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Title:

U.K. Rail Transport--Matching Supply to Demand

Accession Number:

01154723

Record Type:

Component

Availability:

Transportation Research Board Business Office

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Abstract:

The United Kingdom (UK) railway provides 7 and 8% of UK passenger and freight transport respectively and as a public service costs the UK taxpayer approximately £8 ($13) billion/year. Yet despite the well documented and expensive failings of the fragmented rail privatization, over recent years it has seen unprecedented growth in the number of trains that run and the amount of freight and passengers carried. However little expansion in network capacity has been achieved despite record investment. Because of this and a fragmented structure spare capacity is now at a premium. This has lead to significant over crowding on trains in some areas, and in others there is little or no capacity left to run more trains within exiting stock or track provision. However, the UK Government has stated that as part of achieving best value it wants to further increase rail traffic, and recently has set out a strategy to optimize this. This paper reviews the issues associated with the growth in passengers and the transport demand placed on the UK rail network and the policy developed to accommodate and manage it. It details the current UK railway structure then identifies the capacity constraints and options identified for capacity enhancement. The paper concludes that while the privatization of the network is perhaps a lesson in how not to do it, there is significant experience to be gained in the development of policy and route utilization strategies for those experiencing similar problems of coping with increased demand within a limited budget.

Monograph Accession #:

01147878

Report/Paper Numbers:

10-0859

Language:

English

Corporate Authors:

Transportation Research Board

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Authors:

Frost, Matthew William
Ison, Stephen
Watson, Robert

Pagination:

18p

Publication Date:

2010

Conference:

Transportation Research Board 89th Annual Meeting

Location: Washington DC, United States
Date: 2010-1-10 to 2010-1-14
Sponsors: Transportation Research Board

Media Type:

DVD

Features:

Maps; References (21)

Geographic Terms:

United Kingdom

Subject Areas:

Freight Transportation; Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning

Source Data:

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2010 Paper #10-0859

Files:

TRIS, TRB

Created Date:

Jan 25 2010 10:24AM