From popular media and political comment, it sometimes seems that fare levels are a really critical issue for public transport, but in fact the role of detailed pricing policies and the wider funding equation are arguably far more important in delivering what users want and growing the market. Analysis of demand elasticity for metro networks worldwide (Anderson, 2011) actually shows that demand is more sensitive to change in level of service than to change in price. It shows, in particular,...

Derogatory phrases such as “Beeching the Butcher”, or “Beeching’s axe”  tend to appear in Britain whenever there is a reference to the wide ranging proposals he made to cut back the country’s rail services fifty years ago. Yet few who quote his name have probably actually read the Beeching report, The Reshaping of British Railways, in the half century since it was published. The dusty copy from the Institution of Civil Engineers’ library in London...

Delivering major city rail schemes is so expensive, complicated and integral to city economies that it is hard to believe that a purely private sector approach to finance could ever deliver them, even in an era of shrinking public sector activity. But it will be a new generation of public sector development bodies, with new powers and financial models that will generally drive them forward. Some examples of the new approaches are beginning to emerge. The massive Grand Paris Express...

D espite having historically one of the most comprehensive of the world’s urban and commuter rail systems, London has been playing catch up to Paris, and indeed other cities with S-Bahn-type railways, on its rail network development. While Paris has a mature cross city rail network in the form of its five RER lines, and is now moving on to developing its Grand Paris Express network of orbital super metro lines, London is trying to do both at once, and coming from a long way behind....

Biting the bullet on expensive, transformational, railway schemes is something that mainland European governments have been good at, as exemplified by the development of national high speed rail networks in various countries. But in France attention has turned to capital city Paris, and bullets haven’t come much bigger and faster than that of Grand Paris Express, a plan to revolutionise urban railways there, with a price tag to match. Spiralling costs and delays in estimated completion...

Though Paris and London have attracted attention by developing their regional heavy rail networks to supplement existing tube/metro lines through new cross-city tunnels, they are not the only cities who have taken their city railways beyond the traditional model of large stations at surface level. Elsewhere in Europe Vienna is replacing its South terminal station with a new central Hauptbahnhof station which will link together the routes which converge on Vienna, including international...

IIn quitting London bus operations, UK-based transport group First has made good on its promise to raise £100m through disposal of non-core operations, with the surprise sale of practically all its London bus operations to two foreign groups for £80m. But it raises some interesting questions about the difference in approach to tendered markets between UK groups and those from the rest of the world. First is to sell eight of its London bus garages – five with 494 vehicles in...

It’s 50 years since the publication in 1963 of two pivotal reports on British transport: The Reshaping of British Railways by Dr Richard Beeching, and Traffic in Towns by Colin (later Sir Colin) Buchanan. Both represented sea changes in the accepted transport wisdom of the time. What do they tell us today? Beeching’s report said that the then railway network was a financial basket case, with too many little used and loss-making secondary routes. It called for a focus on core routes...

UK transport is heavily influenced, as elsewhere, by political leaders. Transport problems and challenges exist at both a national and local level and it is Boris Johnson Mayor of London who New Transit believes has continued to be most significant in his interventions in transport over the past year and hence included in our top dozen power people. He faced an election last year against his old adversary Ken Livingstone, which he narrowly won, and then gained the reflected glory of both the...

It’s a public transport practitioner’s dream experiment: what would happen if a city made its public transport completely free, permanently? The Estonian capital Tallinn is finding out, because as of New Year’s Day, that is exactly what it has done. The city’s local authority says the move will “safeguard social cohesion of local communities by granting equal mobility opportunities to all social strata.” It is hoped that car drivers will find it an incentive...

The UK Technology Strategy Board is launching a funding programme for business-led innovation to stimulate the development of fuel cell and hydrogen technologies, with two new competitions: ‘Building Fuel Cell Manufacturing and the Supply Chain’ (up to £5 million) and ‘Supporting European Collaboration in Fuel Cells and Hydrogen’ (up to £1 million). The second project has the aim of encouraging collaboration with potential European partners to enable the...

