Why is rail travel sooooooooooooo expensive?

[Joseph_Pestell]

SWMBO and I are away for a few days in April to our house in Southern France. We recently booked air tickets from Bournemouth to Girona: £100 for both of us including car hire for the 5 days. And about 6 hours travel. Total costs around £200.

 

In-laws want to join us but travelling by train. £630!!!! and 16 hours travel, starting at 05.20. And that's not counting transfer costs at each end.

 

Now, in fairness, I don't think the travel agent (no names, no pack drill) has been too clever there. I am sure that I could do rather better with a bit of internet research. But small wonder that Eurostar is not as busy as it could be.

[40F]

Don`t forget the agents commission .Always go to the Eurostar web site and keep an eye open for the cheap advance tickets

[jjb1970]

I quite often make return trips to Brussels in standard premier class which is very civilised for less than £200 (sometimes quite a bit less) which is pretty good value IMO.

[Andy Hayter]

Looks like they will be getting one of the peak time morning Eurostar services (so a higher price) which is probably a necessity to reach the destination in one day.

 

Your trip will cost £16.67 per person hour, their trip will cost £19.69 per person hour - which is another way of looking at the costs.  

[Nelson Jackson]

It's not in Northern Ireland.

[Joseph_Pestell]

Don`t forget the agents commission .Always go to the Eurostar web site and keep an eye open for the cheap advance tickets

That's what I am going to try. A cheap Eurostar ticket from London to Val de Marne (Disney) and SNCF Ouigo from there.

 

But most travellers are not going to take that much trouble. If the railways are ever to compete with the airlines, they need to up their game a lot on the marketing front.

 

That an experienced rail specialist travel agency can not find a better option than £600 is quite remarkable.

Edited March 16, 2018 by Joseph_Pestell

[letterspider]

It is overpriced to keep passengers away and stop overcrowding

[Joseph_Pestell]

Looks like they will be getting one of the peak time morning Eurostar services (so a higher price) which is probably a necessity to reach the destination in one day.

 

Your trip will cost £16.67 per person hour, their trip will cost £19.69 per person hour - which is another way of looking at the costs.  

 

They would be travelling on a Sunday, so peaks do not apply.

 

I have managed to find an itinerary that works "unofficially". Changing at Marne-la-Vallee - Chessy, they can leave London at 10.15 and arrive at Narbonne around 20.00 with an additional change at Nimes. The reason that option does not come up easily is that it involves an 8 minute change at Marne-la-Vallee. Perhaps a bit risky bearing in mind that the in-laws are  in their 70s and not very mobile?

[Mike Storey]

I strongly recommend Mark Smith's https://www.seat61.com/index.html . This will almost always show the cheapest and/or most convenient way to travel by rail across Europe (and not just from London).

Edited March 16, 2018 by Mike Storey

[Chris M]

The railways have to pay people to keep the track in good condition but nobody maintains the air the planes fly in. This is going to be a big cost saving.

[chrisf]

Eurostar have a sale on for the next few days.

 

Chris

[Mike Storey]

The railways have to pay people to keep the track in good condition but nobody maintains the air the planes fly in. This is going to be a big cost saving.

 

Actually, they do. It's called air traffic control, and is the equivalent of railway signalling. Signalling is by far the most expensive part of railway infrastructure operations costs, as well as renewal costs, but of course you are right, in that no-one has to replace the sky every 25 years or so.

 

But the comparative economics are hard to understand (I spent four years on a Masters course trying to do that in the 1980's). In theory, the huge superiority in volume carried by rail should mean that the economics of the cost per passenger are weighed in favour of rail. That was largely true up to the 1980's, but then Laker and then O'Leary and others changed all that, by sweating their fuselages to the limit and moving the airline model much more into bus mode, with low cost terminal costs and no-frills service. The (very belated) French response to that is now "OuiGo", which is the equivalent philosophy, whereas the UK industry has chosen to continue to go with selective and demand pricing on standard services domestically (very successfully it must be said). The few Open Access operators can cream off the surplus, but only whilst the rules allow them to avoid the bulk of infrastructure renewal costs (in return for not having the level of protection afforded by a franchise agreement, in theory).

 

Translating that to international services will require the final tranche of EU international competition rules to railways, due into force by 2021 (?), where, in theory, SNCF cannot screw up every private (and other state) operator's attempts to run cheap, direct (passenger and freight) services across their turf (by charging crazily high track access charges, and by being less than objective with allocation of train paths and release of redundant rolling stock). We shall see. But if that does have the effect desired, it could make a vast difference to international rail fares pricing.

 

The other factors, post-Brexit, that could affect future air pricing, are of course the need to enter into replacement agreements to cover the existing Open Skies permissions and access, and the likely need for UK airlines, or airlines intending to fly from the UK to outside the EU, to create duplicated bases and duplicated ownership (or in effect, separations of existing companies) in order to meet both EU rules and US rules, which are quite different. Perhaps this will be easily done, but none of the dismissals of these issues has actually provided any solution, other than that it was not a problem before we joined the EC. Of course, the rules of today did not exist in 1973.

