GB Railways Believes In Quality And Growth - Brief Article

International Railway Journal, Nov, 1999 by David Briginshaw

GB Railways may have won only one British franchise, Anglia Railways, but it has set it sights firmly on growth both in Britain and abroad. It is poised to launch new passenger and freight services in Britain, it is a partner in Great Southern Railway in Australia, and is preferred bidder for an Estonian franchise.

THE seven-year Anglia Railways franchise is unique in that it is the only one to combine a former InterCity service--London Liverpool Street to Norwich--with several branch lines in eastern England operated by British Rail's former Regional Railways division. GB Railways is also one of the few franchise owners which does not come from the bus industry.

GB Railways believes very strongly in providing a high quality service. Anglia was the first train operating company (TOC) to win two Passenger Charter Marks for improvements to customer service, and three Cycle Marks for fitting cycle racks in all its local trains. In 1998-99, Anglia exceeded its punctuality target on its InterCity service and four of its six local services. Its London-Norwich restaurant cars serve dishes devised by a Michelin-starred chef.

"We want to be seen as one of the best three franchises, although it is for other to judge us," Mr Jeremy Long, GB's deputy chairman and Anglia's chairman, told IRJ in London. "Opraf [the Office of Passenger Rail Franchising] has a strict assessment of quality and I think we are well regarded, which means we get a proper hearing when we put forward ideas."

Long thinks that it is good that the Strategic Rail Authority (SRA), which now incorporates Opraf, will look at both passenger and freight services and the structure of franchises. "I think the SRA will get lots of interesting ideas regarding franchise extensions," Long predicted.

GB is already trying to expand outside its original operating area. It had hoped to launch with the start of the winter timetable a new cross-London service called Cross-Link. It would connect Chelmsford, on the Norwich-London main line, with Basing-stoke to the west using some of GB's new fleet of class 170 dmus being supplied by Adtranz. But it has yet to receive approval from the Rail Regulator, and in any event delivery of the trains is late.

GB has also joined forces with two former BR managers to form Hull Trains. There is currently only one through train a day between Hull, which has a population of about 450,000, and London King's Cross. This is operated by Great North Eastern Railway (GNER). Hull Trains plans to start a new service next year of seven trains a day in each direction, initially using GB's 160km/h class 170 dmus. These would be replaced in 2001 by a new fleet of up to six 200km/h dmus offering an almost hourly-interval service.

Hull Trains is fighting with two other operators for paths on the busy East Coast Main Line. GNER, the main long-distance operator on the route, wants to operate more services by taking over spare Eurostar sets. West Anglia Great Northern wants to extend its London-Peterborough services north to Doncaster.

As Mr Max Steinkopf, executive director of GB Railways, explained: "We don't need to invest much to launch the service--recruitment, training, leasing charges, legal fees, etc--it's only an incremental cost. We are discussing a 10-year franchise separate from Anglia. I'm cautiously optimistic that we will get approval."

Ideally, GB wants to complete the negotiations for the introduction of CrossLink and the Hull service before it starts to renegotiate its Anglia franchise with the SRA in the spring.

Anglia has steadily expanded services so that it is now running two trains an hour between London and Norwich instead of just one. The eight three-car class 170s were ordered to cater for the expansion of Anglia's services and to enable it to provide through services from London to towns off the electrified main line. Adtranz was supposed to deliver the first train at the beginning of the year, but it didn't arrive until July. "We originally planned to introduce the new trains with the May timetable change, but we never expected to miss the September timetable change as well," Steinkopf revealed. The delay has forced Anglia to hire additional emus. It is also using its fleet of locomotive-hauled trains more intensely. Nevertheless, the London-Norwich service has been expanded a year ahead of Anglia's franchise commitment.

No Train, No Pay

The new trains have been acquired through an innovative "no train, no pay" deal with Porterbrook, one of the rolling stock leasing companies (Roscos). Porterbrook only gets paid if the train is at the platform to start its rostered diagram. "We had to challenge the Roscos and manufacturers to come up with a deal which puts the risk for the whole life cost and reliability where it belongs, with them," Long explained.

The additional services and better marketing have helped to boost traffic on Anglia. Passenger-km increased by 11.2% in 1998-99 to 636 million, and passenger income (excluding subsidy) grew by 13%. But GB Railway's total pre-tax profits dropped from [pounds]3.2 million in 1997-98 to [pounds]1.8 million in 1998-99, largely as a result of reduction in government subsidy. This fell from [pounds]36.2 million in 1997-98 to [pounds]27.2 million in 1998-99. It will drop to [pounds]23.3 million for the current financial year, and to just [pounds]6.6 million in 2003-04.