Not a good few days for Network Rail in the press

[whole diary]

[ellendune]

...........so where is the ^7.5 billion of investment that FGW^▸ (First Great Western) regularly trumpet coming from?

I don't know the specific answer to the question you ask.  But if you want what you ask for you probably wanted more than that spent about 10 years ago! People accused Railtrack of asset stripping, but really no one could beat BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) for that.  They were cheap for a reason! Halve the cost of relaying a junction by taking half the capacity out, or singling a double track to avoid the cost of renewal - and then reducing the timetable to match the reduced capacity available.

If you want that sort of turn around in the infrastructure you speak of then I suggest what we need is a complete shut down of the line for about 18 months!  All the South Wales Trains were diverted via Bath. It would be much cheaper to do the work that way and the reliability issues during construction would not be a problem.  And before you say that has never been done.  That is just what BR did when they improved the line from Wooton Bassett to Filton in the mid 1970's just before the introduction of the HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train).  O and when they electrified the Euston to Birmingham route in the 1960's all the Birmingham Expresses were concentrated on the Paddington to Snow Hill route.  It is not that easy now - diverting all the trains into Paddington on a normal working day is just not feasible.  

And the trains - yes if governments had given all the franchises on the same length as Chilterns then perhaps other companies - just as Chiltern Trains has - would have been able to invest in improvements.  However the clamour for politicians to micro manage (by sacking the TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) if they do not perform instantly)  the railway lead to short franchises. Then the cap and collar arrangements that gave the TOC no benefit from increasing revenue.  So the rest of us have to put up with the consequences.  Oh and governments (of all parties) are guilty of:

• moving the rolling stock around to match where they need votes rather than building new - while at the same time denying they had any say in where rolling stock went;
• taking on the procurement of rolling stock contrary to their stated policy then taking excessive amounts of time to negotiate the contracts.  

[Super Guard]

The standard one-way concorde/economy+ return price was ^4,350.  No-one paid that for a return rail ticket over the festive period.

LHR to JFK distance roughly 3500 miles, price per mile works out at about ^1.25, if your airline ticket price is accurate (the price you quote is actually closer to the business class fare on BA^» (British Airways - about) at around ^5k return, I just checked for mid-January travel). Which isn't vastly different per mile to what I paid the last time I travelled BGN-PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains) and back (on advance tickets). When considering the immense difference in service quality between standard class rail & business class on most airlines, a business class ticket to New York looks pretty good value to me. You're also guaranteed a seat on a plane...

The standard return price of ^4,350 was one way Concorde and one way economy plus.  It sadly is no longer available for obvious reasons.

A return on Concorde was over ^8K.

Ironically my source: 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-196994/Concorde-tickets-snapped-up.html

For the record, I read plenty of grumbles about BA Club World level of service on other forums nowadays..!

[Electric train]

........does leaving kit on the line potentially causing a fatal accident qualify as something not "going quite to plan"? Does the flaky signalling causing the service between Paddington and Reading to fall apart regularly since October fall into the same category???

Reference to placing a trolley on the line you are assuming it was the person placing or supervising it who was in error, there are processes and procedures which involve training and a competence assessment / reassessment for these people, maybe the train was signalled incorrectly again there are  processes and procedures which involve training and a competence assessment / reassessment for signallers, could it have been the driver that SPAD^▸ (Signal Passed At Danger), there could be other reasons, it could be a culmination of a number of factors; the RAIB^▸ (Rail Accident Investigation Branch) will determine the cause and make recommendations.  Does this warrant managers falling on their swords or being sacked no one world want to work for a company or organisation with such a culture.

The flaky signalling system is down purely to lack of investment over the last 40 years, Slough Panel Box dates back to the early 60's most of the cabling and equipment in its area is of the same vintage, just looking at it makes it fail.  

While we "the Railway Engineers" carry out renewals / enhancements on such old equipment things that is in operational use there are sometimes failures, we put in a certain degree of control measures and backups but there is only so much money, time and spare resources.  If only we could close the railway for a year  

[ellendune]

..... Does this warrant managers falling on their swords or being sacked no one world want to work for a company or organisation with such a culture.

The principle proponents of such policies seem to be politicians. Their skills at running companies seem to be such that nationalisation is no longer politically acceptable it seems.  Their current attempts to manage the railways supports this view. Yet these same politicians, when they retire seem to get cushy directorships in the private sector.  Odd that!