Why I don't use the train
 

I would like to think of myself as "caring" about the Environment.

However, evidence would suggest I'm not as caring as I think...

I drive about 10,000 miles a year.
Mainly with just me in the car, sometimes with a bag.
Some of the miles are for work and some are justifiable.
I also took 10 flights in 2005 and another 10 (including 4 internal flights) in 2006.

If I really cared about the environment maybe I should use the train? Especially between major cities...
Sometimes I do - but only when work are paying (I actually get paid to drive but when going to London it's not practical).
This is mainly because of the outrageous cost of travelling by train.

Getting a return train to London (if I want to get there before midday) costs approximately £200.
To fly costs £60.
To drive maybe £80.
It's a no-brainer really.

This is all assuming trains are on-time (which they seem to be better than before but still can be irritatingly cancelled or delayed for seemingly no reason).

Now train prices have just gone up again.
No doubt this will be followed by the cost of driving and flying going up again.
Followed by train prices going up again.
Why are we being fleeced so much just to travel round our beautiful country? :(


Anyway, this is sparked by reading this article that tells you how to save money on your train journeys.
Ideas are:
Get a year railcard for the Isle of Wight which gives you discount on all other rail journeys in the UK.
Get a train further than you want to go and get off early (although if an inspector catches you doing this you can still get charged the full whack apparently)
Split tickets at a station on route (but you still don't need to get off the train)

I thought I would share it with any train users here so you can save a bit of money travelling to the next GD meet ;)

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Honestly, dont feel in any way guilty about using air travel when the trains are so expensive and unreliable and using a car is being deterred.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I justify it to myself by saying "the flight would still happen whether I'm on board or not so the environmental impact is minimal" but it still leaves me with a bit of a guilty conscience.

Maybe I should plant a tree or something...

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The article's wrong about this. You can always leave the train before the destination printed on your ticket (as long as you're actually on a route that will eventually go to the printed destination). If an inspector gets arsey just wave a copy of the Conditions of Carriage in his face.

(Apparently the only exception is something called a "Megatrain" ticket, which actually states that you can't end your journey early. So don't buy one of them (whatever they are).)

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

lovely article .. thank-you very much :-) (I'm a infrequent train user)

I like using the train, despite the timetable issues its is alot nicer to sit and read a book on a 3hr journey than stare at someones rear lights, or on a longer stint, sit and eat when u want to, not have to wait 50 miles to use a toilet, or even sleep .

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

if you feel that bad about it you could offset things but doing say a weeks voluntary work helping the environment - they do tree planting and stuff.

But at the end of the day if the powers that be didnt keep chopping down the natural rain forests and such that help stabilise our environment then maybe air travel wouldnt be so damaging.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

More information can be found here for anyone interested - http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi...54104247,31062


The above link says "Virgin, for instance, will not sell saver fares from Chester to London at peak times, but it will sell savers for journeys starting in Wales - absurdly making it sometimes cheaper to travel further. This does mean you could buy the longer ticket for less, and save a lot, but this is called travelling 'short' and sadly it's a no go as it's against the ticket's terms and conditions."

I'm sure no inspector will care too much though...

I don't feel that guilty... I switch lights off and stuff so I'm better than average...

And I agree about your second paragraph as well...

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

i quite often (used to, although i did for the meet last year) bump the train from darlington to york, which although i know it was bad did save me an awful lot of money

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I travel regularly on coaches (both Megabus and National Express) and trains between Cardiff and London. Coaches are almost always on time unless you're coming back into London during the evening rush-hour, in which case you can expect to be half an hour late. But this is guaranteed, once you've done the journey a couple of times you can just plan for it.

Trains I rarely have any problems with. They usually leave on time, and if you get delayed mid-journey they'll do their best to speed up once past the affected area.


Car lovers forget that they can encounter any number of hold-ups during their journeys. Accidents will slow down any motorway to a snail's pace, roadworks force you down to 40 mph (and those pesky average speed cameras make you stick to it), and rush-hour on the M25 is the entire reason why automatic cars were invented.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

What are they going to do if you hop of early though? And how are trainfares regulated? Here we can get a tickey and hop off if we want to continue our journey an hour later ....