First Group has sought to position itself in recent years as the UK’s largest transport group, and a major player on the world stage. When new chief executive Tim O’Toole took the helm two years ago there were acknowledged problems of both profitability and strategy. Things have arguably now got worse. The rail division is in turmoil after a new UK West Coast intercity franchise was snatched from its grasp and other franchise competitions put on hold (see below), and the bus...

Legal action, petitions, pleas to the UK Parliament, and plans for competing flights by dissapointed rival Virgin have followed the naming of First as the new operator for the West Coast train operating franchise between London, Birmingham, Manchester and Scotland. The franchise is the first of a significant batch to be re-let, embodying new government thinking on the running and development of the UK rail system. But it has raised questions of forecasting demand and how to ensure that an over...

The future of public transport in Britain will be more electric, the UK government has decided, as it begins the process of catching up with mainland European thinking on public transport power supply. It has given the go ahead to substantial electrification works on the country’s rail network, and a commitment to fund plans to reintroduce the first electric trolleybuses in the country, since the last one was withdrawn from Bradford in 1972. While European mainland railways are...

At Arriva’s UK bus division, a £1.5m programme is being initiated to reduce use of energy and utility resources. The programme has been driven primarily by the need to look across the business to minimise costs in response to challenging trading conditions. However, the new focus is also designed to deliver significant environmental benefits. Financial payback on the programme is expected within two years, demonstrating the value that targeted investments in environmental...

It is a win-win situation when the engineering, commercial and marketing departments of passenger transport organisations can find common cause in their business objectives, and a shared message to present to the public and political decision-makers. But the idea of ‘going green’ is increasingly providing just that opportunity - with improved economic and environmental credentials going hand-in-hand. Applying smarter thinking about how bus and rail systems are designed, equipped and...

Glasgow commuters will offered contactless smartcard payment on the city’s single-line circular Subway from 2013 as part of the system’s £288m upgrade. The Scottish Government is contributing funding for the system, developed by Ecebs and the Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT). It is due to be in place in time for the 2014 Commonwealth Games. At present there is a flat fare, and a new system will introduce lower rates for short journeys. To avoid people being caught...

With the Competition Commission’s review of Britain’s bus market now complete, the Government has launched its formal new bus policy statement. As expected there are no radical changes to the deregulated framework that has now been in place for some 25 years, or moves to bring franchising into play outside London, though Local Transport Minister Norman Baker kept the door open for English local authorities to pursue bus Quality Contracts with a measure of formal control, whilst...

National Express Group has highlighted that the UK government’s decision to scrap concessionary travel programmes for coach passengers last November will cost its coach division £15m of lost revenue this year. In its first quarter trading statement, the group said that “mitigating the lower profit” that the reduced revenue would cause would be the coach division’s major challenge in 2012. Initial progress following the launch of National Express’s own...

The UK Department for Transport has published a new rail demand forecasting framework developed by consultants Oxera and Arup that suggests current industry expectations of passenger responses to price and journey time changes may be wrong. It adds to an emerging understanding that the old principles and practices of revenue management are increasingly out of date. Commissioned by the DfT, Transport Scotland and the Passenger Demand Forecasting Council, the ‘Revisiting the...

The French passenger transport sector has achieved a strong and focused representative framework that brings the operating industry across all the modes together in a single body, which itself works closely with the parallel organisation for local transport authorities and their political leadership. The Union des Transports Publics et Ferroviaires now includes both urban bus and tram systems, and since 2006 the rail sector too, with ten rail undertakings including SNCF and Eurostar. A...

Three months before the victory of François Hollande as France’s new socialist President, his transport adviser during the campaign, Roland Ries, Mayor of Strasbourg and Senate member, presented the would-be president’s ten point transport plan.  The clearest statement to date of how President Hollande will approach this policy area, it reflects his wider campaign pledges to drive forward economic growth and public investment, address environmental issues and put equity...

A feature of France’s public transport system is that tram lines are much more common than in countries of a similar size and urban structure like Britain. France has 22 tram networks comprising a total of 41 lines. In the past twelve months new lines have been opened in Dijon, Le Havre and Montpellier. Britain has just five, including  the only long standing traditional network in Blackpool. French trams can be found operating in what would be regarded in Britain as quite small...