Certainly with FGW^▸ (First Great Western)/GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway), I always thought that the current set-up made for a fairly effective balance of powers.

GWR have to keep the trains running, the punters and the employees happy, whilst balancing the books.

GWR can't do anything too silly if they want to keep on operating services, the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) are protected from doing anything too silly by GWR.

My concern is that in the event of a central Government-controlled railway, the "difficult bits" tend to get sacrificed to sacrifice the high profile / politically sensitive bits. So West Country lines will be left to rot for want of a few million here and there whilst billions are poured into a shiny new lines for the Labour voters of Liverpool and Manchester to keep Andy Street et al off Keir Starmer's back. 

The last time that I did BTM^▸ (Bristol Temple Meads (strictly, it should be BRI)) to Avonmouth by rail it was £2 - presumably the same as the bus.

Conceivably Bristol Parkway might work, especially as it's electrified already.

Longer term, they might convince the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) to fund extension of electrification to Avonmouth via Henbury, at which point there are most of the main logistics players plus Amazon a short drive away.

If Bristol to Worcester can merit a 5-car 80x then I think we can safely say that Cross Country merit some 9- and 5-car 80x stock, not least because they spend a considerable time under the wires, and probably settle the business case for Bromsgrove to Bristol and Birmingham to Derby.

IIRC^▸ (if I recall/remember/read correctly), TfWM have an aspiration to run 1TPH to Bristol and 1TPH to Cardiff. I believe that there is also a plan afoot to beef up the Leeds to Nottingham stoppers (CC services to Chesterfield already having been significantly pruned) - I wonder at what point CC might introduce some kind of premium or reservation-only policy to keep the commuters out?

One way of looking at things is that the idea of a WCML^▸ (West Coast Main Line) relief line made great sense (particularly seen through the prism of Railtrack's failed upgrade), but it morphed into a monster. The Treasury wanted it to be standalone, others wanted it to be Euro-spec in loading gauge and train length, someone else decided it should be super-fast etc.

Getting out of London and the Home Counties was aways going to be horribly expensive. Replacing Euston makes sense, OOC^▸ (Old Oak Common (depot)) makes sense (Heathrow interchange, backup to Euston and Paddington), Birmingham Curzon Street and Interchange kinda make sense (particularly if Moor Street is rebuilt as a regional hub and HS2^▸ (The next High Speed line(s)) East was used to enable a layer of regional super-fast services to Nottingham, Leicester & Derby).

For me, what didn't make sense were Leeds and Manchester as terminii (which a standalone project dictated) - the solution should have included a high-speed transpennine corridor (with passive provision for an eventual south-transpennine Sheffield to Manchester Airport line).

So the idea of a privately funded Hansacre to Manchester Airport line seems like a smart piece of politics and a good way to deliver a WCML relief line. It's limited in scope, much of the prep work has been done, it will be much cheaper per KM than phase 1, the Treasury is less likely to object as it's PFI, it doesn't tread on the transpennine aspirations of NR^» (Network Rail - home page), the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) or anyone else etc.

As has been said many times here and elsewhere, driving trains, especially fast ones, is a very responsible, high-pressure job, which takes a lot of training and there's not many that make the grade, never mind the shift work, especially if you're driving freight.

Much of the railway can replace humans with technology, down-skill or short-staff from time to time, but without drivers the job literally stops, so not surprising the ToCs will get their cheque books out to acquire and retain. One of the perks of a fragmented railway if you're a driver I suppose.

From time to time it pops up in the media, but for many, there's long been a realisation that you you can get far better rewarded and enjoy better job security in a highly skilled "blue-collar" job than many "white-collar" professions, especially now that AI is automating so many tasks. I'd certainly have no problem with my kids being train drivers.

Coincidentally I spotted this the other day - promotion of the cycle route along the River Loire with the TER local rail service beefed up to include plenty of space for bikes. 

https://www.loireavelo.fr/reservation-ter

Isn't there quite a lot of asbestos and contamination to get rid of first?

I think it's fair point. Whilst we owe a tremendous debt to the enthusiasts who have saved our lines and heritage, places like Minehead could be transformed with full reconnection to the National Rail network and a full rail service, something which as we've seen from Okehampton, can be done cost-effectively and with great results.

How do we do that sensitively? To my mind, a preserved railway serves two purposes:
1) To show people how things were, preserving material and skills for future generations to see
2) To maintain the line as a living part of the community within which it operates, preserving it from encroachment.

If you want to achieve the second point, surely the better option is to have it run for the benefit of the whole community as a full time National Rail operation?

So how do you achieve the first point effectively and not "throw away" the hard work of the volunteers? 

1) Give significant public funds to national/regional centres of excellence, enabling them to have full-time professional skills in conservation, maintenance, education - lines acting as examples of "how things were" and enabling them to build additional income streams such as events, filming, acting as a base for railtours etc. Why not run fewer centres really well and give enthusiasts a chance to earn real money? 