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The main reason I use my car is because it goes from door to door.
If I lived right next to a station (well I do, but not many trains stop there) and I was going somewhere next to a station then I'd perhaps get a train. Unless it's a hell of a lot cheaper to drive (which it is normally) or the train took longer. Or wasn't at ideal times etc etc.
You're also really restricted in the times you can go.

What do you do if you're stuck in traffic on the way to the station? You miss your train/bus and it adds on more time to your journey.

To get to work I have the choice of Bus or Car.
Despite living near a station, and working near a station, I'd need to get a train into manchester and then back out - probably taking me over an hour and a half. a Bus (which pretty much goes the same route I drive) takes 45 minutes. I drive it in 15-30 depending on the traffic.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The only long-distance journey I make with any frequency is Edinburgh-Liverpool return, which I can do for about £38 with my railcard, adding in a local train in Liverpool to and from my house to bring it to £41ish. Even with a 10% rise that's only £45, about £15 less than the petrol a car would have guzzled on the same 526 mile round-trip.

At Christmas I made the downward journey in about 5 and a half hours, door to door. In fact, that's pretty much what it takes by car, especially considering I'd made the journey on the Saturday. Coming back was about 6 hours, on the Wednesday. I didn't have a seat for about 45 minutes of that journey but otherwise it went pretty smoothly. In Edinburgh I live close enough to the station that I can walk it comfortably in 20 minutes, with enough time to have a crafty fag before I go in.

London is of course a different story, but an awful lot of ruckus comes up about these things almost exclusively based upon travelling to and from the capital, a journey which isn't reflective of an average citizen's travel. I'll admit that when I have had to go to London on the train it's been more hassle than doing the one-change Edinburgh->Liverpool (even though the London train's direct), but it's hardly earth-shattering, I don't come out the other end of it with post-traumatic stress disorder and assuming I'm not retarded with my travel times it doesn't cost me the Earth. Travelling by train's as much of a pain in the ass as people choose to make it. Plan for problems, leave earlier than you need, take a book and realise that an hour's delay here or there really isn't much bother, and things go a lot smoother than wigging-out because your late train will miss a connection at York (which you cunningly planned to be the very last train out of York that could possibly help you), or because you're spending a shit-tonne of money getting a train that'll get you into London for 11am when you could have spent half that for one that would get you there just after lunch.

What the hell happened to Britain's stiff upper-lip? We're turning into a bunch of whiny tarts.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I use the train virtually every week and long distance journeys to and from Aberystwyth for Uni. Arriva Trains Wales have put there prices up more than Virgins increase. Yet they cant manage the train track and are ALWAYS 10 minutes late - result is me having to run from one side of Birmingham New Street to the other within 3 minutes, whilst being laid down with backpacks, laptop bags and the occasional student.

Eventually prices do rise but surely they should only rise when train companies are actually doing there job?

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

the main problem i have with the trains is the sheer difference in ticket prices, i mean, for one journey to london from where i live you can get something like 15 different tickets.

if they simplified the system it might make things a lot easier

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I've not found trains to be too horrific (even when venturing outside the M25), but the range of fares on offer does seem kind of strange (flights aren't much different though).

London does seem to benefit quite a lot by having things like Transport for London - and it's not often I sing the praises of centralisation.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I drove 30,000 km (20,000 miles) last year in my poluting diesel lease car. When I still went to Aachen, a 90km single trip that took me over an hour, I looked into the options to go by public transport.
My town -> train station Venlo : 30 minutes
Venlo -> MönchenGladbach : 30 minutes
MönchenGladbach -> Aachen : 60 minutes
Aachen -> my work : 15 minutes

So even not taking prices into consideration, public transport is not an efficient option, and I did not even take into the account the time it takes to transfer between busses/trains. 2.5 hrs versus 1 hr is just too much.

