Breaking News: East Coast Line Taken Over By Govt.

[Si1]

a comment on the telegraph story about this:

In certain ways I feel very sorry for National Express. when they took over from GNER (which I have to say I thought were excellent) they had exclusive use of the East Coast Main Line. However, within months another operator, Grand Central, was licensed to run on the same routes, diluting the number of passengers that would use National Express. This must have had an impact on their passenger numbers and their bottom line. As far as I am aware no reduction in their franchise was made, and so in many ways they were cheated (no surprise from this government).

I am surprised that Grand Central has not been mentioned by either the BBC or this column, as I am sure it was a contributory factor in the demise of National Express.

Will GNER be allowed to rebid?

[Rare Bear]

Tarmac over the train lines and have it as a dedicated road network for freight and passengers with a 125mph speed limit. IMHO cheaper, safer and faster than a train network

Don't forget the 100mph minimum.

[Guest redwine]

How much do you think it costs to build the TGV or the AVE in Spain?

Barcelona to Malaga (563 miles) cost $130 billion

Paris to Baudrecourt (188miles) cost 3.5billion euros

Yet the French and Spanish just get on with it, they realise that it's cheaper in the medium to long term (if not the short term) to build a new railway than upgrade and maintain an old creaking one built 150 years ago.

The problem here in France with the TGV is that the local branch lines have been left behind

Local trains are falling to bits old rolling stock that often break down

They are building a new TGV line to Geneva so that you can go from Paris to Geneva there aim is to attack the airlines

[Si1]

one of the main reasons spain and france are more into very high speed trains is because they are physically bigger countries with much more space inbetween cities

In the UK, as with, say, the low countries and Scandinavia, much higher population density - so the geography favours lots of medium-fast trains that stop every 50-100 miles or so. Benefits of 200mph runing get diluted down with these shortish runs. Thus there is less of a case, socially and economically, for TGVs in this case, except super-regionally, eg Eurostar and Thalys.

[bingobob777]

It took me longer to get from Gatwick to Lambeth, than it did for me to fly all the way from Marrakech to the UK because of railworks the other weekend. :angry:

Railworks which would have been advertised well in advance. Works like this are planned a minimum of 13 weeks in advance, so your TOC (not Network Rail) should have made it clear.

How do you propose we modernise the railway without closing it? Would you prefer it was shut during the week?

[bomberbrown]

Railworks which would have been advertised well in advance. Works like this are planned a minimum of 13 weeks in advance, so your TOC (not Network Rail) should have made it clear.

How do you propose we modernise the railway without closing it? Would you prefer it was shut during the week?

Yes please, and preferably the week I'm on holiday or every night while I'm in bed, asleep.

Other countries can manage 24 hour transport systems, so should we.

[The_Surveyor]

Railworks which would have been advertised well in advance. Works like this are planned a minimum of 13 weeks in advance, so your TOC (not Network Rail) should have made it clear.

How do you propose we modernise the railway without closing it? Would you prefer it was shut during the week?

Yes please, and preferably the week I'm on holiday or every night while I'm in bed, asleep.

Other countries can manage 24 hour transport systems, so should we.

funny you should say that others can manage a 24hr railway and we cant, when we do. Every night when most passengers and you are in bed, freight trains generally take over the network. The West Coast mainline is one of the busiest route in Europe. The East coast is not too far behind.

Then when possible, like bingobob said, Network Rail go about maintaining the infrastructure.

Simples really..

[jonewer]

How much do you think it costs to build the TGV or the AVE in Spain?

Barcelona to Malaga (563 miles) cost $130 billion

Paris to Baudrecourt (188miles) cost 3.5billion euros

Yet the French and Spanish just get on with it, they realise that it's cheaper in the medium to long term (if not the short term) to build a new railway than upgrade and maintain an old creaking one built 150 years ago.

The main causes of problems and delays on our mainlines are signalling problems and points failures, the solution is dedicated high speed lines without lots of branches and in cab signalling (rejected for WCML upgrade due to cost). This will cost money to build, so are you willing to pay for it to get it?

I'm not denying that we need more investment. But look! At the end of all that the spaniards and the frogs got some nice shiny TGV lines.

What did we get for the west coast upgrade?...... er...... Not a TGV line, thats for sure.

Back to the money - I maintain that we get the worst value for money in this country. We surely have the most expensive ticket prices and theres still a multi-billion net subsidy from the taxpayer. I wouldnt mind paying for serious infrastructure, if at the end, we had some serious infrastructure to show for it. At the moment we pay a hell of a lot of money and it goes directly into the pockets of the shareholders and executives of the companies that do a piss-poor job of running the thing.

Thats my beef.