MichaelSol wrote:I am sure the misunderstanding is the result of the usual careful attention to detail, but unless he moved recently, Futuremodal lives in the State of Washington, which does, in fact, have heavily urbanized areas
But nothing even close to England, with maybe the exception of downtown Seattle, so the point is moot.
Bert
An "expensive model collector"
Do you think that might have something to do with the differences in culture and politics?
I will admit that I was off the mark with the title of this topic. The franchise system is is certainly not a pure open access deal, but it does have a major element of open access, i.e., the separation of ownership between operating companies and infrastructure companies. I share the view of many, both on and off this forum, that splitting ownership in this manner sets a condition where management of the system will range from difficult to impossible. Appearantly the Tories now recognize that the system they promoted needs some work.
Being in Idaho, FM has little comprehension of life in a place with a population density of the United Kingdom. The UK has an area of about 245,000 square kilometers and a population 60 million. 50 million live in England which is maybe a little more than half the area of the UK. Idaho covers an area of 214,400 square kilometers and has a population of about 1.4 million people. Boise, ID is the states largest city with a population of 190,000. Do you think that might have something to do with the differences in culture and politics?
"We have met the enemy and he is us." Pogo Possum "We have met the anemone... and he is Russ." Bucky Katt "Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future." Niels Bohr, Nobel laureate in physics
Cogland's are consistently on the most negative side of opinions, while others such as owlsroost and Tuylar, et al, have taken a more optimistic view of the privatization. While these perhaps more enlightened guys may or may not agree with my views on the subject,
Actually, Dave, just you have named him that.
Of course, the fact that cogland has worked for EWS, in the industry he is commenting on, lends a certain amount of credence and substance to his words…
You on the other hand…
Have a nice day.
Ed
futuremodal wrote: Murphy Siding wrote: I guess when Dave fixes all our railroad ills. we'll send him over there to fix yours. Don't hold your breath. You have bestowed upon Cogland the title of "He Who Speaks For All Britons Regarding The British Rail Privatization."
Murphy Siding wrote: I guess when Dave fixes all our railroad ills. we'll send him over there to fix yours. Don't hold your breath.
You have bestowed upon Cogland the title of "He Who Speaks For All Britons Regarding The British Rail Privatization."
23 17 46 11
futuremodal wrote: Murphy Siding wrote: I guess when Dave fixes all our railroad ills. we'll send him over there to fix yours. Don't hold your breath. "Slip slidin' away...." You just keep sinking into the depths of the Sea of Sophomoric Smarminess. I remember a time when the guy from SD would willingly engage in conversation rather than ill-educated attacks. Since you are seemingly unaware of this slide into ignorance, I will remind you of something here.... You have bestowed upon Cogland the title of "He Who Speaks For All Britons Regarding The British Rail Privatization." Yet, if you care to go back over your "British Railway Operations" thread, you will find that of all the submissions from our British forum participants regarding the British privatization experience, Cogland's are consistently on the most negative side of opinions, while others such as owlsroost and Tuylar, et al, have taken a more optimistic view of the privatization. While these perhaps more enlightened guys may or may not agree with my views on the subject, we do have one important thing in common regarding British rail privatization - an optimism of how things are working themselves out in the transition from nationalized system to privatized system, especially when it comes to getting freight off roads and onto rails. Have a nice day.
"Slip slidin' away...."
You just keep sinking into the depths of the Sea of Sophomoric Smarminess. I remember a time when the guy from SD would willingly engage in conversation rather than ill-educated attacks. Since you are seemingly unaware of this slide into ignorance, I will remind you of something here....
You have bestowed upon Cogland the title of "He Who Speaks For All Britons Regarding The British Rail Privatization." Yet, if you care to go back over your "British Railway Operations" thread, you will find that of all the submissions from our British forum participants regarding the British privatization experience, Cogland's are consistently on the most negative side of opinions, while others such as owlsroost and Tuylar, et al, have taken a more optimistic view of the privatization. While these perhaps more enlightened guys may or may not agree with my views on the subject, we do have one important thing in common regarding British rail privatization - an optimism of how things are working themselves out in the transition from nationalized system to privatized system, especially when it comes to getting freight off roads and onto rails.
Cogland gets the title of Brit who has seen through your lame facade FM. He's made a lot of good points and set forth support for his position. You, as usual in you transparent bluff have merely set forth your customary "My way or no way" It's still just as lame talking about Great Britian as it is in the States...
Give it a rest...
LC
I can say with all honesty, that I believe I have read each post that you and cogload have written in the roughly year and a half that I've been on this forum. Having never met either one of you, my opinion of each can only be formed by what I have read. Optimism, or pessimism depends a lot on perception. For example, I do not recall you ever saying anything optimistic(or nice for that matter) about BNSF. The point is,cogload appears to have more of a grasp of the situation in his own county-and his field, as a matter of fact, than you do. Perhaps the opposite would be true, if the subject were energy something-or-other in the Pacific Northwest. My perception, is that you appear foolish in this particualar discussion. But, that's just me.(shrugs).
For what it's worth, while cogload certainly has the right to call me an idiot, if he so pleases, he has not found the need to do so. You, on the other hand, have found the need to do so.(shrugs again). As I "slide into ignorance", I've found, that for the most part, it's easier to just pretend you're invisible. It works for me.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
futuremodal wrote: Anyone read the latest TRAINS newswire? There's an item regarding New Zealand's OA operator and a subsequent end to one of NZ's oldest passenger rail operations..... http://www.trains.com/trn/print.aspx?c=a&id=625 Here's the question: How does NZ's system differentiate from Britian's rail system? Is it possible NZ is closer to the theoretical OA model, and that is the reason that passenger services are ending, e.g. here freight is squeezing out passenger? Memo to Murphy: You should start a New Zealand rail operations thread.
