As you can imagine, I've been aware for quite some time that proposals such as this could be put forward. As a result, I've been looking at what the consequences of implementing such a policy would be, and others have been doing the same.
One such view of what the situation could be if the policy was already in force may well interest you. It is expressed in the form of a purely fictional
TOC▸ briefing paper, and the administrators of this forum will confirm that it was submitted to them privately on 10 June 2010:
Phase 1 - West Fleet Operating Area Review
The Department for Transport (DfT» ) require financial savings from all franchises, and as part of that process, they have asked us to reduce the size of our train fleet. This will be achieved mainly through our participation in the Pacer Retirement Programme (PRP), which also aims to remove the least effective rolling stock from the national rail network.
Current West Fleet
7 x 2-Coach Class 142 Units.
8 x 2-Coach Class 143 Units.
23 x 2-Coach Class 150 Units.
12 x 1-Coach Class 153 Units.
6 x 2-Coach Class 158 Units.
11 x 3-Coach Class 158 Units.
Proposed Rolling Stock In
15 x 2-Coach Class 150 Units (from DfT-agreed rolling stock cascade)
Proposed Rolling Stock Out
7 x 2-Coach Class 142 Units (retired through the PRP)
8 x 2-Coach Class 143 Units (retired through the PRP)
4 x 2-Coach Class 150 Units (returned to Arriva Trains Wales)
1 x 2-Coach Class 158 Unit (returned to South West Trains)
Proposed West Fleet After Adjustment
34 x 2-Coach Class 150 Units.
12 x 1-Coach Class 153 Units.
5 x 2-Coach Class 158 Units.
11 x 3-Coach Class 158 Units.
2 Loco-hauled trains will also be taken off-hire. High Speed Train and Night Riviera deployments in the West Fleet area will remain as present.
Extra Carriages On Greater Bristol Peak Services
The DfT Rolling Stock Plan is on hold pending review, but overcrowding remains a significant issue on a number of services. As a result, we will provide extra carriages from within our remaining rolling stock resources on the following Greater Bristol peak services:
0600 Exeter St Davids-Bristol Parkway.
0640 Weymouth-Bristol Parkway.
0711 Gloucester-Swindon (between Gloucester-Bristol Temple Meads).
0730 Cardiff Central-Portsmouth Harbour (between Cardiff Central-Bristol Temple Meads).
0737 Weston-super-Mare-Cardiff Central (between Weston-super-Mare-Bristol Temple Meads).
0800 Cardiff Central-Paignton (between Cardiff Central-Bristol Temple Meads).
1300 Brighton-Great Malvern (between Bristol Temple Meads-Gloucester).
1441 Westbury-Gloucester (between Bristol Temple Meads-Gloucester).
1442 Gloucester-Westbury (between Bristol Temple Meads-Westbury).
1451 Great Malvern-Weymouth (between Bristol Temple Meads-Westbury).
1616 Taunton-Cardiff Central (between Bristol Temple Meads-Cardiff Central).
1638 Westbury-Gloucester.
1642 Gloucester-Weymouth (between Gloucester-Westbury).
1645 Bristol Parkway-Warminster.
1700 Cardiff Central-Taunton.
1712 Bristol Parkway-Weston-super-Mare.
1746 Bristol-Parkway-Westbury.
In order to facilitate the above, and to further contribute towards the financial savings required by the DfT, the following service revisions will be implemented:
St Erth-St Ives
Rail services on this route will be suspended until further notice. Bus connections will be available at St Erth via the 17/17A/17B First service.
Penzance-Plymouth-Newton Abbot Corridor
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged, but the following stations will be served on a peak-only basis:
Devonport
Dockyard
Hayle
Keyham
Lostwithiel
Menheniot
Saltash
St Budeaux Ferry Road
St Germans
Truro-Falmouth
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged, financially supported by Cornwall County Council.
Liskeard-Looe
Rail services on this route will be suspended until further notice. Bus connections will be available at Liskeard via the 573 Western Greyhound service.
Plymouth-Gunnislake & Par-Newquay
Plymouth-Gunnislake services will operate on a peak-only basis. The same unit will provide a limited off-peak Par-Newquay service, similar to the pre-December 2008 pattern.
Exmouth-Exeter-Paignton
An hourly off-peak service will be provided, calling at Exmouth, Lympstone Village, Topsham, Digby & Sowton, Exeter Central, Exeter St Davids, Dawlish, Teignmouth, Newton Abbot, Torre, Torquay and Paignton. Additional services will operate during the peak, calling at all stations.
Exeter-Barnstaple
A service every 3 hours off-peak will be provided, financially supported by Devon County Council, calling at Exeter Central, Exeter St Davids, Crediton, Yeoford, Copplestone, Morchard Road, Eggesford, Umberleigh and Barnstaple. Additional services will operate during the peak, calling at all stations.
