Simon Reed wrote: The bad part of this is that the authorities have a tendency to be swayed by the financial, rather than social, value of the franchise. The SRA seemed to be a subsiduary of Virgin on a number of occasions, and the regulatory authority of the DfT is so weak that it's taken Civil Law to stop GNER bullying Grand Central.
The bad part of this is that the authorities have a tendency to be swayed by the financial, rather than social, value of the franchise. The SRA seemed to be a subsiduary of Virgin on a number of occasions, and the regulatory authority of the DfT is so weak that it's taken Civil Law to stop GNER bullying Grand Central.
There's some interesting stuff regarding the outcome of the application for a Judicial Review initated by GNER concerning open-access passenger operators on the ECML here - http://home.ezezine.com/759/759-2006.08.21.00.01.archive.html
If you follow the link to official judgement - http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/square/ca14/ALYCIDON%20RAIL/PDF%20files/Judgment___approved___27_July_2006.pdf - some of the comments are quite entertaining - particularly paragraph 89 on page 26 (basically, if the track access charging regime is so favourable towards OA passenger operators, why aren't there more of them ?). The answer of course is that it's financially riskier being an OA operator compared to a franchisee.
There's a bit more background to the GNER situation here - http://www.alycidon.com/ALYCIDON%20RAIL/INFORMED%20SOURCES%20ARCHIVE/INF%20SRCS%202006/Informed%20Sources%2005%202006.htm
Tony
Actually, the London - Birmingham route(s) are a good example of both competing operators on one route and competition between routes.
If we restrict the comparison to standard class 'walk on' fares (no advance booking needed) - the tickets most people buy - then :
Chiltern Railways (Marylebone - Moor Street route, 140 minute journey time) offers 15, 26 and 65 GBP returns.
Silverlink + Central Trains (Euston - New Street, 135 minute journey time with a change at Northampton) offers 21, 23 or 42 GBP returns.
Virgin WC (Euston - New Street, 90 minute journey time) offers 36 or 108 GBP returns (also valid on Chiltern and Silverlink). All the cheaper VWC tickets are advance booking only, from 20 GBP return upwards.
The cheaper tickets of course have more restrictions on which trains they can be used on, and the 36 and 108 GBP returns are any operator/any route tickets - so you could add Paddington - New Street (FGW + Virgin CC, 135 minutes, change at Reading) to the list too !
All of the operators above are franchisees, not open access.
I've not been able to reply before now but Owlsroost has done it very eloquently for me - thanks.
Beaulieu - your point about WCML stopping services illustrates precisely what is good, and bad, about open access passenger service.
A passenger travelling between London Euston and Birmingham (Britain's second biggest city) have the option of travelling with Virgin or Silverlink.
Virgin provide an express service with 140MPH capacity tilting trains. Silverlink provide far less opulent accomodation and probably take nearly twice as long.
I could'nt immediately give you the respective fares but the Virgin train is going to be by far the most expensive option. If, however, you are of restricted financial means you can still make the journey on the Silverlink train.
I fully accept that this is a nod towards the class differentials imposed on the very earliest rail travellers but it provides a semblance of a different type of Open Access - ie the provision of options for the passenger.
beaulieu wrote: Hugh Jampton wrote:A quick nose around the rest of Europe and elsewhere shows privatisation as the root of all evil.Water, Gas, Electricity etc. yes. But Estonia, is the only rail privatization otherwise. Well you could consider the Dutch and Danish freight services privatized.
Hugh Jampton wrote:A quick nose around the rest of Europe and elsewhere shows privatisation as the root of all evil.
futuremodal wrote: An excellent synopsis. But I still don't know your take on the whole "was it the privatization, or was it the quasi-open access" argument as it relates to the problems experienced. Surely they overdid it with the break up into 100+ entities - do we put that one in the "privatization" catagory or the "open access" category?
