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MyUK : Transport

While we are in the process of migrating all our new services to our brand new dedicated servers, I thought it would be a good time to start my series of commentaries about Britain in the twenty-first century. These posts will come in no particular order and with no particular schedule. The first comment is tackling the failing integrated (if you can call it that) transport system with have in the UK, especially dealing with British railways.

The first six years of the twenty-first century has seen a lot of changes in Britain. Labour have won a record third term in office, but a number of the issues they entered office championing in 1997 have still to see real improvement. I am not saying that no improvement in our public transport, hospitals, schools or universities has materialised. But the general public concensus is that Labour’s core manifesto pledges have been largely ignored in recent times, no doubt damaged further by an all but illegal war in the Middle East.

Transport

So in the first of my three part comment, I will handle the British Public Transport network. In particular the sorry case of our privatised railway system.

History

In November 1997, the company that was the publically owned British Rail sold the final franchise off to the private sector. The end of subsidised rail transport in the UK signalled the beginning of worst times to come. The railways privatisation was the brainchild of the Conservative Party during the Thatcher premiership. John Major’s Tory government continued the preperation work, renaming regional rail services to easily marketable entities; Network SouthEast; InterCity; Cross Country; Regional Railways and many others.

Unfortunately, opinions of the Conservative government were already heading south as the privatisation plans were being realised and faced with defeat at the next election, accelerated plans so they would be unstoppable by a victorious Labour government. I doubt very much if Labour would have stopped the plans if they had been given such an oppertunity. Only muted mentions of re-nationalisation have been touted since, by Labour backbenchers and the Liberal Democrats.

Nine years later the Tory company set up to run the railways, Railtrack, has been disolved and taken into administration. There have been five serious train incidents in as many years during privatisation, killing hundreds of passengers and staff. Fares have gone up over 300% while punctuality has dropped. Most importantly, the numbers of passengers has risen each year exponentially.

As we near the middle of 2006, Network Rail (as it is now known) has few things to be happy about, other than their network is just about working on the minimum amount of investment.

Passengers mean money

There is not one commercial railway in the world that makes money. It is simply a fact that railways loose money and that is where governments step in. Our immediate neighbours are all proudly watching their networks grow and prosper. Next year you’ll be able to travel between Amsterdam and Barcelona hardly dropping below 186mph (300km/h). The journey will transport passengers at high-speed across Europe without delays, airport transfers or other minor annoyances and unlike air travel, the carbon footprint will be tiny when compared to taking a plane.

How is this possible? Simply, Europe is investing in their railways. France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Spain, Switzerland and Italy are all investing heavily in developing new highspeed lines, or LGV’s (Lignes Ã Grande Vitesse), or InterCity Network. Although the names and systems may differ slightly between territories, all systems support speeds in excess of 300km/h. Trains from France can run to Holland. German trains can run to France and Spain. A true European highspeed rail network is quickly forming - all running at a loss.

In the UK, our fastest domestic service is 125mph (201km/h). Last year Virgin Trains were planning to launch a 140mph (225km/h) service but had to drop back to 125mph because the West Coast Main Line was many times over budget and behind schedule. Fifteen years earlier BR intended to run a 140mph service from London Kings Cross to Edinbrugh using the electric InterCity 225 as the workhorse. Needless to say, it never happened.

But the demand from UK passengers has been relentless. Although fares have been increasing beyond reason, more and more of the British public have using the railways to get to and from work. In theory, Train Operating Companies (TOC’s) should be making serious money, but the profits they share with shareholders rather than re-investing in their railway. Moreover, with the millions the public and government are pouring into the railways, not much improvement to our network is currently evident. It seems that even with all the passengers in the world wanting to use the railways, privatisation is not servicing our needs. Prices are astronomical and the service is generally poor.

One glimmer of hope

Fortunately for Tony Blair, he has been able to put his name to one success on the railways. Two years ago he proudly opened the first section of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL) between Folkstone and Maidstone. The slogan behind the smiling PM was, “On Time. On Budget“. Even Tony Blair said that it is rare in this day and age that grand projects of any type can boost such an achievement.

When the second section of the CTRL opens in 2007, Eurostar express trains will be able to travel to Europe from London at an almost constant 300km/h without being held up by slow commuter trains or freight. The CTRL could be compared to a dedicated highspeed node to Europe from London. But unlike the rest of the European network, the fun stops at London.

But the point is, Britains first taste of highspeed travel has been whetted and it has been proven that it can be done to budgetary limitations.

Currently the UK infrastructure couldn’t support travel of much faster than 140mph even with tilting technology. This is where I think the Strategic Rail Authority (SRA) need to rethink their strategy. Rather than trying to go through the incredibly expensive task of upgrading all of our old tracks to a near modern standard, do the unthinkable and build new highspeed lines. In the past this would have been impossible as their wasn’t enough room to keep new tracks on a relative straight and flat route. But today’s LGV lines can go up and down hills rather than around them.

A highspeed proposal

So how did Europe get their high speed networks when we are still running at 125mph. Well this is because in the 60’s and 70’s, Britain actually had the best railway network in Europe. Our InterCity services ran on time and the network had a lot of capacity for more traffic. France had a terrible network at that time, damaged heavily by the Second World War and up to that point patched to semi-working order. This is when France decided they needed a new network to connect the major population centres, Paris and Lyon initially. So France got to work designing their future of highspeed travel in 1966 and the first TGV went into service in 1981. It took 15 years of dedicated research and development to get the TGV project off the ground.