Anyone read the latest TRAINS newswire? There's an item regarding New Zealand's OA operator and a subsequent end to one of NZ's oldest passenger rail operations.....
http://www.trains.com/trn/print.aspx?c=a&id=625
Here's the question: How does NZ's system differentiate from Britian's rail system? Is it possible NZ is closer to the theoretical OA model, and that is the reason that passenger services are ending, e.g. here freight is squeezing out passenger?
Memo to Murphy: You should start a New Zealand rail operations thread.
Its said nothing of lack of capacity in the newswire, to me it sounds like they are getting rid of a money losing operation, much like the US railroads did hear before Amtrak. I think that NZ OA model vs Englands OA model has nothing to do with it.
futuremodal wrote: mhurley87f wrote: Dear FM, Cogload's already explained that Motoring Taxes in the UK are not "hypothecated" (back in the days when I was a student, the phrase then in vogue for such was "assigned taxation"), i.e. the Tax Revenue the Govt raises through Motoring Taxes is not handed back to be spent on New Road Schemes, nor maintaining existing roads. Our Motoring Taxes are examplesof "Excise Taxes", which the Government is free to spend/invest on whatever it wishes, e.g. Healthcare, Education, Iraq, the 2012 Olympic Games, etc. Our Road Taxes might seem rather high by US levels, but have to be seen in the context of the whole range of Company and Personal Taxation. Hwyl, Martin Martin, it doesn't matter if the road taxes are disected and a portion directly redistributed to road expenditures, or if all goes into a general fund and are then apportioned to whatever social need arises, the fact remains that the British government collects more from road taxes than are redistributed back for road expenditures. This is key to understanding why it is irrational for anyone to suggest that any private passenger rail service is "profitable" when for all intents and purposes nominal road users are being taxed off the roads and onto mostly subsidized rail lines. Further, with such tax-induced social behaviour programs there is always an unintended consequence of such deliberate market skewing, and one of the facets of consequence is the stated fact by Cogland that there simply just isn't any room on British rails for any significant increases in freight transportation due to it's being saturated by passenger trains. He speaks of the externalities of individual road usage as a salient reason for policies that encourage passenger rail usage, but when there are more trucks/lorries on the roads than would otherwise exist due to this deliberate market skewing, you are getting some unintended externalities that exacerbate rather than alleve the goal of reducing the impact of auto-based externalities. Trucks pollute more than autos. Trucks are more likely to cause traffic jams than autos. Trucks take up more road space than autos. Accidents involving trucks causes geometrically greater damages than auto on auto accidents. Trucks cause more road damage than autos, regardless if they run light or heavy. Etc., etc., etc. Ergo, you are better off substituting rails for highways when it comes to moving freight, even if it means more autos on the roads than are there currently.
mhurley87f wrote: Dear FM, Cogload's already explained that Motoring Taxes in the UK are not "hypothecated" (back in the days when I was a student, the phrase then in vogue for such was "assigned taxation"), i.e. the Tax Revenue the Govt raises through Motoring Taxes is not handed back to be spent on New Road Schemes, nor maintaining existing roads. Our Motoring Taxes are examplesof "Excise Taxes", which the Government is free to spend/invest on whatever it wishes, e.g. Healthcare, Education, Iraq, the 2012 Olympic Games, etc. Our Road Taxes might seem rather high by US levels, but have to be seen in the context of the whole range of Company and Personal Taxation. Hwyl, Martin
Dear FM,
Cogload's already explained that Motoring Taxes in the UK are not "hypothecated" (back in the days when I was a student, the phrase then in vogue for such was "assigned taxation"), i.e. the Tax Revenue the Govt raises through Motoring Taxes is not handed back to be spent on New Road Schemes, nor maintaining existing roads. Our Motoring Taxes are examplesof "Excise Taxes", which the Government is free to spend/invest on whatever it wishes, e.g. Healthcare, Education, Iraq, the 2012 Olympic Games, etc.
Our Road Taxes might seem rather high by US levels, but have to be seen in the context of the whole range of Company and Personal Taxation.
Hwyl,
Martin
Martin, it doesn't matter if the road taxes are disected and a portion directly redistributed to road expenditures, or if all goes into a general fund and are then apportioned to whatever social need arises, the fact remains that the British government collects more from road taxes than are redistributed back for road expenditures. This is key to understanding why it is irrational for anyone to suggest that any private passenger rail service is "profitable" when for all intents and purposes nominal road users are being taxed off the roads and onto mostly subsidized rail lines. Further, with such tax-induced social behaviour programs there is always an unintended consequence of such deliberate market skewing, and one of the facets of consequence is the stated fact by Cogland that there simply just isn't any room on British rails for any significant increases in freight transportation due to it's being saturated by passenger trains. He speaks of the externalities of individual road usage as a salient reason for policies that encourage passenger rail usage, but when there are more trucks/lorries on the roads than would otherwise exist due to this deliberate market skewing, you are getting some unintended externalities that exacerbate rather than alleve the goal of reducing the impact of auto-based externalities.
Trucks pollute more than autos. Trucks are more likely to cause traffic jams than autos. Trucks take up more road space than autos. Accidents involving trucks causes geometrically greater damages than auto on auto accidents. Trucks cause more road damage than autos, regardless if they run light or heavy. Etc., etc., etc. Ergo, you are better off substituting rails for highways when it comes to moving freight, even if it means more autos on the roads than are there currently.
Dave,
Who said "Road Spending is lower than Motoring Taxes" in the UK??
It's a popular mantra chanted by the RAC / AA / Assocn of British Drivers / Daily Mail and other nutters. That may well be the case in some years, but definitely not the case in all years, especially back in the seventies and early eighties when spending on new motorways was used to boost an economy feared to be flagging, and co-incidentally seen as a good vote booster.
Motoring Taxes, like Tobacco and Alcohol Taxes, have always been popular with UK Govts as the cost of collection is very modest in relation to their yields.
My daily round trip to work is 42 miles, and in the great scheme of things, I don't see the price of petrol £0.99 or so per litre (say £4.50 or so per gallon), and I would burn about a gallon a day, as something to get hung up on, seeing as oil is expensive to find, extract, transport, refine, distribute, and any profit has to fund finding the next oilfields.
