At least the trains are on time!

There may be fewer trains at present, due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown, but at least the ones that are running arrive on time.

That’s certainly the experience in Scotland.  Using the rail industry’s public performance measure (PPM), which judges any long distance train that arrives no more than 10 minutes late as being on time (five minutes for commuter and regional trains), ScotRail’s figures for April 2020 show that 97.6 per cent of its trains arrived ‘on time’.

These times have been measured against the key-worker timetable that ScotRail introduced following lockdown, including early morning and late-night services, to keep doctors, nurses, care workers and others moving as they carry out their essential work.

Alex Hynes, managing director of Scotland’s Railway, said: “We know how important Scotland’s Railway is and I am delighted at how hard our staff are working to keep the key workers moving across the country.

“With fewer services running, we have made multiple changes to the timetable to make sure we are meeting the needs of those key workers who absolutely need to travel.

“There are clearly challenges ahead but it is very encouraging that we have been able to implement such a robust timetable and get so many trains running on time.”

Further amendments will be made to the timetable in the coming weeks and months, in line with government advice, to provide key workers with more opportunities to practice social distancing on trains.