It’s money for old rope for rail operators, just take the commuters money, 
thousands of pounds a year, never mind if they don’t have a seat. It’s been standard practice for far too long.
Mike Mitchell, head of railways at the Department for Transport, believes commuters should expect to stand at peak periods, even if they have paid £5,000 for an annual season ticket. He believes it is acceptable to stand for up to half an hour. He suggests that if commuters don’t want to stand, then they should travel out of peak hours. That’s fine if you have flexible working hours, anyone would avoid standing on a train if they could.
This man is obviously not a regular peak commuter. I don’t believe it is acceptable for commuters to be treated like this. I always feel sorry for them, I can’t think of a worse way to start to the day. Often their journey is much longer than 30 mins, what do they do then, get someone to give up their seat so they have their fair share of standing?
If the government is trying to encourage people to use public transport to reduce carbon emissions, and they predict that rail passenger numbers will increase by 30% over the next decade, why haven’t measures been introduced by now to take that into account? Why are there no plans to increase significantly the number of trains on busy lines?
It’s miserable being a commuter, why don’t we have double decker trains like other parts of Europe? Why should our commuters expect a second-class service? Where else would you pay this amount of money for such a shoddy service?
I am also concerned about the health and safety aspect here, it is easy to fall or get pushed about, surely our commuters’s safety should be paramount.
Why can’t peak trains have more carriages? I suggest Mike Mitchell and his cronies try out these nightmare journeys every day for a month or so and see what it feels like to be a crushed, sweating commuter who has paid thousands of pounds for the pleasure.
Update: 25 January, passenger protests increase
I think it is about time that the train companies (including the Underground)and the government take real responsibility for over-crowding. There are limits on buses regarding maximum numbers allowed to stand and similarly in cars where seat belt laws also apply. It would be laughable to consider operating the same practices when flying.
Often we have no choice but to use the trains -and as you say, environmentally and socially we are pressured to do so. But the whole experience is all too often unpleasant, unsafe and unacceptable. The stress and cost of travelling by rail (including trying to park or access the stations in the first place)has never been worse. I dread to think how anyone with special needs copes (including the elderly or pregnant women) – let alone the impression we are giving to visitors to our country who use public transport.
I am surprised that Mike Mitchell doesn’t suggest that standing for half an hour is good exercise for commuters!
What are the safety implications in a crash of of forcing so many people to stand? Coach operators and airlines provide seats for every passenger.
It’s also quite convenient that MPs live just across the road from the Palace of Westminster as and when required!
You bring up an interesting point. Why indeed do we not have double decker trains?
Heather, I think rail car parking facilities should be considerably increased and made cheaper to entice more commuters on trains. Train companies know there is little commuters can do to protest because they have to get to work.
Tejus, I have travelled on a double decker train in Amsterdam, I had never seen them before. It would mean raising the height of bridges or lowering the track perhaps, but all we do is delay making decisions that could make a difference to people’s lives.
Elee.
1 the very last thing we need is a further extension of the colossal behemoth Elfan safety. there is no limit to the amount of private individuals wealth and freedom that can be justified by this means. Genuine new small business is practically extinct in this country already. Same with affordable childcare, and so on. There will never be an end to “concern for health and safety”
Do you accept that there is a line to be drawn ?
2 I saw this story which didn’t grab my attention much as I stand everyday anyway.
The misery of being a commuter is that we undergo this torture largely for the benefit of polulations in the North and Scotland whose services are in everyway better. Still looks like we’ll be rid of the Scots soon .Good
On Carbon emissions i have raise a number of queries about the environmental “consensus” on my ..feeble ..blog. I do not expect you to come over to the conspiracy theory Libertarian view ,..which I do not really hold anyway. I wonder if you could admit that that the problems are poorly presented and dealt with in the most superficial of ways .
I think there is a workaday problem to address but this hyperinfaltion and apocalyptic religionism only fuels the fears of those who suspect it is another state means of grabbing your life and your wallet.
As always this post is brilliantly backed with supporting detail which what I love about your blog . You will never get state monopolies to worry about the customer Ellee .
We need to start thinking of a future for activities not amenable to competition. Education, Health Transport. All these areas are hitting the right wall of the post 2nd WW consensus and ,predictably , collapsing .
It isn’t easy though. And politically it is a minefield. I believe myself that David Cameron has the right attitude and I hope that he will be able to navigate us away from the mess we have got ourselves into
Tejus Ramakrishnan: Why indeed do we not have double decker trains? On many commuter lines — particularly going into London — bridges might present problems.
More trains. I’ve got two problems with this. The first is that, as a shareholder in a rail company, I might have problems with the idea of spending large amounts of money on kit that probably wouldn’t bring in a great deal of extra revenue and wouldn’t be earning me anything very much for most of the day.
The second is that I’m never sure how this is supposed to work in practice. You’ll have to allow a few minutes between trains, just to the first one safely out of the station before the next one arrives, and you’re going to have to allow for hold-ups at junctions and crossings when trains from other departure points join the same lines into the main station. Then you’ve somehow got to get all the passengers off the train when it arrives at (e.g) King’s Cross and then take the train off the platform (because it can’t go any further, obviously) and into a siding somewhere before the next train can come in.
I just wonder how many extra trains, money aside, you could have running into London during the rush hour before you end up with a railway version of a traffic jam. I’m sure you could put more on, but I just wonder how many.
a few points:
double-decker trains – our rail guage (the distance between the tracks) is too small compared to europe making them unsafe on our railways. There is a great story behind this look up Isambalrd Kingdom Brunel. Anyway, the government wrecked things in victorain times is a short summary.
Even if we could fit them on the tracks we would have to rebuild all the tunnels which are too small. That is too expensive.
Over-crowding – We all have a choice about where we live and work, it is a free country.
However the biggest issue here it the botched privatisation of the railways. As consumers we have no choice and so monopoly companies are extracting as much as they can from us.
You could say re-nationalise, but then you just transfer the monopoly to the government, which achieves nothing.
Its all to do with tunnels and the loading gauge. now if we had stuck with the 7foot gauge of Gods Wonderful Railway (GWR by Brunel to Bristol and onwards to New York with the Great Eastern steamer) railways today would be great. Instead we have the corrupt gauge 0f 4 ft 81/2″ and the small tunnels that we now have to put up with.
Public transport is one of my hobbyhorses, in both countries, as you know. So I’ll just say that these bosses should be made to commute at peak time, in the middle of winter, for at least a month.
It sounds like Mr Mitchell is probably chauffer drriven to his office every morning, and would never consider using a train.
[…] In reality, there are no real alternatives, we certainly all pity the rail commuters who pay thousands of pounds for a season ticket and have to stand during peak times. […]