"Only a third of our network is electrified, which ranks us the lowest in the EU." Well. You cannot be the worst in the EU if you are not in the EU. Smart move.
Anton Berglund Not really. EU stands for both European Union and Europe, referring to Europe most of the time. Let me just prove my point. There’s no point in comparing Britain’s railways to only those in European Union, because it’s not a significant community. On the other hand, most countries in Europe are similar for culture, religion, background and so on. So there’s no point in segregating the non-European Union members. This video might’ve compared it to Union members only, but it’s pointless. In addition, for example when a game has an “EU Server” it refers to Europe continent yet again, as there’s no such thing in universe that a country’s people shouldn’t get to play just because they’re not in the union.
The Japanese railways are privately run too. But the Japanese culture is *very* strict when it comes to punctuality. For drivers, the penalties for being late are *very* harsh. They face financial penalties, and are forced into harsh and humiliating "retraining programs", known as _Nikkin Kyoiku,_ which sees them removed from their normal duties and performing tasks such as cleaning and essay writing, while being yelled at. There was a major derailment in 2005 once after a late-running train was driven too fast around a curve; the train slammed into a block of flats after derailing. The driver (who was killed in the derailment) had been through the "retraining program" once and was determined *never* to go through it again.
@@LordBruuh really? NMBS isn't like really good, however, it doesn't suck this much as well. NMBS is owned by the government btw, so is all public transportation (as in de lijn, TEC and MIVB) People with low incomes get reduction on train tickets as well are able to use public buses, metro and teams for free. (Keeping it cheap and even free isn't possible by privatisation)
So true, I used to live in Japan up to the age of 14, and it was such a great country. Everything is clean, it's cultural, the weather's nice, and the community is so kind and honest. However, I used to be in a soccer team there, and I was 3 minutes late to training. In Britain, 3 minutes late doesn't matter, however in the Japan, you would be kicked off the team. Not to be arrogant or anything, but I was one of the best players on the team, and I was kicked off for being 3 minutes late. If any of you people are out there reading this, never be late in Japan.
@@csocseszrocsesz No private railway companies like italo railways don’t get subsidies from the government like the UK because theirs already a state owned railway company called Trenitalia. Fun fact - the stated owned railway was fined $272,000 for by antitrust authorities for bad practices.
Italo has had crazy increases in annual profits between the years of 2016 to 2018 making 30 million euros to 93 million euros. Private sector railways in Italy are doing great with the competition it’s gets from state owned railways.
the trains were running much better in the Southern Railways days long before the beeching axe and British Railways came in and ruined it all and so what if the train operator is turning a profit from the railways? that will mean that to make more money from the railway line, they need to attract more customers and they do this by improving the service on that railway line and maybe even cutting the rail fare in order to get more customers on the line.
@paul gough the middle man is the subsidizer which artificially makes the rail fare cheaper which is the tax payer, aka you and the government (thats if you pay tax to HMRC) so if we remove the subsidy then the fares will be at market rate and service will be improved.
Its a whole lot better than giving the money to over paid train drivers who spend most of their time either on strike, finding non existent reasons to drive, having very long wee breaks and six weeks off at a time
@Robert Davies nationally? yeah. however, the boswash corridor (where one fifth of the us population lives) rivals/exceeds European densities and it's such an embarrassment that they cannot even get the Acela right.
@Robert Davies I'm saying we have areas that are actually highly suitable for trains and the BosWash (the Boston-NYC-Philadelphia-Baltimore-DC megalopolis) is extremely well suited (One-fifth of the US population, the right amount of distance, cities are in an approximately straight line, etc) and the best have is the Acela which is a friggin' joke compared to Europe or Japan. Amtrak turns a profit on the BosWash which is remarkable given how poor the service is.
@Robert Davies Haha! Guess what? We're building high speed rails and better train transportation in Cali, Texas, and Florida, as well as some other states!
Demand for Train Travel in the US is on the rise, mostly as an alternative to driving by car where soul crushing traffic just gets worse and worse year after year. If it wasn't for this damn virus I would be pretty optimistic about train travel in the US, there is actually one private rail line in Florida that's running at a profit with intentions to expand to LA -> Vegas. Also Amtrak (The government controlled for profit company that took over all passenger rail service in the US) would have made a profit this year (2020) if this virus didn't happen, something pretty much everyone thought impossible. We might actually be in a lot better shape then people realize over here, passenger rail service was never really profitable for railroads, it was always about freight, and as a result in the US we actually probably have the best rail system for transporting fright anywhere in the world, France and other E.U. countries on the other hand fall behind when it comes to freight. But with the incentives changing our railroad companies might start reinvesting in passenger rail and we might end up with a first class passenger rail system in less then a decade, fingers crossed.
Robert Davies nonsense the USA has the most extensive rail network on earth when you count freight trains therefore that’s not a valid excuse. Due to this the rail network can be upgraded to easily adapt passengers the tracks are there they just need to double or triple track existing lines and add advanced signals or even reduce regulation and get private rail to return. Some long distance lines can be rerouted and consolidated then upgraded to HSR service then boost regional lines
@@trazyntheinfinite9895 Careful now, you're saying that a more centralised authoritarian Government can be beneficial in some circumstances. Some mihgt accuse you of being a damned Commie.
@@chicofoxo It's much easier for Government to manage to build rails, motorways and other similer kind of construction when it's authoritarian and centralized. Hitler's autobahns or Chinese rails are very good example. Government is allowed just make a line on the map and build. They don't care about anything in the way very often. Human rights are the other side of the same coin.
"Comparing trains from the 80s to those of today is like comparing apples to oranges" Yeah? Try taking a Northern train from Manchester to Liverpool, they've been using the same trains since the 80s
You’re right. They just don’t want you to compare it to the past because not much has really changed and the conclusions make the case for not letting the government run it again.
Hajimemasite! People forget the History of Rail. Its true us British invented and pioneered early rail travel. But you guys over there REALLY took it to the next level. When i return i hope to travel on the Shinkansen :)
@Ploke Newo78 you probably are because trains in a nation as big and, more importantly, as sparsly populated as the US is (for the most parts, at least), trains are simply unprofitable. I mean, why would someone go on a train from, let's say Miami to Dallas, which would take you a day or so with Jacksonville, New Orleans and Houston being the only major cities on the way, if you can just fly there which would probably just take 5 hours? The UK, on the other hand, is much smaller and much more densily populated, that's why comparing the US railway to the National Rail isn't really fair
I live in Yonkers, New York and have lived in Philadelphia and Pittsburgh where trains are common methods of public transportation and I can safely say that the U.S needs some serious improvement on their railways. Pittsburgh's rails were actually not that bad; they have one subway station that exist for no reason I can think of, which only goes to a very few places around and outside the city. I would actually like to see high-speed suspended magnetic monorails become the norm for cities; suspended magrails would cost less than laying railways or making subways, and would move right over traffic quickly.
I live on the moon and take the space shuttle to work. At $23,000,000,000,000 etc a trip it's much cheaper and cost effective. I live in the 21st Century.
@Seaghán Ó Laochdha I think the Irish Republic was the second in Europe concerning withdrawal of the steam traction. The Netherlands was the first (8-1-1958, 1-8-1958), in (the former) West-Germany the steam lasted until October 1977 (!) (May 1975 for steam hauled passenger trains). Even in the Scandinavian countries the steam lasted until the early 1970's...
@@thwalesproductions which shines only because of the foreign players. The quality of English players gets exposed with the English national team's performance.
