Which one is more costly to run?
If I look at Easyjet/Ryanair flight deals, escaping to European captials is cheaper than travelling by train to London from South East.
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Im going to Devon in a couple of weeks with my partner.
I really wanted to get the train as I have travelled many time before to Bristol Parkway from Darlington on business (so the company paid for it)
Its a lovely train drive down (and back) and I wanted to take my partner with me this time however its going to be £200 (approx) each
We are going to take the car £60 tank of fuel door to door each way (£120)
To operate the loco's and the infrustucture is a expensive business. thats the running of the track up keep of rolling stock, running stations etc all ads up
Airplanes, I dont know but it must be cheaper in the long run
Last edited by: Redviper on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 11:42
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The fares charged have very little to do with the operating cost of the vehicle/infrasrtucture and everything to do with what the market will bear.
Redviper's Darlington to Bristol fare (unless 1st Class) sounds like an open return. Limiting travel times to off peak gets to around £115 per head while still offering a fair degree of flexibility to 'walk up' & board any train.
If you mix singles tied to specific trains and book well in advance it can go as low as £25-30 per head each way.
The normal fare from Northampton to London is £49. The of peak fare is £29.20 but involves an evening restriction as well as the usual no arrival before 10:00am one. This week and next there is a £10 'go anywhere' fare. Again subject to a morning restriction but useable in the evening peak for an extra £5.
There are usually singles available for specific trains as low as £6 even in the peak.
Train travel can be very cheap.
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Yes I agree it can be cheap.
It wasnt a 1st class ticket, i think it was a open return as you suggest.
Its a good job I like driving becasue I enjoy the road trip down - benfits of the car is I can take it when I want, and its door - door
Without getting into the whole Argument of what would be better BR Again or different TOCs, I would like te be able to buy a cost effective ticket as little as a day in advance - not have to worry about which train TOC it is I have to catch (but I know we live in the real world and its not as easy as that)
interesting though becasue there are people willing to pay - thankfully on my departure from Bristol Parkway one time - I had a reserved seat, i cant begin to tell you how busy that train was then it was bursting at the seams - BUT I do not want to pay a price like that - to stand in the isle way.
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I have found a figure for the direct operating costs of a 737-500, quoted at $2310 per hour. This will not include landing fees and airport passenger handling charges and I do not know if it includes leasing costs, if the aircraft is not owned outright. So, not a very helpul figure!
I am lucky/unlucky enough to have a senior railcard; using this and booking 4+ weeks in advance, I am able to travel Peterborough to Wokingham and back for under £20, including getting across London on the Underground. As others have said, walk up and pay on the day can be V expensive. Martyn Lewis's website has some good dodges for getting cheap fares and, if you are lucky, it is still possible to get cheap fares within 7 days of travel.
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>> I have found a figure for the direct operating costs of a 737-500, quoted at
>> $2310 per hour.
How long ago was that figure calcualted 7 how much is aviation kerosene per litre now? Using $1 as a starting point and assuming a litre to weigh aroud .92kg your $2300 will buy about 2.5 tonnes.
The fuel load for a 737 classic is quoted by Wikipedia as 23 tonnes and they generally fly sectors up to about 5hrs suggesting consumption of rather more than 2.5 tons/hr (allowing for take off etc).
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I thought it was on the low side but the source wasn't dated, so far as I could see. Ryanair flies 737 -800s and I'd suggest most of their sectors are under 2 hours
Last edited by: Perky Penguin on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 13:54
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Not sure about the relative costs of running them, but is there really any such thing as a cheap flight? tiny.cc/v14tm
Warning - some of the language might not be suitable for your workplace; if in doubt don't click. Mods, if this is innapropriate please accept my apologies
Peter
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Language is no worse than Father Ted !
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>> Language is no worse than Father Ted !
>>
True, but the potential to be somewhat embarassing in some offices I'd imagine :-)
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I have done Stansted to Hahn and return for £20, no checked luggage and not recently. However, this year I have done London to Lanzarote and back on a scheduled flight for £150 including checked baggage and all taxes. In May I am flying to Madeira for £125 return, schedules and all charges included. Those fares seem cheap to me or at least good value.
I have heard it suggested that the hassles of early check-ins, airports miles from city centres and the laborious security procedures, compared with the ease of Eurostar train travel may kill interest in flying to a lot of Northern Europe
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Another Youtube clip
nothing profane
tinyurl.com/2d767tg
Cheap airlines and luggage is the topic
As always
Mark
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>>I have heard it suggested that the hassles of early check-in..>>
My daughter used the 11-10am Manchester to Heathrow BA shuttle recently - the booking in/security checks deadline for catching the flight was 9-35am.....
