Regulated rail fares could fall

The Government has confirmed that regulated* rail fares will be reduced in January 2010, if the retail price index is more negative than minus one per cent in July 2009 – the regulated fares charged by all the train operating companies in the South West of England are altered every January by the formula of the retail price index for the previous July plus one per cent. The Department for Transport is also planning to adopt the recommendation from Passenger Focus that from January 2010 individual regulated fares should be capped at one per cent above inflation – at present train operating companies have the flexibility to increase individual regulated fares by six per cent above inflation, provided that the average rise does not breach the cap of one per cent above inflation.

(*: Regulated fares include short-distance standard returns, long distance off-peak returns (the former ‘Saver’ ticket) and season tickets)

Train operating companies to undertake infrastructure work?

Network Rail has invited the train operating companies to undertake hundreds of small infrastructure projects that the company would prefer to sub-contract – the company has now admitted that undertaking many small infrastructure improvement schemes is not one of the strengths of the organisation. Network Rail is particularly keen to off-load many of the small projects in the National Stations Improvement Programme.

Council buys railway track

It has been reported that Weymouth and Portland borough council have purchased, at a cost of fifty thousand pounds, the track bed of over one mile between Melcombe Regis open crossing and Weymouth Quay, which for many years was used by trains connecting with ferries to and from the Channel Islands – the council have purchased the track bed in order to proceed with the re-development of the former Weymouth Quay railway station site before the 2012 Olympic Games at a cost of over six million pounds.

Study into cycle use at Bristol Temple Meads

A study into cycle use by customers arriving at and departing from Bristol Temple Meads by train has been undertaken by the University of the West of England, supported by First Great Western. The study found that approximately two per cent of rail passengers were using cycles for their journeys to and from Temple Meads railway station. A review of the three hundred cycle parking spaces at the station revealed that ten per cent of bicycles were abandoned, while a further forty-seven per cent were not moved within two working days - over two hundred cycles were left every night at the station. One significant barrier to encouraging the use of cycles for journeys to and from Temple Meads station was found to be the restrictions on the carriage of bicycles on peak hour trains, due to overcrowding.

And finally,

The First customer services staff at Bath Bus Station have circumvented a ban on posting entries to ‘Twitter’, the social networking website, from the company’s computer workstations – the staff provide ‘live’ bus service running information on ‘Twitter’ (‘http://twitter.com/bathcsc’) by posting updates from their mobile phones!