Crisis?? what crisis? (Railway crisis)

Member Name: Highwayman

Product:	Railway crisis
Date:	26/04/02 (27 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: , It works

Disadvantages: , It's not perfect

I travel by public transport wherever I go - because compaired to where I lived before (Australia) the public transport in the UK is a dream. I'm not anti-car, I do drive and and enjoy it greatly. I have had my licence for 25 years, and in that time I calculate I have driven 500,000 miles.

There is no doubt about though, the UK's railways aren't perfect. Why?? any number of reasons - and not many of them are the politicians.

We have the railway system we are prepared to pay for. No less, but unforntunately, no more. Less is spent on the railways per capita than in most countrys of Europe. ( I would quote statistcs, but there are many sets of stats about this, and in the usual manner of these things, they can't agree on anything....except that we spend less).

When a decision is made to spend money there are complaints - about the amount of money, the taxation we have to pay to raise that money - AND strangely enough, the fact that the work is being done at all. Ever try to iron a shirt while you are wearing it? That is the problem this country has with railway maintenance. To repair a railway you have to stop the trains, and I have a feeling that the protests about stopping or delaying any train has played right into the hands of those who don't wish the railways to be manitained properly.

Who are those people?? I'm not one for conspiricy theories, but I imagine it's a combination of a politicians covering for a botched privatisation, a strong road lobby, and years of the misguided belief in the general public that driving a car equates to personal freedom.

There is also the fact that we live in a country where we pay little income tax, and that money has to support ALL government functions including a health system which is non-contributory in it's use. No wonder that for the years the railways have been seen to be still working, governments have not provided the necessary funding.


The Railways ARE a bit of a mess, but they ARE safe.

"In 1999 - when 31 people were killed in the Paddington train crash - overall deaths on the railways were 0.9 per billion passenger kilometres compared with 28 deaths for cars drivers and occupants, 42 for cyclists, 48 for pedestrians and 113 for motorcyclists. In 2000 rail fatalities fell from 0.9 back to a more normal 0.4 despite the Hatfield crash". (Courtesy the Guardian, 5/2/2002). Add it up - a person died for every 1,111,111,111 miles traveled on the railways in that year (the worst since 1988). In the same time, a person died every 1,970,433 miles travelled by road.

This doesn't mean that we should rest on our laurels............but maybe it means we SHOULD stop continually complaining. Some people won't travel by train because they are so bad. Many of those people have never caught a train - but KNOW they're bad because of the complaining. How many more people have died because they have left the rails for the road? I guess we will never know. Paddington had a huge effect on rail travel, and caused a lot of heartbreak and outrage - and rightly so. The 31 people that died in that crash should still be with us - but so should the 10 people that die every day on the roads.

Yes - let's make the railways the best in the world. Let's increase our income tax levels to those paid in France or any of the Scandinavian countries. Faced with that choice though, will we ever fix the railways?

I feel better for getting that off my chest, actually.......

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