Saturday 11 July 2009

Laurencekirk Reopens



The town of Laurencekirk is proud of their restored station. It was closed in September 1967 and fell into disrepair. This wiki image shows the extent of the decay only a couple of years ago when the platforms were gone and the building was in danger of being lost. Thankfully the Scottish Government decided to do something about this crazy sitatuion where a resonable sized town on a busy rail route has no station. The Station was restored and new platforms built. In May of this year it reopened and has been very popular with local people. The picture is from www.laurencekirk.info where you may see more pictures, details and find out more about the town.

Wednesday 1 July 2009

NXEC no more

Yesterday I was writing about National Express East Coast offering 20% off their lowest advance fares, today they are back in the news again, this time having lost the franchise to run trains on the east coast mainline. The route runs from Edinburgh (and points north), Newcastle, York, Leeds to London. It is one of Britain's most popular routes and was Intercity's flagship in the 1990's with the high speed 225 electric trains. Today the Government has anounced that it is taking over the franchase and will run it until a new operator can be found. Ironic that British Rail's most successful route is back in state ownership, for the second time. Yes it has happened before. GNER (Sea Containers) won the rights to run as it was then known Intercity East Coast. Soon dark blue trains, stewards in smart uniforms and perhaps something of a return to the great days of rail was around as GNER lead the industry for customer service. GNER won the franchise for a second time but then in 2005 it was taken over by the government. Why? They didn't pay enough money. GNER didn't win the franchise for their customer service, they won for agreeing to pay a 1.3 billion premium to run the route. It was unaffordable. At the time Gerry Doherty, general secretary of the Transport Salaried Staffs Association, said "GNER is losing the contract because it cannot afford to pay £1.3bn to run the service, while at the same time the government is giving Sir Richard Branson £1.3bn to run the West Coast line,". Fast forward two years to 2007 and the Government and National Express now think 1.4 billion is a realistic figure to pay to run the route. At the time many industry insiders were wondering if anyone had learnt anything. Clearly they have not. Its still unrealistic. Yes, the East Coast makes money, it made money for BR, GNER and National Express, or would have if the franchiase rates were realistic. Of course the Government is well known for their over optimistic economic predictions...

What does this mean for the passenger though? Well the trains have been almost all refurbished, tickets purchase will be honoured and tickets for future travel are being sold. Thankfully unlike an airline going bust there is nothing to worry about. The route will continue as is for the time being and the most likely outcome is that a new operator will continue where National Express left off (National Express itself changed very little from GNER other than the livery). It would be nice though for the money constantly spent on new brand images, re franchising and other waste to be spend on trains or lower fares though. Do I ask for too much?