Title: Effective Capacity Utilisation Crucial for Freight Growth, Crucial for Network Management
1Effective Capacity UtilisationCrucial for
Freight Growth, Crucial for Network Management
- AGRRI
- 28 November 2003
- Graham Smith
2Contents
- Why make the effort?
- Competing demands for network capacity
- Recent trends in capacity utilisation
- Possible solutions
- Prioritising between demands for capacity
3Whats happening on the roads?
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5Freight by road more costs
- Working Time Directive, from April 2005
- costs an extra 1 billion a year
- needs another 21,000 skilled drivers
- Road user charging (lorry tolls), from April
2006 - supposedly cost-neutral but
- pay at point of use
- hit long-distance operations
- Skills shortage
- 45,000 HGV driver vacancies
6The significance of rail freight to the UK (1)
Many sectors of UK industry critically dependent
on rail freight
- Coal to 16 UK power stations 800 trains a week
from pits and ports to power stations - Steelworks and automotive plants kept running
- Materials supplied to build UK infrastructure
road, buildings and rail - Deep and short sea containers from ports to
inland terminals
7The significance of rail freight to the UK (2)
- Local authority domestic waste
- Major rail industry service provider including
engineering trains for Network Rail - UK network services move wagons and containers
for a broad cross-section of UK industry - International traffic through ports and the
Channel Tunnel
8Benefits of UK rail freight
- Since 1997 rail freight has kept off the UK
roads - 600 million tonnes of goods
- 89.9bn net tonne kilometres
- Two million tonnes of pollutants
- 644 deaths and serious injuries
- 6.4bn lorry kilometres / 31.5m lorry journeys
- 800m of congestion costs plus
- 1.2bn of environmental costs (pollution, noise
and accidents)
9UK rail freight growth billion tonne
kilometres
10UK rail freight growth surface market share
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12Characteristics Passenger Trains
- Regular, relatively frequent service patterns
- Mainly discrete routes
- Demand during day
- Many require shorter journey times
- Massive peaking of demand
13Characteristics Freight Trains
- Business often depends upon running as few trains
as possible - National coverage crucial to meet competition
- Flexible access needed to meet competition
- Demand mainly during day but also evening and
overnight - Regular interval and bespoke services
- Single and multi-user
- Relatively flexible, but not always predictable
or regular
14Characteristics Engineering
- weekday working
- more productive
- cheaper labour
- safer
- advance planning allows better use of resources
- for some jobs longer possessions mean exploiting
economies of scale and scope - requires regular access times
15Recent trends Passenger Trains
- Significant growth since privatisation
- Increased frequency
- Competition on some routes
- New rolling stock nearly always has fewer seats
(especially high speed units vice coaches on WC,
GW and MML)
16Differential capacity trendsNetwork Efficiency
1996-2001 Selected TOCs
- Operator BR Sector Input Output
- Connex South Eastern NSE -1 15
- C2C Rail NSE 11 45
- Thames Trains NSE 14 3
- West Coast Trains Inter City 9 14
- North Western Trains Regional 12 14
- Scotrail Ltd Regional 15 15
- South Central NSE 3 23
- GNER Inter City 19 17
- Central Trains Regional 26 20
- Cross Country Trains Inter City 19 14
- Great Western Inter City 25 17
- Anglia Railways Inter City 46 26
- Midland Main Line Inter City 120 43
Input growth in train miles. Output growth
in passenger miles.
17Capacity differential has been most noticeable on
main lines
18Recent trends freight trains
- Longer average journeys, bulk and non bulk
- Expanding throughout the network but
- Freight will always try to increase its efficient
use of capacity - Access charges totally variable more traffic,
more charges - More high axle load wagons (EWS new coal hoppers
require 31 fewer trains to move a given tonnage) - More powerful locomotives
- Move to increase proportion of International
block trains to remove hubbing at Wembley - Rationalised wagonload trunk network
- New wagons 75mph or higher rather than 60mph or
lower
19Coal hopper
20Recent trends engineering
- Possession out-put down 40-50 since
privatisation - WCRM track renewal train productivity down 50
since 2001 - Current moves to improve asset knowledge still to
bear fruit - increase high out-put machines
- improve engineering planning
- Perception that the only answer is to increase
access time
21Possible Solutions
- Build more railway - Who pays?
- Redesign ironwork - Suitable for local situations
- New technology/signalling systems - Dubious
benefits, definite costs - Opportunities for improved network management?
22Better Operational Management
- Review operating rules allowing greater use to be
made of bi-directional signalling - Review operating rules allowing greater use of
permissive platform working - Reducing delay per incident through rule change
- Minor signalling redesign
- more closing up signals, eg, Watford Jn (also
when many platforms exit station on to same road) - more signals in tunnels
23Network outputs
The Regulator has stated that Network Rail should
maintain the capability of the network for
broadly existing use at April 2001 levels
- The size of the national network should not
decline - Network Rail should not reduce permanently the
permissible speeds on any route - Network Rail should not reduce permanently the
permitted axle loads on any route - The proportion of the network that is electrified
should not decline and - The number of stations and the facilities
provided in these stations should not decline.
24Capacity initiatives - freight
- Get more traffic into each freight path
- Allow 75mph vehicles to run at 75mph everywhere
- Maintain fit for purpose freight routes (such
as SC to ease WCML congestion) - Improve
- axle load
- loading gauge
- train length
25Capacity initiatives passenger
- Capacity Utilisation Policy / Route utilisation
strategies - Effect of competition on capacity
- Review high fixed, low marginal cost structure
- Targeting operator subsidy more on key
elasticities such as reducing off peak fares,
rather than funding increased frequency - Review loading on new services
- Requirement for new rolling stock to be capacity
efficient - Reward TOCs by capacity efficient performance
indicators - Providing peak resourcing top up support to
some operators rather than using blanket subsidy
26More efficient use of Engineering Access
Productivity could increase by 50
27Better not more possessionsWork at more
efficient times
- Standard 8 hour shift ceteris paribus
- Basic productivity Basic safety Key determinant
- Weekday High High Industry structure
- Weeknights Relatively low Relatively low Industry
structure - Weekend day Average High Industry structure
- Weekend night Low Relatively low Industry
structure - Review Schedule 4 culture which extends number of
possessions needed
28Prioritising between demands for capacity -
Operators
Work undertaken by Ove Arup to estimate short run
marginal value of Inter City and freight
business on two main lines
- Work shared with SRA
- Great value from peak passenger trains (high
loading, high fares, congestion and pollution
avoided) - Negative value from off peak passenger trains-
i.e economy better off if subsidy avoided and
fuel duty paid. Demand does not match capacity
requirement. - Freight benefits much smaller than peak passenger
but always positive
- Review value for money of continued growth in off
peak passenger trains
29Results of Valuation of Train Paths Study
- Train kms Net benefit2002/03 000s PA per
train km - First Great Western peak 2,750 78.40
- First Great Western off peak 9,050 (0.85)
- Freight on GW 11,282 7.90
- West Coast Trains peak 3,585 65.99
- West Coast Trains off peak 10,500 (7.01)
- Freight on WC 12,790 4.35
- 2010/11
- First Great Western peak 5,056 73.93
- First Great Western off peak 15,4800 (0.74)
- Freight on GW 22,210 6.94
- West Coast Trains peak 5,347 77.63
- West Coast Trains off peak 18,015 (4.86)
- Freight on WC 22,780 3.04
30Capacity utilisation on a mixed traffic railway
- Timetable must provide regular hourly path
opportunities for freight - Need to be quality paths - journey time important
- Connectivity between routes essential
- Cater for fluctuations in demand
- Development of new traffic
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