Paying for what? (From York Press)
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Paying for what?
10:54am Saturday 15th November 2008 in
I recently moved to Harrogate, but still have work commitments in York, so I am now a regular user of the Northern Rail train between the two.
The service is incredibly bad and is costing me money and business during a recession. For example, a recent train home was 15 minutes late (it’s a 30-minute journey).
It might not sound like much but I work long hours and get home late (after 10pm) so it eats into what little free time I have in the evening.
The train the following morning was 18 minutes late, which caused me to miss a meeting, which cost me £39. These are not isolated examples. The worst was when the train was 45 minutes late and I didn’t get home until 11pm. This is all in less than a month.
If you email Northern Rail, you get an automated reply saying they will respond within “20 days” – I’ve never known such poor customer service.
Also, the information screens at Harrogate Station don’t work (the station is operated by Northern Rail.) So you can’t tell if a train is going to be late. Finally, the trains are old and rickety and filthy.
I assume Northern Rail gets a massive subsidy from the taxpayer. Exactly what are we paying for?
Matthew Handy, Cheltenham Mount, Harrogate.
Comments(4)
pedalling paul
says...
11:29am Sat 15 Nov 08
Leeds to Knaresborough is within West Yorkshire PTE so gets a more frequent service.
Suggest looking up Network Rail's Route Utilisation Strategy for Yorkshire which is somehwere on the internet.
The Office of Rail Regulation also determine how much Network Rail can spend in coming years.
So lots of players i the game, and even if Northern want to increase services towards York, there are a lot of hurdles to overcome.
who2believe
says...
2:53pm Sun 16 Nov 08
bwhughes
says...
9:59pm Sun 23 Nov 08
Millions are being spent on upgrading the A1 in this area. It would not cost nearly as much to make the rest of York-Knaresborough double track.
I am sure that Northern really want to be able to run more frequent services. But that can't happen without some investment.
I agree that many of the trains used on the line are in a sorry state. However, with the pressure on government to electrify many lines, we could be getting a cascade of better diesel trains or even electrification of this line (possibly through the tram-train proposal)
bwhughes
says...
10:05pm Sun 23 Nov 08
Each year, Northern has to pay something like £144,000 to effectively 'rent' a 2-car Pacer train. That's not too far away from buying a brand new bus!
Considering they cost just £350,000 to BUILD back in the mid-1980s, this is huge profit generation. Trains like this should NOT cost this much to hire - in fact the ROSCOs should give up their control over them and let Northern Rail have enough money to make things better for the traveller and people on the A59 road who would benefit from reduced congestion.
If Northern didn't have to pay the ROSCOs this money each year, its trains would cost peanuts to run!
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