ALTHOUGH Network Rail’s £8.6 billion upgrade of the West Coast Main Line — Europe’s busiest mixed-traffic rail route — is now expected to be completed by the end of this year, there are growing doubts that the new infrastructure will be sufficiently reliable to enable an enhanced range of passenger train services to be fully implemented in December.

Virgin Trains, which plans to introduce a new high-frequency timetable, has complained for several months to the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR). 

Virgin’s partner in the Virgin Rail Group, Stagecoach, expressed these concerns again in a statement to the Stock Exchange as recently as 28 August:  “Based on Network Rail's recent operational performance and the extent of the required infrastructure upgrade, we remain concerned that there is significant risk to the successful delivery of the December 2008 timetable.”

The upgrade is “crucial in delivering a reliable railway for customers,” said Stagecoach, which owns 49 percent of Virgin Rail Group.

These concerns have been repeated in the ORR’s latest ‘Network Rail Monitor’ and ‘National Rail Review’ — both also published on 28 August — which state that Virgin West Coast’s 20 million passengers a year are “bearing the brunt” of the unreliability of new equipment being installed by Network Rail.

Virgin West Coast’s punctuality has slumped to little more than 8o per cent in recent months.

“The West Coast main line performance has been very poor this year and shows no sign of improvement, giving rise to significant concern that the reliability of both old and new assets is not sufficiently robust to support the higher levels of train service in the December 2008 timetable,” said ORR.

 “If the service upgrade is to be a success the bottom line is that the underlying performance of the network has to be much better than it is today.”
 
It noted that Virgin’s poor performance was “in part due to failures of new equipment such as axle counters and HPSS  [high performance switch system] points,” and added: “Quite apart from the impact this is having on rail users here and now, this poses a threat to the planned December upgrade.”

The planned more intensive level of service — including three trains an hour between London and Birmingham and London and Manchester — requires increases in infrastructure, rolling stock and manpower to sustain high levels of performance and reliability, said the ORR

“Any delays will be far more likely to have a rapid knock-on effect on services across the route and cause disruption throughout the day. Effective contingency plans must be developed to mitigate the impact of delays and to handle large numbers of passengers safely and efficiently on any occasion
 
“Network Rail has submitted a plan showing how it intends to return performance to acceptable levels over the next three months. We are monitoring Network Rail’s progress on a weekly basis,” said ORR.

“Work is also in hand preparing alternative timetable plans that would step up services more gradually from December onwards, if this is seen as a more sensible option.

“Properly handled this could be a pragmatic and acceptable approach to reduce the risk to performance, while giving passengers the benefit of improved timetables as soon as this can be done reliably.”

The ORR said Network Rail had to make the decision on the December timetable
by mid-September so that passengers and train operators can plan for the Christmas period.

Emphasising its doubts, ORR concluded: “This leaves little time for [Network Rail] to demonstrate convincingly that its plans are likely to deliver the necessary improvements for full introduction of the new services.”


• ORR’s worries about completion of the West Coast Route Modernisation project reflect wider concerns about Network Rail’s efficiency.

In its ‘National Rail Review’ ORR reports that it has “benchmarked” Network Rail’s costs against “an international peer group” of 13 European railways.

“Despite Network Rail’s significant progress in reducing its cost base
over the past four years, the results of our analysis suggest that Network Rail remains one of the worst performers in terms of cost efficiency in its peer group and is at least 35 per cent less efficient than the top quarter of performers in the group. This difference in costs currently amounts to around £1.2 billion annually.”

The regulator adds: “Given the almost complete absence of internal cost benchmarking evidence presented by Network Rail, our international benchmarking work takes on greater significance in enabling us to understand how much more efficient Network Rail ought to be.”

In the next five years, 2009-14, Network Rail wants to spend £29.1 billion on maintaining and enhancing the rail network — but ORR has proposed this should be reduced to £26.5 billion.