Railways: Passengers
(asked on 12th January 2016) - View Source
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what estimate his Department has made of the number of passengers forecast to use the rail network in each of the next 10 years; and if he will make a statement.
The most recent passenger forecasts for the rail network are published in the December 2014 National Policy Statement for National Networks (NPS)[1]. A summary of these forecasts is shown below:
Table 2: Growth in Passenger km (in %) since 2011 including Phase 1 | |||
Year | 2020 | 2026 | 2033 |
London & South East | 20.4% | 31.2% | 46.1% |
Long distance | 12.9% | 36.8% | 63.8% |
Regional | 8.7% | 16.5% | 32.8% |
Total (average) | 15.3% | 30.5% | 50.1% |
Source: Network Modelling Framework (NMF) – estimates based on model runs conducted in October 2014. HS2 forecasts have been supplied by HS2 Ltd modelling team and incorporated as overlays to the NMF numbers.
These can be compared against Office of Rail and Road (ORR) figures[2] for existing rail usage for the financial year 2014-15:
Sector | Number of passenger kilometres travelled (billions) |
London & South East | 29.6 |
Long Distance | 20.8 |
Regional | 12.0 |
Total | 62.4 |
The Department for Transport (DfT) is currently undergoing an extensive update of the models involved in forecasting rail demand, specifically in preparation for the Control Period 6 planning. The update will ensure more recent evidence and data are taken into account whilst also ensuring wider consistency with separate modelling being conducted on the High Speed Rail (HSR). Later in 2016 DfT will be in a position to make another publication of forecasts ready for CP6.
Given the nature of the model, a 10-year successive forecast for rail is not published.
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/387222/npsnn-print.pdf 2.28 to 2.41
[2] https://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/displayreport/report/html/34856085-cf9c-4e0d-a7f8-8f9e5ee1b772