Why Southern all the time?

[Splitlink]

As an outsider looking into the UK

Why is it Southern Rail, all the time?

Is it out of step with the other rail services in the the UK?

 

[tomorton]

It seems here we have an unusually inept company and an unusually leftist union.

One or the other might win this dispute, but most likely both will lose in the long term.

 

[Mr. Charts]

It's the passengers who keep on losing.
Whilst being against the far left union militancy and strikes, I happen to think the union is right about wanting to keep guards on each train. Yes, there are plenty of trains without guards on other regions but the cost of one guard per train is a drop in the ocean compared with the huge revenue from passengers and most passengers would quite rightly prefer a guard on board from a security and boarding/alighting safety perspective.
That doesn't justify the carefully timed strikes the far left neo-communist unions have called.

 

[Splitlink]

We have had "driver only" only trans in Barcelona for as far back as I can remember. Ticket machines have done away with a lot of platform staff, too. We do see security guards, though, with dogs, who travel up and down the line. Ticket inspectors get on the trains once in a blue moon.

The service seems to work frequently and on time. Very few people fall on the line! In one station (Provenca) they had an experiment with a barrier along the platform with gaps where the train doors open. No more, though, so that must not have worked, or was found to be unnecesary.

I expect that we shall start having strikes when the driverless trains come in. It's a matter of time. Southern crews will have to come to terms with it.

 

[Mr. Charts]

Yes, when I've been in Barcelona I've been very impressed with the underground: lifts for disabled people, cleanliness, efficiency. And in a very left wing city.

 

[sminicooper]

(Brexit and the Consequences thread)

We supposed to have privatised railways. So why isn't there another freaking company running the same line??? Because there is no competition. It's a freaking private monopoly. SCREAM indeed. Who thought this great idea up? Answers on a post card.

From the time the railways were first invented and in private hands there was never any kind of competition to benefit the passenger – only a particular kind of inter-company competition designed to benefit the shareholder (and outdo the canals and help the profits of mine owners). Rather ironical that many governments, nationalisation, pseudo-privatisation and nearly 200 years later, not a lot has changed and there seems to be little prospect of improvement.

Attilla has hit the nail on the head with the idea of running competing services on the same line. In all walks of life the customer benefits when he has a choice. Those poor sods in "Southern" territory don't even have the choice to take it or leave it. As usual, there's all sorts of political nonsense being tossed around e.g. re-nationalisation (that would be a joke wouldn't it with the unions totally in control). More government legislation "to limit/ban strikes"? - that's just what certain sections of the community would like and I'm sure the descendants of Arthur Scargill are waiting in the wings and would relish the fight – that's not going to benefit Southern Rail passengers any time soon is it?

There needs to be a complete rethink of the rushed and botched pre-election John Major privatisation, prior to which the taxpayer poured money into a nationalised pit and now pours it into a part-nationalised part-privatised system instead: no significant changes there then? – certainly not for the passenger anyway. I hold little hope that anything sensible will get done: the unions and this government and private interests are all pulling in different directions. And yet, on the Midland Mainline (latest reincarnation is East Midlands Trains) which is my territory, we have an excellent service which is an example of how good it can be.

 

[forker]

The government should set out plans to allow home working as a solution to relieve stress on public transport. Anyone who is not client facing should be able to work from home which to me represents a very easy win for reducing congestion.

 

[sminicooper]

The government should set out plans to allow home working as a solution to relieve stress on public transport. Anyone who is not client facing should be able to work from home which to me represents a very easy win for reducing congestion.

Yup! That's really good thinking. Everywhere I've worked where we've been able to do that it's been really good both for the company and employee. The worker has the ultimate in flexibility of hours and dress code can be just whatever you want. Employer saves on office costs (big money these days) and we actually found productivity was better. A real benefit to parents with young kids who don't conform to the 9 – 5 routine.

But will the politicians see it that way? It means real money upfront (if the government are going to be sensible and pay the infrastructure costs of someone working from home) rather than promises to spend something in the future which can be dumped on the next government. Go-ahead companies (and those with the financial resources) can do this of course, but government needs to provide a real incentive for those who don't seem to care one way or the other and whose main interest is in doing what the accountants say is a good thing to do this week to keep shareholders happy. I live in hope.

............ Come to think of it, I wonder if they would sub me as a Trader?

 

[Atilla]

Where there are natural monopolies, there should be strong regulation and government control imho. Right now, Government is a joke saying this has nothing to do with me when clearly it is the main player.

In some respects, I reckon the Governement is stoking the fire with management to boot unions and the workers for political gain.

In most advanced leading countries (just look at our European neighbours) public transport is best when it is integrated and managed as one body. Then rail, road and sea and air routes can be managed with optimal operational productivity. This is beyond arguement and is just common sense. Public transport as a public service, in principal should be owned by government. Coach and or Bus travel lends it self to privatisation as one can easilly have any number of operators on the road. Rail travel sadly does not.

