One of the most surprising developments on European railways in recent years has been the renaissance of night trains.
A decade ago, they were seen as being in terminal decline. But in Britain, new stock has been provided for the Caledonian Sleeper, and demand for the three routes has remained buoyant with trains booking out weeks (even months) in advance.
Fully commercial Sleeper services have been part of the British railway scene since 1873, when the North British Railway introduced a Sleeper between London King’s Cross, Edinburgh Waverley and Glasgow Queen Street.
From the beginning, the challenges of making a profit were evident: Sleeper cars are bespoke and heavy vehicles; they can be used only once a day; they are operationally complex with more plumbing to maintain and linen to process; and the staff and material costs are significant.
No evidence survives that tells us about the economics of pre-nationalisation Sleeper services. The low prices offered suggest they were seen as something of a public service, and competition on some routes kept the supplement over the normal fare at a lower level than on the continent. One historian has given the cost of using a Sleeper car between Paris and Marseille as 24 times higher than the Edwardian equivalent in Britain.
That fundamental aspect of Sleeper trains in Britain has continued, with per passenger subsidy to the Caledonian Sleeper the highest of any train operating company (TOC). It has also experienced the highest number of complaints of any TOC per 100,000 passengers (395). And although it is a politically indispensable part of Scotland’s transport, its operator (and perhaps operations) look set to change within months, following the decision by Scottish ministers to terminate the franchise on June 25 2023.
Caledonian Sleeper services - from London to Edinburgh and Glasgow on its Lowland Route, and London to Fort William, Inverness and Aberdeen on its Highland Route - were part of ScotRail until April 2015, when the franchise was handed to Serco. Even with the subsidy, Serco’s bid was too low for it to make any money.
In March 2022, Scottish ministers extended the Temporary Measures Agreement (TMA) for a year until March 31 2023, but in October decided to terminate it. Folding the Caledonian Sleeper into ScotRail is something the RMT union has campaigned for, bringing it in line with the rest of ScotRail, which transferred from Abellio to Scottish Rail Holdings on April 1 2022.
As Mark Smith, the Man in Seat 61, says: “The rationale for awarding the Caledonian Sleeper as a separate contract was to focus management attention on it, otherwise it is just a niche product within ScotRail that no one pays any attention to or is delegated to a junior manager. That’s the biggest risk of it going back into ScotRail.”
Britain’s other Sleeper service is the Night Riviera, operated by Great Western Railway (GWR) between London Paddington and Penzance, and which has been running (at least as far as Plymouth) since 1877.
There was some doubt over its continuation at privatisation, but Smith recalls that withdrawal of the separate Plymouth portion made the necessary cost saving - the full cost of a Class 08 shunter to detach the Plymouth coaches had been charged to the service.
The service remains popular, and GWR reports that “over Easter and during the summer holidays, we regularly hit 100% passenger loadings from London Paddington on a Thursday/Friday, and from Penzance on a Sunday/Monday”.
What lessons about night-train operations can be learned from across the Channel, where the unpredicted and remarkable revival of Sleeper services has been largely under the auspices of Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB)?
Continental revival
In recent decades, a whole range of factors has worked against the success of Sleeper trains on the continent: budget airlines, motorway construction, high-speed trains, an unequal competitive framework, tired trains, and rising expectations of privacy and comfort.
Many had expected Sleeper services to disappear altogether - and in some countries they have (Spain) or almost have (France).
Kurt Bauer, head of long-distance transport and new rail business at ÖBB, says: “Where night trains exist, there is in most cases the political will to do so as PSO services in Italy, Scandinavia and in Austria, because policy-makers think Sleeper trains should be publicly procured.
“We have always had very good partnerships with neighbours, and especially Swiss Railways, and they became the most important partners when we established a Nightjet network in 2015-16. Also, with Trenitalia for trains to Rome and Milan.
“Germany had other priorities at the time. To address the huge backlog in investment in all rolling stock, it adopted a focus on high-speed trains.
“In Austria, we had a good fleet of Railjets , but we lacked Sleeper coaches. DB decided to disinvest in night trains so we had the chance to procure 42 Siemens sleeper coaches. However, DB remained the operator of Nightjet in Germany.
“It is interesting to see how high-speed can kill Sleeper trains - it happened in Spain, France and Germany, but not in Italy because high-speed served only half of a long country, and it had political will to support Sleeper trains. Austria is far from the high-speed network and we need good connections with western Europe.