In the Netherlands the National Railway NS has a trackrecord of 92.6% of trains on time, 94,8% chance of having a seat in rush hour and a 4,6% rise in passengers. I thought that were bad figures. But then I read that our train system is one of the busiest in the world. There are so many trains in one hour that there is no need for a timetable, every 5-10 min there is train between the major cities, it’s called “spoorboekloos rijden” it means timetableless driving. NS is also the parent company of Abellio UK with Scotrail, West Midlands and East Anglia. I don’t know how they perform, but seeing the UK figures I fear it won’t be good. Maybe it’s the infrastructure?
@@RealConstructor Abellio run Merseyrail which connects Liverpool with its suburbs. It has the best performance level of any UK train operator with 96.4% of trains running on time.
In terms of renstionalisation of UK rail, Corbyn if he was elected Prime Miniter was only looking to do it via the regional railways model (the precursor to privatisation introduced by Thatcher in the early 1980's), not BR with no regional names on carriages and locos with the running of the whole system from Whitehall like the original nationalised model until the early 1980's. Local decisions made by local operators across the UK per regional railways are more efficaient than same decisions made 100's of miles away in London. Can certainly be done in nationalisation.
I used to live in England (I'm German) and was amazed who expensive traveling by train in Britain is. I commute 20 miles to work in Germany and pay around 800£ each year for train, bus and tram. In England, I used to travel more or less the same distance, but paid more than 3 times that money and was only able to use trains. How is that even possible? Not only that, but the trains are always full, they were beyond old and looked like we Germans missed them in the war. How come you pay around 3700£ for an unlimited season pass for the whole of Germany, but in England you can barely cover Greater London for the same price?
Don't forget that services in Germany are heavily subsidized. Depending on the region the taxpayer adds between 1-2€ for every Euro the commuter spends.
Sunny101190 Britain has seen an almost 20% increase in its population over the last few decades. With economic growth to match that population growth. German on the other had has seen about a 10% growth but has seen economic growth to match that population growth. German has then been able to invest in its infrastructure through both private and government investment. The only way the UK government could actually fund a nationalisation of rail would be to increase taxes which would actually hurt economic growth.
Regionsl railways introduced by the tories in the 1980's would have been fine enough if they didn't go further by totally starving BR of funding, and then privatising it. Of course that wss their intention, just that most of us thought the introduction of Regional Railways early Thatcher was to give rolling stock identity and for local decisions to be made locally rather than at Whitehall and not being the first step towards privatisation. How badly wrong we were proven to be when it did grt sold off in 1995, the fact the regional railways early Thatcher happened a few years before the big sell off of most of the other former major nstionalised industried such as BT, British Gas, Electricity boards got privstised gave us a false sense of security that it wouldn't get sold off. All local/regional decisions don't need to be done in Whitehall though even in a nationalised model. Regional railways could come back in a renationalised rail network, and in fact having come out of privatisation would prove be far better in practice than Regional Railways as a major step towards privatisation early Thatcher.
@freakin16 . There's an assumption that privatisation of a service or an industry isn't happening because it hasn't happened. Yet! We only know ts happened once its officially announced at tory party conferebce, but by then it's far too late to do anything. All the deala are going on behind closed doors between tory governmsnt ministers snd various 3rd parties. Indeed privatisation is gradual, so gradual that hardly anyone notices eny changes even though chsnges have proven to be significant change over time - before the privatisation actually happens - and its been staring us all in the face all this time. It is being privatised. The tories don't ever do privatisations rapidly because they are desperate to maintain voter support come the following general election or 2. Most of those who despise provatisation who votng for the tories because they don't think the NHS is being privatised becauee it hasn't happened, the tories won't want to complete the privatisation yet because they are desperate to keep those voters for the 2024 general election. Once the tories been in office for 3 or 4 then lose popularity among those voters regardless of privatisation, and labour are so far ahead the tories won't win the next once they feel they have nothing to lose by officially announcing the privatisation so close to the general election even though they could have done it sooner, and the privatisation done the way it is that by labour renatlnalising after winning the general election that it would "bankrupt the country". I recall Blair saying (in fact promising it in the manifesto before the 1997 general election would renationalise the railway), but after the election pulled away from doing so as it cost the tories billions to privatise it, but even more by hundredfold to renwtionalise it and indeed would have bankrupted the country had he done so snd as spending is such a sensitice issue to much of the electorste he probably would have lost the next general election even though nstionalisrd railway is a much better railway than a private railway. Ok, Trump just lost the US election, it has saved the NHS from going private for now, but let's not rest too much it will juet tske the tories longer to sell it off completely, we only hsve one general election to save the NHS now. If the tories win next election (but then lose popularity (including among too many who should never thought about voting for the tories, hope they sll finally come to their senses before 2024 anyway) as labour rise again), they will do to the NHS what they did to the railways in 1995 too close to the general election so they claim a labour rnationalisation of the NHS after the election will bankrupt the country even though a nationalised health service is better than a private health service. The trick for labour is to catch the tories onawares win the next general election before the tories officially completely sell the NHS off so they don't have the impossible situation to either keep it private or renstionalise it and bankrupt the country with the economy being such a sensitive issue. Even if private healthcare proves unaffordable for most in the same way that train fares have shot through the roof since privatisaton, sadly judging by opinion polls too many people don't seem to care about that above out of control ever rsing house prices, strong pound, higher FTSE100 index prices and whatnot.
The labour governments of the 70s and early 2000’s destroyed our future out of spite. Then they had to hand it over to the conservatives, who, I agree didn’t do a lot to help, we’re just left to pick up the pieces
I was a Train Driver for 25 years, some with BR, the rest in the private sector, the whole privatization process was flawed from the outset, the companies bidding for the licence to run the old BR services were ill equipped to run trains within the confines of the franchise parameters. Money still flowed into the railways from the taxpayers, this money worked it's way through and ended up in the pockets of private companies, staff were cut, management increased, moral hit the floor, all this and more made working very difficult, unresponsive management would never listen to staff so staff stopped listening to management. The main problem is Britain's railways are a 21st century railway running on a 19th century system, no amount of new track and signalling will bring the paths needed to run more trains, what is needed is massive investment in new track lines but in this country that will never happen, £100+Billion on new high speed won't solve the problem either, the railways still suffer from the same old problem, political football between the two main parties, a new third way is needed, but don't hold your breath.
It's interesting that the common consensus is that the current infrastructure is woefully outdated and in dire need of replacement into more durable and electrified rail gauges suitable for high speed trains, but nobody in Britain is committed to overhauling this very important dilemma.
I wish the people running these train companies in the UK would take a trip to Japan to see how the national JR system there is run to military precision. In Tokyo they have 10 carriage trains every few minutes that can carry up to a thousand people each time. They are spotless and always on time. The train drivers and conductors wear classy pilot style uniforms with white gloves and are incredibly well disciplined and professional. This is not to mention that Japan has also had high speed rail (Shinkansen) like the upcoming HS2 since 1964! All a massive success. We in the UK are so far behind.
@richard3015......the taxi drivers in Tokyo [and probably all over Japan] are the same. Immaculately dressed in smart uniforms and caps the drivers stand OUTSIDE their taxis waiting for the next passenger! Here in Hong Kong, you are more likely to contract lung cancer from the vile stench of stale cigarette smoke in the vehicle. [even though smoking in taxis is banned in HK - I have never seen a taxi driver reprimanded for it]. In addition, Japanese are incredibly polite, courteous and helpful - especially in their service industries. Indeed, in an extensive study by the 'Economist' magazine on 'customer service' Japan were ranked number 1 in the entire ASPAC region! Conversely, Hong Kong was joint worst [with Singapore] and THE worst when it came to rude and uninformed customer service staff! Perhaps Hong Kongers can find work in the British railways industry?
