To think train travel is too expensive?!

It's absolutely ridiculous. An hour long train journey to our nearest big city costs more than it does in fuel if I were to drive. If I go alone, it's sometimes worth it for the convenience of arriving in the city centre, but if there is more than one of us going the cost is unjustifiable.

I really hope government gets on top of this. I would like to use public transport and not drive everywhere, but I can't justify it when it costs more than fuel. Similarly, our local bus service into the nearby small city also costs more for a return ticket than it costs in fuel.

I'd like to add in another moan - when there are engineering works, and rail replacement buses (changing my 4 hr direct journey to a 6 hr journey with 2 changes), why do I have to pay the same, or often more?

Safer than cars

I travel down to London from Newcastle every week. The return train was £150 two years ago the same trains are £250 now. The train in the morning is the main cost. It's always completely empty. I bet if they charged half the price they'd get twice the customers but they probably get slightly more profit doing it their way. So fuck the customers right. It's daylight robbery.

Try two singles

Any time it is specifically highlighted that Unions don't cause high fares you say you never made such a claim, but still claim they have to be "smashed" to reduce fares. It dosen't make any logical sense.

It's also complete and utter nonsense.

Many other countries are capable of running efficient and cheap public transport, often with much stronger unions than we have. It's about government and desire, and our government desires to make a profit for it's donors.

My point, as is quite clear, is that unions make running the trains expensive, which makes the tickets expensive.
If you want cheaper tickets then you have to reduce the costs. That means cheaper/fewer trains, or cheaper/fewer staff.

So what point were you trying to make exactly when you responded to the OP's observation that train travel is too expensive by stating "that's Unions for you"? Are you now saying Unions have no role at all in the fact train travel is expensive?

Exactly, it’s like pick a struggle - you can’t be expensive AND unreliable… not to mention quite dirty & unsafe sometimes.

It's disgraceful. Public transport in the UK is appalling, not only is ridiculously expensive since, it NEVER runs as it should.

What a redundant point - I never said they do those things.

That's a whole load of untruths in one post @CoatRack .

The unions represent the workers employed by the private companies charged with running the (very fractured) railway. With exception to NR (or Great Britain Railways) which is publicly owned. But the unions represent them as well.

Unions do not set prices of tickets. They do not run stations, nor trains, nor pay staff, nor do the engineering work.

So the only way to reduce rail fares is to slash rail workers salaries and Terms and Conditions?

Doesn't that seem like a rather backwards, race to the bottom approach?
Why do only the bosses get improvements?

How much do you think the bosses are paid, and how much of a difference would that make to your average train fare?

Let's assume there are 10 directors who are paid £1m each per year. Hell, let's make it 100 directors, with total salaries of £100m.

First Group alone did 260m rail journeys last year, and the entire group (so not just rail, buses too) made about £160m profit.

Confiscate 100% of both the profits and those directors salaries and you'll save... £1 per ticket.

So the only way to reduce rail fares is to slash rail workers salaries and Terms and Conditions?
How about slashing the fat salaries of the bosses of the privatised rail companies and saving money by not paying out dividends instead?
What is good about destroying ordinary people's livelihoods?

No, I'm just saying people forget the full cost of driving the car when making comparisons, I didn't mention convenience.

Bollocks. The problem is privatisation. Trains were better and cheaper when they were state run - and workers has higher pay than now in real terms.

Yes, imagine when they reduce flying and driving due to climate change and trains would be the main mode of transportation . The rip off that prevails in the U.K. is always there already when crisis hit. If you work you are fuck. Middle class always mainly affected by all this as well.

I think many people are bothered but they just let it happen which is typical British attitude. I have a moan about it myself but I realise I’m not doing much to change it - don’t know where to start tbh.

Driving to London from my town is 4 hours. It’s only 2 hours on the train. There are very good reasons to want to take the train instead.

Add to that an Increasing amount of people are concerned with being more “green” or can’t afford to run a car or disabilities prevent them from driving so they want cheaper trains.

The Manchester to Yorkshire (Sheffield, Doncaster) trains are frequently extremely overcrowded, with no bookable seats. They have their share of moronic travellers who appear to think their luggage should have a seat in preference to standing passengers. Last week I had to ask a young guy to move his bag, he seemed surprised.

I am very nervous of this as when I’ve done it independently in the past (eg bought separate tickets for regional stations to mainline stations in order to get to London), if your regional train was late causing you to miss the mainline train, you’d not be allowed to travel on a later mainline service, whereas if you’d bought a through ticket, they would accept liability for the first train’s lateness and allow you onto a later mainline train without having to pay a fine.
does tickety split allow for this?

It is too expensive. Will it ever change though? Most people aren’t bothered as they can just drive everywhere, they’d prefer cheap fuel on road vehicles and aviation than a system that funded public transport properly.

Has anyone mentioned Tickety Split yet? Especially in the morning there can be travel to work subsidies on some portions of the journey, so splitting your ticket providing the train actually stops at that station can save quite a bit of money.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/travel/news/europe-mercilessly-mocks-uk-government-27771225.amp