“The creation of Nightjet from a PR perspective was so successful because a railway was willing to take full ownership of a brand and customer experience. Until then, the passenger experience was totally fragmented with coaches from several railways making up a train. It was not clear what you purchased, what the service standard would be, what breakfast you would have.
“For the first time, we had an opportunity to become a European player in the passenger market. We didn’t run franchises abroad like NS or Trenitalia. We had a realistic chance to become a European player, and this brought so much energy throughout the railway from management to cleaning staff. It suddenly became the most important product of ÖBB.”
The launch of Nightjet was helped by the flygskam (flight shame) movement, which started in Sweden in 2017 and quickly spread through northern Europe. Swedish Railways sold 1.5 million more tickets in 2018 than the previous year.
In April 2020, Air France’s €7 billion (£6bn) pandemic bailout was conditional on the cessation of most flights that competed with TGV services.
But Bauer regrets that the European Commission, although wanting to encourage rail transport, does not address the most important issues.
“We need a level playing field, and we do not have that in Europe. Airlines pay no fuel tax - we pay all the taxes and VAT. Buses don’t pay tolls on Germany highways.
“We shall need PSO on some international services until we have an external world where it can be done competitively. My vision is that we don’t need PSO, and I believe it will have to come on a European level. Minor things would help: the track access charges that we pay for night trains are such a tiny part of all infrastructure revenues that business managers wouldn’t even notice their abolition, yet it would transform the economics of Sleeper trains.
“As for keeping costs down, we really look into how many staff we need at different times of year. We have disposed of old rolling stock with high maintenance costs, and built a more homogeneous fleet to standardise maintenance.
“We have invested in a unique yield management system. This is relatively easy for day trains, but there are so many options on night trains - sleeping, couchette, sitting, and various-sized compartments - that it can drive you crazy. The product is so complex that you need advice in purchasing a ticket. We have worked hard on our website to give a clear idea of what you get for your money.
“I think a game-changer for economics will be the new capsule coaches, like Japanese capsule hotels. ”
Built by Siemens Mobility, the key feature of the new Sleeper carriages is the accommodation of passengers in capsules instead of ordinary compartments.
Each capsule, known as a MiniSuite, has sliding doors to provide a high level of privacy. It is also equipped with a monitor, reading lamp, charging facilities, coat hook, and a pocket for storing personal belongings to offer a comfortable trip.
There are four capsules in each compartment, located on two floors, and capsules on the same floor can be paired by opening a sliding roller at the head. Each compartment has a special area to store outer clothing and baggage.
Says Bauer: “People don’t want to share. A Sleeper is easy to sell and so is seating, but couchettes are difficult. The capsule compartment will solve this, providing full privacy for the price of a couchette.”
On the demand side, the market on the continent is predominantly leisure, not least because the business traveller often wants flexibility, and Nightjet trains are often booked months in advance. Offering flexibility can adversely have an impact on loadings, but leisure travellers are willing to pay for a good-quality service.
Although Nightjet operates a Zürich-Hamburg service outside Austria, Bauer says any further services that do not touch the country have to allow an easy return to one of Nightjet’s three maintenance facilities at Vienna, Innsbruck and Graz.
Nor does he see the EuroNight Trains brand, operated by ÖBB in partnership with six other national railways, being folded into Nightjet: “EuroNight Trains have coaches from different countries. so you never know quite what you are going to get. The brand promise of Nightjet is that the train is all Austrian and of consistent standard.”
Consumer research shows that dinner is not that important, but good beer is, and breakfast is always mentioned positively.
Friendly and informed staff are also crucial, says Bauer: “When things go wrong, and there is plenty of scope in running Sleeper cars for them to do so, this can be greatly eased if there are good personnel, and people feel taken care of. When we have complaints, they always end by saying that the staff really tried to help.
“With all these cost and revenue measures, I’m totally convinced there is a business case for night trains.”
Prospects for Britain
Mark Smith agrees that costs, not demand, are the problem, and that track access fees are as significant a factor in Britain as on the continent: “In vertically integrated days, the railway didn’t save anything on infrastructure by not running the train, so it was zero cost. In some countries, lower charges have been offered for classic as opposed to high-speed routes.”
