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Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

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Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#221

Post by short_sells_poo »

martinald wrote: post #168
owisd wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is just another “bendy bananas”-tier myth. The UK was never forced to privatise because of EU competition rules, see, for example, France, an EU member state that retained publicly owned railways during the same period. There are EU competition rules that require separating operations from infrastructure, but it is and always has been fine to do this as separate divisions under the same publicly owned umbrella.

Not true. The EU is taking Netherlands to court for not allowing private companies (not state owned) to bid on the main passenger routes: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_25_... De facto it is required, and you see that in Germany - many routes are not operated by DB anymore.

I don't understand how is this "forced privatisation"? There's nothing preventing a state owned rail company from operating, no? All this says is that private companies must be allowed competitive access. Am I missing something?

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#222

Post by qcnguy »

fergie wrote: post #176
terminalshort wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't convince me. Companies commonly handle situations like this just fine. I know because I have seen it. I think you are the one who fell for the propaganda here.

Your informative, water-tight argument has convinced me.

But you haven't made an argument, so you're in no position to criticize. You asserted that "train drivers became rarer due to shareholder reluctance to train and recruit them" and then didn't back this strange claim up, just said "I'm right" in different words. A sociology degree isn't convincing btw.

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#223

Post by hexbin010 »

wtcactus wrote: post #3

I hear these stories about UK private rail system being terrible for more than a decade now. But, truth is, I go there frequently and the times I had to use it it was quite fine. Lots of trains and they arrived on time (and they were fairly clean). It was much, much better - by any account of imagination - than the public railway we have here in Portugal. And I’m guessing they cost the taxpayers a lot less too (but t…

Which part of the UK out of curiosity?

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#224

Post by hexbin010 »

phobotics wrote: post #17
wtcactus wrote: post #3

I hear these stories about UK private rail system being terrible for more than a decade now. But, truth is, I go there frequently and the times I had to use it it was quite fine. Lots of trains and they arrived on time (and they were fairly clean). It was much, much better - by any account of imagination - than the public railway we have here in Portugal. And I’m guessing they cost the taxpayers a lot less too (but t…

I think a lot of people in the UK would agree with this. It's not perfect but the rail system on the whole is pretty great for getting around the country. There's some annoying things like having to go to a hub to go back the way you came sometimes. But without a sprawling expensive network that's somewhat unavoidable. And obviously some lines are worse than others re delays and cancellations. Most complaints in the…

> I think a lot of people in the UK would agree with this. It's not perfect but the rail system on the whole is pretty great for getting around the country

In the South East, or if you're employer is paying for 1st class, definitely agree.

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#225

Post by qcnguy »

dcel wrote: post #212
tompagenet2 wrote: post #111

As always this is grossly oversimplifying. As well as the misleading safety stats, as graemep has noted, it ignores that journeys just absolutely exploded under privatisation [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privatisation_of_British_Rail ]

Graham Dennis (author of the article) absolutely does not ignore this. He regularly points out that Irish rail ridership exploded almost in lockstep with GB rail network growth despite remaining entirely publicly run. Even right at the top of this article he points out that the growth had begun long before privatisation. He goes into a lot more detail in his book.

The growth didn't happen long before privatization in the UK though. It turned around almost exactly when the privatization process started (which wasn't an immediate overnight event).

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#226

Post by ant6n »

jhonof wrote: post #178
oersted wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a middle ground that is quite common across Europe: a private company that has the government as a shareholder. I think it is reasonable for subsidies to be structured just like private investments rather than a donation. The public should reap the rewards of the money they invest in their country through taxes, just like wealthy investors do. It's a question of perspective. I've spent my life in countries w…

> There is a middle ground that is quite common across Europe: a private company that has the government as a shareholder. Interestingly, Quebec in Canada has been loosely following this model recently and it's working great. Long video but interesting if you like infrastructure stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlHqqA0onn0&t=532s TLDR: CDPQ invests on behalf of the Quebec Pension Plan, and has been building inf…

CDPQinfra deals in Quebec are wonky at best.

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#227

Post by selimthegrim »

xnorswap wrote: post #209
TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is incorrect. The biggest accidents - Potters Bar, Hatfield, Southall - happened in the years immediately after privatisation, before passenger numbers had grown much. The problem was more that - in typical privatised fashion - the industry was treated as a cash grab, and property speculation and other side quests got more management attention than running a safe railway. That first incarnation was so bad it was…

I remember reading an article in the journnal of the RSS about whether it was actually less safe or whether it was just statistical clustering. I don't however remember the conclusion! I've tracked down the article to https://academic.oup.com/jrssig/article-abstract/4/1/15/7029... but I don't have access.

It says there’s no evidence for that hypothesis.

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#228

Post by hexbin010 »

rsynnott wrote: post #73
wtcactus wrote: post #3

I hear these stories about UK private rail system being terrible for more than a decade now. But, truth is, I go there frequently and the times I had to use it it was quite fine. Lots of trains and they arrived on time (and they were fairly clean). It was much, much better - by any account of imagination - than the public railway we have here in Portugal. And I’m guessing they cost the taxpayers a lot less too (but t…

British trains are _terribly_ expensive, and get cancelled a lot, has been my general impression (from next door in Ireland, another country with a notoriously bad rail system, though it is at least cheapish). As someone else mentioned, London (and really urban commuter services in general) are essentially separate; the problems are _primarily_ around the regional/intercity stuff. One specific consequence of the priv…

> Earlier this year I visited Manchester. The airport to city route is operated by _two_ rail operators, on the same line. You buy a ticket for one service or other. I bought a ticket for operator A because their train was next. A few minutes later that train was cancelled, so I had to watch as a couple of operator B trains passed and wait for an operator A train.

As of June 2025, there is automatic ticket acceptance rules between those operators now in the case of cancellations and disruption, as both Northern and TPE are owned by the DfT.

Great British Railways will continue these kind of sensible changes (though not cheaper tickets, that's for sure!)

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#229

Post by Starlevel004 »

rmoriz wrote: post #206
bluGill wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Train drivers are mostly obsolete. More than 20 years ago full self driving trains became a reality in several areas. Since a train cannot stop if something is on the tracks anyway, we can ignore safety issues. The computer tells the track to switch, and then the train to go when the track is clear. When it is time to stop the computer stops, and the doors are exactly in the right place to align with the doors on the…

What happens if signalling or mechanical failures occur and manual intervention is required? I will collapse the network, that’s why you see conductor-less operation only in separated environments, like subways (Nürnberg) or DLR (London)

Even the DLR has drivers onboard to take over in an emergency.

Re: Britain's railway privatization was an abject failure

#230

Post by joncrocks »

gcanyon wrote: post #82
komali2 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree and am working on an article arguing that Japan rail privatization represents a failure, as does its much lauded pedestrian friendliness. The premise is basically that Tokyo is the busiest city on planet earth and so should therefore have the best public transit and pedestrian infrastructure by a huge margin, when in fact it still gives unbelievable space to cars (Shibuya crossing should have been permanen…

> As for trains, during rush hour trains can be so full you might be squashed against the door unable to move I don't know why this never occurred to me before, but: is there a reason they can't run more trains or higher-passenger-capacity trains? The demand is obviously there, so the question is: do they like it super-crowded?

Often you are limited by dwell time + track separation.
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