What I do find unfair is that the price of my tipple at my local Rugby Club is hovering near to £16.00 per gallon - around four times the price of petrol for something as homespun as fermented barley, water, and some hops to add a taste!!
MichaelSol wrote: greyhounds wrote: What FM doesn't get, and the Torries do (I think that's the first time I've ever used that word) ... First time anyone's used it. It's spelled wrong.
greyhounds wrote: What FM doesn't get, and the Torries do (I think that's the first time I've ever used that word) ...
What FM doesn't get, and the Torries do (I think that's the first time I've ever used that word) ...
First time anyone's used it. It's spelled wrong.
Ooooooooooooooooo! That's the best critique you can muster...
Sounds like someone is pounding on the table...
Limitedclear wrote: futuremodal wrote: mudchicken wrote: Context, FM - Context. (new forum, same pedantic snob act; you remain clueless....) Grow up. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! FM, crying like his ol' self, eh MC... But we can't expect an uneducated non-railroader like FM to understand much, can we??? LC WONDERFUL!! Finally a breath of fresh air!!, and nobody has turned this into a "THREAD For...." Nothing like a little fresh vitriol in the morning! Welcome back, Bomb throwers Anonymous
futuremodal wrote: mudchicken wrote: Context, FM - Context. (new forum, same pedantic snob act; you remain clueless....) Grow up.
mudchicken wrote: Context, FM - Context. (new forum, same pedantic snob act; you remain clueless....)
Context, FM - Context. (new forum, same pedantic snob act; you remain clueless....)
Grow up.
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!
FM, crying like his ol' self, eh MC...
But we can't expect an uneducated non-railroader like FM to understand much, can we???
WONDERFUL!! Finally a breath of fresh air!!, and nobody has turned this into a "THREAD For...." Nothing like a little fresh vitriol in the morning! Welcome back, Bomb throwers Anonymous
beaulieu and cogland,
Thanks for the detailed information. I apologize for having to take the devil's advocate way of inducing the necessary responses, but often that is the only way to find out what people really think, not just the pat answers inherent under the ego's conscience control.
Two things I'd like to add - I have in the past made the statement that, although "no current passenger system makes a profit" (not my words but a popular belief put forth by rail advocates), I still believe that a profit making passenger rail operation is possible under one of two scenarios. One is in tour trains, the other is in the ability to get the passengers from their driveway to their destination in a faster, more comfortable, and more convenient (e.g. let 'em take their autos with them, etc.) way than is currently available with driving, taking the bus, or flying. Under these auspices, I reject the notion of taxing people out of their cars to force them to use rail, which seems to be the major reason for such high patronization of European passenger trains. If the driveway to destination factor is met in each of the three subcatagories, you don't have to tax people out of their cars, they will use the rails by choice. Because the Europeans tax their road fuels at a rate higher than that necessary to maintain the road systems, this causes a market skewing that makes it seem as if a rail passenger service might be making a profit, but I will not count such as an example of profitable passenger rail service. Keep your road taxes at the user fee level and no more, and we'll see if your passenger trains actually are profitable.
Secondly, freight can move by rail in short haul corridors if the only alternative to the single railroad is trucks and there is enough freight available at each cycle completion to form a decent minimal consist. It is universal that over the road truck rates will be above the corresponding average rail rate. Just price at a rate below that of the truck rates, and it's yours. The key is to minimize any carload shunting, sticking to mini-unit trains unbroken at either end. Works for aggregates, grains, containers, truck trailers, etc. Yes, this applies only to corridors where there is but one rail service provider, e.g. no intramodal competition. But, that's for another topic...........
futuremodal wrote: Cog, I will venture that if you look at a mirror, you'll see a brick wall staring back. You are dead set in avering that hauling passengers makes money for rail while hauling freight does not. I'm sorry, but this runs against every accepted theory of transportation economics. However, you did let the cat out of the bag by acknowledging that the whole system is subsidized, passsengers included. Question: If hauling passengers by rail makes money, why the subsidy? Question: What type of "subsidy" is used to fund roads and rails? If it is fuel taxes and lorrie fees that pay for roads, then that is not a subsidy, but a user fee. A subsidy occurs when the beneficiary gets an earmark that was collected outside the actions of the said beneficiary. Over here, fuel taxes are around 40 cents at the federal level, and range from 12 cents to 40 cents at the state level, so total fuel taxes are usually no more than 20 to 25% of the market price of the fuel. Over there, it is my understanding that fuel taxes are 100% or more of the market price of fuel. Indeed, fuel taxes are used for generating revenue to your general funds, right? So no matter how you slice it, 100% of your road expenditures come from fuel taxes. Now, stay with me on this. I am assuming that the railroad subsidies also come from the fuel taxes. That's subsidies for both the infrastructure entity and the 25 or so operating companies. So what you guys have done is to tax the nominal road users onto the passenger trains, and in doing so you have ostensibly crowded out the freight users from using rail effectively. So your freight moves by the less efficient mode than that predicated for moving freight in greater than lorrie-load quantities, and your citizenry moves by the less individualized mode that that predicated for individual freedoms, and apparently you have not found a way or a will to fit the one into the other for the economic benefit of your society. So what would happen if you guys decided to end all subsidies for rail, and only tax road fuel for use in the maintenance and development of your road system, like we do here in the States? I think we both know what would happen - more people would opt to drive than to take the train as pump prices more closely reflect the market price of the fuel, and conversely more freight would opt for rail transport even over short haul distances over 300 km as those avenues open up. Why wouldn't that be a good thing? I have a hunch what your reply will be, but still............ BTW - haven't you guys heard of bi-modal lorries? Very low modal transfer costs, well adapted to short haul freight corridors. I would think such technology would have taken off even more so over there than here in the States, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Possibly because you've clogged your raillines with the less than optimal load factor inherent in passenger rail. BTW2 - If real time intramodal competition was deem "unworkable, inefficent, and stupid" according to the Ministry of Running Out of Negative Adjectives For Things We Haven't Even Tried Yet, what do you call the last decade or so of trying to change a nationalized integrated rail system into a privatized overly separated but exclusively franchised rail system? You dogged the system you didn't even try, yet the one you guys did try wasn't exactly proof otherwise, was it? Now you want to go to a privatized integrated rail system, one I bet will continue to drain the fuel tax fund for even more subsidies just so you guys can pay monopoly rail rates. The whole point of open access is to get that intramodal competition, yet you guys seemingly went out of your way just to prevent such intramodal competition, so it wasn't really open access, was it? I guess Jay needs to change the title of the thread to "Trouble in less than open access paradise".
