High Speed Rail Services

[O.V.S.Bulleid]

Dear All

I see that BBC Kent are reporting on today's 1st anniversary of the CTRL-DS services with the great press release by GoVex that in its first year it had carried 7.2m passengers.

Let me put this into perspective - that is about 4-5% of GoVex passenger volumes. What they do not say is whether this is just for the section between Ashford/Ebbsfleet to North London or for all journeys including those which are on CTRL-DS trains but not on the CTRL itself.

In comparison classic services via Chatham carry about 12% of their passengers, those via Headcorn about 10% and via Maidstone East just under 5%.

Put into perspective the classic "Kent Coast" services, together, account for about eight times the number of passengers compared to the CTRL carryings - yet everyone is being taxed for the CTRL-DS rolling stock construction - including the seven not actually scheduled to be used - because the Department for Transport not only specified a poor service but also failed in their market research.

Now to add insults GoVex say that the two trains that daily crawl through Deal station each day in each direction cannot stop there to pick up passengers unless somebody pays them more money as it doesn't form part of their contract with the Department of Transport. This does not seem to me to be the words of a business that is looking to increase its profits but one that knows that it has failed and simply sits behind its contract. This company should not be allowed to operate beyond 2012 when its ability to operate for its passengers rather than its shareholders should be assessed as failed.

Yours sincerely
O.V.S.Bulleid

[Mike from Melbourne]

As a native of Ramsgate, regular visitor to my home town & regular user of Southeastern services while visiting I do enjoy reading the contributions to this forum.

I was fascinated by Mr Horton's reasoning for High Speed trains not serving Deal even though they pass through empty travelling to & from Ramsgate Depot, namely that Southeastern wouldn't make make a profit out of doing so. This seems to me to be a classic example of what is wrong with the current day railway, the philosophy that making money is more important than that of providing a service.

Surely the whole point of the passenger railway is to provide public transport at an affordable price, not just to gouge the passengers for as much as possible? I always get the impression with Southeatern that they do the absolute minimum required in their franchise agreement & not 1% more.

As I understand both Southern & Southeastern are owned by the same parent company, GoVex, but the impression I get is that Southern are a much more innovative & progressive operator. Is that fair comment or do Southern have a better deal with their franchise than Southeastern?

[genehuntisking]

Dec 14, 2010 6:05:46 GMT @Mike from Melbourne said:

I was fascinated by Mr Horton's reasoning for High Speed trains not serving Deal even though they pass through empty travelling to & from Ramsgate Depot, namely that Southeastern wouldn't make make a profit out of doing so. This seems to me to be a classic example of what is wrong with the current day railway, the philosophy that making money is more important than that of providing a service.

Surely the whole point of the passenger railway is to provide public transport at an affordable price, not just to gouge the passengers for as much as possible? I always get the impression with Southeatern that they do the absolute minimum required in their franchise agreement & not 1% more.

As I understand both Southern & Southeastern are owned by the same parent company, GoVex, but the impression I get is that Southern are a much more innovative & progressive operator. Is that fair comment or do Southern have a better deal with their franchise than Southeastern?

The point of railway privatisation was for companys to come in and make money, and thus take it off The Treasurys books. But it hasn't turned out like that, as there really wasn't that much money to be made. Despite a lot of the media saying how inefficent BR was, it was actually fairly slimmed down at the time of provatisation.

I don't think Southern are any better or worse particularly, they are just doing what was in their franchise bid too. The whole way the DfT has operated over recent years is to micro manage the TOC franchises, and tell them exactly what they will and won't run.

Its not a case of South Eastern don't want to do it, so much as its not in their franchise, so they view they have no reason to do it. If the franchise is amended, the service may be amended. That is the way of the privatised railway. The franchisees are purely there to run the DfTs franchise as specified.

My personal opinion (for what its worth) is that when the extra 395 units were freed up last April with the Broadstairs - St Pancras services being reduced from 12 to 6 coaches, the three "spare units" should have been utalised to run the existing Dover services through to Ramsgate all day. Don't forget the orignal spec was only to go to Folkestone and 28 units to be built.