Public transport forms the platform and environment for all businesses to operate. If one has a messed up public transport system, one has poor productivity. Politicians wonder why UK productivity is belowh neighbours???

Time spent travelling, costs, pollutes and demotivates the workforce adn the public.

In contrast SouthWest Management will get an extra 25% bonus on their several hundred thousand and some million pound salaries whilst the rest of the people suffer.


If Tories don't sort this out it is going to be a main vote winner for the party that reflects the will of the people down here in the South.

 

[Atilla]

Yup! That's really good thinking. Everywhere I've worked where we've been able to do that it's been really good both for the company and employee. The worker has the ultimate in flexibility of hours and dress code can be just whatever you want. Employer saves on office costs (big money these days) and we actually found productivity was better. A real benefit to parents with young kids who don't conform to the 9 – 5 routine.

But will the politicians see it that way? It means real money upfront (if the government are going to be sensible and pay the infrastructure costs of someone working from home) rather than promises to spend something in the future which can be dumped on the next government. Go-ahead companies (and those with the financial resources) can do this of course, but government needs to provide a real incentive for those who don't seem to care one way or the other and whose main interest is in doing what the accountants say is a good thing to do this week to keep shareholders happy. I live in hope.

............ Come to think of it, I wonder if they would sub me as a Trader?

Unless one is actually producing manufacturing goods, service industry relies on data access and manipulation, email and communication.

There are now many VOIP SaaS solutions in the cloud. Once you login to the system, anyone calling your telephone number is directed to your location.

Infrastructure is pretty much already in place. Upgrading broadband to fibre optics would help and once again add to improving productivity. Reduce energy spent transporting people too.

Governments have taken their eye off the ball really and the mind boggles what they do with respect to future strategic planning these days. South Korea has the fastest internet access, whilst some of our regions and locations don't even have broadband.

OpenReach is another freaking privatisation nightmare.

Privatisation will improve competition, reduce prices and provide choice for the public they said!!! :whistling

Feel rant coming on so will sign off.

 

[forker]

They are going to have to face the heat at some point. There is a limit to funding and options in relieving the inevitable congestion that comes with population growth. It seems like they are sweeping it under the mat for the next parliament to deal with.

 

[Splitlink]

From the time the railways were first invented and in private hands there was never any kind of competition to benefit the passenger – only a particular kind of inter-company competition designed to benefit the shareholder (and outdo the canals and help the profits of mine owners). Rather ironical that many governments, nationalisation, pseudo-privatisation and nearly 200 years later, not a lot has changed and there seems to be little prospect of improvement.

Attilla has hit the nail on the head with the idea of running competing services on the same line. In all walks of life the customer benefits when he has a choice. Those poor sods in "Southern" territory don't even have the choice to take it or leave it. As usual, there's all sorts of political nonsense being tossed around e.g. re-nationalisation (that would be a joke wouldn't it with the unions totally in control). More government legislation "to limit/ban strikes"? - that's just what certain sections of the community would like and I'm sure the descendants of Arthur Scargill are waiting in the wings and would relish the fight – that's not going to benefit Southern Rail passengers any time soon is it?

There needs to be a complete rethink of the rushed and botched pre-election John Major privatisation, prior to which the taxpayer poured money into a nationalised pit and now pours it into a part-nationalised part-privatised system instead: no significant changes there then? – certainly not for the passenger anyway. I hold little hope that anything sensible will get done: the unions and this government and private interests are all pulling in different directions. And yet, on the Midland Mainline (latest reincarnation is East Midlands Trains) which is my territory, we have an excellent service which is an example of how good it can be.

It needs a good "think" tank dedicated to this, I see a lot of problems with competition on the same line. In fact, I don't see how it can be done. That is why the railway system has such a take it or leave it attitude and the main reason for the increase in road transport. Competition is possible, there. However, road transport could never lift the millions of passengers that a train service does. The train owners are laughing at the public and the public must come up with an answer to it.

We have train strikes in Barcelona, now and again, but it is all done in a, rather, genteel way. The public are warned days in advance with noticeboards, etc. and what happens is that services of 6 minutes are cut to15 minutes after 0730 until 1400 (for example). It is all done in a rather apologetic manner towards the public. Rather like the way the Spanish think the British do things. I know, and British residents know, that things ain't quite like that!

 

[forker]

I have always been of the opinion that upgrading our city train services to allow for double decker trains to be a solution on existing infrastructure. The problem is costs and interruptions will make this option very low down the list of possibilities.

