01.05.12
Listening to the passenger
Source: Rail Technology Magazine Apr/May 2012
Centro’s Rail Partnerships Manager, Steven Fisher, explains more about the agreement that is adding value to West Midlands’ railways.
An innovative partnership arrangement between Centro and operator London Midland is set to improve the passenger experience at stations across the West Midlands. As part of the Transforming Rail Travel Agreement, ten stations will benefit from a £250,000 minor works programme through the installation of more ticket vending machines, upgraded passenger information systems and better cycling facilities.
Steven Fisher, Rail Partnerships Manager at Centro, spoke to RTM about this project, and the wider partnership facilitating the improvements.
The agreement, signed in September 2011, states that both parties aim to ‘truly understand our passengers and deliver to their expectations through effective partnership in planning and delivery’. The main objectives are to increase patronage, revenues, customer satisfaction and modal shift from car to rail. Additionally, both parties seek to create innovative and good value solutions to the challenges faced in the industry today.
Adding value
Fisher explained that prior to 2007, Centro was a co-signatory of the West Midlands rail franchise but that when the franchise was re-let, it was DfT policy at the time to not extend that co-signatory status. This led Centro to investigate alternative approaches to working in partnership with the new train operator for the West Midlands, London Midland, a subsidiary of Govia.
He said: “We wanted to try to find ways of adding value alongside the train operator and seeing what we could do jointly that perhaps we wouldn’t be able to do on our own.”
The joint approach is allowing both partners to improve and deliver rail facilities, performance and services in ways that they would not have been able to do in isolation. With the collective input of a multi-disciplinary, cross-organisational team, the partnership can achieve more together, he said – although this does not mean that their priorities are completely shared.
“There are always going to be things we don’t agree on,” Fisher acknowledged.
Fundamentally, Centro’s motivation is modal shift – getting people out of their cars and onto more sustainable forms of transport, including rail – whilst London Midland is a private company looking to make a profit from running passenger services. However, the two parties are aligned on most issues, such as building patronage and revenue.
The shared outputs range from delivering better passenger information, integration and improved connectivity, to safety, the environment, rail service incremental enhancements, joint marketing and transparent, cooperative working.
The minor works package is just one of “many projects” making up the wider scheme, Fisher said. A steering group meets to try to draw on the collective expertise of the various personnel at Centro and London Midland. The relevant people are brought together to generate projects that could be jointly delivered to add value. There are currently around 30 or 40 agreed work items, Fisher said, varying in size and scale.
These include providing secure stations accreditation for West Midlands stations, providing integrated passenger information and exploring additional rail services.
He said: “The minor works package is effectively an idea that was born out of one of those steering group meetings. We were having a discussion along the lines of ‘We’d like to spend some money improving local stations, does London Midland have a wish list of things it would like to do that it doesn’t have the budget to do?’
“London Midland said: ‘Yes, we’ve got a massive wish list, we’ll share it with you’.
“There were items on there that, broadly speaking, we wouldn’t be interested in funding – that we didn’t think were appropriate – but there were a number of things on which we thought ‘yes – this is exactly the kind of thing that could make a difference to passengers’.
“We’ll use a quarter of a million pounds of ITA (Integrated Transport Authority) money to provide the capital funding to deliver a whole host of enhancements, mainly ticket vending machines and passenger information at stations. London Midland’s contribution will be the project management and the delivery of those schemes by spring 2013.”
Ticking off the wish list
The improvements approved from the ‘wish list’ are ones which sit comfortably with Centro’s business plan objectives, such as the need to improve passenger information.
Snow Hill station is set to undergo a £1m upgrade under the National Stations Improvement Programme and passenger information and cycle storage funding included as part of the minor works package effectively forms a Centro contribution to this scheme. The other stations on the list will benefit from upgraded passenger information systems and additional ticket vending machines, selected for their ‘congestion-busting functionality’.
At University station, proposals to situate the newest TVM on the University of Birmingham campus are being examined to further reduce crowds, especially during the morning peak, and provide greater choice to students using the railway.
At five unstaffed stations, this project will mark the first time that ticket buying facilities will be available to passengers.
“By providing TVMs on those stations, we’re ensuring that at every station within the West Midlands there will be a means of buying a ticket,” Fisher commented. “That’s what it’s all about!”
The stations will be using the same real time train information equipment seen throughout the London Midland network – standardisation makes it easy to maintain, Fisher said.
Understanding the passenger
To make sure the chosen improvements align with customer demand, the partnership has conducted research into footfall at the various stations, and also used information from the National Passenger Survey, Centro’s annual Customer Satisfaction Survey and customer comments and feedback. This has helped them understand which infrastructure improvements need prioritisation – those that are the real key to the passenger experience.
Fisher stated: “We’re looking to deliver these items this year, which have been identified from a mixture of customer feedback and market research data. Subject to the success of this programme, we may look to identify further works in future years by a similar means; direct feedback from customers as to what they want.”
The improvements consist of new customer information screens (CIS), an extension of the public address system and new cycle storage at Snow Hill, CIS improvements at Tipton and Whitlocks End, additional ticket vending machines for Bournville and University and primary ticket vending machines at the remaining five stations.
The wider partnership agreement will run until the end of London Midland’s franchise and it is envisaged as part of the steering group meetings that the partnership will continue to add new items, as they finish various workstreams. This will also include re-evaluating items to ensure they are still appropriate for implementation. “It’s supposed to be organic – it will keep going and building momentum right up until 2015 when the franchise ends,” Fisher said.
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