From: anw@maths.nott.ac.uk (Dr A. N. Walker)
Newsgroups: uk.transport
Subject: Re: Transport subsidies - Was: Car Parking
Date: 11 Dec 92 17:17:41 GMT
Reply-To: anw@maths.nott.ac.uk (Dr A. N. Walker)
Organization: Maths Dept., Nott'm Univ., UK.

In article <724056139snx@warren.demon.co.uk> leveret@warren.demon.co.uk writes:
>I have to say that's somewhat of a specious argument. You can fairly
>easily find a couple of hundred people who want to travel from the
>Nottingham area (population well over half a million) to various points
>between Leicester and London so as to arrive within half an hour of
>10:37, say.

	Yes, you probably could.  The trains that do this journey are
reasonably well populated.

>	     Most of them are perfectly willing to adjust their journey
>times by that much either way, in order to avoid having to leave an hour
>earlier and have a much more stressful journey.

	I am not a speed maniac -- 70mph down the motorway is *plenty* --
but perhaps I'm unusual in other ways.  The last time I travelled to
London, I drove.  It took me just 2 1/2 hours from leaving home to being
parked at South Bank University, which is not *that* far from as central
as you could expect.  It took me slightly longer to get home, 'cos I
forgot about our friends in the IRA having blown up Staples Corner, and
the resulting traffic jam, but it was quite a relaxing drive both ways,
and I learned a lot from Classic FM about "Tosca".  It would have taken
a few minutes longer by train, including the taxi at my end and the tube
in London;  up to an hour longer if the times hadn't [as it happened]
been suitable;  and many hours longer had the conference been on a Sunday.
The cost would have been *horrendous*, and I find it hard to believe that
travelling by tube can be described as not stressful.

	By contrast, the last three train journeys I have made have been
enough to convince me that cars are better:  Nottingham to Cambridge and
back (on a Sunday, pouring rain, no taxis in sight, heavy suitcase, while
the multi-storey car park is next to the college);  N to Leiden and back
(the luggage problem again, and watching the train from Harwich start to
pull out just as I cleared customs -- there were dozens of people behind
me who missed the train that is supposed to connect with the ferry);  and
N to London and back (the train broke down, and took over four hours to
reach Derby, where after another hour they laid on a special train to
Nottingham;  anything can break down, but it was rather annoying to see
the following two expresses go sailing past with no attempt apparently
made to rescue us).

>						 So even if you "factor
>in" (UGH!) the extra travel time you still come out ahead.

	Not my experience!

[calculation omitted]
>So, in terms of energy efficiency, once you have more than about 150
>people going in the same direction (allowing the average car journey to
>contain two people, which I think is on the high side) it's more
>efficient to run a train.

	Well, again you've omitted the travel to and from the station at
each end;  this often involves taxis if you're carrying luggage, which
makes the journey even more horrendously expensive.  You're right, of
course, that when you can batch up lots of people into the same train,
there are efficiency gains to be had, but there are lots of other factors
to be taken into consideration, including expense and convenience.  I
personally rarely use public transport, not for any ideological reason,
and not even because of the expense, but simply because the *actual*
travelling that I and my family do -- shopping expeditions, holidays,
to and from work/school/social events, visiting friends and relations,
etc -- simply *cannot* be done sensibly by any available bus or train.
No doubt I could re-arrange my life to avoid Sundays, evenings, remote
places, luggage, rain, families, etc ....

-- 
Andy Walker, Maths Dept., Nott'm Univ., UK.
anw@maths.nott.ac.uk