TfW rejects ‘artificially boosted’ performance figures claim
Emily Price
Transport for Wales has rejected a claim by the shadow transport minister that reopening a valleys line “artificially boosted” the rail operator’s performance figures.
Natasha Asghar says the closure of the Treherbert line for major engineering works last year impacted TfW’s 2024 improvement figures after it was reopened.
The line had been closed for 10 months whilst transformational works to upgrade part of the South Wales Metro took place.
Ms Asghar says that reopening it caused a large drop in cancellations and delays – therefore skewing year on year performance data.
Figures for the period April to June 2024 showed TfW made the biggest improvement of any UK train company for punctuality (+8.1%) and reliability (cancellations reduced by 3.2%), compared to the same period in 2023.
‘Smokescreen’
She said: “The so-called recent improvements reported by Labour-run Transport for Wales are clearly a smokescreen.
“The decision to close the Treherbert line last year for ten months caused significant disruption, understandably then making this year’s numbers seem as if they were much better.
“Whilst passengers across Wales will likely see some improvement from the re-opening of the Treherbert line, they will unfortunately continue to suffer from overall delays, cancellations, and poor service, once again exposing Labour’s failure to deliver any real progress.”
Performance
TfW says the shadow transport minister’s claim is incorrect because services removed to make way for engineering work are not included in the Office of Rail and Road’s (ORR) daily performance figures.
A spokesperson for Transport for Wales said: “Statistics for services removed for planned long-term engineering work, such as the closure of the Treherbert Line, are not included in the ORR’s daily performance figures, so have had no impact on 2023 or 2024 data.
“The recent performance data is based on actual times of more than 1,000 services a day across the Wales and Borders network, which have shown a year-on-year improvement.”
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As Frank Drebin said: ‘Noting to see here. Please disperse. Nothing to see here’.
Isn’t everything better in England, according to the right-wingers?
Why does she constantly belittle and disparage TfW? Does she want the metro built or what
Note to Ms Ashgar: get your facts right first before opening your mouth and proving how stupid you sound.
Send her to the Ffestiniog Railway as a volunteer to learn about railways, Andrew Davies, or better still, sack her.
Here’s the thing. If a train company invests in it’s rolling stock and lines and provides a better service that will boost performance. What’s shocking is that Natasha Asghar is apparently not aware of this obvious fact.
The Cons don’t take good news well.
Train line reopens, performance improves, this is dreadful. What a weird story.
If you download the data set and put it into a league table on overall performance TfW are in the bottom zone, they improved performance from a low base. Statistics and numbers used to suit the political master
Plenty of other TOCs are worse in all metrics.
That may be but there is no getting away from that TfW are not in the upper echelon of TOC’s.
TfW scored bottom for overall satisfaction in Transport Focus’s most recent rail user survey. It also scored bottom for satisfaction with punctuality/reliability, frequency of services, cleanliness and for satisfaction with information provided during the journey. Senedd 24 May 2024
https://senedd.wales/media/ql0eekpo/cr-ld16479-e.pdf
Satisfaction surveys are as much a measurement of national grumpiness as they are about the actual service. That’s why the ORR metrics are the data that matters. And after decades of underinvestment any expectation of being in the “upper echelons” is an unreasonable expectation. What matters is the direction of travel.
When it’s Ms Asghar proffering a view I almost always dismiss it out of hand, because what she is shouts loud enough to drown out almost all of what she ever says.
Ms Asghar’s relationship with the real world is best described as tenuous.