Quote: "It is a popular misapprehension among amateur transport planners that air and rail are somehow alternatives that can jockey for an inter-city market. The fact is that they tend to serve different markets."
Exactly, it's specious nonsense peddled by the "green" lobby. Along with the roads, the two complement eachother.
If there was competition between rail and air, would expect it to be with MAN-LCY, rather than MAN-LHR.
Quote: " London to Manchester is an example, with heavy flows on both air and rail, but there is limited scope to transfer between them. Few O&D pax on the air route are actually heading for Central London. In contrast air serves Surrey and the Thames Valley, both generators of much commerce in offices and also higher-income residential traffic, so much better than the fag into London and across to Euston before you even start."
As a resident of the Middlesex section of the Thames Valley, be assured that it is much easier to head to Heathrow and take a flight to Ringway than traipse up to London on a train, then accross London on the tube, then to take another train.
Maybe if the airport bus to/from Watford was still there and the fast trains still called at Watford, there may be a case for using the train. Apart from this, the cost of using the train is often prohibitive!
So inconvenience and expense, it's a no-brainer.
Quote: "The Euston trains abandoned their stops at Watford, which suited the Berks/Bucks market well, for technical reasons that a train stopping absorbed the slots of two that didn't."
Good grief, there are so many platforms at Watford, it should be possible to get the stopping "intercities" out of the way of those not stopping. Otherwise have all the "intercities" stop there, as they do at Stockport at the Manchester end. It isn't rocket science!
"That's all very well for the financial well-being of the monopoly franchise train operator, but does nothing for a national transport policy. It also puts two fingers up to any argument about railways being the "green" option."
Exactly!