The stations we deserve?

The question of how we make more use of small and medium-sized stations has been addressed in these columns on several occasions in the past. As we wait with bated breath for the invitations to tender for the Northern and TransPennine Express franchises, it’s worth thinking a bit more about the potential of these smaller stations. Why? Well, Northern Rail has no less than 463 stations within its estate, more than any other train operating company. It actually stops at no fewer than 527 stations across the network. It doesn’t of course ‘own’ them, but leases them from its landlord Network Rail. In contrast, TransPennine Express operates just 30, though they do tend to be larger than most of Northern’s. Another interesting fact about these stations is that most of them are ‘unstaffed’. Of the 527 stations that Northern trains stop at, 331 are ‘unstaffed’. 

Paul is speaking on the 23 February at the 15th Annual Rail Stations and Property Summit in London.

Why the inverted commas? Well, some of those 527 stations are very much ‘staffed’ but not by Northern or other TOC staff. Take Clitheroe or Carnforth (a TPE station) which is very well served by Lancashire County Council staff; or Eaglescliffe and Chester-le-Street, which are staffed by local rail business ‘Chester-le-Track’. Millom station, on the Cumbrian Coast, has a booking office run by a local social enterprise. In addition, many of the Northern stations have been adopted by local community groups or ‘station friends’. Shining examples include Poulton-le-Fylde, Walkden, Hindley, Westhoughton, a whole string along the Settle-Carlisle line, Bentham, Mytholmroyd, Littleborough… I could go on, there are lots of them. All these different kinds of activity add value to the station, reduce vandalism and drive up patronage. I’m very much hoping the invitation to tender encourages the three short-listed bidders for Northern to take small station development on to an even higher level. There are lessons to be learned from other parts of the network, and equally what has been achieved on Northern has relevance to Great Western, ScotRail, Greater Anglia and many other franchises around the UK. The central issue is ‘how can we make stations into real, thriving, community hubs?’ The potential benefits can be considerable, adding up to making stations sustainable in the full sense of the term, in social, economic and environmental senses. 

• Socially, by making stations the heart of community life and ensuring they are safe and attractive places to use.  The sort of station envisaged here is a major asset to a community, providing a focus and in many instances a place that people feel proud of, contributing to a genuine sense of civic pride. Use of station buildings for community purposes brings a very direct benefit to local community life. 

• Economically, this approach helps improve overall usage of a station by making it a high-profile and attractive facility, increasing revenue to the railway. Increased use of station property helps improve the TOC’s bottom line and at the same time stimulates local business and creates jobs. An attractive station with a good service can act as a huge magnet to surrounding development (housing, business) particularly if encouraged through the planning process. 

• Environmentally, by helping to improve rail’s overall use, encouraging modal shift from car to rail (which may include ‘rail-heading’ at the station instead of making the entire journey by car). Practical measures to encourage journeys to and from the station by foot, cycle and public transport further help improve rail’s overall environmental advantages. Several stations (e.g. Accrington, Liverpool South Parkway) can be beacons of good environmental design, helping to embed ideas of sustainable building design and use in wider areas.

The key to developing this approach is having a strong commitment by the TOC to actually doing it, with the capacity and willingness to make things happen. The winning ingredient is having a well-resourced community rail partnership to work with the TOC and potential tenant to see things through to a successful conclusion. It is about going well beyond the essential ‘basics’ of accessibility, safety, lighting and information. It requires flexibility, creativity and imagination. And it involves partners. What works in one location might not work somewhere else. One local authority or community group might be keen, others won’t be. There is no simple ‘rule book’ on how to make it work, but lessons from around the UK are worth studying.

ScotRail has done more than most to bring unused station buildings back to life, thanks to the efforts of their external relations manager, John Yellowlees. Why single one person out? Because it needs a champion. If you just add it onto the list of what station managers are expected to do as part of their day job, it won’t happen. However, you do need to make sure the station manager – and station staff where they exist – are keen to be involved. You ignore them at your peril, but if you get them engaged you’ll get spectacular results. I’ll just mention Neil Gaittens, the sole member of staff at the undistinguished 60s suburban-style Hamilton West station. He was encouraged to get involved with local community groups and the result is a station that has been transformed. But a word of warning. If TOCs see community use of their buildings as a high-rent cash cow – forget it. The business case for doing it is around creating the sort of benefits highlighted above, not through rental income. 

Many smaller stations that are staffed are underperforming and missing opportunities. Imagine having a petrol station that only sells fuel! Yet we continue with the antiquated idea that station booking offices should only sell rail tickets. It’s daft and means that some staffed booking offices are under threat. Don’t reduce staff – engage with them and see what other products they could sell. Give them a proportion of the revenue! In time, could staff take over the running of their station entirely, either as a small business or as a co-operative if there is a sufficient number of staff based there? It doesn’t have to be large. The work of Stafford Beer in the 1950s, who developed his ‘Viable Systems Model’, suggested that a team of seven people is the idea base size to run an operation. In his case it was parts of the US steel industry, but it could easily be applied to the railways here in the UK. 

We need to lift our sights beyond just using existing buildings. Many stations that are in the right location, with potential interest from local community groups or small businesses, lost their buildings decades ago. There needs to be a new, simple modular design of station building that can be easily adapted to different locations, offering retail and community space. There’s a prevailing orthodoxy that says you need a footfall of around 300,000 passengers to make station retail viable. I’m not so sure. Some small stations with far fewer passengers have got very successful businesses that add real value to the rail journey. The point (an obvious one really) is that those businesses are not wholly dependent on rail footfall. So Dalmally (4,600 passengers a year, ORR estimates 2013/4) has a thriving art centre, Dingwall (102,000) has a very nice cafe and neighbouring pub, Kent’s Bank (23,500) has a superb art gallery, Pitlochry (102,000) has a great second-hand bookshop and Kyle of Lochalsh (67,000) boasts an excellent restaurant. Betws-y-Coed (35,400) has an array of cafes, shops and galleries in the old station building; it is the heart of the village. In each case, people come to visit by train, certainly, but lots come by other means, be it car or foot. The station gets a welcome sense of life that makes it safe and secure without CCTV and the modern accoutrements of the ‘security industry’. But it isn’t just the station itself, the entire community benefits from these developments and the station starts to develop as a real ‘community hub’. All it needs is lots of hard work, imagination, a champion and real partnership working. But it helps if there is high-level encouragement through these very legalistic documents called franchise agreements.  

Paul is speaking on the 23 February at the 15th Annual Rail Stations and Property Summit in London.