The privatization model fails to recognize one basic fact. Railroads are a system. Rolling stock and trains are but one piece. Once you divorce ownership of the trains from the rails you create silos of interest. The owner of the roadway has no financial interest in making the trains run better.
The public then pays penalties to private owners and they don't even have to run their trains to make money. Then there's none left to fix the infrastructure. Capitalism at its finest.
@EpiDemic117 "There isn't any problem besides all of the problems" Amtrak sucks specifically because they don't own any rails. When you own the rails you decide when anyone leasing those rails gets to wait. Surprise, surprise, Amtrak has a massive delay problem caused specifically by leased rail. Their OTP is significantly better on the one tiny part of the network they actually own.
plus commuting city to city by rail just isn't a thing in the US like it is in europe. there's little demand and less supply because the culture doesn't support it. where i live getting the train is by far the fastest way to get to any major city in the UK. it's faster than plane to get from here to france. if the rails suffer and fail it actually damages my ability to make choices on how i travel but thats not true for the majority of the US.
@@bangtidybird8284 Great British pride of all ! Car industry wrecked, rail industry wrecked, ... list goes on... and obviously it is everyones fault - mainly European fault.
@TW3 Yeah the first world war was not for the good of the planet. That was a sibling fallout for the European royals. Second world war we werent exactly the good guys either, seeing as we, you know, starved 4 million Indian people, who were fighting on our side... against the nazis. But we dont talk about that, cos Hitler killed 6 million Jewish people so he was obviously worse. We only went to war with them cos we realised they might pinch the title of most brutal empire on the face of the planet. but hey dude keep being proud of something you had absolutely nothing to do with, and something you obviously havent even bothered to learn about... Becuz you're british init! Now look what you made me do, going off on this random world war rant! I came here to talk about TRAINS!
Our railway system is actually ridiculous. The most needlessly complex yet non functional system, like many things in Britain, it clearly is not working yet no one wants to do anything about it. Met a guy who had a season ticket from Kettering to LDN which was £9000...... and then they wonder why people feel discontent in this country.
@@mydevices5503 Don't try to justify a frankly ridiculous system. Speaking of housing, not sure if you've noticed but we currently have a long-running housing crisis in the SE so he'd be exchanging exorbitant transport for expensive housing. Great deal there.
@@mydevices5503 True, but housing in the UK is super expensive as well, especially in London. As a German I would like to work and live in London, but if I compare my income and basic living expenses, it sadly doesn't make sense for me to do so. Even though we are catching up with housing costs right now. If anything, it will get as bad here as in London. Probably not going to improve over there.
Train Delay? Really!! In India, they come when they want to... And people sit where ever they want! On top of each other. On top of the train, under the train, near the train driver...And everything works still to this day! lol.
@@Crazytesseract Absolutely! Trains have changed in India so much that the issues like regular delays, extremely crowded space, etc. aren't that common now. There might be some places still struggling, but sure a lot has changed now. But some people have this habit of living in past or just defaming, don't mind that.
What is wrong with the Railway is the same as what is wrong with the country. It is small mindedness. Like closing 1/3rd of the system in the '60's without considering the long term effects. Looking for a quick profitable result and damning future generations. All the good times are past and gone. The only way to get them back, & don't expect it to happen overnight, is to completely change the mind set of all the governments we have in the future. Here's an idea for starters; just like you get a leaflet detailing where your Council Tax is going, how about one showing where your Income Tax is going. Then go and see your MP.
Your thoughtful comment applies equally well to the new and troublesome political mindset in the United States today, we don't build for the future like preceding generations did not so long ago.
We made the same mistake in France when during the nationalization, as soon as 1938, 1/4 of the railway network got sacrified. I mean no less than 13400 kms. So today that still remains, including high speed lines, about 25000 kms open to passenger travel (barely more than Japan's 23000 in a country 3 times smaller in size) under constant threat, with 5000 kms more either for freight trains only either completely abandoned. Things didn't get better after the war with only a few suburrban lines extended or reopened (and yet another 6500 kms lost between 1969 and 1974). On the other hand the TER and RER systems set by the Regions proved to be a success for the remaining provincial and Parisian lines. Situation would have been even worse without them.
Britain used to aspire to being the best, now it looks to other countries that do things worse than it as a feeble excuse. That is classic low self esteem. Have some pride and have a system as good as the Dutch, or French, or German.
I'm from Australia but I see your problem. Your ticket prices are criminal. If you've bought an annual ticket, they've already got your money. They don't care what sort of service they provide. It seems going to and from work can cause you to live beyond your means. Privatisation doesn't always work.
NakedMoleRat 43 Um Japan’s system is private and it does work. And Britain’s main industry was heavily nationalised during the 70s and it was a disaster
the problems are caused by the nationalised Network Rail which took over from the private Railtrack which owns all the railway infrastructure and often fixes tracks too late causing trains to not run from the main railway terminus or at a massively reduced frequency during the weekday when it was scheduled to finish on the sunday which almost never happened under railtrack without them being blamed. because Network Rail is state owned, they are unaccountable when it comes to a train crash or when the track maintenance isnt finished on time.
Looked to book a train ticket yesterday to go to Manchester in March. That is quite far in advance but it still cost £80!!!! Nationalise it now. The fact that you can fly into Europe, get a connecting flight to Newcastle, and it works out cheaper than if you got a train direct from London, shows how these private companies are getting away with murder.
the africans dont pay anything, just get under the trains, get cushy and drop on the tracks on destination, Next day they go to Merkel and she issues a german passport and housing, and health care and loads of money
Natizonalisation won't make the ticket prices magically less, that's not how it works, The private companies already paid lots of money just to operate, the money they 'make' is only returns on what they spent just to get it.
I am Japanese & I've been planning trips to many places in both Wales & England for us in this coming summer by train & bus ,but I was so shocked by the prices & travel routes / time tables.Very frustrating that time tables between two trains ,or bus / train don't really match & many stop serving early if it's in the countryside ,or rural areas .And often, a lot easier/ faster & cheaper if we take the train from london. Even if it's a lot closer from Wales ! And a lot of those train tickets are $40-$80 for an hr.trip !! If for 1 to 2 ,3 hr.travelling .In my country ,Japan that's like 3 to 4 hr trip fees !! It is disappointing !! I was wondering how Brits felt about this ,so thanks !! Now I know ! Lol. I found that in Britain ,or U.K.it runs a good system of transportations in the cities ,but awful in the countrysides/ rural regions !! Even if in the high tourist areas !! That ,we hardly see in Japan !! Privatization fails in many things !! A great example is here ,U.S. !! Lol. Whenever we get blackouts ,it takes forever to get lights back on !! In Japan, the electricity & gas are operated by the government, so in a brief period ,it'll come back on !! Trains are ,too ! They are always on time ,or early .Rarely late ! Buses come on time ,too ,or a little late !! Lol.💜🥁🐉🎤🚞🚈💞
There are some things just better run being government owned. British Rail often had trains running late, but they got you there. There was real service at the stations. It seemed every employee knew the train timetables by heart, whether ticket seller or porter. Trains had a baggage car where you could put your bicycle or your bulkier baggage.
