A rant about trains...

[annwfyn]

Recently, David Cameron made a statement to the effect of 'people don't need to drive everywhere - we have a perfectly good train system'. I think he may have been trying to explain why it's generally a good thing to tax car travel lots, and try and beat people into taking the train.

Well, wide eyed and bright with hope, I decided last weekend to try the more environmentally sound train while travelling up to Birmingham. Sadly, I failed entirely, after getting to Euston, only to find out that the fare of £28 quoted on Virgin Trains website, was only applicable when travelling via the slow train from Marylebone. The normal London-Birmingham train service costs £38 return. I didn't have £38 on me, or available in my bank account (I'm a student and so often broke. It's a sad story), and Marylebone was a bit of a way away (and would have gotten me to Birmingham at a rather uncivilised time) so I went home, moped, and wound up deciding to drive up to Birmingham the next day with pierot and ksirafai, who nobly gave me money for petrol as well.

I had a completely empty tank of petrol just before leaving. I put £30 of petrol in it, and it got me to Brum and back, and has got me into college and back for the last three days. I also paid £8 for a day's parking in Birminham city centre. Time-wise, I spent about the same amount of time driving as I would have done if I'd had to travel across London to Euston, and then up to Birmingham. So, it took the same amount of time to drive as it would have done to travel by train, and it cost me exactly the same amount to get a car containing three people up to Birmgham, and park for day as it would have done to get a single person up to Birmingham by train.

There's a rant coming at the end of this, if I can just put it into words. I think it starts with me being of the opinion that trains are meant to be good things. They are meant to be better for the environment, ease congestion from the roads, offer an alternative form of transport for those who can't afford a car. Yet none of this can come to pass as long as train fares continue to be this high. At the moment, there is absolutely no positive incentive for me to use public transport outside of London. It isn't cheaper, it is less comfortable and less convenient. This needs to not be the case. People need to have positive reasons to not drive everywhere. Yet the government, and the opposition, don't seem to see this. Instead they are trying to sort out the car problem by penalising drivers and car owners, quietly making travel in general more and more prohibitively expensive for everyone beyond the middle classes and economic elites. That's not reasonable. Why can we not try and help the planet and ease congestion by offering people alternatives, instead of just taxing them into stasis?

And why on earth does it cost so much more to travel from Euston instead of Marylebone?

In other news, I've done nothing all week except college, dinner and TV and it feels amazing. My sanity is greatly restored. I think we all need to sit and chill every once in a while. I think life is beginning to pick up pace again, however.

Mostly for my reference, here are my plans for the rest of the week:

Thursday:

Daytime - adventures in museums with adze and anyone else who is around.
Evening - Writing my museology essay which is due in on Monday.

Friday:

Daytime - going to the bank to change all our mortgage stuff over to the new joint account, tidying, hopefully finishing my museology essay.
Evening - meeting up with molez.

Saturday:

Daytime - meeting up with Mark Buxton to wander around museums and chat.
Evening - meeting up with kittyboo_tastic and her young man for drinks and dinner

Sunday:

Currently free. What have I forgotten? I've got a reasonable lump of uni work to do if nothing else comes up...

Comments

[silver-blue.livejournal.com]

I don't particularly think so. The tube in particular is extortionately expensive for a mediocre (at best) service with poor reliability. Bus is reasonable, certainly. Overland train services within London and surrounding area vary wildly from excellent to awful.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

You see, I quite like the tube, but it's entirely possible that it's overpriced. I don't have a huge amount to compare it to.

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

The tube is overpriced, certainly. The service hasn't really improved with all the price hikes, but sticks around the 'okay' mark.

But I get buses, anyway. I hate the tube.

[anonymous-james.livejournal.com]

I agree, to get from Waterloo to Farringdon I can either get the 243 and often get a seat or get the tube and stand with my nose in someone's armpits. That's assuming I get on the train in the first place. My choice was obvious.

Of course the 243 is one of _the_ most popular buses and so that queues are madness. But I reckon it's still quicker because you have to change to get to Farringdon. Most of the time I'm a loon on a bike, it cuts 15 minutes off my journey. I really am "better off by bike"

[madwitch.livejournal.com]

One of my housemates often cycles to work, it's often much quicker for her. I never managed to learn and anyway, I work on the same bus route I live on, so it's simple.

[lilitufire.livejournal.com]

The Tokyo Metro system kicks its arse. I am always shocked at how small, dirty and inefficient the tube is when I come back.

The Ginza line in Tokyo is from the late 1920's, so it's not all about the old.

[astro-dust.livejournal.com]

Yes, the tube is expensive, in a far away lil' ol' town called Melbourne I could get a weekly ticket for $18.00AU now i pay £22.40 on my oyster... The aussie price converted into pounds is around £7.00. I know Melbourne is comparatively a tiny place compared to London, but that's three times the price.

Waaah.

[satyrica.livejournal.com]

Melbourne's public transport was great from my brief experience but Sydney . . . oh how I wish for London transport in Sydney . . .

[wildrogue.livejournal.com]

I haven't much to compare it to, but to me the tube seems pretty good and is certainly improving gradually.

That said I grew up in a place where buses came by weekly so my views of a good service might be a little skewed.

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

We had two buses per day when I was a young 'un.

Then I hit my teens, and it became one bus every two hours, and that were luxury, I tell you.

I hear rumours of hourly buses from Lambourn to Newbury now. I tell you - those kids these days just don't know how lucky they are!

(the bus never went anywhere other than Newbury, which kinda sucked if you had anywhere else to be, but let's not worry overly about that!)

[riksowden.livejournal.com]

Bah, when i lived in Leafield there was a bus at 3pm on a Thursday to Witney. The bus back was at 2.30 - the next Thursday.

One bus a week!

[anonymous-james.livejournal.com]

Do you use the tube in rush hour? I wouldn't even contemplate that, buses or cycling seem like the more obvious choices.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

The big difference between London and HK/Kl is that their urban rail networks are almost a hundred years newer than ours - the Victorians didn't build for our infrastructure requirements. Talk to Monty about the hellishly difficlt work that LU have to do to keep the tubes running in tunnel networks simply not designed for the modern world.

And as for cost? I didn't vote for Ken, so my hands are clean.