Although some of the Dover trains run ECS through Deal in the peaks, it is not a case of "merely stopping them", as they have no On Board Manager. The trains come empty from Ashford via Canterbury West, but the On Board Managers are based at Dover, Ramsgate and Faversham. Whether this is right or not is another matter, but thats how it is at the moment.

Of course with the driver doing all the despatch arrangements, there is theoretically no reason they can't run in passenger service DOO. But suggest that and watch Bob Crowe leap in the air and bang on about "compromising safety".

The Gene Genie

[O.V.S.Bulleid]

Good Morning Gene

I tend to go along with you with regard to GoVex and their two franchises. I suppose that originally both services were reasonably well operated by their respective teams, largely based on traditional lines of route and format of timetables. As time has gone on neither franchise has really kept its public with it.

In the case of Southeastern it is around the worst timetable ever produced for Kent and Medway (including pre World War II when considering residential distribution). In the case of Southern the services to coastal towns have suffered from an increase in stops and wasted time in division of trains at Haywards Heath and Horsham. Now there are proposals to remove toilets on coastal services where the journey times are well over an hour (so one can imagine Southeastern looking at that as a way to increase seating on peak hour services - perhaps testing the theory by virtue of the number of units running around without working toilets at the moment.

Having said all of that I'm actually not sure that the Demon is Southeastern but the Department for Transport who specified the services but have yet to prove that their analysis of passenger need was anything approaching accurate - hence so many unused 395s sitting in sidings, the number of off-peak trains that stop at Longfield and Meopham with the odd one or two passengers using them and pushing of a relatively high proportion of passengers now forced to go via North London onto already overcrowded tube trains.

A far better arbiter of service specification would be Kent County Council - if they could consult properly - the Rail Summits were a joke of organisation and objectivity (but highly political). If it is good enough for London to specify service levels and fare levels then it is good enough for the county.

This then comes back to the basis on which franchises should be awarded. The coalition's ambition to award longer franchises will simply open the door to even higher fares as the goal of profitability becomes more easily achievable by those in the business unless there is real competition - and that is unlikely in commuting areas where it has a captured audience. Much better would be the implementation of a process very similar to London buses where the local authority specifies the deliverables and businesses bid for operational management contracts where they have no access to fares policy but do have quality assurance issues to maintain. When it comes to the CTRL then it is really just another mainline service in the same way as Virgin, NatEx and First on longer distances. When looking at the proportion of passengers that they carry then it is about 8% of the national total - not a million miles away from the CTRL service proportion of Kent's travel needs.

Yes we should have a privately owned long haul rail network - as part of the European high speed network - but commuting and rural services are simply not suitable candidates for such operation as they are simply too important to be left to a pure culture of shareholders before clients in an environment where it isn't an optional purchase but a social need coupled with the support of industry. (...and perhaps local buses should be thought of in the same way - ah integrated transport controlled by those who were voted in by their local populations.)

Yours sincerely
O.V.S.Bulleid

[Mike from Melbourne]

Thank you for your insights as to how it all operates gentlemen, although I have to say that as an 'outsider' it seems a bizarre way to run what is after all supposed be a public service, even though that may not be a fashionable term nowadays.

My general impression of the High Speed services was good and being able to get from Ramsgate to London in 80 mins was excellent, but on the occasions that I used them also made me realise how slow the classic services have become. I am glad though that I don't have to regularly pay the eye watering fares that are charged for your rail services, it makes me wonder how a lot of passengers can actually afford them.

[hsdealblogspotcom]

The figures Mr Horton is using to make the case that Deal is not a viable financial option for highspeed even though it has a higher population than Dover and other HS stops does not include season ticket holders who drive to Dover or Ashford to board the service because the mainline service via Deal has become abysmal. The whole purpose of highspeed is to connect communities with exisitng poor transport infrustructure not just make a profit.

The Onboard Managers for the highspeed trains which pass through Deal empty without stopping also have to travel on the mainline service to get to and from Ramsgate - I have talked to them and they would be very happy to stay onboard.