@@rockykoast7065 HI. Thanks so much for your reply ! I have to agree with you on the government owned train companies so on are better !! I totally agree with you ! But,in Japan, that's why ( & our discipline. Our nature .Lol. ) all the trains come on time !!! Lol. Unless there are accidents like derailing ,or suicides ,freak accidents. And they're usually decent prices !! I just got back from Wales & England. I was very frustrated by many delays/ changes ( ex. It was a direct train to my destination ,but became non direct ,so I had to change ! And a couple of times I heard announcements that passengers needed to move to another cars as they were going to different directions ! Brits ,I mean here ,English & Welsh were so confused themselves!! Lol. Imagine how confused I was !! Lol. ) & not to mention the ticket prices !! Yes ,the workers knew their timetables by heart ,but that's the same in Japan ! I was very very impressed ,though that many workers at each station were SUPER nice !!! That ,I have to mention here !! Both Welsh / English !! I got a lot of help w/ my heavy carry on luggage ( 2 ) & directions from them !! Welsh female workers were so tough & kind beyond anybody's limits !! One of them followed me on my train to catch up w/ me ( I was not aware at all !! ) to help me putting my heavy luggage on the rack !!! Nobody does this ,but them ,or her in the world !!! I believe !! There were some very rude staff at subway & train stations in London & Newport ,Wales ,though ! But overall ,85 to 90% ,their services were superb !! Very very kind !! I had a blast regardless in both Wales / England 🇬🇧 !!! Thank you so much for your reply !! 👍💜🥁🐉🎤🎶🚈💞
Oh ..! I did !! I did have lots of fun & blast !! So~many beautiful ,kind people there !! Are you a Brit !? That's so fantastic to know you loved train travels in Japan !! Kamakura is my fave ,too !! Lots of nice cool cafes are there !! You didn't mention of Kyoto ,didn't you go to Kyoto !!? You should the next time ,if you haven't !! My No.1 fave in Japan is Kyoto although I am originally from Tokyo !! Thank you so much !! Thank you so much for your reply ,too !! 👍👍💜🥁🐉🎤🎶🚈💞
@@spark_6710 I am glad you enjoyed Britain! Yes I am from North East England 🇬🇧 yes I took the train to Kyoto but didn't see much of the city as I had a meeting 😓 I wanted to see a Maiko wandering around 😅. The train I took to Osaka was very cool it was old fashioned with retro windows and it has its own mascot at the station.
Ivan Razumov Let’s all talk about American Trains! 1) American trains go around 30 MPH per hour 2) This video was made my Americans but they paid a British actor to make it look better 3) The Americans didn’t even try
The Theory Kid I guess to the USs defense, we do have a decently long road network so a car is usually always the better option (excludes NY and Chicago)
I used to live in Switzerland and thought their train system was horrifically overpriced. Although in hindsight its actually tremendous value for money. Trains are never ever late and if they are its very well communicated why and when. A year long ticket to travel anywhere in the country would only set you back like 2,000 pounds to ride the most efficient, clean and quiet trains ive ever traveled. Excellent - state owned system they have... 10x cheaper and more efficient than that of the UK which is a disgrace...
The UK train lines are owned by the public (government) the problem is there simply is not enough line to facilitate the trains. So this means in highly dense populated areas that rains will be really slow and never on time and full up with passengers. If people want nationalization maybe they should demand that the government puts their own trains on the lines but not at the expense of the trains that are already there. UK government expenditure on rail sits at about 30 billion per year. The problems with UK rail is far beyond what you are seeing being reported. Switzerland uses a small government approach which is broken down into regions. The UK uses one big central government approach which means it is highly political. The last time the UK had nationalized its industries including rail it bankrupted the country and meant it had to go to the IMF and borrow money.
@@vishushams it may be expensive but is honestly still cheaper than tickets here in the UK. The prices don't fluctuate so you can buy a ticket and get on any time train as you wish and the price wont change whether you bought it weeks ago or on the day... the system is just much better
@@perc30mg Switzerland does not have public healthcare liabilities like the UK. Switzerland uses a public insurance model combined with locally owned and run hospitals. The UK spends about 150 billion a year on health. It cannot be expected to add trains on top of that.
@Monsieurturmoil You might be right about the nearly bankrupt sent after the both world wars, but we must not forget the British, along with the other Allied forces, liberated the Continent (or Europe, like some Britons say.. ;-)) from the Nazis! Yeah it is off topic, but we should not forget we in Europe had the benefits of the British war efforts in WW1 and WW2! Greetings from the Netherlands. Happy New Year and a healthy 2019 with a lot of train travel.
I have been commuting around Germany for the last three month. Trains/Networks are much better and cheaper than the UK, but punctuality is far worse than UK. I have traveled 37 times using ICE,IC,RE in the last 2 month alone, they rarely ever came on time. 30min+ delays were the norm for almost half the cases.
On the other hand, the Dutch also privatized their railways and are ranked #3 in the world (after Japan and Switzerland) of countries with trains arriving on time; while Dutch railway networks are among the busiest in the EU. They chose however a semi-privatized construction, whereas NS (Dutch Railways) is a private company but 100% state owned and it provides all services on the main infrastructure. Services on the lesser infrastructure are performed by other private companies like Arriva and Veolia and it has proven to be pretty successful. How? Railway companies have to sign contracts with the government in order to provide services and the government only accepts a certain amount of delays and failure. If the companies do not meet the criteria, they are forced to pay serious fines. So I guess privatisation doesn't necessarily mean worse railways, it's just about how you do it.
They only became a thing in the 19th centuary... The buisness model is the same a most privateised railways money. It's called capitalisim. The first railways were built for money, then the Big Four era of high quality services, it wasn't till WW2 that the camels back was broken. The Mainland european trains had the' lucky' effect of mostly being destroyed so they were rebuilt in the 50's and 60's to higher standards than lines dating from the earliy 1900's. Now give Network rail the money it needs and the suppervision it needs and the costs would go down.
In the UK: When a train is late, National Rail (who owns all of the rails in the UK as well as big stations like Waterloo) will Fine the Organisation. But this is obviously not enough
Considering the complicated rail network of the UK rail system, especially near London, I think they overall run pretty well . Its just the stupidly high prices that is the killer.
Britain is the laughing stock of the western world. Nevermind just how shite our trains are, but also that our biggest international airports can be crippled for days by a bloke with an RC helicopter.
Well it was alright. Which is high praise for C4 news. Needed more about France though. Why are there trains so good and cheap? We all know why England's are bad.
The trains are transactionally expensive to the individual rail passenger, but it would cost more over all in terms of tax to support nationalising the railways. It would inevitably lead to uncompetitive and inefficient management (like all socialised systems eventually do) and we'd end up paying billions each year in tax. Just look at the billions of euros in debt the (nationalised) French SNCF railways rack up each year, and all the rail workers strikes...
@Otto Skorzeny very true, if the government wanted to run the rail service in the interest of the passengers they could & would but they would rather private companies heavily profit from it. The government's motto is anything that can make lots of money should exist to make lots of money instead of providing a good reliable service.
When I lived in the UK I had absolutely no problems with the quality of trains or safety of the trains (imo the regional trains were better than the ones we have in Germany but I do know this depends on what area you live). The issue is private companies ruling different services. This results in people not having the same experience and high ticket prices. The UK's trains aren't bad at all it's the companies ruling them in some cases. Germany is sadly following this... The other issue is the fact the UK invented railways, this means they are running on anixent lines and have more issues upgrading services.
Hunter owen1 a lot of the U.K. Railway tracks are curved which meant high speed rail was difficult ,Britain tried to make to train to go fast around curves but failed due to poor passenger experience but trains in the U.K now do have similar technology which bank slightly around a corner
We had exactly the same problems when they planned to privatise it fully. Investment declined, the working-climate reportedly weakened, and delays raised up. And the CEO even boasted "It has to be this way; who would buy it, either?!" Now they are still working to repair the spoilt rail-networks. With tax-money, because there had been created such a build-up on damages that the ordinary profit-reinvestment wouldn't be enough anymore... Could have been avoided, hadn't there been this greedy juvenile impulse to privatise everything! ...