Cog,
I will venture that if you look at a mirror, you'll see a brick wall staring back. You are dead set in avering that hauling passengers makes money for rail while hauling freight does not. I'm sorry, but this runs against every accepted theory of transportation economics. However, you did let the cat out of the bag by acknowledging that the whole system is subsidized, passsengers included.
Question: If hauling passengers by rail makes money, why the subsidy?
Question: What type of "subsidy" is used to fund roads and rails? If it is fuel taxes and lorrie fees that pay for roads, then that is not a subsidy, but a user fee. A subsidy occurs when the beneficiary gets an earmark that was collected outside the actions of the said beneficiary.
Over here, fuel taxes are around 40 cents at the federal level, and range from 12 cents to 40 cents at the state level, so total fuel taxes are usually no more than 20 to 25% of the market price of the fuel. Over there, it is my understanding that fuel taxes are 100% or more of the market price of fuel. Indeed, fuel taxes are used for generating revenue to your general funds, right? So no matter how you slice it, 100% of your road expenditures come from fuel taxes.
Now, stay with me on this. I am assuming that the railroad subsidies also come from the fuel taxes. That's subsidies for both the infrastructure entity and the 25 or so operating companies. So what you guys have done is to tax the nominal road users onto the passenger trains, and in doing so you have ostensibly crowded out the freight users from using rail effectively. So your freight moves by the less efficient mode than that predicated for moving freight in greater than lorrie-load quantities, and your citizenry moves by the less individualized mode that that predicated for individual freedoms, and apparently you have not found a way or a will to fit the one into the other for the economic benefit of your society.
So what would happen if you guys decided to end all subsidies for rail, and only tax road fuel for use in the maintenance and development of your road system, like we do here in the States? I think we both know what would happen - more people would opt to drive than to take the train as pump prices more closely reflect the market price of the fuel, and conversely more freight would opt for rail transport even over short haul distances over 300 km as those avenues open up.
Why wouldn't that be a good thing? I have a hunch what your reply will be, but still............
BTW - haven't you guys heard of bi-modal lorries? Very low modal transfer costs, well adapted to short haul freight corridors. I would think such technology would have taken off even more so over there than here in the States, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Possibly because you've clogged your raillines with the less than optimal load factor inherent in passenger rail.
BTW2 - If real time intramodal competition was deem "unworkable, inefficent, and stupid" according to the Ministry of Running Out of Negative Adjectives For Things We Haven't Even Tried Yet, what do you call the last decade or so of trying to change a nationalized integrated rail system into a privatized overly separated but exclusively franchised rail system? You dogged the system you didn't even try, yet the one you guys did try wasn't exactly proof otherwise, was it? Now you want to go to a privatized integrated rail system, one I bet will continue to drain the fuel tax fund for even more subsidies just so you guys can pay monopoly rail rates.
The whole point of open access is to get that intramodal competition, yet you guys seemingly went out of your way just to prevent such intramodal competition, so it wasn't really open access, was it? I guess Jay needs to change the title of the thread to "Trouble in less than open access paradise".
Slaps forehead many times. Right; for the final time.
1) there are passenger operations which pay PREMIUMs to the Treasury for operating. One is GNER which will pay the govt £1.2bn over 10years, the other is GW which will pay £1.3bn over the same time. If these horrible passenger trains did not make cash then would they be paying premiums? Er no. Also Heathrow Express (15miles, 100MPH very very high fares) also makes cash, thats probabley because there is a very captive market. But hey. And that is a private company and not a franchisee of the govt.
The freight operators which run in this country do make profit; however they are helped by paying basically marginal costs toward infrastructure and various govt grants which acknowledges the societal benefit in getting heavy lorries off the roads. There are bulk hauls WHICH ARE SUBJECT TO INTRAMODAL COMPETITION ON AN OPEN ACCESS BASIS which in the times of BR were subject to super profiteering by the operator. One problem with OA is with competitive bidding for contract, the price of the slot bid for will fall to move the goods in theory if there are a choice of rails - when there is a a monopoly supplier of rails that doesn't quite add up. Therefore regulation.
I do not know what the annual budget for roads is in purely care and maintain or for adding infrastructure. Taxation is, as a general rule not hypothecated in the UK. I pay may VAT on goods, or pay my income taxes part of that maybe allocated to the road network. When I fill my car up with petrol part of that may be allocated to buying tanks. However there are external prices to pay for travelling on the road in terms of time, accidents (appx £500K is spent each time there is a fatality on the road in the Uk - there were 3500 last year), congestion and pollution to name some. If subsidies were ended for the railway system we would be left with very little railway (probabley about 1k if that) - google the Serpell Report if you wish which would result in yes - a lot more people travelling by car. Now why would society find itself willing to pay a price to stop that - possibly because in terms of congestion, pollution and the like. In a small, very very crowded Island which this is there isn't the land available to build 16lane motorways either. So, as a balance there is a degree of "subsidy" toward public transport which recognises this and gives the consumer a choice of travel; which in your hypothetical world would not exist.