 

[Atilla]

It needs a good "think" tank dedicated to this, I see a lot of problems with competition on the same line. In fact, I don't see how it can be done. That is why the railway system has such a take it or leave it attitude and the main reason for the increase in road transport. Competition is possible, there. However, road transport could never lift the millions of passengers that a train service does. The train owners are laughing at the public and the public must come up with an answer to it.

We have train strikes in Barcelona, now and again, but it is all done in a, rather, genteel way. The public are warned days in advance with noticeboards, etc. and what happens is that services of 6 minutes are cut to15 minutes after 0730 until 1400 (for example). It is all done in a rather apologetic manner towards the public. Rather like the way the Spanish think the British do things. I know, and British residents know, that things ain't quite like that!

That's a laugh. 15 min delays are considered on time here. You can only ask for a partial refund if your train is delayed by 30minutes or more. Even then trying to claim is a headache - day after day after day.

 

[Mr. Charts]

SouthWest is a different company to Southern. Please take care not to mix them up, Atilla.

SouthWest is poor, Southern is appalling beyond words.

All my close family members are already able to work from home on days when they are not client facing and this will increase as our manufacturing base declines and our service industries increase - if
those industries aren't damaged by a decrease in exports to the EU.

 

[sminicooper]

It needs a good "think" tank dedicated to this, I see a lot of problems with competition on the same line. In fact, I don't see how it can be done. That is why the railway system has such a take it or leave it attitude and the main reason for the increase in road transport. Competition is possible, there. However, road transport could never lift the millions of passengers that a train service does. The train owners are laughing at the public and the public must come up with an answer to it.

We have train strikes in Barcelona, now and again, but it is all done in a, rather, genteel way. The public are warned days in advance with noticeboards, etc. and what happens is that services of 6 minutes are cut to15 minutes after 0730 until 1400 (for example). It is all done in a rather apologetic manner towards the public. Rather like the way the Spanish think the British do things. I know, and British residents know, that things ain't quite like that!

In fact, it's already been done in the UK more by accident than design and not immediately apparent. E.g. you can travel from Bedford to London virtually same route but 2 different companies, same thing to a limited degree on the East Coast mainline and there are other examples. I used to commute to London from Surrey (not on Southern Trains thank God) and although it was the same company mostly (but not completely) there were alternative routes/times/London destinations – this was useful when there were technical or engineering failures. It does actually show that this sort of system could work.

 

[sminicooper]

OpenReach is another freaking privatisation nightmare.

Yes – it beggars belief that nothing has been done about that. Do the politicians really understand that we've left the days of metal bashing in this country and the future is high-tech?

 

[sminicooper]

I have always been of the opinion that upgrading our city train services to allow for double decker trains to be a solution on existing infrastructure. The problem is costs and interruptions will make this option very low down the list of possibilities.

This was actually tried in the late 1940s in an attempt to alleviate commuter overcrowding (nothing new in the world is there?) on the then recently nationalised Southern Region of British Railways. Designed by a rather clever and innovative Irish railway engineer (he also made a locomotive for the Irish railways that ran on turf) it wasn't a success – you could pack the passengers in but the loading and unloading times and awkward physical access just didn't work well enough. The other problem is that the British loading gauge is smaller than the continental one and you can't make the trains any bigger without basically rebuilding the line – prohibitively expensive and inconvenient. Now, if we had stuck with Brunel's 7 foot gauge it wouldn't have been a problem.

Short explanatory video here

 

[Splitlink]

In fact, it's already been done in the UK more by accident than design and not immediately apparent. E.g. you can travel from Bedford to London virtually same route but 2 different companies, same thing to a limited degree on the East Coast mainline and there are other examples. I used to commute to London from Surrey (not on Southern Trains thank God) and although it was the same company mostly (but not completely) there were alternative routes/times/London destinations – this was useful when there were technical or engineering failures. It does actually show that this sort of system could work.

What happens if trains run late, though, as Atilla says? How does the competition overtake? I guess that it is not that kind of competition, but that is the type that is needed, so that the passsenger can reject one service over another.. A lousy bus, or airline, service, will, soon, go out of business,

 

[forker]

This was actually tried in the late 1940s in an attempt to alleviate commuter overcrowding (nothing new in the world is there?) on the then recently nationalised Southern Region of British Railways. Designed by a rather clever and innovative Irish railway engineer (he also made a locomotive for the Irish railways that ran on turf) it wasn't a success – you could pack the passengers in but the loading and unloading times and awkward physical access just didn't work well enough. The other problem is that the British loading gauge is smaller than the continental one and you can't make the trains any bigger without basically rebuilding the line – prohibitively expensive and inconvenient. Now, if we had stuck with Brunel's 7 foot gauge it wouldn't have been a problem.

Short explanatory video here

Yeah i figured that much with it being on the highest end of the costs. I also suspect they would need wider tracks and they would need to deal with changing every station as well as dealing with bridges.