News Desk

UK Rail Network Planning Ahead

22nd July 2009


One of the complications apparent in the privatized UK rail network is the different planning horizons adopted by the various stakeholders. The Office of Rail Regulation, which controls Network Rail’s budget, works in 5-year control periods; the latest one, Control Period 4, runs from this year until 2014. The train operators plan around their franchise length. The politicians have much more short term objectives, with the Treasury concerned particularly about the next three years. The DfT tries to plan on a longer term, perhaps up to 30 years for some issues, but is constantly diverted by much shorter term issues. Meanwhile, railway assets have a life typically in the 40-60 year range, with some expected to last much longer. This mismatch of planning periods is unhelpful enough, but with assets having such a long life a long term plan is required in order to plan their upgrading or replacement. This is the main reason for the industry-sponsored report Planning Ahead, published on 26th May 2009.

With Control Period 4 having just begun, immediate issues of planning and investment are largely covered. However the industry needs to plan for what happens beyond, and the report therefore focuses on where the industry needs to be in 2014-2019, or Control Period 5.

The starting point is some kind of ‘vision’ about where the industry needs to be, followed by the eminently logical corollary of what the rail industry needs to deliver and how it should deliver it. The vision is perhaps of necessity not very scientific, but is sufficiently general to be broadly uncontentious. In short order, the railway will:

• continue to be the safest form of transport;
• meet expectation of all classes of customer;
• provide competitively-priced services;
• is seamlessly integrated with the rest of the transport system, allowing rail to complement and compete with other modes;
• offer improving value for money;
• bring clear economic and environmental benefits.

There are some small observations one might make about some of these, but these points will be picked up in due course. The outcome of these initial thoughts will, after consultation, be included in Network Rail’s long term planning framework, to be published next year.

By 2014 a large number of significant projects will be complete or nearly complete, increasing network capacity in places, but not everywhere where it might be needed. Meanwhile customers’ expectations will have risen, further efficiency improvements will be demanded, great pressure will be applied to switch transport demand to more carbon-intensive transport modes like rail and policies will have been sharpened to integrate transport and land use planning rather better than today. Importantly, it is thought that despite the current recession UK rail use will have doubled by 2039, meaning that drastic improvements will be needed to the network which will have to be started much earlier, almost certainly within Control Period 5.

Amongst other things, the ‘vision’ requires system capacity to be doubled within 30 years (and possibly increased by the same amount again later) simply to cater for rising demand without increasing train crowding or strangling freight growth. It means a 7-day railway, too, not one that is closed on Sundays (and sometimes Saturdays as well).

The outputs designed to deliver this vision are as follows:

Safety. Safety levels are rising as safety planning improves and this trend must be made to continue during system enhancement. Modern equipment and operating methods are expected to deliver this.

Capacity. Even without specific initiatives to generate travel inter-urban flows are likely to double owing to general market growth and increasing market share. This will cause huge problems unless capacity is increased. Dealing with rising commuter demand, not just around London, is an intractable problem. Freight growth is set to continue and seems likely to reach a 20 per cent market share. This is going to take some time to analyse satisfactorily, and then to plan and deliver.

Train Performance. At present industry performance is generalized. While this is useful to an extent it hides individual successes, problem areas and local trends. With the system coming under further intense pressure it will be necessary to become much cleverer at identifying and eliminating problem areas suggesting new means of monitoring might be needed, perhaps trading some performance with capacity provided.

Availability. The industry recognizes the need to work towards a 7-day railway. This might need radically different operating methods, such as more use of diversionary routes and single line working. The ‘Availability’ heading might well have covered making the railway more accessible to parts of the country not well served; this issue isn’t really covered but there is a reference to a further document ‘Connecting Communities’ which is reviewed by us elsewhere on this site.

Quality of Service. Not a great deal is said here except that there was a lot of research and more is apparently needed. A clearer view of overall customer expectations was thought necessary against which specific costs and benefits might be gauged. It is a little surprising this doesn’t already exist in an adequate form.

Carbon. Government targets require carbon to be reduced by 20 per cent by 2020 and 80 per cent by 2050. This sets the trajectory within which rail must not only clean itself up but divert traffic from less carbon-efficient modes (and some heroic assumptions about how those modes will at least in part clean themselves up making rail’s task harder). This implies significant increase in rail market share and reduced energy waste, amongst many other things. Putting plausible metrics behind all this will be quite challenging.

