Last-minute canceLLations: a way forward?

Network Rail says that it has improved communications with tour operators – but should further change come from above?

Here’s a circle for you. HM Chief Inspector of Railways Ian Prosser wants robust charter plans – not last-minute changes. Yet, with multi-million (or billion) pound engineering schemes paid for by taxpayers taking place across the network, the Office of Rail and Road’s top safety man also points out that it’s unrealistic to expect the railway to ‘down tools’ just so special trains can run.

Indeed, the favoured time for charters – weekends – also happens to be when the ‘Civils’ and ‘P-Way’ people can normally expect to get their hands on the railway. There are “hundreds of changes to possessions every week,” Network Rail’s autumn charters conference was told by one participant. The logical conclusion is to expect cancellations.

Regular services attract compensation if the railway is effectively shut from under them. Charters, however, do not. So promoters lose not only any profit they might have made, and have to deal with the fallout from angry passengers – they also have to pick up the bill for any costs (maybe thousands) that have arisen by that point. That is despite having had their trains accepted.

So it’s perhaps no surprise that this particular topic of discussion at the conference was… lively. One operator claimed that even when train specifications are put in eight or nine months in advance, timings are not issued until maybe ten days before a run. Another claim was that there are more possessions now than at any time since the meltdown in the aftermath of the Hatfield accident of October 2000.

Yet it’s probably fair to say that NR was a tad surprised by the criticism. The infrastructure owner accepts that there have been more calls for possessions. But NR’s Jack Harvey says his organisation is now “better at identifying and recording… changes nationally than was the case”.

There are, he says, now twice-weekly phone conferences with operators.

The track owner also rejects the idea that it’s failing to time trains by the target point of four weeks before a train is to run – known in planning parlance as ‘T-4’. However, it does accept that even if ‘specs’ are put in months in advance – when NR says it finds changes will be likely – it will not create timetables for them at that point.

“It would be illogical,” NR’s man reports, “to time a train before the infrastructure compatibility work has been undertaken, as the gauge or structure restrictions may subsequently affect the routing or speed of the train.”

Bids for special trains are due at T-14, gauging work runs up to T-8 – and only then does the job of creating a schedule start. Most trains then need a discussion with the operator, says NR – for example because “aspirational times requested by an operator may not be possible”.

“These discussions inevitably go on over a number of days or weeks with operators,” says Jack, “to try and find a successful outcome”.

However, NR said: “A quick check of the various websites will demonstrate that currently [November] timings are available at T-4. This is assuming the charter has been bid on time and not changed by the operator.”

That view was given outside support, by a promoter who reported their organisation to be happy with NR’s performance this season. The move to develop fixed, rather than simply ad hoc, charter paths – discussed here many times – will surely help too.

Yet whether timing targets are being met at any point surely masks the bigger issue. Things WIll sometimes go wrong – that would be true even without the possessions heralded by years of major projects ahead of us. When they do, promoters can end up out-of-pocket through no fault of their own.

That comes back to the fact that charters have no firm rights to run – and that is down to the structure of the railway. Indeed, as NR’s Rachel Gilliland reminded the charters conference, if you want to change that, it’s not actually her organisation you have to talk to… but the ORR.