The discussion in this thread illustrates something that the Williams Review should highlight as one of the problems that derogate from a truly user friendly passenger service.
The industry as a whole has to appreciate that for journeys like this, where there is no direct mainline service, it is unforgivable that you cannot pay a single fare and mix and match any convenient service via Reading, Didcot, Cheltenham or Bristol, whichever works best at the time you are travelling without having to run the risk of encountering a member of train staff who happens to know the arcane rules who will fine you for doing so or relying on the knowledge of someone who knows at precisely which station en route you can split your tickets to do so.
Quoted in full because you are so
right. Turn up at station "A" at any time, going to station "B" ... and whatever route will get you to "B" earliest should be a permitted route, with "any permitted" tickets available between
all pairs of stations ...
Examples of other aberrations ...
* Westbury to Manchester Piccadilly ... available "via London" and "not via London" but no "any permitted".
* Melksham to Bristol Parkway ... only available via Bath Spa, when routinely much faster via Swindon.
I find myself yet again potentially stimulating debate!
Since the introduction of “selective pricing” in the 1960s the railways have been, in essence, charging what the market will bear, in exactly the same way as many if not all businesses operate. You are not going to work for £10 per hour if you know you can get £20 somewhere else, and Sainsburys aren’t going to flog cans of peas for 45 pence when they know people will happily pay 50 pence for them. This is The Great Order of Things.
Applying these principles to a Swindon to Birmingham trip, we have a number of options, some more convoluted than others, with rounded mileages shown in brackets:
1. Via Bath, Bristol
TM‡ and Cheltenham (132 miles)
2. Via Badminton, Bristol Parkway and Cheltenham (117 miles)
3. Via Kemble and Cheltenham (88 miles)
4. Via Didcot and Leamington (106 miles)
5. Via Reading and Leamington (139 miles)
6. Via Paddington and Euston (187 miles)
Of these options, 1, 2 and 4 have their own healthy “domestic trade.” The
TOCs▸ may feel no particular need to encourage more traffic onto what are well-patronised services anyway.
Under the current fares regime, options 5 and 6 are going to attract a premium anyway because the magic words “Reading” “Paddington” and “Euston” appear.
That leaves option 3 – get the punters to use a comparatively under-used line (which was of course singled for a proportion of its length until just recently), where a few more bums on seats might be welcomed.
Looking at it in that way you begin to see a rationale behind what otherwise appears to be irrational. Whether you personally agree with that rationale is another matter, but at least you can now see it!
So what would have happened under the old “pence per mile” system? If, for sake of argument, we said that the going rate for a mileage-based system was 30 pence per mile in this day and age, we would find the following fares:
Option single return Price
Bristol TM 132 264 £79.20
Badminton 117 234 £70.20
Kemble 88 176 £52.80
Didcot 106 212 £63.60
Reading 139 278 £83.40
London 187 374 £112.20
Average £76.90
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So which of these is the fairest fare? The cheapest (£52.80) but you could go whichever way you wanted? That wouldn’t work because you would actually be charging people going from Swindon to Birmingham via Paddington a lot less than you would for those simply going from Euston to Birmingham (£69.00 using this scenario). That would of course get some interesting headlines in the press about a new improved rail fare shambles… So could you charge the average of £76.90 and let people go whichever way they want? Once again that would be prone to problems if people going from, say. Windsor to Birmingham via Paddington started comparing the fare they paid with someone who started their journey at Swindon.
“Ah!” you may say – “you’re just being stupid! People who want to go via London would expect to have to pay more!” But the minute you say that you accept that you have just introduced a routeing condition, and then you have to decide where to draw the line and which routes to allow, and which routes to deny.
It’s not that simple any more, is it?
