Freight leaders angry at blame for delays
FREIGHT leaders and passenger watchdog Transport Focus have hit out at train operating companies who are incorrectly blaming freight trains for delays to passenger services.
A RAIL investigation was sparked after the guard on a Southeastern service, on which Intermodality UK Managing Director Nick Gallop was travelling on January 23, attributed a late arrival into London Bridge to a freight train causing a late departure from Hastings.
Gallop checked RealTime Trains (RTT) and found the only freight train on the route at that point was “way ahead” of his service train.
A day later, RAIL was travelling on a Great Western Railway service from Paddington to Plymouth, and the guard announced the train was being delayed due to a “laterunning freight train”. A check of RTT showed the only freight service in sight was, in fact, running more than half an hour early.
And on February 1, Greater Anglia tweeted that the 1830 Norwich-Liverpool Street service would be ten minutes late through Ipswich “due to a late-running freight train”.
RTT showed the passenger train was only two minutes late through the East Anglian station, while the only freight train that passed through was on time as it passed through Ipswich. However, a GA spokesman told RAIL that the service was delayed as a result of an earlier freight train running late.
Rail freight leaders are on edge following a series of comments made by former National Infrastructure Chairman Andrew Adonis, who suggested that ‘platooning’ lorries should take the place of rail in transporting cargo after wrongly accusing freight trains of causing delays to his journeys ( RAIL 841).
Guy Dangerfield, Head of Strategy at Transport Focus, hit out at train operating companies incorrectly attributing delays to freight trains.
He told RAIL: “Passengers want to know the real reason they have been delayed. If it is because of freight then fair enough to say so, but don’t blame somebody else if it’s not true. The industry will only be able to rebuild passenger trust and confidence if it gives honest explanations when things go wrong.”
Gallop said train operators, freight operators and the Rail Delivery Group (RDG) need to be on the same page when communicating with passengers about delays.
“Being quick to pass the blame onto third parties (real or imagined) doesn’t help make a delayed journey any more palatable for the passengers involved,” he told RAIL.
“Knee-jerk responses defaulting to ‘freight trains’ won’t help improve the image of the TOC concerned, or the wider rail industry. The public deserves something simple and grown-up on the actual cause, what’s being
done, and how long the delay is likely to last.”
Echoing comments made by Gallop and Dangerfield, Rail Freight Group Executive Director Maggie Simpson told RAIL: “Freight accounts for only 2%-3% of passenger delays, and it is frustrating to see these cases where freight trains appear to be blamed where they were not the cause of the incident.
“We would like to see a more collaborative approach, which gives passengers and freight customers the information they need in a properly impartial manner.”
An RDG spokesman told RAIL: “Rail companies are adopting the most transparent performance measure in Europe, which shows punctuality to the minute at stations on a train’s journey. Accurately understanding the cause of a delay after an incident is crucial to the industry driving better performance.
“Freight has a vital economic, environmental and safety role to play, and freight operators are working together with other parts of the industry to improve punctuality.”