Noam is brilliant I'm a Left Libertarian if regulated less state more society was able to run things the way they should be for a service first not profit the lines would run cutting a service because too few use is pointless why don't we sell of empty shops then to housing associations?
Aizaz Ali Friedman would never have approved of the British system though. The way to stop this is more competition, if there is more competition then companies need to both provide a good service and invest money that would otherwise be paid into dividends.
In capitalism though, those companies have competition. So you can go elsewhere if the price or service is bad. Under this broken system, the train operating companies are a local monopoly.
@Hairy Chinese Kid Do you have any evidence for that? The computer, the internet, shipping containers, the radar, GPS are the most consequential inventions of the last decades and they literally all came out of the government system.
Not true. The "lower class" has it better today than at any point in history. Every house has running water, electricity etc etc... The majority have a car on the drive or two or three. etc etc...
Also if you're referring to the whole "make britain great again", back when great britain really was a great empire, back when the railways were first built, if a lower class working man got sick, his whole family starved. Literally. That's where the saying "put bread on the table" comes from, back then if you did not work you did not have bread, you did not eat. Is that what we want to go back to? Don't get me wrong, the elite still earn way too much money, and there's plenty of room for imporvement. But it could also be worse. It's not a simple subject, the world is a very different place to what it used to be, if we are to progress it needs to be done intelligently.
Here in Denmark - we have a card that works for everything and everywhere and it is super cheap! A zone 2 ticket in Copenhagen using: metro, busses or trains will only set you back 1.5£ and it lasts an hour. The country also invests heavily into public transportation and infrastructure. And it is NOT PRIVATISED.
Lucky you, here in Norway a 5-minute bus ride will set you back £5, 3-hour train is £70, except when the system is down and you’ll have to take a 20 minute £60 taxi ride to the bus, which will cost you another £30. Not just that, the railway system will become privatized later this year and the British won the bid. Future looks great over here lol
Only really works for residents unfortunately. It's rather pricy as a visitor. I don't really understand why they made the anonymous cards so restrictive and expensive.
Anonymous cards don't charge you any more than a regular card does, it's the same between the two. Only difference is that on anonymous cards you need to have a fair bit of money on it if you plan on going between a lot of zones, as to prevent people from buying the cards and then throwing them away when their balance goes negative.
@john m And why are Japans trains better? Because they are faster? We can't have super highspeed trains here - the country simply isn't big enough as the distance between Copenhagen and Ålborg is only about 300km/250miles apart (Ålborg would is the that is the furthest away from Copenhagen that has a somewhat decent population). You would never be able to reach those speeds at such short distances as the two other large cities in between Copenhagen and Ålborg also would have to have a stop, which makes it less than 100km between each city - meaning you would never be able to get the trains up to the same speed as in Japan. The country simply isn't big enough. And with just under 6mill people we just do not have the population for it. Besides Japans government is funding most of their trains, just like most other countries, even the UK, but in the UK taxpayers pay for the systems and tracks, but let the companies take all the profit.
@@xJonathan6405 They cost much more than the other cards, require a higher deposit and cannot be recovered if lost or stolen. Most other places don't have such a big difference on anonymous cards, and they can be registered later, no matter your residency.
09:13 how is it possible to spend so much for so long on the infrastructure and yet still say it would cost a fortune to fix! They keep saying it's expensive - well yer obviously, that's why we've spent so much, so where has the money gone? 20, 10 or 5 years ago, did they say 'we will spend X billions each year and the end result will be a reliable system that works.' Does ANYONE in power actually work out what needs doing and put in a realistic (and expensive) plan to get it fixed properly within a specific time, or are we just going to continue shoveling money out for decades on a bad rail system hoping that a future generation will sort it? (I guess it's more exciting for MPs to spend £56 billion on the brand new HS2 link that will eventually cost ten times the estimated cost plus a fortune to maintain.) And the train companies can win a contract by promising a great service, but do a bad job, take millions in profits and then 'lose' (ditch) the contract. The commercial 'competition' is who can win the contract and squeeze out a profit, not who can maintain a good service year after year.
As the report said 60% of delays are caused by infrastructure that is owned and operated by public Network Rail. Only recently NR was told off by MPs for ordering expensive style overhead power masts for electrification on GWR. Must other stuff costs that are not necessary.
@TW3 German Rail are publicly owned but the service over there is increasingly bad with delays become normal. In France the regions paid for new works and trains which UK regions could never afford. Even the French are opening up their market to private companies. EU rules will force it on everyone soon.
Once privatised the great unwashed have paid through their nose for second class services, the shareholders must have their dividends before the great unwashed get their comfort..
Gabriel Swift Average profits are only in the single digits across the operating companies. Several have made a loss and that makes dividend payments less likely. Would you put your life savings in a scheme where you won’t get a return? Privatisation has provided investment for railways that the government would struggle to do alone
@@katy3901 that's not going to solve anything sorry 😂 making a list of what needs to be improve and getting people to sign that list like a petition to get this approved then sign it off to government with an idea of how we can improve the train and the service that's just my idea anyway 🤷🏾♂️
@@kaziourblue8410 I'm completely in favour of nationalisation personally. The whole pretence of private rail relies on money being funnelled to shareholders and CEOs. If we're going to treat public transport as a necessity rather than luxury then nationalisation is the sensible option. The private companies are only going to be incentivised by profit.
@@kaziourblue8410 I don't think the policy is the issue? The tracks are publically owned and private companies largelly compete for the contracts. I'd assume it would make sense to wait until the contracts expire and then simply establish the nationalised system.
Some seriously idiotic comments here. Just because the UK invented the darn things doesn't mean they'll be any better at it today. It's part of inventing things, you invent something, and then you fall back on it. The title of the video is very miss leading - the UK trains are not ''so bad'' - they are just poorly managed and the video questions wether or not the current system is working well or not.
Adolf Hitler Acela Express? Yeah paying 1st class airliner ticket riding Chinese D train equivalent and traveling at the speed at Chinese T train be like. Laughs in Chinese(sarcasm 100)
I did in fact get out and walk alongside the train in America , 20 odd years ago when I was still a smoker as they had banned it . and the doors weren't locked as the Train crawled along I could rejoin at the last carriage . I also noticed not only was a the only foreigner but often the only white person using the service
The ONLY thing the USA can do very fas is bomb and kill millions of people in sovereign land and then steal their resources by inserting their own puppet in their Government who will be paid handsomely.
aCup0fBlackTea_ well deutsche bahn is much better than britains trains, yes they may have more delays than them but everyone in europe looks up to deutsche bahn As a good service
It's interesting that in Germany we have just the same problems. A lot of people, and that includes me, would say it's due to the privatization of the DB (Deutsche Bahn - German Rail) in the mid 90s and the ongoing efforts to get DB listed at the stock exchange. From this time on, maintenance funds were cut down to the absolute minimum. Today the infrastructure is in a very bad shape and inadequate for the amount of traffic it has to support, while tickets are insanely expensive (it's often way cheaper to take a plane!). In the 1960s, DB had the slogan: "Everyone is talking about the weather. We don't." ("Alle reden vom Wetter. Wir nicht.") Today we get delays when it's too hot, too cold, when it's fullmoon, when leaves are lying on the tracks in autumn, plus due to a plethora of other reasons. It basically became a running gag.
