Now I live up in Durham I'm "lucky" enough to actually have some choice as to which train company I use (East Coast, Cross Country, TransPennine Express and Northern Rail depending on where I want to get to). You'd think there would be good competition on fares but in practice they're all much the same and seem pretty expensive for what you get. East Coast use ancient, filthy, unreliable trains whilst the others use modern, filthy, unreliable ones! I'm not certain where I stand on the EC reprivatisation but I'm utterly unconvinced that there will be a significant improvement. On the plus side most of the train and station staff are friendly and helpful but I think that's more of a Northern thing anyway...
My wife is German and can't believe how much we pay for such a shoddy "service" in this country. Take a Deutsche Bahn train and it will be clean, punctual and a fraction of the cost. What are they doing right that we can't?
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