Nationalise the railways!

[Gups]

[
You make it sound like the system is relatively fixable as is. How accepted/controversial is your analysis? Is there any kind of political will to act on it?

Views are polarised. There are a lot of people who woudl go for the Tyr view of nationalising the lot.

It's understandable because the privatisation in the early/mid 90s was utterly botched. Responsibility for track and for operations were split. One company was responsible for all of the track, signal and the major rail terminii. The country was split up for operational purposes into regions and franchises offered on a lowest bidder basis, generally for 7 years apiece. The system had fundamental design flaws and for the first 10 years or so was not fit for purpose. The company running the track (Railtrack) failed and had to be taken back into public ownership.

In some areas, there has been a significant improvement with the franchise system with the Government being much more savvy in the negotiations. But there are still some pretty poor operators out there and infrastructure improvements remain reaticve (geared to demand) rather than playing a role in economic development. The result is that there is a terrible Londoncentric bias in provision and the north-east and south-west are very badly served.

I do think the system is operating OK now, in the round with a lot of room for incremental improvements. I very much doubt that full-scale nationalisation is the answer (and is unaffordable in any event) but I do think that regional public bodies should be encouraged to bit for franchises and that franchises should be offered on 20+ year terms.

[Agelastus]

Is Tyr old enough to remember pre-privatisation BR?

My line used to get hand-me-down rolling stock. Now it has new rolling stock and twice the number of train services including direct services to some destinations that were not previously available.

BR used to concentrate funding on two or three lines leaving much of the network to falter. Falter badly. Also as a public service they were vulnerable to "prestige project syndrome"; does anyone here remember the fiasco with the development of high speed tilting trains?

Now, I'm not going to dispute that privatisation was mishandled; franchises should have been sold for longer periods and the system should have been sold as bloc franchises (track and train together - Network Rail's improved now but it was a problem for years.) But going back to the old nationalised system would be a major backwards step.


Edit: tapping away on a Kindle took so long that Gups said much the same thing before me.

[Josquius]

It wasn't privatisation that made the railways better. It was the government actually beginning to take notice of them and invest in them.
Prior to the 90s the government was still channeling the ghost of Beeching, rail was an old fashioned relic, cars were the way things were done in the modern world.
Privatisation happened to come in however at a time of renewed global interest in railways, general (drastic) economic improvment and increased government investment.

I've used the railways in several countries, and the British system is one of the worst going (considering the infrastructure we have in place and the general wealth of our country).

The generally agreed best are the Swiss (state owned), the Germans (quasi-private, mostly state owned), and the Japanese (JR is usually what is meant here and that was privatised along a similar timeline to the UK however not because service was worse when it was state owned. Privatisation's success has been....highly dependant on where you live. The government maintains heavy influence in operations, it isn't truly private despite profits from the profitable parts being funneled away from the government)

[Tamas]

In reaction to Tyr's apparent communist leanings, I would like to explore further the seemingly established (and not argued by me, for sure) fact that the UK and other highly developed Western countries having better culture toward their politics and as such national wealth management than more easternly places.

That's an excellent argument for the left to dismiss the hard worldwide evidence that the higher a state's involvement in the economy is, the more guaranteed the ruin of a country is.

However, what is also dismissed by them I think, is the source of that higher political culture, and more responsible relation to the common wealth. Namely: a (at least historically) healthy and influential middle class.
A healthy and influential middle class that has been allowed to develop precisely by the lack of state-controlled artificial influences on the economy.
The bane of Hungary and it's entire region, let alone the former Soviet territories in the ROTW is that the aristocracy there, combined with historical circumstances, has been able to successfully prevent the rise of a healthy middle class.

So while Tyr and perhaps others keep waving the red flag, it does worth remembering that the option of efficient state involvement (if there is one), has been granted by the toils and achievements of the very world of dependence on individual interests and accountability that the far left seems to be bent on decreasing.
The welfare world, so to speak, has been living off on the results of the world it denounced as bad.

Just sayin' 

[Sheilbh]

That's an excellent argument for the left to dismiss the hard worldwide evidence that the higher a state's involvement in the economy is, the more guaranteed the ruin of a country is.

The evidence is the other way around. The only place I can think of that would accord with that is Hong Kong and it's an extreme outlier.

A healthy and influential middle class that has been allowed to develop precisely by the lack of state-controlled artificial influences on the economy.

Rule of law? Enforceable property rights? Education? Weights and measures?

I think saying it's the middle class is a bit monocausal. But the emergence of the middle class in Western Europe (especially North-Western Europe) is exactly simultaneous with the 'state' emerging as an actor. The two reinforced and buttressed each other everywhere.

Without state-controlled artificial influences on the economy you get an economy dictated by strength. In other words, feudal aristocracy.

[Admiral Yi]

The evidence is the other way around. The only place I can think of that would accord with that is Hong Kong and it's an extreme outlier.

Russia, Argentina, Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, Belarus, Singapore, Bolivia, China....