A Piggyback trial was run; but for reasons unknown it was cancelled and no more came of it. Perhaps Axle loadings were too heavy for most lines or there was a problem with clearances I do not know. It has been tried and discarded at present but may make a return. And, if we only charged fuel prices to a C/M on the roads for car users; then the same for lorries as well wouldn't the real cost of using a lorry come down? That is the logical extension of your argument. And as the major centres of consumption for a mostly service based economy are within 100 -150 miles of the major ports then the railways would be even more pushed out then they are at present.
Real time intramodal competition is happening. Way back at the beginning of this thread I stated that the idea about bidding for slots on the railway was dismissed not the idea of intramodal competition. The idea for slot bidding to the highes
futuremodal wrote:Question: If hauling passengers by rail makes money, why the subsidy?
Because no commuter operation "makes" money. Cogload is talking about two of the three Intercity services. GNER which operates over the East Coast Mainline makes the most money. Great Western makes a little money. None of the more numerous commuter operations make money. The third Intercity operation would have made money except that the upgrade of the West Coast mainline was botched and instead of being fit for 140 mph, only 125 mph is possible. Because of this, the carrying capacity of the trains is lower and revenue generated is also lower, so West Coast loses money.
Question: What type of "subsidy" is used to fund roads and rails? If it is fuel taxes and lorrie fees that pay for roads, then that is not a subsidy, but a user fee. A subsidy occurs when the beneficiary gets an earmark that was collected outside the actions of the said beneficiary. Over here, fuel taxes are around 40 cents at the federal level, and range from 12 cents to 40 cents at the state level, so total fuel taxes are usually no more than 20 to 25% of the market price of the fuel. Over there, it is my understanding that fuel taxes are 100% or more of the market price of fuel. Indeed, fuel taxes are used for generating revenue to your general funds, right? So no matter how you slice it, 100% of your road expenditures come from fuel taxes.
Of course it is hard to say exactly where any particular money comes from, They have a lot less vehicles and travel a lot less miles (kilometers) than we do on a per capita basis.
No freight would not opt for rail. Do you see any noticeable amount of freight move less than 200 miles by rail in the US, only commodities like Iron Ore and the like. The only positive from the freight perspective would be the highways would be total gridlock. Of course nothing could get from the rail terminal to the factory so there would be no need to ship anything by rail. Speaking of which do you really want to see several thousand more Britons die each year in highway accidents. Not to mention all the additional injuries and the expenses that arrise from that?
Why wouldn't that be a good thing? I have a hunch what your reply will be, but still............ BTW - haven't you guys heard of bi-modal lorries? Very low modal transfer costs, well adapted to short haul freight corridors. I would think such technology would have taken off even more so over there than here in the States, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Possibly because you've clogged your raillines with the less than optimal load factor inherent in passenger rail.
They have tried roadrailers over there already too.
The problem with Intramodal competion for passenger services in Britain is that with that much traffic they can't afford the capacity to allow the trains to run as empty as they would while trying to steal passenger from each other.
kenneo wrote: jeaton wrote: This universe is populated by geniuses and the mere suggestion that any of their ideas is stupid will cause an onslaught of insults that would make a right wing talk show host stand up and salute. And we do have some of those. Of late, however, they have seemed to be reducing the onslaught. Maybe Bergie got to them. When I had the opportunity to have dinner with TRAINS magazine group that was at Gorge Rail 06, I got the distinct impression that they were not to happy with the tone of things in certain discussions by certain folks. The direct remark was made that "they" were keeping tabs on it.
jeaton wrote: This universe is populated by geniuses and the mere suggestion that any of their ideas is stupid will cause an onslaught of insults that would make a right wing talk show host stand up and salute.
This universe is populated by geniuses and the mere suggestion that any of their ideas is stupid will cause an onslaught of insults that would make a right wing talk show host stand up and salute.
And we do have some of those. Of late, however, they have seemed to be reducing the onslaught. Maybe Bergie got to them.
When I had the opportunity to have dinner with TRAINS magazine group that was at Gorge Rail 06, I got the distinct impression that they were not to happy with the tone of things in certain discussions by certain folks. The direct remark was made that "they" were keeping tabs on it.
HA!
Not quite.
Maybe in the future.
chad thomas wrote: kenneo wrote: jeaton wrote: This universe is populated by geniuses and the mere suggestion that any of their ideas is stupid will cause an onslaught of insults that would make a right wing talk show host stand up and salute. And we do have some of those. Of late, however, they have seemed to be reducing the onslaught. Maybe Bergie got to them. When I had the opportunity to have dinner with TRAINS magazine group that was at Gorge Rail 06, I got the distinct impression that they were not to happy with the tone of things in certain discussions by certain folks. The direct remark was made that "they" were keeping tabs on it. I sure hope they don't get kicked off the forum. It would be like the class clown getting sent to the principal's office. The entertainment factor would take a hard hit.
I sure hope they don't get kicked off the forum. It would be like the class clown getting sent to the principal's office. The entertainment factor would take a hard hit.
The entertainment factor would be only one thing that would take a hit. We would also lose the variety of opinion and information that these discussions provide - and that would be a real loss.
I, personally, absolutely hate the invectives that get thrown around sometimes. We can have our discussions - and even severe disagreements - and yet be civil about it. "You" have your ideas and "I" have mine. It's alright with "me" if "you" don't accept "mine", and it should be alright with "you" if "I" don't accept "yours". And if "I" can't handle that, "I'd" better learn how, fast. Discuss all you want. State your "facts" all you want. Keep a "civil keyboard" attached to your e-mail.
This particular thread has given me a really improved understanding of how the railway system operates in GB. Even when some either refuse to understand or simply are not able to understand, the knowledgable responses from others educate us. And that is just one of the purposes of these forums.
You may have noticed that the format I try to use is "Look, I don't understand yada-yada. Here is how I do understand it. Yada yada. Please explain this to me." I have been wrong before, and I will be wrong again. I have been corrected by others on this Forum. I fully expect that to happen - again.
edblysard wrote: Cogload, Kinda makes you want to wash your hands afterward, dosent it?
