Converting commuter railways to busways

[DavidBird]

It would be even better to see the UK's roads...

... have a nice clear set of accounts where we get to know:

Cost of providing existing infrastructure
Cost of improving/expanding infrastructure
Cost of [vehicle] operations
Income from [car, bus & coach taxation}

Income from [lorry taxation]
Government contribution
Other income [and costs*]
 

 

*Other costs to include things like traffic police, cost to NHS of accidents, cost of pollution, congestion - as reduction of all these things is always quoted as a benefit of road "investment"

 

Then we might see which really is best... Anybody any idea which it would be?

Edited February 13, 2015 by DavidBird

[roythebus]

The Dartford Crossing was paid for quite a few years ago but again the politicians went back on their word and the charging by a private company continues.

[PhilJ W]

The Dartford Crossing was paid for quite a few years ago but again the politicians went back on their word and the charging by a private company continues.

Not according to the private company it isn't, when they've deducted their dividends.

[Mike Storey]

But that's not the same either - as only a portion of NR's costs are paid by the TOCs, much is now paid by direct grant from the government - and again, how accurately it reflects the real cost of providing a given level of infrastructure is very questionable.

 

All railway finance in the UK is extremely arcane, which does IMHO lend arrows to the likes of the writer of this - i'm pretty convinced for example that the main lines into London which they advocate changing are actually extremely efficient (financially) ways of moving the vast numbers of people involved, that'll be why so many countries (including those in Asia and South America) are building shiny new railways!

 

Many parts of the UK network though won't be so efficient (financially) - but then the pressure to convert those lines to a handy road won't be as great either as the demand for a new road will also be less.  

 

Be clear - i'm not ADVOCATING road and rail pricing here, i'm interested that they see one as being a great thing, and the other one not.

 

I would however LOVE to see the UK's railways have a nice clear set of accounts where we get to know:

 

Cost of providing existing infrastructure

Cost of improving/expanding infrastructure

Cost of train operations

Income from passenger receipts

Income from freight operators

Government contribution

Other income

 

That ^ would be basic info in any industry, but the UK rail industry has been (deliberately?) set up to be opaque. I'm convinced that does rail no favours.

 

 

 

 

I agree that it is not directly comparable to road pricing, as there is nothing to compare it with (other than section tolls, which are artificially set (cf Dartford Crossing), but it is the nearest equivalent we have. I did a dissertation on this as part of my MSc in Transport and Logistics, in the days leading up to BR privatisation, and it proved impossible to use many suitable equivalents, without considerable qualification, in order to draw conclusions as to whether existing road pricing theory could be applied to track access charging.

 

Your comment on the adequacy of railway industry accounting caused my eyebrows to rise to where my hair used to be. If you compare what we can find out now compared to what we thought we knew in BR days, the current data is astonishingly detailed. I followed the debate during access charge consultation by the ORR leading to the CP5 settlement, and there are very strong arguments for the changes that transpired, not the least being that operational subsidy passed via the TOCs (and in a different way via FOCs) to enable them to pay the true cost of track charges, had become a far more opaque process than intended, and there was some clear potential (if not actual) diversion of grant into dividend.

 

The key remaining issues for understanding true costs remain the adequacy of NR's asset condition knowledge, the debate which continues over the true efficient costs of maintenance, renewal and enhancements (the basis of which keep changing due to new methods and technology introduced, many of which have been successful but some of which remain to prove their worth) and the extent to which legacy costs (passed from the old BRB Residual responsibilities) should be included. I agree that the true maintenance and accelerated renewal costs of train and loco types, frequencies and especially axle forces, are still a black art, but the new regime does at least attempt to begin to address this.

 

Not perfect by any means, but, as has been said, light years ahead of where you would even start to assess the basis of road pricing charges. Try breaking down Highways Agency, County and urban highway costings and then assess all the ancillary services required to back them up or costs they indirectly force on others, including emergency, utilities, long term health, environmental and so on. Most of these are readily available or already included when doing the same for UK rail. Hence I disagree with your comment that this needs to be radically improved in order to counter nutcase proposals for mass conversions or closures. The proper attack should be in reverse - where the hell do the IEA and others get their highways costs from? Oh, that's right, most of it is actually heavily subsidised indirectly by the rest of us, in vast but uncalculated amounts, on the basis that all of us "use" roads. So rather than stating that they can devise the perfect market, they can easily be demonstrated to admit that they only mean a simulation of direct-cost pricing, ignoring all other costs, including set-up, renewal and capital, as artificial and ill-thought as any system they currently defame. Let's get them on the back foot for once.

