Jasper Tomlinson introduces an intriguing debate...
I am old enough to remember Brigadier Lloyd’s paper ‘Potentialities of the British Railways system as a reserved road system’, which he read to the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1955.
Government subsequently asked Dr Beeching to tell us how to make railways profitable - a financial issue. The better question, which he was not asked, was how the rail network, a 19,000 mile major national asset, should be operated in the national interest. That is, an economic rather than a financial question.
What did Lloyd actually mean by a reserved road network? Essentially he proposed paving over the rails and licensing freight, passenger and public service vehicles to use the network. Lloyd’s paper led to the Railway Conversion League (1958 – 1994) some of whose reports indicated that rail conversion can lead to four times the capacity at about one quarter the cost.
UK railways - with un-repayable debt in terms of infrastructure investment, presently at £50bn or more, and an annual £5bn subsidy - are in trouble. The current annual subsidy averages about £200 per family. Less than half the population are using trains, probably because of cost.
Mark Carne, CEO Network Rail, gave evidence in May to the Transport Select Committee describing rail transport on a trajectory to more failures over the next two decades, partly because of insufficient capacity.
The Network Rail programme that has been launched to rescue railway travel is known as ‘digital rail’. Mr Carne promised by the end of 2016 a business plan for digitalisation, a 25-year agenda. The plan, expected to include costs and benefits, envisages a possible capacity increase of up to 40% - but it has not yet been released.
Digitalisation on the railway of every aspect of train use can allow trains to move as smartly as is physically practicable. However, to update a failing Victorian engineering triumph, is it enough just to aspire to a 40% capacity increase? The urgent problem is a doubling or tripling of capacity and a halving of cost to the passenger.
The reserved access that railway tracks actually own, even after Beeching, into all major urban centres is a huge valuable public asset - why has it now become a very costly liability? How about, then, a level playing field debate at an open meeting between railway engineers and transport economists about the best use, in the national interest, of this network?
Unfortunately, no credible railway engineer is going to be allowed to take part in such an event. For over a year I have been finding qualified railway industry speakers who are then warned off taking part in any such debate. This topic is taboo…
So after failing for a couple of years to get a debate about the reserved road system idea a one-sided presentation at a public meeting has been arranged to explain the concept:
Rail in Crisis - for freight and passenger transport, could the rail network do better as a reserved road system? Do please come along and hear the case set out at a central London venue.
Wednesday 17th May 6.00pm for 6.30pm until 9pm. Conference Room of St James's Church Piccadilly (entrance to meeting in Church Place W1J 9LL).
Keynote Presentation by Dr Richard Wellings, Deputy Research Director IEA, and Paul Withrington, Director Transport-Watch. Q&A and networking.
Also please email jaspertomlinson@gmail.com if expecting to attend. Jasper Tomlinson MA(Oxon) CEnv London
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