Cogload,
Kinda makes you want to wash your hands afterward, dosent it?
Oh come on Ed, that's what makes Dave so FUNNY. The way he opens his mouth to change feet.
FM
I notice you make no mention of relative freight rates. You seem to infer that trucking is less costly than using rail to move bulk commodities. With petrol prices that hover around $6 US equivalent, British truckers are paying twice the cost of fuel as US truckers. Meanwhile, much of the British railway network is electrified, so there is another advantage of British rail over US rail networks.
No, much of the British system is NOT electrified. Try again.
What you seem to be missing is that there is a greater cost margin to move a container by truck in Britian than to do the same by truck in the US compared to the respective rail offerings. Those greater differentials represent a larger piece of the pie for revenue sharing with rail service providers than we have in the US. Yet, intermodal is continuing to grow on US railroads, so somehow, in spite of the relative cost disadvantages US railroads have vs over the road truckers, they're still getting the natural shift from road to rail, because the trucking companies will make more money if the ship their trailers and containers by rail than by over the road. The US railroads are getting a share of that savings, and everyone wins.
Possibly because the distances in the US are greater than they are within the United Kingdom? That bit hasn't registered has it obviously. If you count transhipment then there will be a big swing back to the lorry, even with the "greater cost margin". Therefore in many cases it is cheaper by road and within the logisitics industry there are greater margins than shifting your container onto the railway. That is not univeraslly true of course because as you point out there a number of instances where the reverse is true. So say From Southampton to the north of England where the traffic is containers/ swapbodiesn and where EWS and Freightliner offer a service. Say 10 trains per day. Now that route uses 3 main lines which carry rather more passengers and greater revenue than say 25 containers per train = 250 containers And as the majority of the population of England alone lives in the South East and the major container ports are only 50-odd miles away it doesn't really add; although there is one flow from Thamesport from North London.
Yet, your country is so saturated with passenger trains that there is no room for freight, even with the higher profit potential?
Where is the higher profit potential? Where? Bulk Commodities where there is intramodal (i.e. more than one operator) competition had seen rates fall to pretty low levels and as a result they have very small margins. Indeed, a lot of bulk freight projects have govt help in the form of Track Access grants or help to build the requisite infrastructure as otherwise it would go by road. Again the centres of production are few, we import a lot in this country being mainly service based and the centres of consumption are in US terms relatively close together. So there is little scope to make mega bucks. This can be seen in the margins of the railfreight operators and why they haven't all been floated on the stockmarket. And why CN is still trying to sell its share in EWS and no one is buying. Btw the most profitable railway in the Uk is an entirely passenger one which charges very very high fares. Many operators are now paying premiums (in the case of GNER £1.2bn over 10 years) for the right to operate. EWS made a profit of around £50m on a t/over of £500m + if memory serves me. Which one, by definition is more profitable?
Then it all gets back to the choices I layed out for the Europeans - either go back to nationalization and mostly passenger trains, or stick to your guns and force passengers and freight to pay fully allocated costs of providing rail services under privatization with intramodal competition - at full allocation passenger numbers will drop as they shift to road in reaction to fare increases, while freight will have enough margin left over to stick with rails.
The choice which you have so condescendingly layed out has been rejected by the voters so ask yourself why? This aint Hicksville, blah blah where the nearest town is over 1000miles away to spread the gene pool. The entire point is that to avoid congestion in a very urban country which the UK, Belgium, Denmark, Netherland(s) are (to name a few) priority is given to the passenger train. Therefore the social and economic costs involved in congestion such as time allocation, pollution, accidents etc etc etc are recognised in terms of subsidy where applicable paid to the train operators. There is no requirement for passenger train operators to be fully nationalised. In theory they are not in the UK. Like a lot of industries and like the (private) buses central and local government has made a decision on the timetable it wants and contracts an operator to run that timetable in the form of a franchise. Now, under the nationalised BR passenger trains actually made some cash (not all) and freight was mostly dumped (except bulk where super profits were made on some captive flows)because it never made a return. So, no freight will not have enough margin - unless perhaps the freight operators own thier own rails........
It is natural economic law - freight moves better in bulk, passengers move better with individualized choices. But because of your addiction to subsidy and overt control over the citizenry, you seem to have it backwards, with freight moving by road at a larger percentage while passengers move by rail in larger percentages.
Overt control of the citizenry?. You're having a herbal aintyer? I make a choice when travelling to see my family - train, bus or car. All three are subsidised to a degree by the taxpayer. Cars are subsidised because the road space on which I travel is in a sense a free good. If I travel by bus, I catch a local (operated thru CCC by contract by Western Greyhound) to the nearest local major bus station using, yes a free good. And trains are subsidised by the taxpayer. So yes, in that case we are all addicted to subsidy. If the free market ruled, then I would hate to see what condition my local road network would be in; but look on the bright side there will be 25 motorways between London and Birmingham. Are passengers moving by rail in larger percentages a bad thing? Freight is subsidised as well as I have explained ad infinitum, but the penny doesn't seem to be dropping does it?
Now, for some real irony in you POV - if you opt for privatized integrated railways, you will be in a worse fix than you are now. Because without intramodal competition to keep things honest, the naturalized monopolies inherent in integration will disregard the lesser revenue providers in favor of the most optimized revenue producers - and them ain't passengers.
Fail to see the irony. Intergated operations cost less to run that OA operations. FACT. Maybe not in the states; but we are talking about over here aren't we? See above many many times. And incidentally, the franchises are let for a term of years to a set formuale and only a small basket of fares are regulated, and yes to meet those franchise payments the franchisees yes - target the optimized revenue providers. There is a quite legitimate fear that if the railway is reintergrated then some OA freight companies may get a raw deal - however there is a Rail Regulator and a weight of law on thier side.