An excellent synopsis. But I still don't know your take on the whole "was it the privatization, or was it the quasi-open access" argument as it relates to the problems experienced. Surely they overdid it with the break up into 100+ entities - do we put that one in the "privatization" catagory or the "open access" category?
owlsroost wrote: Taking a cue from Simon Reed's contribution, my take on the privatisation/open access situation in the UK is:- 1. Open Access freight is probably the best thing to have happened to rail freight since BR was formed in 1948 - even allowing for economic growth and changing traffic patterns (e.g. power station coal traffic switching to imported coal with longer hauls) it's reversed the relentless decline in rail freight and made it a truly competitive (between operators) business for the first time since 1825. 2. To make open access work, I think you need to separate the infrastructure from the train operators and provide some sort of independant regulator to sort out disputes and keep the playing field fair and level - they got that bit basically right. One thing that seems to have 'matured' since privatisation is the attitudes of operators and Railtrack/Network Rail towards each other when problems happen on a day-to-day basis - they've realised (re-discovered ?) that the railway is a complex system and keeping it running smoothly needs co-operation, not laywers arguing with each other over the fine print in the contracts. 3. The big mistake was setting up Railtrack as a 'virtual' company as far as maintenance was concerned (it was all contracted out), and splintering the ex-BR maintenance function into so many small pieces. All this really achieved was increased costs and a crucial core activity which was far more difficult to control and monitor - and it's taken even more effort/money to put the maintenance function back together under Network Rail. 4. I think open access passenger operations could work here on a larger scale, now that the industry has recovered from the initial 'nuclear explosion' and has (in some cases) re-learnt how to run a railway. The big problem I see is how do you handle socially necessary subsidised services, without the subsidies directly or indirectly contributing to the profits of an open-access operator on the route - the franchise model seems to be the best compromise anyone has come up with so far. One thing to keep in mind is that there is actual competition between operators on some routes e.g. GNER, Virgin and TPE between York and Newcastle (while operators are required to sell and accept operator-agnostic tickets, they are free to sell cheaper operator-specific tickets if they want to, and run more trains than their basic franchise commitment mandates). I think the recent round of franchising changes have been a retrograde step in some cases because they've reduced the competion possibilities e.g. all of the services from Paddington (First Great Western) and Liverpool Street ('one' Railway) are now in the hands of a single operator where before they had different commuter and long-distance operators. 5. I suspect one reason why the politicians didn't want to risk more open access passenger operations at the start is because of earlier experiences when bus operations in most parts of the UK were privatised and de-regulated. It basically went from regulated monopolies through a period of instability (in some cases schedules and routes changing every week, lots of buses on prime routes and very few on others etc - not very useful if that was the only way you had of getting to work etc), then slowly the bigger operators either bought out or forced off the road the smaller ones (by undercutting the fares and/or swamping the route with buses) until we ended up with a different set of regional monopolists - e.g. Stagecoach, First Group and Arriva (sometimes known collectively as the 'bus bandits'). If the bus services in my area are typical, overall they have improved compared to pre-regulation, but things took a long time to settle down and in some cases there is a clear separation between commercial services (basically morning to early evening, mon-sat) and subsidised (run under contract from the local council) services at other times e.g. a different operator. So, overall - I think it's been a successful experiment (but expensive), and I don't think I'd want to go back to BR - that had it's problems too. Comments ? Tony
Taking a cue from Simon Reed's contribution, my take on the privatisation/open access situation in the UK is:-
1. Open Access freight is probably the best thing to have happened to rail freight since BR was formed in 1948 - even allowing for economic growth and changing traffic patterns (e.g. power station coal traffic switching to imported coal with longer hauls) it's reversed the relentless decline in rail freight and made it a truly competitive (between operators) business for the first time since 1825.
2. To make open access work, I think you need to separate the infrastructure from the train operators and provide some sort of independant regulator to sort out disputes and keep the playing field fair and level - they got that bit basically right. One thing that seems to have 'matured' since privatisation is the attitudes of operators and Railtrack/Network Rail towards each other when problems happen on a day-to-day basis - they've realised (re-discovered ?) that the railway is a complex system and keeping it running smoothly needs co-operation, not laywers arguing with each other over the fine print in the contracts.