Nowadays my drive to Eindhoven is about 35 minutes, with public transport it would well be over 1.5 hrs and 15 euros for a single trip, 30 a day. About half of my nett earnings.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Does anyone think rail privatisation was a good idea by the way?

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

if your travelling to the south .. and have to pass through london .. ask at your station if there is a route that goes round london, its actually cheaper to travel round london.

when venture up to nottingham from home .. i get the bus to stanstead airport costs me £5 takes 30 mins to get there, from stanstead i go to nottingham .. at a discount of about £20

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

No.

But the frontline staff (not management) now are exactly the same people who worked under BR and latterly the Railtrack subcontractors so basically nothing's changed.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I would shudder to call an industry more heavily subsidised now than it was under BR privatised. Perhaps if done properly it could improve certain aspects of the railway industry, but certainly not all at once in the short-term.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

As JBG said, it hasnt been privatised in any meaningful sense - its still pretty much run by the government (by the time you sum up all the rules and regulations, not to mention funding), and individual train companies are still protected from market forces and not able to compete with each other.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

They changed the prices for the Train from NW Indiana into Chicago. It used to cost me 6.35 one way, and they raised it to 6.50. Granted this fare isn't that bad as it's about a 50 mile drive, and with all the stops it takes about the same amount of time. The advantage I like is not having to look for a parking space which usually will run you 10 - 20 anyway. The only disadvantage is you need a cab to get around if it's not within walking distance, and that can get quite expensive.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The average consumer isn't bothered what colour the train is and what uniform its staff wear, just that it gets to where they're going without undue delay and expense. We've seen with the buses what market forces do. Routes get cut and fares go up, unless you live in an area with heavy subsidy and control (London).

Basically I think private companies have no business in a fundamentally loss-making core network. They just skim the profits and do an "alright" job. Hull Trains is to be commended on running a wholly commercial operation with no subsidy.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The buses in Manchester are brilliant (at least on the route from where I live into the city)
About 5 bus companies do the same route, there's a bus every couple of minutes from 6am to 3:30am every day and it costs between 60p and £1.60 for the 30 minute trip. (you can get a week pass for £3)
Admittedly the buses are old, loud and shit but still...

In London it cost me about £2 to go 3 stops down the road so I wouldn't say there is heavy subsidy there really at all.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

oyster cards make bus fares far cheaper here. I get free travel by bus now anyway so I'm quite oblivious to the bus fares :(

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

That's not the "real" price, that's just a penalty to force everyone to get Oyster cards (and annoy tourists).
It's debatable how open they could be to market forces in most cases (in terms of customers) because of structural issues in the network. Sure, you can go from Edinburgh to London more than one way but I suspect most commuters are stuck with one specific route to do their key journey. I'm sure there are methods you could have genuine competetition but it's not trivial, given the inherent restrictions on rail travel.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

orly

Also taking a car means you can't get into central london without paying congestion charges, parking charges, and you have the added hassle of having to drive there and back. Which is slower and means you can't sleep or whatever on the train.

The flight doesn't actually cost £60, as you haven't taken airport tax into account, which is usually £50 in total from both airports.



The best form of transport, which you ignored completely, is actually buses. Especially in London. They're a bit slower, but they're cheaper and (I believe) economically better for the environment. They also run all night (well they do in london).

Did you seriously drive everywhere when you lived in Croydon? The trains+bus service was excellent.



Yes.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The cheapest single to London for tomorrow to get there before 12 is £58.50.
(although weekend prices might not be standard)

Looking at Monday/tuesday - If I want to go on monday to get there before midday and return tuesday leaving between 3:30 and 6 - the cheapest fare is £219 on thetrainline.

When I was travelling down I was going to the Gatwick Hilton so add on extra time and cost to get across London.


It depends where you are actually going though doesn't it. By "London" I could mean Croydon, Harrow, Sidcup, Barnet etc where I'm visiting friends but can't get there by public transport without going into London and back out again.
If I was going into central London then no, I definately wouldn't take a car. Or I'd drive to my cousin's and get the tube in from there.