You can tell privatisation is pure ideology because its adherents believe it can be applied to any industry, irrespective of real-world complexity. They're trains ffs, they travel along one rail, how would dividing up the timetables on certain rails (and rail maintenance) to a gamut of smaller companies makes sense? Who goes to the train station to make a consumer choice? people just want to get somewhere. Someone people are applauding a system with choices 'slow and cheap, a bit quicker expensive, or fast and extortionate', I guess some sad souls need to qualify their existence based how much they get to spend on a faster train journey, in 2018. Ripping every off yet reassuring the self-declared well-to-do they're a class above the rest.
Yes the money wasted on different branding,trains, timetables and ticketing is so confusing and wasteful. A single system everywhere makes sense but Grayling would've been able to have brought in guardless trains easily without any notice of unions who would've brought the entire network of the country to a standstill
Well said. Capitalism by definition cannot work when there is a monopoly since there is no competition. Railways, electricity, water, internet etcetera are all natural monopolies.
Japan's rail system is privatized, and that includes their high speed railways. It's well run and profitable, and even still maintains trains to small towns just for 1 or 2 school children. It's a pipe dream to pretend that these issues will be fixed just by nationalizing it.
Yep. There are some things that capitalism is good at: providing consumer goods in a free market. Railways are not one of them. Railways and public utilities (gas, water, electricity) are natural monopolies with no competition, so it makes more sense for them to be state owned.
Cause it doesn't pay to fix things when you literally have people held captive. Why would they care? We don't protest like the French, we just look at our shoes and moan...
Poeticmic we’ve got the Labour Party. With an actual socialist at the helm instead of some pro-establishment careerist. The European left would kill for someone like Corbyn in their ranks.
@@jonathancooper4914 As much as I would hope your right Jon I highly doubt it. Labour are the worst with money by a long shot. I tar them all with the same Brush, not enough of them actually care about the well being of this nation, they just quee up to line their own pockets. That's whats really wrong with Brexit, the people that voted out were counting on politicians to do right by them. So much for that...
Jonathan Cooper If Blair or even Ed Miliband were leading labour, they’d be 20 points clear of the tories by now but they’re still behind because labour can’t be trusted with the economy, nationalisation will mean higher taxes to manage costs and giving in to greedy union demands, not to mention the anti semitism scandal
Both parties spend money, just look at the data. With Labour you get social welfare, and with the Tories you get corporate welfare. I'd rather the money was spent on society than helping out corporations, but that's just me. Each to their own.
Christopher Jennings the MSM, special interests and establishment talking heads wouldn’t be smearing Corbyn as much as they have if they thought he wouldn’t be able to pull off building a country that treats life in it with dignity and respect. The fact that they smear him and his is indicative of him being onto something. Also, if you honestly believe the antisemitism smears hook line and sinker, you’ll believe anything.
I did that for three weeks. Spotless trains that ran exactly on time. I used the line between Zurich and Lucerne and most of the line is single track. Can you imagine the logistics required to run trains in both directions on a single track? But they do it, and do it with an efficiency that would make Germans look slapdash. I reckon we get the head of Swiss Rail and put them in charge of the quagmire we have here.
@@LegendLength because once privatized the costs go down? oh.... Those SBB tickets were not cheap, but permanent residents buy half-fare cards or whatever. Also for the sake of good connectivity one company would be better. Maybe it's not so much required in UK where London is the center of the country and everyone rides there and back again. But Switzerland is very decentralized.
@mjzyt But it's not the money that is spent that makes it work better. If that were the case, the UK would have the best trains in the entire world, which run to time so well you could set your watch to them, which run so smoothly and quietly like passing clouds, with excellent services and cheap prices. But sadly we're not like that. We have a mish-mash of sleek modern trains and rolling stock that shouldn't have seen in the millennium. We have lines which are not yet electrified. We have services that run so haphazardly that the timetable should be referred to as a rough guide. And this all costs us an utter fortune, not just in tickets, but in tax to cover the subsidies.
Difference is that Switzerland does not have nationalized health. It uses a public insurance model and hospitals are run regionally with different groups. The UK 40 years ago had everything nationalized from Trains, Healthcare, education, steel production, auto industry. It bankrupted the UK and it had to borrow from the IMF. The UK has a nationalized rail network which is current full up to capacity. The government of the UK are spending about 20 billion per year on rail and still it is doing nothing to the networks that will alleviate the problems even though they are building new lines and upgrading others. The UK population over the last few decades has increased by 20% and rail networks cannot hand it. Population increase has been in certain areas which has put strain on parts of the network.
mailerdiablo That’s not necessarily a bad thing though. As long as they’re paying a reasonable price. In theory it could allow them to be more flexible with their services, and upgrade more easily.
@@MrDavidfball not any more, HSBC sold Eversholt to Li Ka Shing, the 23rd richest person in the world. Eversholt has roughly a third of UK rolling stock, Portebrook a third and Angel the other third.
Almost certain they just fake the numbers on the vote probably why they like to keep the vote a secret, I can't be living in a nation with that many cunts/idiots? Surely?
British think their system is bad. They need to come and see our system. Amtrak is a major joke. I can not take a train from Savannah, Ga to Houston, Tex. A quarter of the trip is on a bus!
Coast to coast in twelve hours? You do not understand my country, very well. Even still, it is still far less time consuming to fly. I am not sure about energy efficiency, but it is doubtful. By a per seat basis, planes in this day and age are pretty efficient. The real issue is cost. It would cost trillions to build what you claim we Americans need. Just to give you an example, billions have already been wasted on high speed rail in California with no rail to show for it. You cannot just take property; government has to pay for it. One of the problems in California is property owners who have already have had their property taken have yet to be paid for it. Anyway, that is "un-American" to you. We have a good transportation system in this nation, between our roads, automobiles, planes, buses etc. Trains are a boondoggle. If they were so superior, passenger rail would still be alive and well.
You'll be doomed when the system goes bankrupt, because the taxpayer can't afford a free for all one size fits all. Then what do you do? Go back to individual based system. America is going broke with those entitlements and medicare. The most expensive on the planet.
@Sad Englishman so you think things should be done based on ideology? I'm not in the UK but according to the video, government created 4 local monopolies, but resort to private companies to operate a service. That means it's still government operated. So how will nationalizing make a difference??? Government has no business being in the transportation business. We have the same problem with Amtrak in US. Expensive and outdated. Why? Government operation that is nationalized. How would that be better in UK? Makes no sense
@Sad Englishman Sure, the Unions will take control over everything and the system will lose money and no incentive for innovation. That's how it works in the United States. Amtrak is a money loser and trains are slow and under used. Taxpayers are again on the hook to finance Amtrak. Any monopoly, private or public is bad. You need 100% competition, where the customer drives decision making. UK and US models are bad. If you ever come to America try Amtrak anywhere but DC to NYC. You'll see what a monopoly does.
I am czech, we have had a national rail service here since the start, and only very recently have private companies been allowed to start competing on this market. The national rail still remains as the main operator. It relies on subsidies, mainly due to running many non-profitable lines in remote areas that need to be maintained as public service (lately private companies can also apply for these subsidized lines, though they rarely do, understandably, little money to be made there apart from the subsidies) and is widely regarded as mediocre at best, BUT it sets a standard. They run an acceptable, affordably priced service all over the whole network. The private companies are now welcome to enter this market, and either pay for slots on a track or compete for an entire line, but at any given time they are competing against the minimal standard set by the national rail. So in order to get customers or indeed the subzidized contract for the line, they need to start one-uping the national rail and subsequently each other. This has in a recent years led to a stark improvement in quality of rail service across the country and absolutely massive leaps in services on the most lucrative lines where up to 3-4 companies can be fighting for customers at the same time. Amidst the fierce competition the national rail continues to run and pose the looming threat of losing your bussiness should you fall below its standard. This is where I see the largest problem of the british rail. You lack this sort of standard. This line that cannot be crossed. Once the private company secures their contract they can do more or less as they please. So naturally they will put profit first. And you can hardly blame a private company for that. Rail service and public transportation are the responsibility of the government and the british rail is a major case of mismanagement that goes dozens of years back. I can take the 170km, 2.5 hour ride from prague to my birthtown, in a clean, air-conditioned carriage with free on-board wi-fi, for the price of roughly 10 pounds. Comparing this to my experience with british rails, I am simply baffled how can that be tolerated.
