You were warned - let's have a "Rail Rant"

... loosely based around this story on the BBC site ..

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8171009.stm

ATOC - they forget to say that it's actually ATOC Limited - therefore a company looking to make a profit in their own right ...

"Shadow transport secretary Theresa Villiers said the report was "scathing about the way Labour has run the rail franchising system". Now then Theresa ... who privatised the railways in the first place ??? Once again the government in power has to pick up the pieces of John Major's "grand finale".

I'll continue to pull out the Mossley to Manchester = £2-50 yet Mossley to Huddersfield = £9+ argument - same distance, same time - the reason being two different passenger transport executives involved.

Franchises are a joke - they're too short for anyone to think about making any substantial investment - because they ain't gonna get the return (i.e. profit) in the limited time available. You think about how many different companies are involved in any rail trip ... not just the rail companies but the leasing companies (no-one owns any bloody rolling stock) - the maintenance companies (Alsthom etc) - the companies who run the stations (not necessarily the TOCs) - the perpetual outsourcing that goes on (cleaning, ticket checking - yes the semi-useless Group4 in the Manchester area). When a train is late - the amount of cross-charging that is going on has helped to create several layers of bureaucracy that must be a nightmare to keep track (no pun intended) of - and naturally when it all goes to sh*t we have Network Rail (who happily pay their bonuses for failure - because they continually "move the goalposts") begging for extra Government cash, we have National Express "copping out" of their franchise ... meanwhile the customers that have been "sucked in" have to cope with worse/more overcrowded conditions. I always remember First Trans-Pennine talking of huge increases in passenger numbers - I ain't seen any increase in rolling stock - apparently it now takes years to get a new carriage built (what ever happened to BREL York, Metro-Cammell etc - even the new trams on the (privatised) Manchester Metrolink are being built in Austria !). Never mind - there's always the North/South divide as well - we can find £15bn for the Crossrail initiative in London ... but the Manchester MetroLink "Big Bang" becomes a damp squib (never did sort that extension out for the Commonwealth Games did they - well it wasn't in London was it ?) ...

British Railways/British Rail may well have had many faults - but to try and pick faults and lay claim/blame in this maze of profit-making companies these days is one helluva job ! I will say that Mr Branson and Virgin have given it their best shot - but unfortunately no-one in Government seems to like Mr Branson do they (scared) ?? He came up with the goods regarding trains - he was let down by the infrastructure (viz Network Rail/Railtrack - whatever they change their name to in order to attempt to restart life with a "clean sheet"). They even turned down his offer to do the National Lottery in a non-profit sort of way, preferring to let Camelot rake in the profits. They just seem to prefer to let people like Mandelson - sorry Lord Mandelson - back into the fold - now there's a useful member of society eh what ??

Hope they've fixed the fault on those semi-useless ticker-tape machines (see previous post) - another example of wasted money - I'd rather have an extra carriage and a "real" person announcing times/delays rather than a computerised system that changes the next train arriving "on a whim" - a system that only tells you "it's late" when you have already gleaned that information from your watch .. never mind - make the stations nice - the actual trains suddenly become an afterthought ... rant over ....
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