Freight has the value-added component, people do not. Commerce has a better tax return base than people's incomes.
what is the "value added component" if it isn't economic to transport freigh
futuremodal wrote: beaulieu wrote:FM doesn't have a clue when he suggests slot bidding. The answer is to have enough capacity for both freight and passengers.In the British case I think they need to renationalize passenger services, the networks are broken by the current franchising model. The Swiss system is what needs to be strived for. I do beleive that it is possible to franchise out some passenger services. It does seem to be working in Germany. But the contracts must be sensible, performance must be clearly specified, and their performance must be measured. Letting the franchise bidders propose services without consideration and coordination with the other franchises is ridiculous. I would venture that you don't have a clue about how to go about meeting the demands of having "enough capacity for both freight and passengers" or how to make franchisers responsible for your performance specs. At least you didn't offer any proposed solutions to the inherent ineffeciencies of franchising. How do you propose to make franchisers coordinate with one another? What aspect outside of subjective government regulation would inspire them to optimize performance?
beaulieu wrote:FM doesn't have a clue when he suggests slot bidding. The answer is to have enough capacity for both freight and passengers.In the British case I think they need to renationalize passenger services, the networks are broken by the current franchising model. The Swiss system is what needs to be strived for. I do beleive that it is possible to franchise out some passenger services. It does seem to be working in Germany. But the contracts must be sensible, performance must be clearly specified, and their performance must be measured. Letting the franchise bidders propose services without consideration and coordination with the other franchises is ridiculous.
I would venture that you don't have a clue about how to go about meeting the demands of having "enough capacity for both freight and passengers" or how to make franchisers responsible for your performance specs. At least you didn't offer any proposed solutions to the inherent ineffeciencies of franchising. How do you propose to make franchisers coordinate with one another? What aspect outside of subjective government regulation would inspire them to optimize performance?
The only solution that works is the free market/intramodal competition model. Slot bidding is more inline with that end than either franchising, integrated monopolization, and of course re-nationalization. You don't like pure slot bidding? How about preference based slot bidding? Certain train types are given priority over others - passenger, intermodal, manifest, drags - then slot usage allotment is based on established prioritization. That way you don't have the gravel hauler outbidding the intermodal for that crucial time slot. The point is, there is always a workable solution for integrating a theoretical construct into a real world situation. It's called using your collective brain power.
The problem with slot bidding is that the freight operators will lose out, they have no ability under European conditions to out bid the passenger operators. According to the report produced by the McKinsey Group on behalf or CER, The freight operators will have to cut costs by 30 to 40 percent just to hold on to their current market share. To understand better what is going to happen imagine that the US just allowed Mexican truckers to operate in the US. There is a similar situation in Europe right now. The entry of Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, and the Baltic Republics into the EU means that the much lower paid drivers can operate anywhere in the EU. Further, take for example the Netherlands, they have more miles of barge-navigable waterways than they have route miles of railroads. The railroads have a few things going for them. First they haven't been terribly efficient in the past so they can improve that. Second the government in the old EU are concerned about the effects on the environment and about the uncertainty of future oil supplies, so they are willing to invest , at least to a degree, in assisting the conversion from road to rail. Third the People of Switzerland voted to do what it takes to get the trucks off their highways and the pollution they cause out of their valleys. They have set a high tax on trucks operating in and across Switzerland, and they are using the money to effectively eliminate the Alps as a barrier to North-South railfreight transport.
Again, franchising's only advantage over an integrated monopoly or a government-run train service is that the franchiser can eventually have his contract terminated and awarded to other franchise bidders if the clients are not satisfied with the performance. But there is obviously a time penalty from the moment rail users find out things aren't so grand to the moment the contract is up for renewal, so they just have to wait a spell until that day comes (and that usually involves some significant monetary losses during the wait). Under a model that promotes real time intramodal competition, if you don't like the service of one rail service provider, you can call up another the next day, just like trucking. Under an integrated monopoly or a nationalized rail network, you're just stuck with the bad service indefinitely.
The franchise is a contract that normally provides the franchisor with the right to terminate the agreement if the franchisee fails badly enough. The Brits terminated the contract of Connex, for the Southeastern Network, for not living up to the terms of the contract.
There are, what, four current freight service providers that have franchises with the infrastructure operator? Then the Brits could do something as simple as this: Keep the franchises as they are, but allow any dissatisfied rail shipper of one franchise to solicit service from one of the other freight service providers.
That is how it works in Britain, and in those European countries that are "Open". For freight operators the franchise is a "License". It shows that the company has the necessary skills and knowledge to safely operate trains on a countries rail network. It also shows that they have a bond or insurance coverage for the type of service they intend to provide.
However, although that might provide some intrastate relief, when France finally allows current European rail freight service providers access to their rail network then the Brits are going to have to see if a continental freight service provider should be allowed access onto British rails. Hopefully, having some common freight service providers across all the EU nations will finally come into play, and the benefits of the EU rail directive can finally be met.
cogload wrote: FM It was known in the 1993 Railways Act as the Peterborough Process. It was axed. The idea was that bidders would bid for slots every 8 weeks and the highest bidder would win. The reason why it was axed was because: a) The process would destroy the timetable, reduce the premia payable by the franchisee/ increase the subsidy payable to the franchisee; knacker the concept of interoperable ticketing; push freight further to the margins on the timetable than it already would be (monopoly track supplier + competitive OA freight operators = smaller bids for paths = pushed out of the way by richer passenger operators); be inefficient in terms of capital employed and in terms of demand management (sch 8 and 4 performance) etc etc etc..... You just seem to fail to understand that freight would have no chance of even getting on the bid scale unless it was for freight only lines/ secondary mains. They would be pushed out by the passenger operators every time. You don't understand that freight (which are OA operators and NOT franchisees) and OA passenger run because they only pay MARGINAL COSTS toward the infrastructure owner - there is a hidden subsidy whcih is basically paid by the Franchised operators as a quid pro quo for dominating the timetable; and you also singularly fail to understand that if the freight operators bid on the basis of full slots and paying full cost basis there would be very very few freight operators left in the UK. And Europe. Why? Because it is cheaper by truck thats why. I work in the Railway Industry within the UK and am in the process of a degree covering this subject. Blow off about OA operators in the states if you want, that is your country. Do NOT lecture me over why OA access is so superior to vertically integrated systems in the UK. - Especailly when we have had one sep infrastructure owner go bankrupt; a massive cost explosion from the bad old days of British Rail (an increase of subvention from roughly £1bn to 4.5bn per year) and the OA freight operators struggle to return barely 10% GROSS.