Calls have been made for a revival of the idea to run Sleeper services through the Channel Tunnel. When passenger train plans were being developed during the 1980s, Sleeper services were envisaged from Glasgow, Manchester Piccadilly, Plymouth and Swansea as well as London, operating to Amsterdam via Brussels, and to Paris, Dortmund and Frankfurt. A fleet of 139 carriages was planned, and 45 were built by Alstom before the whole idea was deemed a basket case and the carriages sold to Canada for Halifax-Toronto services.
On the demand side, there would almost certainly be sufficient business for Sleeper services from London to a limited range of continental destinations. But the HS1 track access fees (three times the cost of SNCF), Channel Tunnel access charges, security and border control charges, plus the costs of creating sealed sidings and platforms at end destinations, destroy the prospects for a business case.
The stringent safety regulations attached to operation through the Channel Tunnel are another impediment to developing cross-Channel services, adding complexity and cost. Comparable difficulties have bedevilled Swedish Railways’ Stockholm-Hamburg EuroNight service, because of the regulations attached to Denmark’s Storebælt Tunnels.
Brexit has added yet further difficulty and delay for Channel Tunnel services. Smith explains: “Non-EU citizens require passport stamps, and in future will require finger printing and checking of ETIAS visa waivers. People now have to turn up for Eurostar 90-120 minutes before departure instead of 30.
“The only way this will change is if they modify the ETIAS process when it is introduced in 2023, and an increased throughput can be achieved by getting rid of retail units at St Pancras to allow larger passport checking facilities.”
Open access Midnight Trains plans to launch the first service from its Paris hub in 2024, and its map shows a route to Edinburgh and eight continental end destinations at distances of between 800km (500 miles) and 1,500km (932 miles). Its website gives no indication of how it would overcome the aforementioned challenges and make a return.
Smith argues: “The best we can hope for is a hub at Brussels with trains on to Vienna, Berlin and Prague, with timely links by Eurostar. We need Eurostar to be a lot more co-operative in offering through fares with guaranteed passenger rights. But, at the moment, Eurostar is going for high yield with limited trains instead of volume and growth.”
Rolling stock
GWR Night Riviera services are operated by BR Mk 3 stock built at Derby in 1982-84, when 208 vehicles were turned out to two designs - one with 13 compartments, and the other with 12 plus an attendant’s compartment.
The fleet was refurbished in 2017-18 with the introduction of keycard locks, new lighting, WiFi, charging points, a wardrobe and under-bed storage.
The lounge car was completely redesigned with bar-style seating in various configurations, and Sleeper Lounges with shower facilities have been introduced at Penzance and Truro to reflect the facilities already offered at Paddington.
For the Caledonian Sleeper, from 2018 - under a £150 million programme, with £60m from the Scottish Government and £50m from the UK Government - Serco introduced new Mk 5 trains built by CAF in Spain.
When the new stock was introduced on the Lowlander services, there were so many problems (damaged pipework affecting the showers, technical glitches locking toilets out of use, poor room cleaning, staff shortages and strikes) that its launch on the Highlander services was postponed.
It is hoped that the introduction of CAF’s LeadMind platform will improve reliability by providing real-time remote monitoring and condition-based maintenance alerts. The process improves the effectiveness of fault diagnosis and optimises maintenance planning to improve service availability, comfort and safety.
Such complexity with stock illustrates why the high cost of Sleeper cars makes it harder to develop a commercial proposition to compete with airlines, even when the ticket price is regarded as rail fare plus overnight accommodation.
While ÖBB has pockets deep enough to place a €750m (£646m) order for new trains from Siemens, other operators can only afford to lease existing stock. This has led to the suggestion that the EU should commission a large fleet of overnight stock for lease to public or private operators - the economies of scale would lower costs and spur the development of more routes.
In the UK, the competitive position of night trains, as well as inter-city trains, was made even more difficult by then-Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak halving the air passenger duty (APD) on domestic flights in October 2021, weeks before the UK hosted COP26. While it is arguable that the additional CO2 emissions may be small, the impact on the competitive position between air and rail was substantial and sent the wrong signal in an age of climate crisis - pre-COVID, 74,500 people a month flew between London and Edinburgh. The counter-intuitive measure was not lost on international media. ■
The writer thanks Mark Smith and Kurt Bauer for their kind help. Neither GWR nor Caledonian Sleeper were willing to provide someone for interview.
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