[Tamas]

The evidence is the other way around. The only place I can think of that would accord with that is Hong Kong and it's an extreme outlier.

Err.. The entire Soviet block, Venezuela, North Korea, Argentina, etc...

And again, you take something I said about less state influence, and jump right to the part where there is no state actor at all, and come up with a world where strength equals economic power. Funnily enough, we do agree that state actors (the ones with the monopoly on violence) running the economy does equal aristocratic feudalism.
But I digress.

No state influence in the economy does not equal the abolishment of the state in general, jeesh. Where did I ever say that? Rule of law, and accountability of citizens and corporations is always important for things to work and you need the state for that. However, trying to meddle in the economy is not necessary for the rule of law.

[Sheilbh]

Russia, Argentina, Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, Belarus, Singapore, Bolivia, China....

Yeah Cuba and North Korea are outliers as Hong Kong (and possibly Singapore) are.

I think you're equating corruption with state involvement and I'd agree that the more corrupt a country is the more likely it is a ruin. But the state in any Western European country or the US is far more involved in the economy than in Russia - masses more regulations, higher taxes, spending a greater proportion of the economy.

Edit: To put it another way I think the problem is that the economy is more involved in the state in those countries. It's captured by economic actors which is a very unhelpful thing.

And again, you take something I said about less state influence, and jump right to the part where there is no state actor at all, and come up with a world where strength equals economic power. Funnily enough, we do agree that state actors (the ones with the monopoly on violence) running the economy does equal aristocratic feudalism.

You made an historical point that the middle class emerged because of the lack of state involvement, while the middle class and the state emerged together reinforcing one another. Without a strong, active state there is no middle class there's aristocratic feudalism, or Putinist Russia.

And that historical process involved the state meddling in the economy a lot.

[Zanza]

We have one of those peculiar public-private mixes that Germany likes for all kinds of service. We have the behemoth Deutsche Bahn, which operates like a private company, but is still 100% state-owned. And then we have a multitude of smaller railway companies that run everything from a single small line to a network of intercity trains on less popular routes. As Deutsche Bahn would have to be extremely heavily regulated anyway, owning all the railways and the stations, I don't see any advantage in selling them. They have to pay a dividend to the federal government anyway.

[Barrister]

Canada has a state-owned rail carrier - Via Rail.  I'm sure the government would love to privatize it if it could - it's a leftover from when the government owned Canadian National.  But while CN is profitable and has been sold, Via loses money hand over fist.  It receives a subsidy of almost a half billion dollars per year.

That also means that, at least out west, passenger trains are rare as hens teeth.  I think the train through Edmonton comes twice a week.  When you consider the fact that there are multiple planes and busses leaving every day it makes rail a non-factor.

Even then though, the few times I've looked at taking the train, the cost is the same as taking the bus, with it taking just as long as well (if not longer).  There is zero reason to ever take Via.

[MadImmortalMan]

Gups is right about the contracting method. It's not good.

[Admiral Yi]

Seems to me regardless of the length of the contract you're going to have the same end game suboptimality in the last X years.

[Neil]

Canada has a state-owned rail carrier - Via Rail.  I'm sure the government would love to privatize it if it could - it's a leftover from when the government owned Canadian National.  But while CN is profitable and has been sold, Via loses money hand over fist.  It receives a subsidy of almost a half billion dollars per year.

That also means that, at least out west, passenger trains are rare as hens teeth.  I think the train through Edmonton comes twice a week.  When you consider the fact that there are multiple planes and busses leaving every day it makes rail a non-factor.

Even then though, the few times I've looked at taking the train, the cost is the same as taking the bus, with it taking just as long as well (if not longer).  There is zero reason to ever take Via.

Even if you did take the train, no matter where you go, you still need a car.

[Barrister]

Canada has a state-owned rail carrier - Via Rail.  I'm sure the government would love to privatize it if it could - it's a leftover from when the government owned Canadian National.  But while CN is profitable and has been sold, Via loses money hand over fist.  It receives a subsidy of almost a half billion dollars per year.

That also means that, at least out west, passenger trains are rare as hens teeth.  I think the train through Edmonton comes twice a week.  When you consider the fact that there are multiple planes and busses leaving every day it makes rail a non-factor.

Even then though, the few times I've looked at taking the train, the cost is the same as taking the bus, with it taking just as long as well (if not longer).  There is zero reason to ever take Via.

Even if you did take the train, no matter where you go, you still need a car.

I guess that might be the one benefit of the train actually.  Via stations are so old they're all historic sites located right in the middle of downtown, so you might not actually need a car.

[crazy canuck]

Seems to me regardless of the length of the contract you're going to have the same end game suboptimality in the last X years.

The bigger problem is that private actors are not going to invest for the long term or obviously for goals which do not go to the bottom line.  Transportation infrastructure is an important economic tool for governments to use to influence economic development and shouldnt be left to companies who have a limited investment horizon.