Cost. Costs must come down. Network Rail appears to be responsible for most invariable industry costs and significant reduction can only be achieved by different ways of working. In particular, existing practices must be challenged and the industry must work much harder to understand whole-life costs of assets and the maintenance required. Some self congratulation about progress made so far in reducing costs is noted, but this was from a very high base and profound change in methods has yet to manifest itself.

The specific strategies that are discussed include:

Network Enhancements. Some reliance is placed on the delivery of HS2 (High Speed Line 2) striking out from London to the North West and relieving the West Coast main line which is expected to reach capacity by 2020. The Midland and East Coast main lines will also reach capacity shortly afterwards and will need a great deal of investment to make them fit for further growth. The London commuter services are a huge problem. Some services will respond to resignalling and train lengthening, and perhaps revised service patterns and elimination of some single line sections. In many cases this will only mean a temporary respite and major new works like track remodelling and even new lines will be necessary. Freight using these routes must not be overlooked either. All this will be very difficult and a number of studies will shortly be undertaken to look at the long term options on commuting lines, not just in London.

Electrification. At present just 40 per cent of the rail network is electrified, and further electrification offers opportunities to reduce both cost and carbon. The Great Western and Midland main lines appear to be amenable to fairly rapid electrification, and some Scottish lines. Since the report was published electrification of the Great Western main line has been announced.

Stations. Some effort is required to update most of the portfolio of 2500 stations. This includes providing additional capacity at many of them and providing more consistent services and higher levels of accessibility. Stations might be given a wider reach by introducing Park & Ride, and by providing additional stations.

Rolling Stock. The report suggests that shortage of rolling stock needs addressing urgently and considerable new stock will be needed in the future. In particular it observes that previous procurement strategies have given the supply chain many difficulties and the process needs to be improved to get the best value. Existing programmes to procure new trains are applauded, and described as ‘desperately needed’.

Operational Strategy. This is basically about rolling out new signalling technology in the form of the European Rail Traffic Management System (currently on trial in the UK) which will improve system performance and reduce costs.

Integration with other modes. This heading is a bit thin (as are most references to Transport Integration in the rail context). There is nothing new in it and nothing will happen unless a great deal more imagination is brought to bear in this ‘Cinderella’ of areas for improvement. ‘The car will remain a principle mode of access to stations for the foreseeable future’ the report states. So that is that, then?

Finally, the report wraps up where it believes progress has reached so far. By early next year:

• The study into the HS2 route will have been produced;
• A Network ‘Rail Utilization Strategy’ will have been produced highlighting electrification, stations and rolling stock requirements;
• A longer term view of the Strategic Freight Network will have been produced;
• A cross-industry Technical Strategy Advisory Group will have assesses technical developments.

These inputs, amongst various others, will feed into future network planning, but some ongoing work streams will need to be pursued to answer some more difficult questions. These are to determine passenger requirements for service levels and quality, exactly what long term outputs the railway will need to deliver, links with other areas of government policy (especially funding and land use), and a methodology for bringing all these disparate areas together into a single long term plan which looks beyond the immediate Control Periods.

The report does identify a number of generic option types which appear to be inescapable and will simply need tweaking as the planning process proceeds. These include:

• Further incremental capacity improvements where necessary and where not likely to be made redundant by larger schemes necessary later;
• A project plan for HS2 (assuming positive business case);
• Rethinking and optioneering role of the suburban railway;
• Station improvements on a large scale;
• Incremental electrification;
• Selective journey time improvements;
• Extention of strategic freight network;
• Enhanced international freight connectivity;
• Continuation of minor improvements using the Network Rail Discretionary Fund (mainly for local TOC-sponsored local improvements).

On the whole it is good to see the industry finally getting itself into the driving seat to take forward network planning. There is some cause for hope if these aspirations are met and a sensible, deliverable plan can be produced to which all party’s sign up. It will make it easier to justify whatever government contribution might be necessary, and demonstrate that the rail network is part of the ‘solution’, rather than part of the ‘problem’.