The existing franchise Southeastern are operating under does not need to be changed as part of the 2 year extension process with the DFT includes a business planning requirements clause.

The lack of any initiative from Southeastern over the Deal - highspeed issue just highlights the fact that they have no interest in passengers and should be stripped of their franchise.

hsdeal.blogspot.com
@hsdeal (twitter)

[A Guest]

I have heard something that may be of interest to some people on this forum.Southeastern are looking at running HS1 from Maidestone west to st pancras,possibly as early as May.

[Richard Trevithick]

Dear A Guest,

I too have started hearing a few rumours from reliable sources to confirm this plan is definitely going ahead in the May TT change. Apparently it has been confirmed and will definitely be going ahead. Presumably this is to partly pacify those complaining about the fast service to London Bridge/Cannon Street? I wonder if they have been offered cash to run this service, or if it is a "kindness of the heart" affair?

RT

[William Dargan]

Maidstone West is now a go - one of the off peak trains that currently work to and from Faversham will now go to Maidstone West. Atleast one of the early morning services that start from Rochester currently will now start from Maidstone.

No word on stopping patterns as yet - but chances are that there will be no intermediate stops (Maidstone Barracks for Maidstone East is looking doubtful). Drivers are aparently about to start route learning.

[garyw]

I can't see how HS1 from Maidstone West will help. Many of the commuters use Maidstone West because it's the only station that can connect them to services going to London City area after the services from Maidstone East were culled.

So, you have HS1 going from Maidstone West (extra cost for the commuter) plus extra tube costs to get from the wrong side of London to the city area.

Wouldn't it make more sense to provide Deal with these services - people who actually want them?

[William Dargan]

Providing services via Deal would mean the On Board Managers Depot would need to move from Dover to Ashford (where most of the units are based) or an increase of staffing levels at Ramsgate Depot to cover the additional work. Sadly this is unlikely to happen as this would require money to be spent!

[garyw]

Yeah I've heard about that. Seems that they would make the money up thanks to the commuters who want this. Crazy to ignore it.

One other thing. Maidstone West to Strood is all third rail. Class 395's need overhead power. Can the 395 pull power from the third rail then change to overhead?

[Richard Trevithick]

Gary,

Class 395s are dual supply - they have both pantographs for overhead AC cables and shoegear for the 750V DC 3rd rail. They change between AC/DC at Ebbsfleet for services to Faversham (and soon Maidstone) as well as at Ashford for servcies around the coast. The only time they really use the overheads is when on HS1.

Eurostar used to be the same, but as soon as they stopped working out of Waterloo, al all DC shoegear was removed. In many peoples opinions this was quite short-sighted of Eurostar as it severely limited their options during times of severe disruption. In other words, they can't divert elsewhere, and are stuck on HS1. I believe this has already bitten them on the behind at least once, my Medium recalls not long after moving into StP they had to rely on SET ferrying staff and passengers (by the thousand!) down to Ashford due to problems further up the line. If they still had the DC, it may have just been an inconvenient trip across London to Waterloo instead.

Kind Regards,

RT

[garyw]

Nice info. I never knew it was as easy as that to change between pantographs and third rail. thanks muchly!

SET ferrying passengers? Oh how times have changed! :-)

[Richard Trevithick]

No problem, always nice to be of service. :-)

Drivers attending my Staff Seances assure me it's as easy as pressing a few buttons (Shoes Up > Pan Up > AC Select or Pan Down > Shoes Down > DC Select - or similar!). Can be done in a matter of seconds whilst on the move.

The Class 319s as used on the Thameslink route were possibly the first to utilise a dual supply, using AC north of the Thames and DC to the south (Farringdon is the usual changeover point in both directions). Although I now suspect Mr Bulleid will shortly come and slap my wrist citing the Class 73 EDLs as being along similar lines but several decades earlier! ;-)

Although never used in practice, it is theoretically possible for some of the pantograph fitted 375s to work in this manner. FCC 377s already do this as per the changeover at Farringdon above.

RT