 

The other issue, for UK rail origins and destinations, is that, whilst we will continue to remain a member of the UIC, for common standards etc, we will no longer be protected by the EU competition rules (unless current HMG negotiations take a very different turn). This makes the prospect of SNCF facilitation of new entrants, or innovations, to the cross-channel rail market a huge unknown. The growing reluctance of DBAG to progress their original intentions for through services to many new destinations from London, of course precedes the decision to leave the EU. So perhaps Brexit makes no real difference to what might have happened in that respect.

[LBRJ]

The Chicago Convention should cover any immediate airline related issues,as it has done world wide since 1947.

[Mike Storey]

The Chicago Convention should cover any immediate airline related issues,as it has done world wide since 1947.

 

I suggest you re-read Article 6 and come back on that one.....

[Nearholmer]

I am surprised at the rail prices quoted, though, because I’ve twice used TGV/Eurostar at ‘walk up’ fares (it was actually phone up, but within minutes of departure time), London to/from South of France for a family of four, both at busy times, using the Premium option that gives first class with lunch/dinner on Eurostar, and first class but no catering on TGV, and in neither case did the total hit the price cited.

 

The biggest issue was the inability to show tickets on the France to London journey, because the system couldn’t cough them up quickly enough, but the conductor wrote us out paper ones on the strength of the e-confirmation on my phone.

 

I’m pretty sure a ‘walk up’ airline fare would have cost more, and they are almost impossible to get anyway, because the carriers overbook, not leave seats free for last-minute-merchants.

 

Booking sensibly, in advance, train can be very competitive with air, especially if you use one of the through Eurostar tourist services (assuming they still run) as far as it goes, and a separate SNCF ticket for the last bit.

 

PS: using voyages sncf, I’m getting much better than £630, with very sensible departure and arrival times, using Perpignan as the destination (not knowing exactly where the house is). Narbonne is priced exactly the same. Premium return for two people for £278 looks very good indeed to me. Your dates don’t hit Easter do they?

Edited March 16, 2018 by Nearholmer

[Sir TophamHatt]

 

The railways have to pay people to keep the track in good condition but nobody maintains the air the planes fly in. This is going to be a big cost saving.

Actually, they do. It's called air traffic control, and is the equivalent of railway signalling.

 

Ah ha, but re-read the original person you quoted...

Nobody needs to maintain the sky.

But someone needs to maintain the rails, the ballast, sleepers, signs, gantry, electrical this and that... more than what there is in the air.

[Mike Storey]

Ah ha, but re-read the original person you quoted...

Nobody needs to maintain the sky.

But someone needs to maintain the rails, the ballast, sleepers, signs, gantry, electrical this and that... more than what there is in the air.

 

Yes. I did get the point. But the sky is not entirely free to use either, as I explained.

[jjb1970]

Aircraft engines need quite a lot of expensive inspection and maintenance and use a lot of fuel.

[The Stationmaster]

They would be travelling on a Sunday, so peaks do not apply.

 

I have managed to find an itinerary that works "unofficially". Changing at Marne-la-Vallee - Chessy, they can leave London at 10.15 and arrive at Narbonne around 20.00 with an additional change at Nimes. The reason that option does not come up easily is that it involves an 8 minute change at Marne-la-Vallee. Perhaps a bit risky bearing in mind that the in-laws are  in their 70s and not very mobile?

 

FYI - Eurostar peak travel days are Fridays and Sundays although 10.15 is no as 'peaky' as the afternoon on either of those days.  And I wouldn't have fancied an 8 minute connection at Marne-la-Vallee when I was in my 50s let alone for folk of more nmature years as it can get a bit of a tangle with all the 'innocents abroad' heading for Micky Mouseville.

[royaloak]

Aircraft engines need quite a lot of expensive inspection and maintenance and use a lot of fuel.

Good job they dont have to pay VAT on that aviation fuel unlike the train operating companies who have to pay VAT on the diesel they use!

[justin1985]

the travel agent (no names,

Well that's where you went wrong!

 

Who uses a travel agent voluntarily in this day and age? I'm forced to for work travel, and the costs are routinely many times the cost for the same transport or hotel booked direct.

 

I've taken much longer journeys by rail for a small fraction of that cost with just a month or so notice. One of the best ways to book travel throughout the continent is to phone the UK number for DB, they're very helpful and can make bookings and seat reservations etc all over Europe without changing commission.

 

Justin

[Nearholmer]

Which is exactly why I recommend voyages sncf. They are very good by phone or website. And Eurostar can be good by phone, although their website isn’t at all good for destinations that they don’t serve direct.

[Nick C]

I strongly recommend Mark Smith's https://www.seat61.com/index.html . This will almost always show the cheapest and/or most convenient way to travel by rail across Europe (and not just from London).

 

The only problem I've found with that site is that he encourages you to book through DB's website (I presume it has affiliate links, so he gets paid), when it's often cheaper and/or easier to go directly to the local company (unless you're travelling in Germany obviously) 

[Joseph_Pestell]

I will have another go. Kevin, in particular, seems to have found a much better option.

 

I think that it has always been the case that all destinations beyond Avignon are priced the same. I only suggested Narbonne as it is not much further from home for me to drive and they will arrive at a suitable time for dinner. Perpignan is an extra 35 mins on the trains and so dinner would be later ( although many more restaurant options there than in Narbonne where almost all the restaurants, and hotels, around the station have closed down).