German trains are amazing, and I've lived in France for a year and SNCF was brilliant. Just last year a high-speed TGV first-class ticket all the way from Paris right down and across to Nice was £85.. I looked at tickets recently from Manchester to Brighton, standard cheapest possible and they were over £110 up to £280.. wtf is that? Privatisation was sold to us as better, cheaper due to competition. In reality it's worse, far more expensive and unreliable.
Expensive and over crowded yes? Worse and unreliable? Through your eyes that may be but be careful what you wish for! I doubt you used the railways back in the 1970's /1980's.
Britain is one of the wealthiest places on earth, yet its citizens get financially mugged off on a daily basis. How is this even acceptable? Taking a train in England/Britain sometimes feels like taking them overcrowded trains in Mumbai but without daredevil passengers on the roof.
Oh please, for god sake, it's not that bad! It depends purely on where you live in the UK. UK ranks as the safest trains in all of Europe - they just have a problem in terms of the system that runs them. India's problems with their trains is something else...
Sagish Preman nah we’re a complete joke to them tho... I’d rather have freedom than trains, wish we could trade but America would politely decline lol.
Better than the US maybe, but not as good a trains or as cheap a train journeys as over in the continent, or in Japan and China. HST's all running at in excess of st least 150mph vs only 125mph here in the Uk. Plus you can sit upstairs on trains over in the near continent, China and Japan, but you can't do so here in the UK because they are sll single decker trains. Over in the continent, trams operate as the equivalent of our suburban train services (apart from Greater Manchester), and coaches operate in the continent instead of commuter trains. Turning branch heavy rail lines into tram-train lines in Northern England using new tram-trains would be better than still using the heavy rail Pacers in places. The superTrams in Sheffield could be upgraded to tram-train services and divert on the heavy rail lines (if overhead electrified) into the train stations instead of stopping outside the station in the street. Edinburgh trams likewise could be upgraded to tram-train services too. Edinburgh Tram-trains inside Waverley and Haymarket stations would be a wonderful thing.
@@dvidclapperton The UK doesn't have double decker trains because the tunnels are too small. It would cost huge amounts to rebore all the tunnels to take double decker carriages.
To be replaced with what exactly, the labour party who tell lies and mix it with total incompetence so nothing ever changes but millions of idiots still think it will. "this time will be different, honest"
@@Arcadia21 The network has reached capacity, there s no more room, there is no way of it getting better without building new lines. That won't happen. Look at HS2.
Along with incompetent socialists and their trade union paymasters. Replace some of them with MP's who have Engineering experience ie Civil Engineering project experience in the case of building railways. With an engineering background they would have the knowledge to ask very awkward questions of the government and civil service unlike the lawyers, trade unionists and former journalists who plague the palace of Westminster.
AmTrak was an attempt to prevent the final destruction of the passenger rail system. You should look into what General Motors and Standard Oil were convicted of doing in the years following WW2, using National Bus Lines as a front company. The USA _used_ to have the best public transport system in the world until it was systematically and quite deliberately destroyed in order to sell the american public on cars and suburbia. You could get across Los Angeles faster than can be done today in a car. Ironically the freeways mostly follow the old light rail easements that were ripped out by NBL et al.
@@Jj-gi2uv Not really. Most Americans have never been on a train or bus in their entire life. I experienced some train travel, but that was about sixty years ago. It is still a good means of freight transportation when you are not in any hurry.
Alan Brown - You are correct, sir. Watching old films out of Hollywood with exterior shots, you can see streetcars all over the place. But as you say, the big corporations got together and scuttled them in favor of buses. The government began building interstates to connect the nation, so folks who could afford cars began to do as Dinah Shore used to urge when she closed her show: See the USA in your Chevrolet. Cheaper airfare also contributed to the demise of passenger trains. At one point in time, there were more than fifty major railroads in this nation. These railroads provided passenger trains to just about any destination in the country, but now there are only 7 class A railroads left and passenger service is a losing proposition. Amtrak continues to lose money, but taxpayer money grows on trees, so it will not go away. Amtrak has to negotiate with the railroads in order to use their tracks because they don't own 99% of their own railroad tracks.
I hope the same thing happen in Sweden. Our system is on the edge of breaking. Back in the days all of railway network was owned by the state under the name Statens järnvägar. Nowadays it's different. Well everything has happen a bit gradually. Banverket took over the control of the rails and SJ (statens järnvägar) continued to drive the trains. Banverket and SJ was under control by the state. The problems started earlier but during 2010 Banverket was closed down and replaced by, yet a state-owned and limited company, Infranord. They were the worst because they outsourced all maintenance to private companies with rookies behind the wheels. SJ was still driving most of the trains but during this time many privately owned companies started using the tracks. And suddenly Sweden got their own problems, especially in the region where they procures the traffic to the lowest bidder. In 2007 the Danish and Scottish owned DSBfirst won the traffic for the regional Öresunsdtåget. They also won the traffic in the west region around Gothenburg. The traffic started in 2009/2010 and they managed to drive the trains for one and a half year before the pulled the plug and left the deal. Since then a company called Transdev took over the traffic. Things like this have happened all over the country. SJ is still trying to do there best but they are riding on badly maintained tracks. They also have to squash themselves threw the crowded tracks that they now share other companies. When something bad happens SJ always get the blame from people not knowing how it works. "All delays are SJ:s fault" but no it isn't. I've tried not to be political but the latest degradation of the railway is the fault of the conservatives. It seems that they believe that all the free market is good. But it's not. Especially when space is an issue. The conservatives also appointed an investigation in hope of solving the railway problems. However, the investigation had a catch: "The solution to all the problems were not allowed to be nationalization". I don't remember what the investigation led to but the system is still very bad. Everyone blames everyone and nothing is happening. All problems after the Swedish election in 2018 doesn't bring me more hope. I don't know what's happening in Sweden and rest of Europe but the right winged parties seems to think more about themselves than the best for country. We'll see, we'll see. I just wanted to share my believes over the Swedish system. Thanks for a good story!
Arbiter50 productions Clearly you don’t live here. I do and the original comment is accurate. Sweden has an AWFUL train system. I commute daily between Uppsala and Stockholm and, no exaggeration, the trains run on schedule only about 50% of the time. They are also extremely overcrowded. One is incredibly lucky to get a seat (or even a stair to sit on between the bottom and top levels). And Gothenburg is by far the worst transit system in Sweden. Nothing but delays and cancellations in that town.
Having been a visitor to Britain several times, and travelling the length and breadth of the nation entirely by rail I do not accept that Britain's trains are bad. Some are certainly better than others, and some are pretty budget class, but they do provide at least a satisfactory service. The problem we observed developing over the years is that they are under increasing pressure to cope with the sheer growth of passenger numbers. The network is becoming more and more inadequate and needs to be expanded to cope with demand. The The suggestion that nationalisation could fix it is nonsense
A visitor..? Try actually living here long term and commuting for your daily work 🤦♂️ Nationalisation could not possibly do any worse than how things are currently (provided the Tories aren't in charge; they would deliberately seek to sabotage it as they are doing to the NHS so as to make privatisation seem better)
@@deputyVH Other than along the east coast, the mostly freight US railroads own the tracks, and Amtrak is a very minor source of income for them, but a major pain in the rear at times.
