Fate of rail passenger service in various countries

[jis]

This is not unique to Mexico.

Many African countries for example use a lot of second-hand European (especially French) equipment and in some cases keep it running with minimum maintenance. I believe Argentina, Chile and Egypt have some ex-Spanish equipment (some of it extensively rebuilt and modernized). You can find second hand German trains in places like Iran and in several Balkan countries.

(just to name a few examples)

I guess many of these systems would not be able to afford new equipment. Second hand equipment at near scrap prices is thus their lifeline and is what keeps these railroads afloat. Although that is changing somewhat with Chinese manufacturers offering new trains at a substantially lower cost.

Iran actually manufactures some of its own rolling stock and even exports them. For example Pakistan Railway runs a bunch of Iranian imports.

China is not the only player in the rolling stock market outside of the western manufacturers. There are countries like Indonesia, Iran and even India and such doing brisk business in addition to China, South Korea and Japan. Bangladesh for example is swimming in Indonesian and Indian manufactured passenger cars both air-conditioned and non air-conditioned.

 

[cirdan]

Iran actually manufactures some its own rolling stock and even exports them.

China is not the only player in the rolling stock market outside of the western manufacturers. There are countries like Indonesia, Iran and even India and such doing brisk business in addition to China, South Korea and Japan.

There are lots of niche rolling stock manufacturers, and in fact quite a few not so niche but quite big ones who we just generally don't get to hear very much about if we are not specifically following developments in the countries concerned. Interesting stuff happening in South Africa too I have heard for example. In many countries there is also an astounding engineering capability that can remanufacture, modernize and improve second hand equipment they procure, and this knowledge base could possibly over time evolve into manufacturing from scratch. There are plenty more manufacturers and potential manufacturers than a one-sided look at the somewhat consolidated western market might suggest.

But I guess what I was trying to say that second hand equipment is not necessarily a bad thing or a sign that a railroad is on its last legs, but that its procurement can in some cases be a totally rational decision and be used to provide a totally adequate service.

 

[jis]

Oh yeah. Specially for countries with less than spectacular rail budgets second hand can be the mainstay. But there are many countries which have healthy new rolling stock manufacturing ability and others who do not do second hand even though they don’t manufacture e.g. Bangladesh imports from Indonesia, India and China.

Of course Indian manufacturers taken together are nothing to sneeze at. Over 6000 cars and 400+ locos a year is pretty respectable I’d say. Of course the locos are more electric than diesel and many of the cars are part of EMU or DMU sets.

 

[JontyMort]

In all my years of studying British rail that's the most articulate defence of Beeching I've ever read.

To be fair to Beeching, it should also be said that the report, as well as advising closure of unprofitable and/or sparsely-used routes, also stipulated investment in the remainder. Needless to say, the governments of the day were much more willing to forget that part.

 

[jiml]

To be fair to Beeching, it should also be said that the report, as well as advising closure of unprofitable and/or sparsely-used routes, also stipulated investment in the remainder. Needless to say, the governments of the day were much more willing to forget that part.

Canada used a similar model.

 

[Willbridge]

Edmonton's trolley coach fleet included some of British Columbia Electric's original CCF Brills. That turned out to be an important piece of trivia when a judge ruled that "No Smoking" signs must have the correct municipal by-law number. No one had noticed that the by-law quoted in the ex-BCE Brills was the Vancouver number. As there had been no outbreak of smoking on those specific used buses we let them go to the scrapyard with their BCE interiors unrenovated.

The life of these T-44's stretched from 1947 to 1962 in BC and from then till the Commonwealth Games ended in 1978. The maintenance cost per mile was one-tenth of the mid-1950's GMC Diesels retained into 1978.

 

[Anderson]

I think Beeching would never have been able to totally gut the UK system as the UK rail system never fell into the type of marginal insignificant role that the US system outside of the NEC did. Even in the darkest years, there was a considerable and consistent system-wide ridership on BR that could not easily have been absorbed by the roads. In many cases rail was also considerably faster and more comfortable than driving, and large cities, especially London, were even then heavily afflicted by congestion meaning that closing the commuter lines was simply unthinkable.

Beeching reduced the system mileage of BR by about half, but reduced passenger miles by only a fraction of that. Many of the lines he closed were extremely marginal or indeed duplications of other routes and would sooner or later have had to close anyway. France and Germany have seen their systems shrink by a similar amount (if not more) but over a longer period of time. So what Beeching essentially did was apply a shock therapy that permitted BR to concentrate on the routes where it mattered. It was of course a huge and regrettable waste that this came so shortly after the modernization plan with lots of near new equipment becoming surplus and having to be written off.

In terms of the freight network, Beeching reduced this by more than the passenger network, but also managed to reorganize the rather backward and slow system and create profitable corridors, as well as accelerate the introduction of things like intermodal services.

One other thing in the UK is that the "commuter network" around London covers a non-trivial portion of the country, so there was only so far that you could cut the network before serious practical issues with getting cars into downtown would have been an issue. One way to think about it is that if you had a version of the US that was only north of the Potomac River, you'd probably have a decent network in the region (almost all trains being day trains) simply because the basic networks needed for NYC, Philly, Boston, and DC-Baltimore are not insubstantial.

 

[cirdan]

To be fair to Beeching, it should also be said that the report, as well as advising closure of unprofitable and/or sparsely-used routes, also stipulated investment in the remainder. Needless to say, the governments of the day were much more willing to forget that part.