My last flight to London Gatwick from Manchester cost me £55 all in.
Now they've put prices up but it certainly isn't £50 worth.
Checking for flights for monday returning tuesday using skyscanner finds that I will pay under £100 for Manchester to Heathrow. Getting there and back at roughly the times I want.
Booking more in advance will obviously make a difference.

Looking through my emails here are the prices I found and emailed to the work travel booker over a month before I travelled (and yes - the thing started at 12 so I had to be there before then):

Buses are perfectly fine for inner city travel (so long as you are only going in or out of the city centre) but for longer distances they aren't.
Also, if you don't live on a regular bus route they, like trains, are useless.

The trains are fine, so long as you are going into London or to Gatwick/Brighton. Try going From Croydon to West Wickham (where one of my offices was) on public transport. It required a bus, then a tram, then a train. Going to Sidcup - No chance - train into London then train out again taking over an hour for what would be a quicker drive.

I never tried the buses but seeing the problems I had with traffic trying to drive to places like Brixton I doubt they're that good.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Generally speaking public transport from one suburb to another (e.g. Croydon to Sidcup, Bromley to Wimbledon) is patchy at best. It's fair enough really, historically there was little need for travel between these places. Also, with places like West Wickham, most people have cars so there's less need for buses, etc.

In the next ten years we'll have progress in this area though, given the population growth projected in these sorts of places.
Bus lanes are a god send in this regard (although don't apply everywhere).

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

ste: get a young persons railcard since you're under 25. That way, the train journey costs £40 instead of £210 because peak fares dont apply!

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I have trouble understanding why people don't get young-person's railcards, they're effing invaluable.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Then surely the article is correct? 'Sometimes' you violate the conditions of carriage by ending a journey early (it's in there, annoyingly), with the condition being that the ticket must state this (and that you're aware of it when you buy the ticket).

You can't always do something if there are exceptions to the times you can do it

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The Megatrain scheme is vile. How any rail company can justify charging passengers 70 miles away from London a quid, while forcing people from just outside London to pay several times more is beyond me :(

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Well, you pay what a rail journey is probably worth.

Beyond a young person's rail card rail journeys are a rip off.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I'm too old. :(

(I've had a Gold card for the last few years so I think I don't need one, even if I wasn't clinically dead.)

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I'm really not looking forward to the day I'm too old. And it's only a couple years off =(((((((

But by the point I'll have a personal jetpack and everything will be :cool: again.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Steep prices!

In Finland a 6h train trip (Helsinki-Oulu, south to north, one way) in 2nd class on the fastest trains are ~80e or ~110e in business class.

If you don't travel long distance, that 80e is enough to cover 30 days of trains/bus/metro usage around the capital and its surrounding suburbs (~40mins into all directions). Student price is 30-40e. Single tickets cost between 2.2e to 3.6e.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

you work in Eindhoven now? you should come visit me for coffee some time. :p

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I assumed he had one :(

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Oh sure... You don't happen to hop around on the Philips high tech campus do you?

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Why?

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Because overall, while the ticket prices are probably higher, the service and number of trains running has vastly improved. Of course some places miss out but in my experience, there have always been plenty of trains running to places I want to go.

Even when I was in Exeter, the train service was top-notch. I'm sure that if it was nationalised there would be at least half as many trains running. While cheaper, I'd rather have a good service and pay for what I get.

Of course there's the dubious area of privatised companies scrimping on safety to get a higher profit, as we saw in 2001 with that big crash. Since then, I haven't heard of any major train crashes. So it seems that the current system, where it is (supposedly) privatised, but controlled rigidly and thoroughly by the government, seems to be the best.

Having said this, I've only travelled further north than London on one occasion, up to Manchester. The train service on that one occasion was excellent though (and not too expensive either, even for a student).

