The London Assembly Transport Committee had a session today on rail devolution. There were two parts to the debate - first half with TOC reps from SWT and South Eastern, people from Network Rail and the chair of London Travelwatch. Second half was with TfL, ATOC and reps from Kent CC and Surrey CC. The webcast is available at
www.london.gov.uk/mayor-assembly/london-assembly/webcasts.
The webcast is 2hrs 40mins long with the split between sessions around 1 hr 35 mins.
A few bullet points from each session.
- Committee still concerned about London Bridge issues. Network Rail made a reasonable stab at explaining what they've done and what went wrong. However it wasn't a scintilating performance.
- Committee not enthused about the performance of South Eastern or SWT. Richard Tracey was particularly scathing about slow progress on capacity expansion on SWT suburban services. Tim Shoveller (MD) was reasonably lucid and candid about what had happened about the timing of remodelling at Waterloo which had pushed back other work.
- Quite a lot of emphasis about how West Anglia devolution is a much bigger challenge for TfL than the takeover of Silverlink Metro was. Lack of large scale investment is the key factor. London Travelwatch are clearly keeping a keen eye on what is going on although they were clear they support devolution.
- The TOC MDs were being as pragmatic as they could be in front of a committee of politicians and not digging in to defend franchising but you could see they really prefer not being subject to a TfL style concession.
In the second half there was perhaps more of interest.
- TfL (Geoff Hobbs) was his usual lucid and pragmatic self. Very clear that the London commuter market is different from elsewhere and tends to monopoly provision so "on rail" competition is illusory as is trying to chase revenue through advance tickets etc. He was very clear about wanting to pay specifically for defined areas of quality rather than assuming a broad incentive was the way to deliver improvement (the antithesis of a revenue chasing franchise). He also said using "average" measures was not appropriate given these can hide all sorts of issues and can prevent passenger concerns being properly dealt with.
- ATOC Chief Executive was trying to appear as flexible and accommodating as possible but my sense was that he's wedded to franchises and not terribly keen on TfL's approach. I got no sense of enthusiasm from his comments.
- The very interesting bit was that both Kent CC and Surrey CC were pragmatic and sensible in wanting to protect the interests of their residents. Kent had 3 "red lines" - no negative impact on fares, no "theft" of train paths by TfL and peak train capacity improvements by TfL should concentrate on train lengthening.
- Kent admitted that they killed off South Eastern devolution because of the Estuary Airport proposals. In short they didn't want the airport so the Mayor didn't get as much train set as he wanted.
- Kent and Surrey very happy to work with TfL on more devolution proposals. Kent were very keen about Oyster being extended to Dartford, Sevenoaks and possibly as far as Gravesend. Some caution was noted by TfL about the ability to offer cheaper fares (given what's happened with West Anglia and TfL Rail). Interestingly the counties weren't keen on suddenly having a "cheap" station which could skew commuting patterns and create unwanted congestion and parking problems compared to the current situation.
- Both counties wanted to work in partnership with TfL on devolution / Crossrail 2 and not be presented with a fait accompli.
- Both counties were watching West Anglia's progress with interest as they felt that was the closest model to their areas.
- TfL said they were more than happy to go through the relevant issues with the Counties.
- Reliability problems on West Anglia were raised. Mr Hobbs was clear that daily action was being taken to get service quality to where it should be. The 317s that LOROL have taken on were not put through as much "pre transfer" running as expected to shake out faults. These trains have been "off lease" so not in as good shape as expected. Although the word "embarrassment" was not used it was clear that TfL aren't happy. Mr Hobbs said the issues should be solved within a month (I suspect it'll be faster than that).
Overall a much more pragmatic session about future prospects for devolution provided the next Mayor wants it and can work with the government to get it. Oh and if there is no estuary airport proposed for Kent or Surrey.
EDIT - I should just add that TfL confirmed they are looking to increase off peak and weekend frequencies from Enfield Town (Cheshunt not mentioned specifically but may be in scope) into Liverpool Street. They said there's a positive business case and negotiations with Network Rail are under way for how to get paths that work. Absolutely no prospect of extra peak time trains for all the reasons we are familiar with. No mention at all about aspirations for STAR or Hertford East takeovers even though the discussion afforded such an opportunity.