Taunton-Cardiff
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged.
Weston-Bristol Parkway & Severn Beach Line
Hourly services will continue to be provided from Weston-super-Mare to Filton Abbey Wood and Bristol Parkway during the peak, but will operate from Weston-super-Mare to Clifton Down during the off-peak, calling at all stations in each case and in each direction. This forms part of the new Severn Beach Line off-peak timetable, which maintains a 3 trains every 2 hours frequency. This will consist of 2 trains along the more heavily used section from Bristol Temple Meads to Clifton Down, with the other being extended to Avonmouth and Severn Beach, financially supported by Bristol City Council. During the peak and late evening, the current Severn Beach Line timetable will continue to apply.
Great Malvern/Worcester/Gloucester-Bristol-Westbury-Weymouth/Southampton/Brighton & TransWilts Line
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged from Great Malvern/Worcester/Gloucester to Bristol and Westbury, although off-peak southbound calls at Stapleton Road & Lawrence Hill will be removed (replaced by the new off-peak Clifton Down-Weston service, see above), and Avoncliff & Freshford will be served on a peak-only basis.
Service extensions towards Weymouth will be provided on a peak-only basis, with occasional additional calls provided at Castle Cary and Frome in other services. Off-peak service provision at Yeovil Pen Mill, Castle Cary and Frome may be partially restored from December 2011 with the introduction of the Go! Co-operative Yeovil Junction-Oxford service. This will also provide additional services during both the peak and off-peak for Westbury, Trowbridge, Melksham, Chippenham and Swindon.
Off-peak local services towards Warminster, Salisbury and Southampton will be withdrawn. As a result, Dilton Marsh will be served on a peak-only basis.
Due to the withdrawal of the South West Trains Romsey-Southampton-Salisbury service, limited peak calls will be made in our services at Millbrook, Redbridge, Dean and Mottisfont & Dunbridge.
An additional off-peak Brighton service extension in each direction will be provided.
Portsmouth-Cardiff
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged, with 1 peak service in each direction calling additionally at Dean and Mottisfont & Dunbridge (see above).
Swindon-Cheltenham
Service pattern will remain broadly unchanged.
If you dont want such a future to become reality, then the answer appears simple - respond to the consultation and tell them so.
Personally though, I hope that the above doesnt come to pass. It is also fair to say that I have been pleasantly surprised by how helpful organisations such as
FGW▸ , the DfT and Wiltshire Council have been during the TransWilts Community Rail Partnership set-up process, and that the consultation has the potential to shape a positive future if we can steer it away from a negative one.
Here's one of my initial
TWCRP» /
STT▸ briefings:
When formulating our responses to the Rail Value For Money Review and the Future Of Rail Franchising Policy Consultation , I decided to first look at exactly what it is we want from the future of rail franchising ^ ie What type of future rail service do we want any reformed system to deliver for us?
The
Network Rail Great Western Route Utilisation Strategy recommended an hourly Westbury-Swindon service, as part of an enhanced overall Greater Bristol Metro suburban rail network concept.
Such a service would undoubtably have a heavy focus on out-commuting ^ and indeed 24% of employed Wiltshire residents currently commute to outside the county, often to higher paid professional and managerial jobs in Bath and Swindon in particular, with
official DfT data showing the TransWilts corridor as one of the top 50 commuting trips into and out of Local Authority Districts in the South West, and high forecast future delays on parallel sections of the A350.
An improved TransWilts service of this nature would clearly have a key role to play in providing a quicker, more relaxing, lower-carbon and lower-congestion alternative to the car for those commuters currently making such trips. Also, as Graham Ellis points out in
his own analysis, taking the train on such journeys is far more conducive to a ^mobile office^ environment when compared to taking the car.
Out-commuting will remain an important factor in the future as well, growing as the forthcoming period of austerity and slow economic growth leads people to travel further to find work as jobs are cut.
However, when deciding what type of future rail service we want, it is crucial that we also take into account how society in Wiltshire as a whole is likely to change over the coming years.
A good barometer of this is the
Wiltshire Community Plan. One of its objectives seeks to mitigate the current and future effects of out-commuting to jobs outside the county through the generation of sufficient numbers and types of jobs and the creation of local work facilities to attract these people back to working locally.
Another is to strengthen the connectivity of the county, partly through the development of low carbon transport options, especially with respect to the main commuting corridors. An improved TransWilts service has the potential to significantly contribute to this, linking as it potentially could the four largest population centres in Wiltshire, namely Salisbury, Trowbridge, Chippenham and Melksham, and also serving other sizeable towns at Warminster and Westbury.