3. The big mistake was setting up Railtrack as a 'virtual' company as far as maintenance was concerned (it was all contracted out), and splintering the ex-BR maintenance function into so many small pieces. All this really achieved was increased costs and a crucial core activity which was far more difficult to control and monitor - and it's taken even more effort/money to put the maintenance function back together under Network Rail.
4. I think open access passenger operations could work here on a larger scale, now that the industry has recovered from the initial 'nuclear explosion' and has (in some cases) re-learnt how to run a railway. The big problem I see is how do you handle socially necessary subsidised services, without the subsidies directly or indirectly contributing to the profits of an open-access operator on the route - the franchise model seems to be the best compromise anyone has come up with so far. One thing to keep in mind is that there is actual competition between operators on some routes e.g. GNER, Virgin and TPE between York and Newcastle (while operators are required to sell and accept operator-agnostic tickets, they are free to sell cheaper operator-specific tickets if they want to, and run more trains than their basic franchise commitment mandates). I think the recent round of franchising changes have been a retrograde step in some cases because they've reduced the competion possibilities e.g. all of the services from Paddington (First Great Western) and Liverpool Street ('one' Railway) are now in the hands of a single operator where before they had different commuter and long-distance operators.
5. I suspect one reason why the politicians didn't want to risk more open access passenger operations at the start is because of earlier experiences when bus operations in most parts of the UK were privatised and de-regulated. It basically went from regulated monopolies through a period of instability (in some cases schedules and routes changing every week, lots of buses on prime routes and very few on others etc - not very useful if that was the only way you had of getting to work etc), then slowly the bigger operators either bought out or forced off the road the smaller ones (by undercutting the fares and/or swamping the route with buses) until we ended up with a different set of regional monopolists - e.g. Stagecoach, First Group and Arriva (sometimes known collectively as the 'bus bandits'). If the bus services in my area are typical, overall they have improved compared to pre-regulation, but things took a long time to settle down and in some cases there is a clear separation between commercial services (basically morning to early evening, mon-sat) and subsidised (run under contract from the local council) services at other times e.g. a different operator.
So, overall - I think it's been a successful experiment (but expensive), and I don't think I'd want to go back to BR - that had it's problems too.
Comments ?
marcimmeker wrote:By the way, if any of you are in the Netherlands during the weekend of september 1, 2 and 3 come visit the world port days and you can check out the operations at Maasvlakte and elsewhere for yourself. You can even get there by steam train! Or visit a refinery, or a container terminal or... greetings, Marc Immeker http://www.portofrotterdam.com/en/home/ http://www.portofrotterdam.com/en/news/events/events/worldportday.jsp?query=&event_date_month=2006-09-08&event_specification_type=Recreation
By the way, if any of you are in the Netherlands during the weekend of september 1, 2 and 3 come visit the world port days and you can check out the operations at Maasvlakte and elsewhere for yourself. You can even get there by steam train! Or visit a refinery, or a container terminal or...
greetings,
Marc Immeker
http://www.portofrotterdam.com/en/home/
http://www.portofrotterdam.com/en/news/events/events/worldportday.jsp?query=&event_date_month=2006-09-08&event_specification_type=Recreation
nanaimo73 wrote:What is the tidal range for the port at Rotterdam ?
The maximum draught is 22.55 meters. I presume this is at high water.
