Peer review: Mike Goggin
Director, International & Advisory,
Steer Davies Gleave
It was coincidental that on the weekend I read Paul’s article, the Sunday Times carried a piece on the work of Related Developers and its massive redevelopment in New York City (Hudson Yards), and its teaming with Argent (the developer behind King’s Cross Lands). Clearly the railway in Britain continues to have interest and merit, despite the difficulties alluded to in Paul’s article.
I have had the pleasure of working with GB’s railway stations from the very outset of my career, and have had the pleasure of working with developers, architects, local activitists, operators and station staff. And Paul’s article touches on some ‘home truths’ for those of us involved with the railway and its stations.
All too often stations are viewed from a single perspective – commercial, asset, operational. In the work Steer Davies Gleave is doing for the Rail Delivery Group, we are helping it to establish a broad set of principles that consider the role and impact of a station more holistically. When finalised, I hope it will recognise that a station arguably needs to be considered as 50% railway and 50% community. Recognising that the backyard of our stations touches the everyday lives of our communities, and working with them, will produce benefits for all parties.
Richard Coburn rightly notes that there can be a tension between a railway operator’s wish to move people quickly and a community that might want stations to offer additional value. However, I don’t think this is the major issue driving any sub-optimisation - after all, creating a place attractive enough to encourage dwell encourages retail spend that benefits the operator. In my personal view, the owners and operators of stations need to:
- Create a sense of ambition – there needs to be a shared cultural aim to make the best of the estate for the railway and the community it serves. From my conversation with Peter Wilkinson, the man leading franchise development for the Department for Transport, he clearly wants to see bolder and more innovative approaches to the use of stations and other property. I hope that our work with RDG and its engagement with industry stakeholders starts to ‘lift the heads’ for the potential of the estate.
- Engrain the holistic perspective from the outset – at the very heart of the industry’s franchising and Periodic Review process, there needs to be a more visible consideration of the broader benefits to the local and UK economies of station-related property development. Alongside the funding assumption that ORR determines for Network Rail’s property, there needs to be a broader recognition in its licence (and ultimately its Delivery Plan) as to how development is conceived and delivered. This could lead to tension between ORR and Network Rail because community-engaged development might take longer or cost more, but at least it recognises the reality of the railway’s integration into the communities it serves.
- Industry understanding – the good news over the past decade is that the UK Government has put a lot of money into the railway and into its station estate. I would argue that the industry has not yet done enough to pool its learning and insights, to find out what worked and what didn’t.
In a tougher financing environment, and where funding is likely to come from multiple sources, the industry needs to be able to articulate and tailor the case for investment to leverage those funds. SDG’s research for Network Rail into station investments found cases where the benefits might be understated in traditional transport appraisal terms by five to seven times.
The industry also needs to ensure that if industry-wide schemes are developed (for example, National Stations Improvement Programme or the ‘onward travel poster initiative’ that ATOC committed to in 2010), that they are efficiently deployed and effectively sustained. Some mature decisions over prioritisation and the extent of devolution may be required.
- Management capability – it is quite clear that there are pockets of management where any signage is considered good, where the solution to increasing retail spend is to ‘pile it high’, and where follow-through on station investments is poor - for example, poor-quality seats on the mezzanine at King’s Cross and failures to update Stations Made Easy at other stations. There continues to be a significant churn in the people managing the stations on a day-to-day basis - the industry can do more to recognise that station management is a taxing role that brings together multiple skills and perspectives, including human resources, safety, commercial, operational, retail and design. ‘Professionalising’ station manage-ment within the structures and competences would bring benefits.
- Sustained determination – previous attempts at contractual reform is a story of valiant efforts to recognise the fact that the original leasing and access structure created at privatisation was overly complex, inhibited change and led to documentation that did not reflect reality. Unfortunately, those efforts met with limited success (and sometimes no success) as proposals for reform, developed over many months, were then dropped. The industry needs to ensure that there is clear, sustained momentum and a shared accountability for making real change to the processes that govern station management and development.
I have so far focused on the station estate. However, the railway network extends far beyond station lease boundaries. What then for optimising the rest of the estate?
I do think we need to recognise both the challenges and the potential. The challenge of building adjacent to, over or re-using railway estate for development shouldn’t be underestimated. Network Rail and train operators are rightly concerned to ensure that delivery of the development doesn’t have an impact on the safety or efficient ongoing maintenance of the railway, both during construction and when completed. This principle, I would suggest, would be endorsed by all parties involved.
It is therefore the execution of the arrangement where challenges and complexity arise. Perhaps it is time to look again at how Asset Protection Arrangements are conceived and communicated to potential interested parties. The industry needs to remember that, with the Government’s planning changes, there are now more places away from the railway where development can occur. These places often have a simpler structure of participation, a lower time for development and cost of construction, and avoid some risks such as contamination.
In terms of potential, the railway estate is well placed to meet community needs for additional housing. To coin a phrase from the US, ‘transit oriented development’ is something that the UK industry has developed successfully. With work under way to develop generic and lower-cost approaches to decking over railways and to adjacent development, perhaps we can see some of the blighted carriage sidings and maintenance depots brought back into life.
However, to achieve this with confidence and determination requires a detailed and mature discussion on the future of the railway network and its services - I would argue that it begins and ends with a clear and shared understanding of what the railway network, its stations and its train services are there to deliver.
