The £2 cap on bus fares in the north of Scotland could halt investment in rail services as passengers desert the more expensive train network, campaigners have said.

Ian Budd, convener of The Friends of the Far North Line, said the Scottish government had "effectively shot themselves in the foot" by capping bus fares, making them far less expensive than rail services covering the same route.

While a single bus journey from Thurso to Inverness now costs just £2, the same journey by train costs between £16.60 and £28.

Transport Scotland told the BBC it would continue to monitor the impact of the £2 bus fare cap on passenger numbers and wider transport behaviour.

Rail minister Lord Hendy has condemned the common practice of leaving redundant rolling stock to deteriorate and then trying to use it again.

He said: ‘There’s nothing more stupid than watching some trains halfway through their lives that have been parked in a field.

‘They’re put back into service, miserably failing on a daily basis because the industry wasn’t coherent enough to send them from the place they aren’t needed any more to the place they were. You can’t believe how stupid that is.’

He also referred to the age of the fleet which is in service, saying: ‘Every train in the north of England is clapped out. You need to replace them all. That’s a really serious investment choice, and GBR and the Government will have to face it head on.”

He was speaking at the annual conference of the Railway Industry Association.

GWR is currently struggling with its plan to introduce Class 175 units from Transport for Wales which were withdrawn a couple of years ago.

The operator wanted to use them on a number of routes in Devon and Cornwall, including the main line between Exeter and Penzance as well as the branches to Okehampton, Barnstaple and Newquay, but repeated failures mean that the older Class 150 units must shoulder the burden.

As a result, a Class 150 failure can mean that services in south west England must be reduced, with frequent cancellations.

Lord Hendy said the problems with rolling stock are something that Great British Railways ‘needs to fix, rather than just putting it on a long wish list’.

*snip*
When fully in use, and with the resultant improvements in frequency and journey times, the Valley Lines will have come full circle and have a network many will envy, and a huge improvement on the Pacers and Sprinters of the previous generation.
*snip*

I recommend reading/watching the following:

https://www.railengineer.co.uk/discontinuous-electrification-in-the-cardiff-valleys/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfhoSvkayzk

5 years? Understandable? What is the nature of the untried technology?

Given the amount of untried technology on them I think a delay into service is much more understandable than, say the 701s on SWR.

You could use the original 1970 Maidenhead - High Wycombe rail replacement bus service, still operating, the No37. The train the Marylebone and Bakerloo to Padd
The bus stop is by the Maidenhead Jubilee Clock.

Not sure its any quicker

I checked the planner for a journey that I’m rostered to make - Maidenhead to Tottenham Court Road on 28th December.  This clocks in at a whopping 2 hours!!

I can’t help but think that the proposed journey is somewhat convoluted and not efficient for the passengers.  The proposed plan is train from Maidenhead to Slough, road replacement service to Hillingdon Station(?!?), Hillingdon to Paddington.

Why not take passengers to their intended destination of Paddington rather than doing half the job and dropping them at Hillingdon which incurs a further hour of tube travel after the road replacement service. 

A new fleet of publicly funded trains that cost more than £200m still remain mostly unused more than three years after the first one was delivered.

They were initially promised to be fully up and running by 2022 but Transport for Wales' (TfW) boss has said he expects the tram-trains will be in full service by the end of 2027

Data obtained by the BBC reveals that less than half of the 36 fleet - what TfW call the "final piece" in their £2bn South Wales Metro project - have passed rigorous statutory testing.

TfW chief executive James Price said he wants trains that work "100% well, 100% of the time" before putting them into full service.
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17:50 Gloucester to Salisbury due 20:06

17:50 Gloucester to Salisbury due 20:06 will be terminated at Westbury.
It will no longer call at Dilton Marsh, Warminster and Salisbury.
This is due to a fault with the signalling system.

A train derailment which resulted in the deaths of three men could have been avoided if a drain had been built correctly, a sheriff has concluded.

Driver Brett McCullough, 45, conductor Donald Dinnie, 58, and passenger Christopher Stuchbury, 62, died in the crash at Carmont, near Stonehaven in Aberdeenshire, in August 2020.

The train derailed after hitting debris which had washed from the drain following heavy rain.

After a fatal accident inquiry (FAI), Sheriff Lesley Johnston said it was not constructed and installed in accordance with its design, and found there were precautions which could have been taken which "might realistically have avoided the accident".
It follows the Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) making 20 safety recommendations in its report back in 2022 into the crash.

That report had also highlighted the drainage system being incorrectly installed.