A further objective is to agree a way forward where all can contribute to achieving a major shift to sustainable transport, such as walking, cycling and the use of public transport for local trips, especially in the larger settlements of Trowbridge, Chippenham, and Salisbury. Again, an improved TransWilts service has the potential to significantly contribute to this, given that people from these locations combined make up around 32% of the total number who have so far
signed up in support of an improved TransWilts service.Last but not least, tackling climate change is listed as a key priority. According to figures on the
South West Observatory website, Wiltshire was the only county in the south west actually to increase its total CO2 emissions 2005-2007, the most significant increase being in West Wiltshire which had the highest per capita emissions - 27% of the county total. Once again, an improved TransWilts service has the potential to significantly contribute towards combating this. For example, comparative CO2 emissions from Trowbridge to Swindon are as follows - Car 7.4 - 14.9kg, Coach 5.1 kg, Train 3.9kg.
Therefore, it is clear that future changes in Wiltshire society as a whole as they relate to the TransWilts will involve a balance of competing priorities, and any future rail service along the corridor will have to reflect this.
As a result, I have selected the hourly Westbury-Swindon service recommended by the
RUS▸ as a base, with some extensions towards Warminster and Salisbury provided by utilising existing rolling stock. This would provide a step-change in terms of service provision along the entire TransWilts Salisbury-Swindon corridor, whilst also providing excellent connections for those travelling further afield to destinations such as Bath, Bristol and London. As well as this, relatively poorly served TransWilts stations such as Melksham and Dilton Marsh would see a significant increase in terms of service levels and journey opportunities.
The indicative timetable is also fully compliant with Greater Bristol Metro-based RUS recommendations such as additional hourly Bristol-Bath/Bristol-Yate services, and also additional services along the Bristol-Westbury corridor, along with extra carriages to relieve overcrowding. Indeed, the proposed improved TransWilts services would in themselves help to relieve overcrowding on Portsmouth-Cardiff services, by removing ^Bath Dogleg^ journeys. For example, Trowbridge-London would be significantly quicker by changing at Swindon, than it would be by changing at Bath Spa.
Frome is not forgotten either, with additional services and a decent range of connections. In the wider context, the indicative timetable has the potential to transform the usefulness of the Heart of Wessex Line Ranger ticket, which is valid for a days unlimited travel after 0825 on Monday-Fridays and all day on Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays on the Weymouth-Westbury-Bath-Bristol, Bath-Chippenham-Swindon and Westbury-Swindon routes. The indicative timetable would link all three with useful connections and thus provide a range of new journey and day out opportunities.
Given the likely need to pool resources due to constraints on external funding, this could be promoted in conjunction with the
Heart Of Wessex Rail Partnership through shared initiatives such as joint
Line Guides, building on our emerging co-operation on projects such as the
Westbury Station Adoption Group Project.Overall, one thing that stakeholders along the route have consistently agreed on is that any improved TransWilts service should form a multi-purpose link, not one dependent on any one particular aspect. I believe that the indicative timetable acheives this, and it can be found at
http://atrebatia.info/spread/RUS25.xlsHowever, it is important to bear in mind that the above is just my own take. Recent quote from Philip Hammond, Transport Secretary, from
his speech to the National Rail Conference:
^Believe me, this is a consultation that really matters.^
He^s right. It will shape the future of rail for years to come.
Therefore, it is vital that as many of you as possible put forward your views, so I can make the TWCRP/STT responses as reflective of the views of its members as I possibly can.Dont forget also that the Future Of Rail Franchising Policy Consultation is fully open to the public until 18 October 2010, so you can send your own personal responses as well - see
http://www.dft.gov.uk/consultations/open/2010-28/ for further details.
As I proceed with formulating our TWCRP/STT responses, more posts on its different aspects will follow that I would welcome your opinion on. In my next one, and in the context of the Rail Value For Money Review, I will seek to demonstrate how introducing station improvements at Melksham (new station building, car park, bus/rail interchange etc) along with an hourly Westbury-Swindon service with some extensions south towards Salisbury would pay for for itself through increased revenue over a 20-year franchise period. I will also seek to demonstrate how the very high car ownership levels in Wiltshire as a whole, and the fact that the TransWilts corridor is right at the very top in terms of forecast growth in car ownership 2006 to 2026 in the South West, can be harnessed in a positive manner in order to help achieve this.
Interestingly, the initial reaction of campaigners and others that I have contacted has bordered on weary resignation - "They're going to do it anyway, so what's the point in responding?"
They may be right, but my message would be that the consultation offers people both the chance to speak out against a negative rail future, and the chance to put forward their own positive ideas and vision.
If people dont take that chance, then they'll never know.
