Modern Railways – April 2019

7

Railtalk

April 2019 Modern Railways

Recent franchise awards have

seen a pattern emerging. Incoming

franchisees struggle to make money,

while performance deteriorates.

Often, the incomers have signed up

to ambitious rolling stock renewal

plans that will be difficult to realise,

and at the same time train crew

shortages emerge. Greater Anglia

is a topical instance where Abellio

is now challenging the terms of

the franchise agreement. Keith

Williams is right: these are not

indicators of a healthy system.

What is becoming plain is that a

choice is going to have to be made

between lower net subsidy levels,

wholesale renewal of train fleets

and more reliable performance.

Government will have to choose

two from three, since it is unrealistic

to expect to get all three at once.

INCOMPATIBLE PURCHASING

The Department for Transport

stands accused of irresponsible

purchasing. Like the child in the

sweet shop refusing to accept that

too much sugar makes you sick,

the Department has been buying

incompatible things. Franchisees

sign up to ambitious service

improvement plans, only to find

that those plans are incompatible

with those of neighbouring

franchises in terms of track access

and other common resources.

Bidders are not required to provide

performance modelling with their

bids, which is either incompetent

(the Department should know

what the performance implications

are of any more intensive services

proposed) or manipulative (if

performance implodes it was

nothing to do with us, guv).

At the same time there is

incompatibility in the infrastructure

being purchased from Network

Rail by way of the Control Periods

administered by the Office of

Rail and Road, and the service

plans being purchased from train

operators through franchises. The

performance problems engendered

by late-running projects, such as

the Bolton electrification, have

been well-publicised, but still we

are planning for failure. At Northern,

for instance, work will not begin in

earnest on Leeds platform 0 till next

year, and yet service improvements

are planned for introduction

before it has been delivered.

In his report on services in the

north (p32 this month and p18 last

month), Richard George sensibly

advises a level of honesty on this. He

points in particular to the Castlefield

corridor in Manchester, already

struggling and yet where dwell times

look to be even more difficult to

achieve in future when loco-hauled

stock with end doors replaces

multiple-units with mid-car door bays.

Piling more services in will only make

matters worse, and yet the prospects

for extra infrastructure in this corridor

seem more gloomy than ever (p14).

Mr George is of course not alone

in counselling caution; plenty of

work goes on behind the scenes

in pointing out to the Department

the implications of policy decisions.

Sometimes the advice is heeded: for

example, the services endearingly

named by the Southern Electric

Group as ‘Cats and Tats’ (Caterham

and Tattenham Corner) were taken

out of the Thameslink specification

due to worries about throughput at

the junctions north of East Croydon.

But then, seemingly to maintain

the magic 24 trains per hour, was

it sensible to replace them with a

service from north Kent that has to

cross the throat at London Bridge

to reach the Thameslink core, when

one can reach St Pancras from

Rainham on HS1 in half the time that

it takes to get there on Thameslink?

In any case, as time goes on, it

seems less likely that the 24 trains per

hour in the peak that was the original

target of the Thameslink Programme

will ever be achieved. It has become

clear that there are performance

implications of squeezing in more

and more services: the effect on

existing services of new origin and

destination points needs to weigh

more heavily in the balance.

All of which raises the question

of whether the right people are

taking the decisions. The DfT is

notorious for micro-management:

a classic example is the first West

Country train in the morning out

of Paddington. Great Western

sought to switch this from Paignton

to Plymouth, the more obvious

traffic destination. But it took

no fewer than three ministerial

submissions before this minor

change was authorised. Clearly,

people closer to the ground need

greater authority. In the panel

Q and A session at the end of the

Bradshaw lecture, Network Rail

Chief Executive Andrew Haines

identified a disconnect between

responsibility and authority. There

is no point in making people

responsible for things if they don’t

have the authority to put them right.

MOUNTAIN GETTING STEEPER

While there is understandable

concern over present levels of

performance, the truth is that things

are only set to get more difficult.

Much is made of the ‘biggest new

rolling stock programme since the

1960s’, but, as this magazine has

been warning for several years, the

avalanche of new carriages – some

7,000 in the space of a few years – is

now threatening to overwhelm the

technical resources needed to put

them into reliable service. And as

deliveries lag the avalanche grows.

Not only will we have to swim

through the bath tub curve of

reliability, where performance

typically gets worse before it gets

better, we also have to get the

new trains on the rails in the first

place – which, as LNER’s Azumas

have shown, can be far from

straightforward. Is the railway

ready for the new fleets in terms of

the commissioning capability, the

gauging resources, depot stabling

facilities? In even starker terms, is

there the sheer physical space to put

the new fleets while they await entry

into service? Already, Class 717s

earmarked for Moorgate services

have been stabled as far afield as

West Worthing, and the search is on

in locations such as Cambridge and

Ashford for secure siding space.

Not all is doom and gloom

though. Network Rail is accelerating

its devolution policy – a clear

example of decision-making being

handed to people closer to the

action. With implementation of the

Williams review three years away

at least, getting the structure right

is justifiably being prioritised. The

Rail Delivery Group has made a

commendable first stab at sorting

out the fares mess (although

we won’t hold our breath on

Government being bold enough

to sign up to compensating the

losers in any shake-up of the

structure, which will be required if

any real change is to be made).

Meanwhile, we wait for the

Williams Review for advice on

further reform. In his Bradshaw

lecture, Keith Williams made it

plain what he doesn’t like. Now he

has to specify what he does like.

Let us hope that he realises that

trying to solve problems with the

thinking that created them in the

first place is not the answer. a

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