See the website www.portofrotterdem.com/
marcimmeker wrote:Dave, Some figures on rail operations at Rotterdam Maasvlakte based on a recent article in Railmagazine, a Dutch railfan magazine with lots of prototype info ((De Maasvlakte anno 2006, meeuwen, wind en steeds meer containers,Railmagazine 234 pages 44-49). The operators of the container terminals own the tracks on their property or, if not them, then it is the port of Rotterdam as the owner of the harbor. Furthermore, one of the terminal operators, ECT (Europe Combined Terminals) grants access to its own terminals, not Pro Rail, the owner of the rest of the tracks. So, it decides if a train goes to the ORT (Oostelijke rail terminal or eastern rail terminal) or RTW (rail terminal west). ORT has 4 tracks but none dockside for direct discharge and a runaround. From a ship the container goes to storage, or on a MTS (multi-trailer-system, 5 chassis coupled together and moved by computer, 10 TEU total capacity). Then it goes to ORT or RTW. Usually the MTS's move close together and a train is (un)loaded quickly. RTW has 7 single end tracks.
Dave,
Some figures on rail operations at Rotterdam Maasvlakte based on a recent article in Railmagazine, a Dutch railfan magazine with lots of prototype info ((De Maasvlakte anno 2006, meeuwen, wind en steeds meer containers,Railmagazine 234 pages 44-49).
The operators of the container terminals own the tracks on their property or, if not them, then it is the port of Rotterdam as the owner of the harbor.
Furthermore, one of the terminal operators, ECT (Europe Combined Terminals) grants access to its own terminals, not Pro Rail, the owner of the rest of the tracks. So, it decides if a train goes to the ORT (Oostelijke rail terminal or eastern rail terminal) or RTW (rail terminal west). ORT has 4 tracks but none dockside for direct discharge and a runaround. From a ship the container goes to storage, or on a MTS (multi-trailer-system, 5 chassis coupled together and moved by computer, 10 TEU total capacity). Then it goes to ORT or RTW. Usually the MTS's move close together and a train is (un)loaded quickly. RTW has 7 single end tracks.
The MTSs are not computer controlled, the ACVs are the robots. What Dave doesn't understand is that they looked at direct on dock and rejected the idea as inefficient. The newest idea is called "High Quay" Were the main dock surface is about at the level of the ship's main deck. The idea is to reduce the distance that the container spreader has to move. This is also why they have rejected the idea of direct rail loading, they do not want the spreader having to move that far in traverse.
The original yard Maasvlakte (or MVT) is used exclusively for coal and ore trains these days. On an avarage day 6 ore, 4 coal 23 container and 1 carload trains leave Maasvlakte. 203 trans in a week. Because almost no trains operate during saturdaynight, trainlength tracks are at a premium then. West of MVT is the N15 road and west of that is the new container train yard with 18 tracks, MVTW (or Maasvlakte west, Dutch station names generally are shortened by using the first letter of each syllable). Connecting to this track is ORT (reached via a double track below the N15) and RTW and also a new track going further north to Lyondell Bayer (chemical company), DFDS Tor Line (ferry company). In future this line will reach the new Euro Max terminal The APM (Maersk) terminal is reached by MTS from RTW. Number of containers moved by rail: 1998: 200.000; 2005: 315.000 or an icrease of nearly 60%. It is actually 43% since 2002. Distribution of market share: rail from 10% to 16%, barge 25 % to 35 % and road 65% to 48%. Note: if a train is unloaded but will not be loaded at the same time then it is moved to MVTW for storage. Other customers: Lyondell Bayer: 5-10 tankcars styrene monomeer (english word for that?) and propyleneoxide.
The original yard Maasvlakte (or MVT) is used exclusively for coal and ore trains these days. On an avarage day 6 ore, 4 coal 23 container and 1 carload trains leave Maasvlakte. 203 trans in a week. Because almost no trains operate during saturdaynight, trainlength tracks are at a premium then.
West of MVT is the N15 road and west of that is the new container train yard with 18 tracks, MVTW (or Maasvlakte west, Dutch station names generally are shortened by using the first letter of each syllable). Connecting to this track is ORT (reached via a double track below the N15) and RTW and also a new track going further north to Lyondell Bayer (chemical company), DFDS Tor Line (ferry company). In future this line will reach the new Euro Max terminal The APM (Maersk) terminal is reached by MTS from RTW.
