Railway News Matters..........
HEADLINES
The headlines today are dominated by two subjects... UK rail travellers now have to cope with increased fares.... and China is expanding (still!) its high speed rail network. And Christian Wolmar offers his observations on current railway events in his January 2014 Newsletter.. an edited version appears below.
Click on the "Total Railway News" link above to access the stories behind these headlines ...
High-speed rail benefits Ohio: Wali Ahmed Shariff
Makkah high speed rail project in focus
In high-speed rail, the world's loss is China's gain
Airlines VS. High-Speed Rail
China to open high speed rail link to North Korean border in 2015
Passengers: We're not getting value
Rail Fares up, wages flat - Happy New Year from the Government.
Warning over rail 'profit' as commuters face fare hike.
Is this the end of First Class rail? Ministers pay train firms to do away with premium seats.
Rail fare rises: Commuters take a hit as ticket prices increase three times faster than wages
Bombardier loses £350m London Underground contract
Other News.....
First class distraction from fares rises (Christian Wolmar)
MMRDA seeks safety certificate for Monorail.. HERE
Christian Wolmar's Newsletter (excerpts..)
This a bit of a cheat, conflating both the December and January newsletter, and I will definitely try to go back to the monthly routine. It has been a crazy year, having written two books, spent a lot of time on the mayoral campaign, travelled to both South Korea and Canada, and written around 80 journalistic articles as well as spoken at countless meetings. It has all been fantastic fun but it does explain why the newsletter has been missed out a couple of times. I will endeavour to keep it monthly in future.
Next year, the focus is going to be on the mayoral campaign, with my next book, on Indian Railways, not due in to the publishers until late 2015......
On the rails, the details of the fares increases were announced so late – December 23 – that they barely got picked up by the media, but the interesting point was that the state run East Coast announced a genuine freeze – rather than an inflation rise which has been called a freeze by amongst others Boris Johnson – on more than half its fares. While this decision was said to have been taken for commercial reasons, it undoubtedly got up the noses of the privatised operators.
Otherwise, with the franchising deals continuing to be let on the basis of brief single awards and with Labour’s plans for the railways still not clear, there is an air of nervousness in the industry. The fact that Network Rail’s debt will now go on the government’s books, a long overdue measure forced on the Coalition by European rules on accountancy, has added further uncertainty in the industry. Moreover, I can’t really get my head around ATOC being renamed the Rail Delivery Group, a moniker that the wider public will not understand.
As for the journalism, here’s a piece on cycling I wrote for The Observer arguing for better facilities (surprise). For Rail there are columns on The North, here , and the potential for franchising freedom, and on the way that the short term letting of franchising contracts has reduced the potential for investment, here.
In The Oldie, I wrote (another) short piece about the Transsiberian – btw, if you have read the book, please do a review for Amazon; the more the merrier. For Prospect, I was asked to consider what would have happened if British Rail had not been so scandalously broken up and privatised. And finally in House magazine, aimed at politicians, I considered the impact of the Railways Act 1993.
The book I have just finished for Dorling Kindersley, The Iron Road, will be out in time for Father’s Day in May. It covers a lot of the ground from Blood, Iron and Gold but with many more illustrations and a rather different structure.
You can purchase any of my books online on Amazon by going via my website's books list. Clicking through those links also helps to pay for the upkeep of my website!
Anyway, I wish you all a Happy New Year.
Christian
| www.christianwolmar.co.uk For Christian's writing & other work... |
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