Any similar project in the UK wouldn’t require the same amount of technical research and development as we can import the knowledge from a wealth of international organisations already successfully running high-speed services. France and Germany are the European leaders, GEC Alstom and Siemens being the main technology companies behind the TGV and ICE (InterCity Express). In Asia, Japan has been researching highspeed travel for many years, Hitachi Rail providing the bulk of the technology.

After reading many documents published by the SRA and CBi, it is obvious that any future highspeed lines in the UK will use an amalgamation of the technologies available. Like the new CTRL domestic services, the lines will be built and specified to the European standard, but will probably use Hitachi built rollingstock. This is because currently, Hitachi produce some of the lightest rail vehicles in the world. The benefit of lighter vehicles is less wear on the rails, which in turn means lower maintenance costs.

A report in the Guardian newspaper this week revealed another interesting twist in the UK highspeed rail story. Chancellor Gordan Brown recently visited China to discuss trade and industry. While he was there he was invited to take a ride on China’s new TransRapid Maglev (Magnetic Levitation) train that connects Shanghai with the new International Airport 19km away. The Transrapid system is currently capable of 550km/h (342mph), but remember the system is still young and Transrapid are confident that higher speeds are attainable with further development.
Upon returning to the UK, it has been revealed that Gordan Brown and Tony Blair have been discussing a similar project for the UK, albeit on a much larger scale. Siemens and ThyssenKrupp, the German companies behind the TransRapid system, have already jumped on the band wagon and given a quote for Â£16bn that would create a system providing Maglev service that traverses the British Isles between London and Glasgow, via Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Newcastle and Edingburgh. That cost includes all construction, infrastructure and locomotive costs, but doesn’t include the cost of purchasing the land required. But for Â£16bn, the UK would invest in a new transport system that would drop times to these impressive figures;

London < ---> Birmingham
Presently: 1 hour 10 mintes;
TGV: 40 minutes; saving 30 minutes
Transrapid: 20 minutes; saving 50 minutes
London < ---> Manchester
Presently: 2 hours 9 minutes;
TGV: 1 hour 20 minutes; saving 51 minutes
Transrapid: 50 minutes; saving 1 hour 29 minutes
London < ---> Leeds
Presently: 2 hours 30 minutes;
TGV: 1 hour 40 minutes; saving 50 minutes
Transrapid: 1 hour 10 minutes; saving 1 hour 20 minutes
London < ---> Newcastle
Presently: 3 hours 20 minutes;
TGV: 2 hours 20 minutes; saving 1 hour
Transrapid: 1 hour 40 minutes; saving 2 hours 40 minutes
London < ---> Edinburgh
Presently: 4 hours 50 minutes;
TGV: 3 hours 30 minutes; saving 1 hour 20 minutes
Transrapid: 2 hours; saving 2 hours 50 minutes
London < ---> Glasgow
Presently: 5 hours 20 minutes;
TGV: 3 hours 40 minutes; saving 1 hour 40 minutes
Transrapid:2 hours 10 minutes; saving 3 hours 10 minutes

The times above reflect average travelling times, including the preceeding stops, i.e. non-direct services

The concern with Maglev when compared to conventional highspeed travel on rails is simply interoperability. TGV type trains can run on existing rails as well as dedicated highspeed tracks. Maglev trains can only run on Maglev tracks and conventional trains cannot use those tracks. Although this would ensure there were no delays for Maglev trains stuck behind slower vehicles.

Maglevs have an advantage that their tracks can be built on stilts, allowing the tracks to float across farmers fields at 20 metres above the ground ensuring land purchasing costs are much less. Maglevs also do not suffer from problems such as ‘leaves on the line’ or snow, as the train floats 20cm from the track deck; Transrapid also boast that the Maglev can clear upto 20cm of snowfall.

So what now?

First of all Britain has to decide now! Whatever route we decide to take, it will take upto ten years to see it realised, longer in some cases. Secondly we have to decide how to pay for this. The current Government will want a public/private partnership. If the UK decides to go with a wheel on rail solution, then unfortunately this will be unavoidable under the current setup. If the we opt for a Maglev solution, then this would be a real opertunity to reclaim the ‘Maglevs’ for the people, with a publically funded system.

To pay for this, and to lower current rail fairs, there are a number of things the government can do. A higher rate of tax on fuel duty and air travel will be a start. Fuel duty worked out at the pump to the type of vehicle and the number of passengers; an SUV with one driver only should pay the highest rate of tax.

An unpopular route would also be to toll our highways as well. In the short term this would have a detrimental effect as it would push even more commuters onto trains that are already at capacity. However, once the infrastructure was inplace this system could be sensibly introduced.

All new and existing stations and depots should utilise wind and solar energy to provide power to the buildings and services. This would lower operational costs and more money could be spent on the network and/or subsidise passenger fares.

Finally, Green Tax. A tax system for residential and business properties across the country. The tax, which could potentially be as complicated as our current tax system, should work out the carbon footprint of each property, heating, lighting, recycling, waste and travel and then tax accordingly. Taking a bus and/or train to work would be less expensive than driving to work on your own, for example. This also would be unpopular in the current climate, but then the climate is at stake here to.

This could save our transport system, and in turn save our dependence on our cars and oil. Mass transport systems do work as we know, but they need to be invested into and maintained to become truely effective. There is much more at stake than just our journey to work.