I never experienced the rail service before it was privatised (Jersey has no trains) but from what I've read and heard from other people, it is better overall than before. While there will always be faults, and there will always be people finding fault with it, I do think it's one of those industries that works better under privatisation than nationalisation. Simply due to more companies = more trains and more competition = better service. Unfortunately the supposedly common rule of more competition = lower prices doesn't seem to be working.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

There's no (fundamental) reason why the same couldn't have happened under a nationalised service. New trains weren't bought through efficiency savings (yet) but through debt private companies took on (against the assets they were sold). Arguably, the only real benefit to part-privatisations like this is that the state books look better for the government of the day.

Also, according to some sources the private companies are receiving (collectively) more state funding than BR did in the first place.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

Potters Bar was because Railtrack were criminally incompetent. This is an unsupported statement and I'll withdraw it if someone finds figures one way or the other, but I'm fairly sure service provision has dropped on most lines since privatisation (not all; I know Virgin have upped it on the West Coast line for one, but I think the unprofitable local services have been pretty much crushed completely since privatisation - and those were already the ones that Beeching didn't get to because they were so important to the people living on them.)

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

The number of rail services, in real terms, as decreased. The less popular routes are being cut out of the services, while the numbers are boosted by an excessive number of trains between the most common destinations, even if they're not being used.

I don't think the lack of "big crashes" subsequently supports your argument, as Railtrack has been replaced by Network Rail, which is owned by the government.

In any case, "big crashes" aren't exactly the only ways in which rail companies have failed - the performance figures remain pisspoor, while walk on ticket prices have skyrocketed. The average ticket price is about the same, allowing for inflation, as it was under british rail, but this is due to the networks slashing the prices on season tickets and tickets bought in advance, rather than any actual reflection on how ticket prices have changed.

Controlled rigidly? The government is controlling this about as rigidly as they do IT suppliers, with non-competitive shortlists, rewards for failure and the like.

Neither of these things are entirely true. There are indeed more services running in total, but this is done by sending out many, short, trains, which creates problems for, say, people trying to get to work in Newcastle from Durham as there being three times as many trains between ten and eleven won't help that much.

As to the "competition" aspect - why is there competition? A franchise is won by a single operator, there's noone for them to be competing with.

Transport isn't something that works with competition, as many bus services have shown. Standard business tactics of undercutting the opposition until they go out of business, at which point you hike fairs to higher levels than they ever would have been, and the like, are not uncommon. This is not exactly what you want from a transport system.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

So was Hatfield!

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I think there's massive differences across the railways. I mean where I live, Southern and South West Trains have become miles better and run to time, with shiny new trains and the like. There's no doubt that in the south at least the service is better. In contrast, central trains (when I was up in the midlands) are an absolute disgrace, with late, dirty, cramped trains. In fact they are being abolished pretty soon I believe.

Part of it however, is because the timetables have been fiddled with across the board, so train journeys can now officially take longer than they used to. The problem with breaking the railway up into franchises is that you get idiots bidding for tenders who just want to make money rather than provide a proper service and on top of that, the service is bound to be less integrated.

The fact is the railways in some areas now have a service to speak of. People want to use the railways again, and more trains isn't necessarily the answer - it's more capacity.

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

There is a HUGE difference between the companies.

Yes Railtrack were Criminally Incompetant.

Anyone remember the Kings Cross fire :-( that was cost cutting creating criminal incompetance also, if they had just paid someone to clean under the esculators .. it would never have happened .
(on a side note, just after kings cross my ex got a job doing the cleaning, he said they would spot a small fire every couple days for the 1st few months, but once they had done every one, all that was required was a quick clean up and they saw none, a shitty job, he was filthy when he got home, and i am unsurprised that tragic event occured with the tales of what they found under them))

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

yes they pollute, they they cost more to buy, yes the sound like a tractor, yes they are slow but...

diesel anyone?

good mileage and the engines last forever!

Re: Why I don't use the train
 

I built 200 hours of flight time, 14000 miles on my car, and 3000 miles on my dads motorcycle this year. Roughly.

Does this make me environmentally unfriendly?