2) For railways that would be better reincorporated into the national network:
a) The railway gets taken over in its entirety with significant funding to "lift and shift" items like museums, engineering workshops, stock, signalling and trackwork to a heritage operation, plus a binding commitment to maintain heritage features which remain. As far as possible, maintain old buildings for community use rather than leveling for parking, look for community organisations to take over station catering e.g. Yatton 
b) Partial takeover e.g. Monday to Saturday the line is run as a conventional NR^» (Network Rail - home page) line with a heritage operation keeping workshops and station buildings, running on Sundays on something like a "one engine in steam" principle. The Avon Valley in Bristol springs to mind here.
c) "Upskilling" whereby the more capable operations are given capital and operating grants to run a professional service to a revised rulebook. Perhaps a suitable model can be found amongst the Swiss / Japanese private railways? 

I think the £240m is money towards works rather than the full scope.

If I understand correctly, it's been descoped considerably since the 2021 consultation and it's now more of an upgrade of the Marston Vale line than the complete rebuild that was foreseen. Piecemeal track replacement and a single length of redoubling, a sub-100mph line speed (which means the level crossings can stay) giving 3tph and rebuilt Bedford St John's station.

My guess is that they will crack on with the Marston Vale line, but leave the redevelopment of Bedford Station for now. Given that Cambridge South is costing £180m, it must be in the same ballpark, with the various CPOs around the station and to the north inevitably controversial, whereas the existing line is more along the lines of "permitted development"

Oh, there are plenty of holes to be picked. But:

a) Memories are short and we don't tend to notice incremental change e.g. commuting Reading to London 20 years ago was an unreliable slog. The 180s were awful at speed, Paddington was noisy, fume filled and going across London on the Tube took forever. Local Thames Valley services were infrequent short Turbos etc.
b) We also underestimate the cumulative effect of change e.g. Filton Bank and East Junction might seem like they give minimal passenger benefit but enabled the extra services to Gloucester, on the Severn Beach line, will enable the Ashley Down & Henbury spur services etc.
c) When we travel, we tend to see the nicer bits of railway which get lavished with attention - the terminus stations, the high-speed expresses, the airport stations - we rarely find ourselves trying to get to work on a graffiti and litter-strewn platform wondering if the train is going to come before we get mugged.

You're right about shorter trains though. Not a new phenomenon either, I remember in the 1980s when the loco + 4 sets on the Hope Valley services were replaced with 2-car 156's and the carnage that ensued. Using 80x stock on the Worcester services seems equally daft, a bulk order of Stadler tri-mode units and a 20-year electrification plan would be a much better idea. 

It's a fair observation, but I think you underestimate quite how much work goes on in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom).

The reality is that much of the UK railway has been effectively rebuilt over the last 15 years - in England alone we've had the electrification of the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) with the colossal rebuild of Reading, Filton Bank, Okehampton reopening, North West electrification, MML^» (Midland Main Line. - about) to Kettering, Elizabeth Line, London Overground, plus an awful lot of money spent on rebuilding stations, updating signalling and OLE^▸ (Overhead Line Equipment, more often "OHLE"), new trains etc. Over 100 new mainline stations since 2000 IIRC^▸ (if I recall/remember/read correctly), not to mention light rail.

In terms of ongoing projects, the list includes EastWest rail, Transpennine upgrade, MML electrification (lots of work going on behind the scenes), Northumberland line, Camp Hill line and of course HS2^▸ (The next High Speed line(s)), which whilst it might be a bit of a mess, will include a massive new station on the GWML relieving Paddington.

There's also huge ambition for rail on the part of local bodies, backed up by realistic long-term plans to incrementally improve services.

If you want to compare the UK with France, there were also about 100 station openings (of all types) since 2000 but almost entirely focused on dense urban areas - RER, Metro, Tram and TGV^▸ (Train a Grande Vitesse), which is very nice for those that use them, but in much of France, local and regional rail services are extremely slow and spartan, devolved to local authorities who have little money or ambition for them, making the car the only realistic means of transport.

Incidentally, I also think the UK railway "product" is generally much faster, more pleasant and more comfortable, with better customer service than most of the lines I've traveled on in Continental Europe, for all its foibles. And lets remember the reason you don't get overcrowding on TGV's is that they are all reserved, not to mention that catching the Paris RER or Metro at rush hour or late at night is not a very pleasant experience. 

But absolutely, there's much more to do, and of course much of the problem is that we are having to spend huge amounts of money undoing the last century's "rationalisation", which generally didn't happen in most of Continental Europe.

 

Well I should imagine that replacing the headspans with some solid F&F kit would be a good start.

Of course if it's built to spec, Old Oak Common station should help as it is designed to enable a full GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) service to be turned around in the event that Paddington is closed for any reason.

If I understand correctly, it's a 7 year settlement from 2025 to 2032 which gives a *lot* of money to local authorities and considerable leeway on how to spend it.

It's probably a sensible move - a long-term funding window gives local authorities the means to build a pipeline of rail projects that would have been previously outside their budget.

Despite the delays with Portishead reopening, much of WECA^» (West of England Combined Authority - about)'s plans are slowly coming to fruition, with dramatic increases in service frequency, new stations, funding the preliminary work on Temple Meads and Filton Bank electrification etc.   

Of course there's certainly a political element to it - the Labour devolved administrations are not going to let a Labour Government in Westminster steal their thunder, let alone take any of this funding away.

I'd imagine that GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) have a plan to use the battery electrics for Henley/Marlow/Windsor and perhaps Basingstoke branches where they can be maintained in Reading, but will play it safe before they go public.

As for further west, seems more likely that GWR will muddle through until Project Churchward replaces the DMU^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) rolling-stock en-masse.