Number of containers moved by rail: 1998: 200.000; 2005: 315.000 or an icrease of nearly 60%. It is actually 43% since 2002.
Distribution of market share: rail from 10% to 16%, barge 25 % to 35 % and road 65% to 48%.
Note: if a train is unloaded but will not be loaded at the same time then it is moved to MVTW for storage.
Other customers:
Lyondell Bayer: 5-10 tankcars styrene monomeer (english word for that?) and propyleneoxide.
its monomer, drop the extra "e" in English
DFDS Torline: one train (Rail4chem) from Brescia Italy with mostly swap bodies. Ferries to Immingham near Hull England (6/week), Oslo Norway (2/week) EMO: the ore and coal transloading company transloads about 33 million tons metric. It has one loader for ore trains which means 6 trains (to Dillingen, Saarland, Germany) a day max and 6 million tons a year. Ore is decreasing but coal increasing (closing of steelworks in Europe and closing of coal mines in Germany). There are 4 coal trains a day or 4 million tons a year. A new loader should increase the number of coal trains. The rest moves by barge on the Rhine. Sources: www.rolandrail.net www.dfds.com www.ect.nl www.emo.nl greetings, Marc Immeker
DFDS Torline: one train (Rail4chem) from Brescia Italy with mostly swap bodies. Ferries to Immingham near Hull England (6/week), Oslo Norway (2/week)
EMO: the ore and coal transloading company transloads about 33 million tons metric. It has one loader for ore trains which means 6 trains (to Dillingen, Saarland, Germany) a day max and 6 million tons a year. Ore is decreasing but coal increasing (closing of steelworks in Europe and closing of coal mines in Germany). There are 4 coal trains a day or 4 million tons a year. A new loader should increase the number of coal trains. The rest moves by barge on the Rhine.
Sources:
www.rolandrail.net
www.dfds.com
www.ect.nl
www.emo.nl
futuremodal wrote: So are you saying you are opposed to the concept of direct ship to rail unloading? That's fine. But if you are insinuating that it's logistically impossible, guess again. This concept has been discussed in recent times in JOC, LT, TW, et al.......
So are you saying you are opposed to the concept of direct ship to rail unloading? That's fine. But if you are insinuating that it's logistically impossible, guess again. This concept has been discussed in recent times in JOC, LT, TW, et al.......
It's not what I think its what the port does that counts. From preliminary diagrams the railterminal for Maasvlakte 2 will be just like Maasvlakte 1 separate from the port terminal.
"Direct discharge from vessel onto railroad car, road vehicle or barge with the purpose of immediate transport from the port area." .....and like all new ideas will probably eventually find a modification that is applicable in practice.
"Direct discharge from vessel onto railroad car, road vehicle or barge with the purpose of immediate transport from the port area."
.....and like all new ideas will probably eventually find a modification that is applicable in practice.
The railroad operators have zero say in the matter, I don't think any were consulted. All decisions were made by the Port of Rotterdam Authority, and the terminal operator, MPA a subsidiary of Maersk Sealand, soon to be just Maersk.
In your example, how long are the 4 dock side tracks? Are they loops or spurs? If each single stack container train is 80 containers max, that's no more than 4,000 ft of train, so if the loop tracks are at least 16,000 ft, you can actually load 8 trains at a time, with two trains sharing each track. And even if you are loading direct from ship to rail, that doesn't preclude standard dockside operations to move around all the containers not bound for immediate outbound rail, e.g. it's not an all or none proposition.
Tracks are dead-end spurs so that electric locomotives can pull out the trains without the cantenary blocking the loading.
trains are only 700 metres, 2300 ft. the maximum allowed in most of Europe, France and Italy are shorter. Couplings could probably take two sets coupled, depending on the loaded weight. I won't preclude the operators eventually going to better couplers but it isn't a panacea, and no operator is likely to have more than one set at the port at one time.
