Reducing Delays
Since October 2002, when we began to run the railway, we have reduced delay minutes from 14.72 million minutes per year to 11.43 million minutes per year – a 22% reduction.
Year-on-year improvements
2002/03
14.72 million minutes
2003/04
13.72 million minutes
2004/05
11.43 million minutes
Reliability
Delays are at their lowest level for five years because of the changes that we have made to the railway.
Delayed trains can be caused by problems with the railway infrastructure or the trains or third-party events (e.g. a vehicle on the tracks). Network Rail is responsible for keeping the tracks, signals, bridges, tunnels and level crossings working properly so that the trains can use them safely.
Reducing delays
In 2004/05, we reduced train delays caused by the infrastructure by 16%, saving 2.3 million train delay minutes against the previous year. These results were achieved at the same time as the number of passengers and amount of freight carried on the railway increased.
Our target is to reduce delays to 10.6 million minutes (i.e. saving another 7%) in 2005/06. This is better than the Office of Rail Regulation's (ORR) target by 700,000 minutes and achieves the ORR target for 2006/07 a year early.
Looking after the infrastructure
In order to meet these targets, we will be upgrading all parts of the railway.
This will build on the work done between October 2002 (when we took over responsibility for the railway) and March 2005 when we completed three times the volume of work being done in the late 1990s. This included upgrading approximately 2,000 miles of rail, 1,300 miles of sleepers, 1,300 miles of ballast, 1,100 switches and crossings.