This is a situation which must be of very real concern to the public, as well as to the railways, and it cannot be in the best interests of either to restrict fares to the low levels at which they are at present controlled.
There is also another feature which is important from a commercial point of view. The rail system is capable of drawing passengers travelling daily to London from distances up to a hundred miles, and has ample spare capacity for doing so beyond a radius of about 20 miles. It is, therefore, in the railways' interest to foster growth of this longer distance traffic to achieve higher utilisation of the route system as a whole, but this development is itself restricted by the congestion of shorter distance traffic at the London end.
The magnitude of the morning and evening traffic peaks is illustrated by figures showing the flow through some of the main London terminals at various hours of the day.
The peak load, measured over half an hour, is about 10 times the average level over the hours from 6 a.m. to midnight, and 12 times the average over 24 hours. The route and rolling stock capacity provided to deal with the peak is used to only 10 per cent. of its capacity during the hours over which it might normally be expected to carry passengers, and to 8½ per cent. capacity over the whole day. In spite of this, practically the whole peak traffic is carried at reduced rates. Also, and more logically, cheap fares are offered during off-peak periods in an effort to attract traffic when it can be carried at low marginal cost, so that nearly all the traffic is carried at low rates for one reason or another.
The effective level of fares for London suburban service traffic, and the growth of traffic over the years is demonstrated by the following table:—
British Railways—London Lines
Estimated average receipt per mile, passenger journeys and passenger miles
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Estimated average receipt per mile
Estimated passenger journeys
Estimated passenger miles
Year Season tickets only
All
All
Season tickets only
m.
N.A. 175 170 190 203 201 206 202 206 A.S.L.E. & F. strike from 20th May to 14th June. End of 1956 and Suez crisis. early 1957 . L.T.E. bus strike 5th May to 20th June. 1958
.
.. ..
Season tickets only
m.
N.A. 2,083 2,027 2,280 2,435 2,385 2,437 2,384
2,550
21