Not sure what your "sulk" comment relates to, but if you think direct container discharge is incompatible as a subject matter for an OA discussion, well it is my belief that direct discharge is one area where competition between rail transporters would spark innovation, and direct discharge is one logical avenue by which a transporter can get a leg up on a competitor.
owlsroost wrote: martin.knoepfel wrote: Two types of bimodal equipment have been tested in Europe: Combitrailer and Road-Railer. AFAIK, neither has been a breakthrough. Perhaps, that is due to the European railroads inability to adopt one technology. Combitrailers and Road-Railers are not compatible. I suspect it has more to do with the specialist (=expensive) equipment compared to using standard container flats(rail)/skeletal semi-trailers(road) carrying swap-bodies (lightweight containers) for the same traffic. The extra terminal equipment to handle containers compared to bimodal only really amounts to a mobile container crane - basically an oversized fork-lift truck - at it's simplest.
martin.knoepfel wrote: Two types of bimodal equipment have been tested in Europe: Combitrailer and Road-Railer. AFAIK, neither has been a breakthrough. Perhaps, that is due to the European railroads inability to adopt one technology. Combitrailers and Road-Railers are not compatible.
Two types of bimodal equipment have been tested in Europe: Combitrailer and Road-Railer. AFAIK, neither has been a breakthrough. Perhaps, that is due to the European railroads inability to adopt one technology. Combitrailers and Road-Railers are not compatible.
I suspect it has more to do with the specialist (=expensive) equipment compared to using standard container flats(rail)/skeletal semi-trailers(road) carrying swap-bodies (lightweight containers) for the same traffic. The extra terminal equipment to handle containers compared to bimodal only really amounts to a mobile container crane - basically an oversized fork-lift truck - at it's simplest.
I am not familiar with the Combitrailer, the links from a web search either don't work or give sparse information. But the RoadRailers are not container haulers but dry vans and reefers, at least in NA, although there was a Chinese version of RoadRailer called ContainerRailer that was tried out a while back. The RailRunner system is simpler and superior to the RoadRailer technology for moving containers in a bi-modal fashion, and could move swapbodies (the European version of US-style domestic containers?) as easily as ISO containers. The biggest advantage of a RailRunner system in Europe is the ability to create an independent dispersion terminal on the cheap outside the constraints of established inland terminals, so a 3rd party OA operator would not have to conform to any potential restrictions of the public inland terminal.
nanaimo73 wrote:John, Thanks for that post. Are there any double stacks at all on the Continent ? Are the wagons all single-well, or are there any 3 and 5 unit wagons like the cars over here ?
John,
Thanks for that post. Are there any double stacks at all on the Continent ? Are the wagons all single-well, or are there any 3 and 5 unit wagons like the cars over here ?
beaulieu wrote: daveklepper wrote:Are not their any ports with tracks on the docks allowing direct to rail movement of containers? It would seem the a ship unloading to a dock filled with flat cars and locomotives to pull one string out and replace with additional empties anbd then to replace it with the loads intended for the ship would be a great way to reduce port time for ships. Is anybody doing this outside of one port in Israel?Let's take a large 6,000 TEU container ship arriving at Rotterdam Maasvlakte terminal. It left Asia with a full load, stopped at Antwerp and unloaded 1000 containers, and loaded 500 empties. Lets say it plans on unloading 2,000 of those containers here at Rotterdam. Of those containers 300 are for various destinations in the Netherlands, 800 for locations in Germany, 200 for Poland, 300, for Austria, 100 for Switzerland, and 300 for Italy. Lightest containers are on top, heaviest on the bottom,some of the Antwerp empties will have to be unloaded then reloaded. The container train can take 80 TEU, and you have 4 tracks holding 4 such trains under the cranes. The 4 trains will serve say 6 inland terminals. What are the odds that the first 320 loaded containers off the ship will fill any of the trains, near zero, and since the trains belong to different companies you can't sort the cars, takes too long anyway, much easier to sort the containers. The ship has to be kept in balance so it must be unloaded evenly, also some containers will have to be unloaded and then reloaded to reach the lower containers remember 3,500 containers are not getting off here, but lightest must be on top, very embarassing if the ship capsizes. The cranes movements are carefully planned, even the pile of containers stacked on the ground must be planned so that they can be reloaded in the right order and of course the opportunity is taken to load some containers while others are being unloaded. So even a large port like this does not load directly to train. They use unmanned robots to haul the containers away from the port cranes to holding piles, which correspond to the correct train load or for the trucking companies. In the case of the trains, they use dedicated road-trains consisting of a special tractor pulling 5 trailers each capable of handling 1 40ft. or 2 20ft. containers to get the containers from the holding area to the rail loading terminal. These run over dedicated roadways to the rail terminal, where two Portal cranes load the trains. The ground storage is also necessary because ships are frequently late, and time for the ship alongside the quay is more precious than loading tracks for the trains.
