My Railway 200 Story
One of my first railway memories is with my grandfather taking my around Radyr yard and chatting with the crew (health and safety wasn’t what it is today!), but I’ve certainly been influenced by family interest and we recently discovered we had a family member who helped build the Taff Vale Railway.
My first role after Uni was in the National Rail Enquiries call centre, then based in Cardiff, and then moving onto Scotrail’s ticket sales - again (bizarrely) in Cardiff. Both of these certainly taught me the craziness of the ticketing system with its plethora of options and rules - this has to be simplified to ensure passengers’ understanding.
I soon moved into consultancy with WS Atkins. I was in the national Rail planning team where we delivered strategic documents and business cases for many national projects, including High Speed Two (started as the High Speed Line Study for SRA), Thameslink upgrade, several franchise advisor roles and station redevelopment, including Stratford in London for the Olympics in 2012.
This was during the early days of privatisation so lots of changes in the structure, and in the organisations involved.
The major change during this time was the sheer numbers of passengers travelling, but the railways coped well, with relatively little expansion in infrastructure. This general pattern is largely continuing, even with the Covid blip, and is the major challenge for the industry. The network is full and it’s reaching the point where the easy things to solved have been done. We now require major investment on the lines and station to ensure it’s fit for the future.
After leaving Atkins, I worked for myself and had various roles in Department for Transport, Department for International Trade, and smaller consultancies. Working for UK Gov was interesting and certainly totally different to the consultancy mindset, but I helped deliver some successes, including simplifying internal approval systems and recording the highest values of rail exports recorded.
It was also during this time I was introduced to volunteering on the Ffestiniog railway. I worked with the operations team as a guard and signaller, which I really enjoyed. You meet great people who share your interest, and many of these have remained live long friends.
It's amazing to think the railways have been integral to the country’s success for 200 years and more. I really believe they’ll be around for another 200, and will probably be largely recognisable. Given the need to reduce car usage and emissions, I’d like to think we’ll actually have expanded the railway with new lines like HS2 (and electrified most of it), and I’d also expect we’ll see more light rail in our towns and cities. The cost of planning and construction must be reduced though. Am not convinced, despite the calls from some, we’ll see mass driverless trains.