To be fair, the modernization plan was a considerable investment and almost all of it came from the government.

The problem was that it was badly thought through, poorly managed and failed to substantially improve the attractivity of the railroad in many areas.

But let's not forget that the 1960s to early 1970s saw the electrification of the West Coast Main Line as well as several other lines and also a massive expansion of electrification in third rail territory in the south of England. There has not been a comparable electrification push to this today, even though today one would think the arguments for it are much harder to ignore.

One massive mistake that Beeching made was that none of the abandoned railroad ROW was ever safeguarded or railbanked.

In the 50 years that have passed since then there have been huge demographic changes and places that were insignificant back then have significant populations now and there are quite a few lost routes whose reinstatement would make sense, but is made uneconomical because the original ROW can no longer be used, at least not without a lot of eminent domain.

Then there are also routes such as Didcot - Newbury - Southampton that don't serve any noteworthy traffic in their own right (which is why it was closed) but would today provide a much needed diversionary route to keep freight away from the constrained passenger junctions at Reading and Basingstoke. Especially when you consider that the rail industry is saying that the reason that they aren't running more freight trains out of Southampton docks is that there isn't route capacity.

 

[JontyMort]

Then there are also routes such as Didcot - Newbury - Southampton that don't serve any noteworthy traffic in their own right (which is why it was closed) but would today provide a much needed diversionary route to keep freight away from the constrained passenger junctions at Reading and Basingstoke. Especially when you consider that the rail industry is saying that the reason that they aren't running more freight trains out of Southampton docks is that there isn't route capacity.

Reading isn’t actually too bad now. The recent rebuild provided grade separation on the west curve to the slow* lines (the four-track main is paired by use).

*Slow is relative here - the limit is 100 mph between Reading and Didcot. This minimises the inconvenience for Cross-Country, whose trains can use the slows and then untangle themselves in the (non-conflicting) reversal at Reading.

But - as you say - Basingstoke and, to a lesser extent, Didcot are seriously constrained for traffic from Southampton to the north. Those constraints would have applied in spades at Newbury and Didcot if the Didcot, Newbury & Southampton still existed.

 

[AmtrakMaineiac]

Compare British rail fares to German and you'll find the former sometimes a lot more. Still, the service is pretty good and the overnight "Caledonian Sleeper" and its "Club Car" (let's hear it for smoked salmon) are great.

I think at least part of the reason for high UK fares is the "privatisation" scheme with separate train operating companies that lease trainsets from rolling stock companies and pay Network Rail for access, the national organization that owns the infrastructure. All of these various layers (except Network Rail) are private companies that have to make a profit so that gets passed on to the users.

I wonder how all this would be if, for example, the airlines had to: 1) build & maintain all the airports, 2) pay taxes on it all like railroads, and 3) pay the personnel, from air traffic controllers to custodians. Or let the waterborne carriers build & maintain all the ports, pay taxes on it all, pay for all the dredging, and build & maintain all the locks & dams.

This is complicated by the fact that unlike rail, the air traffic infrastructure also handles military and private owner aircraft, the latter being mostly well to do and with some political clout, which provides justification for government involvement.

 

[cirdan]

I think at least part of the reason for high UK fares is the "privatisation" scheme with separate train operating companies that lease trainsets from rolling stock companies and pay Network Rail for access, the national organization that owns the infrastructure. All of these various layers (except Network Rail) are private companies that have to make a profit so that gets passed on to the users.

I don't believe this is the case as Britain already had Europe's highest fares before privatization.

I am unable to offer a full explanation of why this is, but I think definitely many European countries subsidize their systems more generously. So what people don't pay through the farebox they pay through the taxman.

Also, fares are actually quite difficult to compare on a one to one basis as for example the privatized UK system has been good at doing yield management and is offering lots of attractive fares to fill empty seats during times of low occupancy. So what you pay as a tourist or a pensioner maybe, when you can be flexible about when you travel, does not at all reflect what a commuter has to pay, who does not have that choice. Germany and France have been moving more in this direction too recently. So British fares can if you are lucky be extremely cheap but if you are unlucky be very expensive.

 

[JontyMort]

I don't believe this is the case as Britain already had Europe's highest fares before privatization.

I am unable to offer a full explanation of why this is, but I think definitely many European countries subsidize their systems more generously. So what people don't pay through the farebox they pay through the taxman.

Also, fares are actually quite difficult to compare on a one to one basis as for example the privatized UK system has been good at doing yield management and is offering lots of attractive fares to fill empty seats during times of low occupancy. So what you pay as a tourist or a pensioner maybe, when you can be flexible about when you travel, does not at all reflect what a commuter has to pay, who does not have that choice. Germany and France have been moving more in this direction too recently. So British fares can if you are lucky be extremely cheap but if you are unlucky be very expensive.

I agree, particularly about your last sentence. Even for commuters, the season ticket discount is/was significant on some lines. Pre-pandemic, my Worcester-Birmingham annual fare was £1,250 - not bad considering I expected to make the return journey (about 25 miles each way) 220-odd times in a year. Hybrid working messes this up to an extent, but some companies are experimenting with carnet-style discounting.

For leisure travel, it varies between very reasonable and eye-wateringly expensive. Even then, it would be interesting to know how many people on a given train are actually travelling on the most expensive “walk-up” fare. Very few, I suspect.