She had come a week or two earlier on a mid-day Virgin Euston to Liverpool Lime street train. The journey, started and completed bang on time, took just two hours, eight minutes and that included two stops.
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I can get to Newquay about £60 return from Manchester by train but it does require a lot of tricks and effort.
London from Manchester is actually quicker by train than plane when you consider the bigger picture.
If I wanted ot get to London in exactly three hours from now I could be, it would cost me a hell of a lot but the journey would be:-
15-20 minutes on a taxi
5 minutes to buy the ticket
A wait between 0-20 minutes for the train (they run every 20 minutes)
Two hours on the train.
With train services that good it makes locla planes seem very over the top.
Last edited by: RattleandSmoke on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 13:30
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>> London from Manchester is actually quicker by train than plane.
By a long chalk when actual origin & destination are the city centres.
Ten years ago we used to have maybe 50% of Mancunian visitors to this office flying down, particularly those who lived near Ringway. Nowadays they almost all get the train with some picking up at Stockport or Wilmslow.
Leeds Bradford lost it's Heathrow service a few years ago. I wonder how long before either BA or BMI give up Manchester.
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Ten years ago we had one train every 1 hour and a half and they took over three hours. Since the introduction of Pendolinos most trains arrive earlier. The train states something like 2 hours and six minutes but I have often arrived into Euston a good 5 or 6 minutes earlier than time tabled, they build lateness into their schedules.
So if the train arrives to Euston on time it is actually late.
By public transport I am actually well over an hour away from the airport but although when the trams go there it will be a lot quicker.
Frequency is very important in calculating distance times, because any time waiting at platforms or airports has to count as journey times.
Now keeping with the thread title, the Pendolinos have a capacitor of between 600-800 (a guess) and the light planes they use on the London routes have a capacity of around 100 so the carbon footprint must be far lower by train and possibly even coach.
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>>..and the light planes they use on the London routes..>>
I used to use the BA Shuttle service to Heathrow and Gatwick at least once a week and the aircraft used were 737s, 757s and the occasional 767.
The reason was simple. More often than not the aircraft used for the flight down to London would then be switched to a medium or even long haul route - one particular Shuttle flight was always a 757 and it followed up by providing the BA service to Vienna.
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they build lateness into their
>> schedules.
>>
>> So if the train arrives to Euston on time it is actually late.
>
:-)
Not quite, Rattle, though I can see where you are coming from!
All timetabled train journeys have time "built into" them which allow for out of course events such as emergency engineering works, getting held up by late running trains, etc. The amount of time varies from route to route. If that time isn't needed and the train has a clear run it can arrive early... However if it arrives at the booked time its not late!
There are also two timetables, the Public which you see and the Working one which we use that can be slightly different as well!
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>> I wonder how long before either BA or BMI give up Manchester.
>>
BMI have already given up London - Glasgow, it ends in late March
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I agree Train services are good
The Virgin train I take to Bristol is on time, Clean and the staff 100% polite and proffesional
I get the train a 8am, Darlington Arrive in Bristol around 12ish
We got a Easy Jet plane to Bristol once
up at 4 am to drive to Newcastle Airport
Go through numerous checkins and ticket checking and sit in a lounge until 8am
plane sits on the runway for ages as the pilot didnt turn up
plane evenually takes of at around 10
Arrive in bristol at around 12ish
repeat on the way home
Never again! - just as expensive more hassle. more tiring
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tricks and effort.
What dressing up as an old person or a kid ?
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Nope you don't tell then you're going to Newquay. It is so much cheaper to seperate the journeys.
E.g
Manchester to Bristol or Plymouth
if Bristol then book another train to Plymouth.
Plymouth Newquay.
That would be much cheaper than simply booking a ticket from Manchester to Newquay.
Another strange one and I have mentioned this lots of times, at certain times just out of peak it can be cheaper to get a ticket from Manchester to Brighton than to London and just get off at Brighton.
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But what if you wanted to go to London. ;-)
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London is a direct train and they do a lot of discounts for advanced bookings on the budget airline model so from Manchester it is always cheaper just to book a ticket to London rather than trying to split.
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Train beats plane commuting for distances like London / Manchester.
Plane commuting advantages kick in for London / Glasgow or Edinburgh.
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And possibly Europe. I hate flying so I will take the train to any European destination it is just expensive and slow.
London to Paris though is probably quicker by Euro tunnel if you're comparing city centre to city centre.
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>> Plane commuting advantages kick in for London / Glasgow or Edinburgh.
Even then Edinburgh, if you're starting from City/West End is a close thing. Certainly quicker by train than anything involving a Schlepp out to LHR. City airport is much more slick but but it's still a minimum of 40mins from aircraft to the city centre.
Best time to Glasgow from Euston is around 4:20 but most of the services take longer as they cover local stops north of Preston.