It was known in the 1993 Railways Act as the Peterborough Process. It was axed. The idea was that bidders would bid for slots every 8 weeks and the highest bidder would win.
The reason why it was axed was because:
a) The process would destroy the timetable, reduce the premia payable by the franchisee/ increase the subsidy payable to the franchisee; knacker the concept of interoperable ticketing; push freight further to the margins on the timetable than it already would be (monopoly track supplier + competitive OA freight operators = smaller bids for paths = pushed out of the way by richer passenger operators); be inefficient in terms of capital employed and in terms of demand management (sch 8 and 4 performance) etc etc etc.....
You just seem to fail to understand that freight would have no chance of even getting on the bid scale unless it was for freight only lines/ secondary mains. They would be pushed out by the passenger operators every time. You don't understand that freight (which are OA operators and NOT franchisees) and OA passenger run because they only pay MARGINAL COSTS toward the infrastructure owner - there is a hidden subsidy whcih is basically paid by the Franchised operators as a quid pro quo for dominating the timetable; and you also singularly fail to understand that if the freight operators bid on the basis of full slots and paying full cost basis there would be very very few freight operators left in the UK. And Europe. Why? Because it is cheaper by truck thats why.
I work in the Railway Industry within the UK and am in the process of a degree covering this subject. Blow off about OA operators in the states if you want, that is your country. Do NOT lecture me over why OA access is so superior to vertically integrated systems in the UK. - Especailly when we have had one sep infrastructure owner go bankrupt; a massive cost explosion from the bad old days of British Rail (an increase of subvention from roughly £1bn to 4.5bn per year) and the OA freight operators struggle to return barely 10% GROSS.
There, was that so hard? Now I'll tell you where you're wrong.
I notice you make no mention of relative freight rates. You seem to infer that trucking is less costly than using rail to move bulk commodities. With petrol prices that hover around $6 US equivalent, British truckers are paying twice the cost of fuel as US truckers. Meanwhile, much of the British railway network is electrified, so there is another advantage of British rail over US rail networks. What you seem to be missing is that there is a greater cost margin to move a container by truck in Britian than to do the same by truck in the US compared to the respective rail offerings. Those greater differentials represent a larger piece of the pie for revenue sharing with rail service providers than we have in the US. Yet, intermodal is continuing to grow on US railroads, so somehow, in spite of the relative cost disadvantages US railroads have vs over the road truckers, they're still getting the natural shift from road to rail, because the trucking companies will make more money if the ship their trailers and containers by rail than by over the road. The US railroads are getting a share of that savings, and everyone wins.
Yet, your country is so saturated with passenger trains that there is no room for freight, even with the higher profit potential? Then it all gets back to the choices I layed out for the Europeans - either go back to nationalization and mostly passenger trains, or stick to your guns and force passengers and freight to pay fully allocated costs of providing rail services under privatization with intramodal competition - at full allocation passenger numbers will drop as they shift to road in reaction to fare increases, while freight will have enough margin left over to stick with rails. It is natural economic law - freight moves better in bulk, passengers move better with individualized choices. But because of your addiction to subsidy and overt control over the citizenry, you seem to have it backwards, with freight moving by road at a larger percentage while passengers move by rail in larger percentages.
Now, for some real irony in you POV - if you opt for privatized integrated railways, you will be in a worse fix than you are now. Because without intramodal competition to keep things honest, the naturalized monopolies inherent in integration will disregard the lesser revenue providers in favor of the most optimized revenue producers - and them ain't passengers. Freight has the value-added component, people do not. Commerce has a better tax return base than people's incomes. Without that value-added component, it is impossible for a private railroad to make any money without a subsequent subsidy. So in effect, you're minimizing the aspects that have greater tax revenue potential in favor of the aspects with the more, shall we say, "reluctant" tax revenue potential. We're slowly learning that in the States, and it has an analogous meaning for your situation. If the tax base you use to subsidize the rail service providers is related to user fees, then you're not maximizing that potential if you give preference to passengers over rail. If on the other hand it is from more general tax collections, then the misoptimization has less impact. But you'd still be subsidizing private monopolies (who will still charge higher fares than the nationalized integrated railroad of yore) to keep that passenger preference, and your roads will still be clogged with freight that should be on rails by all normal economic measurements.
How does that make you feel? Not too optimistic now, are we?
Back to the Peterborough process. You seem to be of the mindset that slot bidding negates scheduling, and running a scheduled railroad is paramount for a passenger dominated system. I agree that keeping to a tight schedule is key for running passenger operations. So why not let out the slots via the schedule? It shouldn't be that hard, since it is easier for freight to conform to scheduling than it is for passengers to conform to on-call departure/arrivals. Do your passenger trains even approach max train length in conformity to the track layout? Probably not, most passenger trains don't even come close to maxing out length. So why not bid out the always available slot behind each passenger train and run it as an extra, if not a de facto mixed with the passenger train? You'd be suprised what freight forwarders will conform to to get the goods from Point A to Point B in the most reliable manner and the least amount of cost. All it takes is coordination adjacent to the passenger station at the freight's destination. And freight doesn't have to be boxcars and tanker cars, it can be exclusively trailers and containers. I know, I know, clearances on most lines are not fit for double stacks, let alone TOFC, but those are minor inconvienences. Single stack is still more efficient than one container per lorrie, and lorrie's can still ride low in well type cars, enough so to make clearances.
The point is, there are ways of fitting in the logical opportunities to move freight via intramodal competition, without throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
I am glad to hear you are delving into academia. You will learn something at University that y
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