face is never going to sort out the (supposing) increasing gap between the home counties and the rest of the regions.

Just my tuppence
Slip

[n863dwt]

MODERATORS NOTE

Concern has been expressed at UKTS Roadshows at the language used on these forums.

The title of this thread has therefore been amendened to remove w***ers and replace it with wasters which I'm sure was what was meant

sorry to disapoint you but it wasnt what it was meant to be... it pretty self explanitory what it means...

im sorry if its not to everyones liking but its my opinion.

[crosscountry]

Thankfully I rarely have to make the Blackpool to manchester journey...perhaps once a month for industrial tribunals or if I'm heading to the airport (I write for Blackpools daily newspaper) then I know the trains around 7am Poulton to Preston are very busy. Both the airport and Buxton service are heaving by the time you reach Bolton and I think many more are forced into their cars by the prospect of standing.