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V funny.
never heard of them before but now im downloading lots of their videos and not working..
Last edited by: smokie on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 14:00
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Since all the country's charter airliners are u/s or busy ferrying benefits cheats to Benidorm and the Canary Islands, cannot the Foreign Office arrange a special train to rescue the couple of hundred British oil workers trapped in the Libyan desert by that country's social disorders?
Might be quicker in the long run.
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Would that be a camel train then ?
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For the desert leg, that might work out more cost-effective than building a railway line through the rocks and dunes, tempting as that would seem of course to train enthusiasts.
Yes, a train of those roaring, swearing, long-toothed stately beasts might be just the thing, and can be readily chartered in those parts. They are said to leave damn great lice all over you but I am sure our courageous artisans will be used to that by now.
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That is no way to speak of oil-workers, I know they're rufty tufty types....
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Exactly
And oh how the whining wives of trapped oil workers gets on my teets.
"The foreign office is doing nothing to get my husband home - whine whine"
Listen dahling, he went there because the money is huge due to the fact is a dangerous nasty place to be. Didn't hear you whining when the 60 inch plasma TV arrived. Beside he probably went there to get away from your whining.
End of Thursday Rant.
Last edited by: Zero on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 15:12
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I was too nice to even mention that !
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Sorry, I always get like that when people say the Foreign Office should save me. Why? they never sent me there!
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Yes but there is a bit of guff in the front of one's passport requesting and requiring Johhny Foreigner to lend a hand when needed.. I am going start another sweep! How long will it before some FO Talkinghead tells us that things haven't gone well re UK citizens in Libya AND that "We shall put measures in place to ensure that these situations are better managed in the future"
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>> Yes but there is a bit of guff in the front of one's passport requesting
>> and requiring Johhny Foreigner to lend a hand when needed..
Indeed, with the unwritten implication "if you don't we will send in a dreadnought and blow your country back to the stone age"
Alas the words carry no weight these days.
Last edited by: Zero on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 16:09
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>> t before some FO Talkinghead tells us that things haven't gone
>> well re UK citizens in Libya AND that "We shall put measures in place to
>> ensure that these situations are better managed in the future"
Not just an FO talking head but the PM himself www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12566254
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I too get irritated by that sort of thing, but it's the world we live in now. No one properly brought up would allow themselves to be egged on by reporters (because that's what happens) to whine and whinge like that. The problem is that after years of this degraded mediasphere very large numbers of basically spoilt and ignorant people are primed and ready to let loose with that sort of thing whenever they get jostled in the street or their bins aren't emptied.
If they can ambush a politician on a baby-kissing sweep through their neighbourhood and embarrass the hell out of the guy they've really scored. Personally I find most of those interventions pretty despicable too, but I may be in a minority there.
Mention of the word politician on this site is often like waving a huge red revolutionary flag in front of a yard full of snorting, bigoted little pit-bullocks. (Raspberry)
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>> And oh how the whining wives of trapped oil workers gets on my teets.
>>
I could not agree more, I was going to mention that, but i chickened out of it.
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One of the biggest reasons why a train is late is YOU LOT.!! Turning up at the last minute and wanting to get on and the friendly guard lets you sit down then off it goes.
This has the knock on effect when it gets to stations, Also wheel chair passengers which can't be helped.
So next time anyone moans flipping train is late blame the passengers.!! :-)
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As a very regular user of trains my experience of delays is that they are caused by, in no particular order:-
1. Trackside fires spoiling visibility, summer only
2. Signalling problems
3 Copper cable being stolen, see 2
4. Broken down trains.
5. Sorry to mention it but people jumping in front of them
6 Staff failing to turn up
7. Engineering work causing a 1 hour train journey to become a 2 hour bus journey
8. Leaves/snow on the line
9. Frozen points
Short delays caused by tardy passengers should be able to made up over a normal journey and arriving within 5 minutes counts as "On Time, I beleive. Passengers are the least of a railway company's problems!
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Love 'em or hate 'em, without them you'd be jobless.
Pat
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At least some of the oil workers will be in for a nasty surprise when the unexpected tax bill arrives as a result of them not being out of the country long enough for their earnings to be tax free.
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Thank you for that small sum of comfort Bigglesworth.
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Absolutely brilliant PeterS, will check out some more of their works :)
EDIT: in reply to the Fascinating Aida video clip posted at 12:33.
Last edited by: Dave_TD {P} on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 21:01
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I've only recently stumbled across them myself, but definitely worth a listen IMO. There is a tenuous motoring link in the excerpt that followed the 'cheap flights', but I'm not going to push it by linking directly to the full version of it ;-)
Last edited by: PeterS on Thu 24 Feb 11 at 22:04
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Cost of running plane vs train - Redviper
