Saturday 2 May 2009

Barriers "improve access?"

The following is an extract from a Guardian article that appeared last month, by Dan Milmo:

"The government is considering a £250m stimulus package for the railways aimed at boosting revenues and passenger numbers. It is understood that Network Rail, the owner of Britain's rail infrastructure, has been asked to select projects that can be brought forward at a cost to the taxpayer of between £200m and £250m.

The measures are expected to increase train operator revenues by clamping down on fare dodgers, and increase passenger numbers by making rail travel more attractive for less frequent train users. Network Rail is considering investing the money in improving station access, which train operators believe will boost off-peak travel by attracting the elderly and mothers with young children.

Train operators are keen to sell more off-peak tickets because they are contracted to run a high number of services during quiet times of day, when there is less demand from commuters.

Network Rail is also considering bringing forward investment in ticket barriers. Fare dodging is thought to cost the industry 5% of its annual revenues, or about £270m, and the transport secretary, Geoff Hoon, has asked train operators to propose gating schemes. Lord Adonis, the rail minister, told the Guardian last month that such a scheme would be popular. "There is wide support from passengers for gating because they don't like huge amounts of people not paying for fares that they then have to subsidise." Station car parks would also benefit from the programme."


Richard Malins provided the following response to the points in the article.

The thing is this needs to be exposed before a wider audience, and someone must persuade Adonis, who they say has the brain and interest to see through the nonsense the DfT are peddling, to call a halt to it because:
a) the proposition is basically contradictory - install barriers and make rail travel easier to access and attract the elderly and mothers with children.
b) the estimated 5% of revenue is an unsubstantiated number and the true figures will be more complicated and vary according to circumstances - measurement is difficult and usually not done properly, if at all.
c) barriers only protect a minimum fare, their effectiveness declines with length of journey and are believed to reduce short distance fare evasion by around half.
d) outside the London commuter area the magnetic ticket technology does not properly support gating systems and it is thus highly unreliable where system geography and fares structures are complex.


It's also worth adding that no proper survey has been conducted (as far as CABYS is aware) to determine whether passengers actually support barriers or not. (The oft repeated claims that this is the case seem to come from the approach of Passenger Focus, the official rail watchdog. Passenger Focus does frequently support barriers but has expressed some doubts about the Sheffield and York schemes in particular.)

The story also gets covered in the Railway Eye blog:
http://railwayeye.blogspot.com/

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