Let the train take the financial strain

When old pal Nick and I visited the Lake District back in the early 1980s, our choice of transport was rather simple. Neither of us drove so we took the train. I can’t remember the price of tickets but I have no memory of saying and thinking ‘HOW MUCH?’ I remember how much I enjoyed the journey, too. Loco hauled (probably a Class 45 diesel) from Bristol, change at Birmingham New Street for the service to Oxenholme (probably a Class 87 electric) and finally a rattler (DMU) to Windermere. Last week, we had many more options. Drive at a cost of something like £60/70 in unleaded fuel, which included a number of trips around Cumbria or letting the train take the strain at a cost for two of us of a mere £283.20, excluding transfer to Bowness and any trips we wanted to do when we got there. I mean, it’s no choice at all, is it?

Admittedly, I have a geriatrics rail card which would bring the cost down to a modest £240 and if we’d purchased a two together rail card, we’d be looking at less than £200 but it’s still around three times more expensive than driving and it takes far longer on the train. Even with the M6 being an endless road of roadworks, or rather road non works, and speed restrictions, it took just under four hours to drive to and from Lakeland. All the train services involve at least one change of station, which is such great fun at a crowded station, and some journeys involve as many as four changes, all options taking much longer than four hours. With sincere apologies to the wonderful Greta Thunberg and everyone else who is trying to prevent the destruction of the planet I am not going to remortgage my house simply to fund a few days in the Lake District.

Until Covid-19 came along, trains were apparently more popular than ever. The extortionate ticket prices demanded by private monopoly train companies were justified on the grounds that you could not get a seat for love nor money. But who are the people paying for these tickets? Not the lower orders of whom I am one, that’s for sure. But Covid-19 did come along and now many trains are running largely empty.

I noted the empty trains speeding by when train-spotting at Scout Green and concluded, rather obviously, that no one was making money out of this, except the train operators who have course have a license to print money for their fat cat shareholders. It occurred to me that would it not make more sense to charge significantly less for tickets in order to fill said empty trains? Say, for example, that it cost us £100, less our two together 30% off rail cards, which we would then be incentivised to buy, in which case we’d seriously think about travelling by train. At the best part of £300 I would no sooner consider travelling to the Lake District by train than I would by bicycle.

So, what’s it to be? A public service or a privately owned monopoly existing purely to charge passengers as much as possible for the maximum profit to shareholders? In modern Britain, it’s always going to be the latter. Maybe it’s time to tear up the tracks and just build some more roads? I’m not sure I agree with my own suggestion here – actually, I definitely don’t – but sooner or later we’re going to need to choose.