daveklepper wrote:Are not their any ports with tracks on the docks allowing direct to rail movement of containers? It would seem the a ship unloading to a dock filled with flat cars and locomotives to pull one string out and replace with additional empties anbd then to replace it with the loads intended for the ship would be a great way to reduce port time for ships. Is anybody doing this outside of one port in Israel?
Simon Reed wrote: What needs to be understood is the population density, a consideration sadly lacking from this this thread.
What needs to be understood is the population density, a consideration sadly lacking from this this thread.
I tried to bring it into play, but someone jumped all over me for it.
Bert
An "expensive model collector"
Simon Reed wrote:Beaulieu - It's no good, my friend. I more or less explained this to FM on the BR operations thread several months ago, but still the arguement appears. I've been keeping out of this until now (so has Hugh Jampton, who is very qualified to provide compelling arguments.) Folks - the pivotal point is SCALE. I am an unabashed Socialist. I would have found myself in prison in 50's America but I believe in open access in Europe because IT WORKS. What needs to be understood is the population density, a consideration sadly lacking from this this thread. My postcode (zipcode) is BD2 1EA. Look it up on Google Earth. Now - the closest station to me is Frizinghall - about .75 of a mile away. Have a look, if you would, at all the industries you can see, as well as residential property, within a two mile radius of my home. Britain - and virtually everywhere else in Europe - can provide an intensive and cost effective passenger rail network because of the sheer number of people who turn to mass transportation, either through socio -economic necessity or to avoid the congestion that you can doubtless imagine on the road network. Surely the very best way to serve such a large and willing market is to present them with a choice of transportation providers so that the consumer can make an informed decision. OK, we have'nt got to that stage nationally yet but there is the principle. My local station sees six trains an hour, all day until the dead of night. Market economies say that this MUST be a viable station - who would provide such a frequency for a dead loss.
Beaulieu - It's no good, my friend.
I more or less explained this to FM on the BR operations thread several months ago, but still the arguement appears.
I've been keeping out of this until now (so has Hugh Jampton, who is very qualified to provide compelling arguments.)
Folks - the pivotal point is SCALE.
I am an unabashed Socialist. I would have found myself in prison in 50's America but I believe in open access in Europe because IT WORKS.
What needs to be understood is the population density, a consideration sadly lacking from this this thread. My postcode (zipcode) is BD2 1EA. Look it up on Google Earth.
Now - the closest station to me is Frizinghall - about .75 of a mile away. Have a look, if you would, at all the industries you can see, as well as residential property, within a two mile radius of my home.
Britain - and virtually everywhere else in Europe - can provide an intensive and cost effective passenger rail network because of the sheer number of people who turn to mass transportation, either through socio -economic necessity or to avoid the congestion that you can doubtless imagine on the road network.
Surely the very best way to serve such a large and willing market is to present them with a choice of transportation providers so that the consumer can make an informed decision. OK, we have'nt got to that stage nationally yet but there is the principle.
My local station sees six trains an hour, all day until the dead of night. Market economies say that this MUST be a viable station - who would provide such a frequency for a dead loss.
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