I believe that Sir Richard Branson as well as a successful business person is also a very honest caring person, time will tell, but I am sure that he has enough self awareness to realise that what he says today will be remembered tomorrow.
£750M is a huge difference in the bid, Virgin have the knowledge of actual costs and I don't think that they would just throw it away. Personally I believe it was a bid set to get the business at any cost. In a short time it will be found to be unsustainable and then we shall begin to see a poorer, more expensive service, but hey great news for the shareholders. Not good for the Public.

I really find it very difficult to understand how First Group can run the same service with such a huge reduction in the bid. I've used the Virgin trains a few times, and I agree with alan14, the trains were comfortable and clean, and the service was punctual. The food in the buffet car was good, too.

I have a feeling that someone in the government needs to learn the lesson that most of us in business learn - that cheap is not necessarily cheap in the long run.

The people who award these franchises should take a trip on the French TGV trains, and perhaps it would dawn on them that what passengers want are comfortable,clean, fast, punctual trains with a decent buffet service. If it costs a bit more to provide that kind of rail service passengers are usually amenable to see it reflected in the fare.

morddwyd

"Just think how many car journeys, and therefore pollution, are saved by even a half full train"

In fact, passenger trains are far less efficient overall in terms of energy consumption than cars. The overall load factor on UK railways is around 35%, or about 90 people per train. This is because of the need for rail carriers to maintain an off-peak service. That means that lots of trains are running with very few passengers,and as a consequence the energy efficiency of the rail network as a whole is considerably reduced. Cars run only when their passengers need to travel.

Another factor is that over the years cars have become far more energy efficient, and trains haven't kept pace with that. Technical considerations involving rolling stock weights and the efficiency of steel wheels running on steel tracks mitigates against big gains in energy efficiency.

I think the situation looks better where trucks are concerned - trains can compete better with regards to energy efficiency

"I think the situation looks better where trucks are concerned - trains can compete better with regards to energy efficiency"

In theory yes, but in reality they lose out on end of line delivery, trucks deliver door to door, trains usually require a truck to deliver the goods to a depot and then more trucks to collect and deliver, all this movement loading unloading is time and money.

namtas

Thank you for the clarification - I hadn't considered off-train distribution energy costs.