Posted 28th November 2013 | 4 Comments
Infrastructure is being 'pushed to its limits'
THE OFFICE of Rail Regulation has launched a new attack on Network Rail’s record of maintaining railway infrastructure, pointing out that more than half of all recent delays were caused by problems attributable to the company.
It concluded that these causes include previous underspends on maintenance, deferred infrastructure renewals and other factors such as overrunning engineering work.
In a bleak assessment, the ORR said that between April and October this year, there were more than nearly 16,000 infrastructure incidents on the network, nearly 5 per cent more than over the same period last year, despite ‘benign’ weather conditions. These incidents caused almost 1.7 million delay minutes, the equivalent of more than three years.
The ORR's director of railway planning and performance Alan Price said: “Safety has to be Network Rail’s top priority. Beyond that, its focus should be on delivering improved performance and increased capacity. The company is currently operating with a large underspend and a significant shortfall against the performance targets it signed up to. It is also behind schedule on its own maintenance and renewal plans. Network Rail must utilise its funding efficiently to address the increasing backlog and improve performance, as it enters a new five-year delivery plan.
“ORR has set new regulatory targets from 2014 for Network Rail’s asset management, particularly focusing on how it manages, maintains and renews the network. We want the company to move from a ‘find and fix’ approach to maintenance to a ‘predict and prevent’ culture, to reduce the amount of failures affecting services. We see signs of good practice and want to see Network Rail working with train operators to deliver.”
In a statement, Network Rail responded: “While we acknowledge that we are not hitting our tough regulatory targets on performance, when it comes to a choice between running a train that is delayed or cancelling it to protect punctuality, our approach is to run the service because that is in the passengers’ best interests.
“The real issue here is capacity and a largely Victorian infrastructure being pushed to its limits. Asset failures make up a small proportion of why trains are late; track accounts for just 5 per cent. Our railway is congested and any incident has massive knock-on effects. We believe our regulator needs to help us to address this capacity issue rather than focus exclusively on one narrow punctuality target.”
The RMT union said the ORR’s assessment confirmed its own view. General secretary Bob Crow said: “This is an extraordinary report which not only supports everything RMT has been saying about the impact of cuts to maintenance and renewals but which also blows the lid off the role that the ORR themselves play in imposing cuts, on behalf of the Government, on Network Rail.
“Only last month the ORR demanded a further £1.7 billion of cuts from Network Rail from 2014, cuts which would hack back skeleton staffing levels and drag back maintenance and renewals even further than the dire conditions identified in today’s report. ORR have got a nerve.”
Reader Comments:
Views expressed in submitted comments are that of the author, and not necessarily shared by Railnews.
David Faircloth, Derby
Are we sure "blaming it on the Victorians" isn't being used as a"cop-out" for administrative failures on the part of Network Rail?
After all, most European railways were built during the 19th century - just like ours - but they don't seem to be having the same problems as us. And also let's not forget that much of the German high speed rail network is formed of upgraded infrastructure, so why are our politicians convinced that it isn't an option worth even considering here in the UK?
Or is just that Brunel et al were rubbish engineers and that the British rail infrastructure actually isn't capable of being upgraded?
(In fact, a great deal of infrastructure on the continent has been upgraded repeatedly since 1901 -- particularly after World War 2, when large sections of the existing railways were all but destroyed and had to be rebuilt. Although there was obviously enemy damage in Britain as well, it was not on the same scale, which has meant that more assets from the Victorian era have survived. There is no 'blame' attached to Victorian engineers -- quite the reverse -- but their structures cannot be expected to exist forever. Also, Victorian specifications [particularly the small structure gauge in Britain] are also often inappropriate now.--Editor)
Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex
Its a bit rich to cut Network Rail budget and then complain about the state of assets causing delays on rail network ,so simple solution would be to remove the cut on next 5 year control period and let Network Rail continue clearing up under investment in network in the 20th Century !
Perhaps HS1 and 2 show that Network Rail should build more new stretches of line instead of patch and mend of old Victorian structures a process that could increase capacity and reduce journey times with development of land freed up used to fund these upgrades .
Graham Collett, York
These comments by the ORR are unhelpful. Their criticism relates to lack of investment in infrastructure, yet they are continually seeking cuts in the Network Rail budget!
Tony Pearce, Reading
There are many other services feeling their legacy too. Its not Railways but the Victorian Sewers are collapsing daily in Reading. This year we have had many road closures becuase of them. Maybe a parallel with the railways can be drawn. The Sewers are taking more and different waste than they were designed for (eg Fat all of which was eaten in the 1850s but is poured away now) whilst being pummelled by heavy traffic from the roads above which too is heavier and more than the roads were designed for. Perhaps the Rail routes that are having the most breakdowns are the heaviest used, with for example longer and heavier freight trains. (The Network of course did suffer a huge blow with the Colliery landslip in the summer and that may account for a significant amount of the figure) And of course a delay is now causing problems for more trains and more passengers becuase of the large increase in passenger numbers. Imposing fines on the railways isn't going to help anyway. Reducing particular Managers bonuses might if the problems are solvable.