Britain spends more on its railways than other countries in Europe simply because it neglected them for decades under BR, which was forced by HM-treasury to work on a shoestring. Comparing apples with apples and taking two sets of 25-year operative histories, today's DB is a simple organic development of 1994's DB (the year it was privatised) whereas the BR of 1994 has disappeared entirely and been completely replaced with enormous upheaval and expense about two and a half times (two infrastructure operators and an average of four franchise changes per franchise (simplified) across the system). These reorganisations cost huge amounts of money and very sadly, also human lives (train crashes under the privatised Railtrack). So in Germany, we did something right, because for far less money we have a better quality system (which still isn't good enough, and we also have problems). Secondly it is just not true that BR was privatised by degrees and I would challenge the reporter to explain exactly what she means. The only significant privatisation in the BR-years was BREL in Derby. On the contrary, BR in 1994 was remarkably similar to BR in 1970 (post-Beeching) and was crash-privatised overnight by an overeager Major government. Thirdly, Channel-4 Fake News: There is no new EU legislation due which forces further privatisation of our railways. Encouragement of competition has been EU-policy for years (maybe a decade or more) and the biggest single blocker by far is that when the EU commissioner knocks on the door and says "how's about it then?", every railwayman across the member-states points to the ongoing railway catastrophe in Britain and says "you must be joking". The Merkel-government put out a statement around November-time 2018 saying that DB is in no fit state to envisage any form of reorganisation whatever. It's not going to happen.
DB has an increasingly bad record with delays and huge debts, they want to offload Arriva. As you know regional and in future InterCity services are run by private companies with very long franchise times, so the image of DB running everything is now outdated.
Dave Smith - DB was specifically cited here as a model to emulate, it is a very valid point to bring up its current woes, it may not be a British apple but according to a lot of Germans it is pear-shaped right now
Maybe the British should look into the Dutch system. All of the network is owned by ProRail which was only nationalised since 2016 due to reliability issues of the network and internal corruption. The Dutch Railways (NS) is a privatised company in which the national government is the majority shareholder. The NS is doing the main grid. Smaller lines are done by franchises. The only flaw in the Dutch system are the high-speed trains. They should've been more disconnected from the main network, because these trains are pretty unreliable and they can take down large parts of the main network.
@@MrUnbeatable2012 Quite right, DB has huge debts and a bad record, but it does NOT want to "offload" Arriva, it is being leaned on to do so by the trade and industry minister (Altmaier). Arriva and Schenker both turn in good profits and are attractive purchases, the sale of which should help recapitalise DB. DB's debts and poor record are related: Hartmut Mehdorn did everything possible to maximise return on capital invested to make the corporation as attractive as possible for a potential floating on the Frankfurt stock exchange. His bid failed and he left. DB is now slowly rebuilding the empty shell of a railway he left behind (2009). There are no plans to sell it to private investors.
I work on the Railway and the biggest single problem is that it is fragmented with Network Rail responsible for the infrastructure and the train operating companies responsible for running the trains - there is currently a disconnect between the two that leads to every delay being bickered over, drivers and signallers are pitted against each other to apportion blame when they should be working together as a team... on top of which Network Rail (the company I personally work for) waste money hand over foot in a way that was proved to be unsustainable when they were originally privatised as Railtrack - an experiment that proved to be a total failure... and one which ended with the government having to bail the company out and rebrand it (and continue to part fund it) as Network Rail... Bringing the industry back under full government control would be incredibly expensive, but it could be done one train operator at a time as many of them are failing to make the profits they projected when they won their contracts and are often operating with government subsidies and bailouts.
I agree, nobody is willing to take the actual responsibility when something goes amiss. I wouldn't want to say nationalisation is the solution (as the Dutch can surely attest for) but more strict government control and/or a clear contractual description of who is exactly responsible for what would be a great improvement. Also, although it will be expensive, they should upgrade and universalise the infrastructure across the country. That way it will be much easier, and likely also cheaper, to maintain.
This is so true ! I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve been refused to do maintenance because train companies want to run there trains. There more interested in money than the lives of their passengers.
@@CarthagoMike It might surprise you, but the Dutch rail network is *not* nationalized! 1) the infrastructure is owned by a semi-Gov't entity, including track, signalling and platforms, which falls completely under the responsibility of the Minister of Transport 2) rolling stock is owned by the TOC it operates for (one national TOC, NS, with only regional railway lines tendered out for "privateers" ;-) ) 3) stations (bar the platforms) are owned by a subsidiary of the national TOC, NS Vastgoed (real estate branch) Dutch national TOC NS, which is a 100% owner of Abellio, is *not* owned by the State, hence it's not nationalized. But the State owns _all_ shares in the entity that owns NS. That's not the same, mind! It does mean the Dutch Treasury gets an annual dividend and has the right to demand a special dividend payment should NS build up too much financial reserves. It happened shortly into the last crisis, robbing the company of several bn euro of reserves. (note: the long distance part of NS is actually quite profitable, as is the real-estate branch, which now provides for more then 50% of annual profits!) IMO the Dutch system would work for the UK, provided you Brits finally decide to get out of the Victorian era ;-)
I'd rather prefer the dft civil servants NOT directly control all aspects of the transport industry, and instead adopt the 100% gov shareholder structure of the Dutch etc. Look no further than the Thameslink ironing board, may '18 tt fiasco, and now the unwillingness to continue electrification and large scale upgrades to infrastructure in Manchester etc., all where dft in responsible. So too is now visible in the incomplete devolution of TfN. Also, the VTEC franchise required payments to gov of £200m upwards annually (hence no bailouts as money for remainder of franchise not paid yet), and also greater anglia now asking Dutch gov through Abellio to support them for franchise payments to UK gov. So who is losing out most?
@@deussivenatura5805 Yes the trains are bad in America and Canada, Amtrak still has coaches from the 1970s that they have yet to replace and Via Rail Canada has long distance coaches dating back to the beginning of the Cold War.
I've been living in China for the past number of years. The rail system here has really developed and improved with their new high speed rail. Puts many other countries systems to shame.....
@keirfree senior Hi, I tell you something you don't know. Huawei uses technology the Chinese stole from your country. I don't know where you come from but yes they did steal and I am 100% sure. If you come from Europe, they stole it from Europe, if you come from Africa, they stole it from Africa. BTW, North Korean is actually a country with most population and labour in the world. I think they have 2 billion people and that's why Chinese need to buy people from North Korea.
China is a communist country basically, so of course they use forced labour and what not to build theirs. It's why they've surpassed the Western world in terms of trains. I would urge that's only true for some parts of China, Chinese trains are awful in many areas.
A 20 minute delay on NYC subways is not unusual. Now a new guy is in finally in charge who is a great manager, originally from London. Of course as was obvious a big part of the solution is a lot of money. The rest is actual management.
I'm from India, our trains are owned by Indian government.... But we have our own problems to talk about. But we all have one thing in common.. "we all love to hate our railway systems"
That was a great piece, really fair and impartial. Thanks so much. I spent three months in the UK a year ago and I was bewildered by the price of train tickets. The idea of franchising the segments of the country is definitely not competitive. For competition to exist, the customer needs to have the choice of using an alternative. At the moment, the customer has no say in which train company operates in their segment of the country, the companies themselves have the final say because they can bid as much money as they want. How about this for a crazy idea? The customers in each segment vote for which train company gets to operate in their constituent. That way, if a train company is failing to meet expectations with high prices and slow services, the customers themselves have the power to evict them and choose who they would rather provide their trains for the area.