[ess1uk]

Cambridge has such a great safety record??

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-48336219

[PhilJ W]

2 hours ago, ess1uk said:

Cambridge has such a great safety record??

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-48336219

Its not clear in the report whether the accident took place on the busway or at a junction with the public highway. If on the busway the car shouldn't have been there in the first place.

[TheSignalEngineer]

7 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Its not clear in the report whether the accident took place on the busway or at a junction with the public highway. If on the busway the car shouldn't have been there in the first place.

According to the Police report it took place on a railway crossing. Think their map may be a bit out of date.

 

The Stagecoach press release was a bit of an understatement.

"There is significant damage to both vehicles involved."

Photo from Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue.

 

[pete_mcfarlane]

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

Its not clear in the report whether the accident took place on the busway or at a junction with the public highway. If on the busway the car shouldn't have been there in the first place.

 People colliding with trams and/or driving on to reserved sections of tramway (including bits with concrete sleepered track) is a fairly regular occurrence round here. So it's not just a problem with guided bus routes. 

 

Here's the level of signage needed round here: https://www.google.com/maps/@52.9419785,-1.1732934,3a,37.5y,142.8h,86.23t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sUVpAPfSIhAY57mqQ439wGw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656

[phil-b259]

On 13/02/2015 at 21:08, PhilJ W said:

Not according to the private company it isn't, when they've deducted their dividends.

 

Sorry - the cost of building the tunnels AND the QE2 bridge was fully paid off WAY BACK (around 2000 IIRC). At that point the legislation (which allowed the building of the tunnels and later the bridge) was VERY clear - it would have been ILLEGAL for tills to be continued to be charged.

 

However for HM Treasury, the tolls at Dartford were a very attractive source of income and they wished to continue charging them - so the Government passed some additional legislation in Westminster which converted them to a 'Congestion' Charge the moment the construction costs were paid thus allowing Tolls to continue even though said costs (which included interest charges and a decent profit for the builders etc) of building the crossings had been well and truly met.

 

The money you pay to cross at Dartford today is nothing more than an income stream for the DfT to use as they want - which mostly involved on spending it well away from Dartford.

 

While the Government may now pressing ahead with a new crossing further downstream (and can now argue that tolls at Dartford are helping fund that) for almost 2 decades the tolls were simply a way for the Government of mug motorists who had little choice but to pay up.

 

 

[Joseph_Pestell]

2 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Sorry - the cost of building the tunnels AND the QE2 bridge was fully paid off WAY BACK (around 2000 IIRC). At that point the legislation (which allowed the building of the tunnels and later the bridge) was VERY clear - it would have been ILLEGAL for tills to be continued to be charged.

 

However for HM Treasury, the tolls at Dartford were a very attractive source of income and they wished to continue charging them - so the Government passed some additional legislation in Westminster which converted them to a 'Congestion' Charge the moment the construction costs were paid thus allowing Tolls to continue even though said costs (which included interest charges and a decent profit for the builders etc) of building the crossings had been well and truly met.

 

The money you pay to cross at Dartford today is nothing more than an income stream for the DfT to use as they want - which mostly involved on spending it well away from Dartford.

 

While the Government may now pressing ahead with a new crossing further downstream (and can now argue that tolls at Dartford are helping fund that) for almost 2 decades the tolls were simply a way for the Government of mug motorists who had little choice but to pay up.

 

 

 

That's right.It's now technically a congestion charge. You can cross free at night.

[dvdlcs]

14 hours ago, TheSignalEngineer said:

According to the Police report it took place on a railway crossing. Think their map may be a bit out of date.

 

The Stagecoach press release was a bit of an understatement.

"There is significant damage to both vehicles involved."

Photo from Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue.

 

 

Hello.

 

Used to live near there. That is the former railway crossing of the public road that was just west of Longstanton (railway) station. I think that picture is taken looking approximately south and west, so the old station would have been off screen to the left. The traffic light(?) and road sign have appeared since I left the area.

 

[Oddly enough, when I first moved to the area (1997) I did wonder whether that track bed would have made a viable preserved railway, potentially running from Cambridge - perhaps even the original bay platforms - to St Ives. Reasonable distance, double track bed, a number of intermediate stations (villages), etc.]

 

Hope this helps.