Catching up on the Elizabeth line with…Mike Bagshaw
More than a year after the official opening of the Elizabeth line, the Managing Director of the line’s concessional operator discusses customers, consistency and Covid.
Mike BagshawManaging Director MTR Elizabeth line
It seems like it was only yesterday that the Elizabeth line was officially opened by Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II during her Platinum Jubilee year. After much anticipation, the rail service welcomed its first passengers in May 2022.
This was a memorable moment for Mike Bagshaw, who was previously MTR Elizabeth line’s performance and planning director. More than 12 months on, we catch up with him to discuss his subsequent appointment as MTR Elizabeth line’s Managing Director and get the inside scoop on the service’s first year.
You were appointed MD of MTR Elizabeth line in January 2023 but have a history with MTR which stretches back to 2016. What drew you to MTR? Why was becoming MD the right next step for you?
MTR is a well-respected brand that focuses on delivering high performance and high standards for customers. I’d always been impressed with the organisation, so I joined as a bid director in 2016.
In 2018, I became performance and planning director for MTR Crossrail (later rebranded MTR Elizabeth line), and worked closely with various parties to develop staged opening plans for the Elizabeth line.
Stepping into the role of MD was a great opportunity for me to combine my time working on the foundations of what’s now the Elizabeth line with experience gained from more than 30 years in the industry.
You started as MD in the run-up to a big timetable change in May. It sounds like an intense few months.
When I started the role in early February 2023, a key focus was developing a comprehensive plan to deliver a substantial May timetable change with an increase to 24 trains an hour in the central section. A lot of technology and different programme elements needed to come together smoothly to deliver on that date.
While the date was pretty much fixed, our focus was on ensuring we were fully ready for the change and a much more intense timetable with shorter journey times and a greater frequency.
Everything we did had to be sharper and more focused. And that remains our approach, to deliver consistency of service on a high-frequency railway with cutting-edge, but still maturing, industry-leading technology.
What have been your memorable moments of the Elizabeth line’s journey?
The most memorable moments for me are:
Standing at Paddington station as the gates were opened for the Elizabeth line and seeing the first passengers come down the escalators. The Crossrail project had been 20 years in the making, most of my railway career, so travelling on the first train with those passengers was quite a moment.
When we introduced the end-to-end railway in November 2022. That was my ‘bag’ in my role as performance and planning director. I’d led the planning work that went into getting the train paths and the different elements lined up. So enabling passengers to travel through from Heathrow and Reading, all the way up to central London – essentially transforming people’s journeys – was a significant moment.
Becoming MD and delivering the end-state timetable on 21 May 2023. We delivered the benefits for the Elizabeth line that had always been envisaged, including reduced journey times.
Seeing how many passengers are enjoying using our service and the ways in which we have made London and the surrounding areas more accessible to a greater number of people.
How have you been responding to the challenges brought on by Covid-19?
Prior to opening, the pandemic made delivering our driver training programme more challenging. We had to develop new and innovative ways to train our drivers to ensure we were ready for the opening date. A lot was done to ensure Covid didn’t delay the line further and, thanks to hard work from all involved, it didn’t.
From an industry-wide perspective, the pandemic has changed travel patterns. We are very busy Tuesday to Thursday and quieter on Mondays and Fridays. However, weekends and leisure times are busier than they were pre-Covid.
What we are seeing is that the Elizabeth line is supporting the Covid recovery by providing a high-quality way of quickly travelling into London. This is encouraging people back into the office, and more people to travel into London for work and leisure.
Is the Elizabeth line bucking the trend with passenger numbers?
We’re new so we can’t make a pre- and post-Covid comparison. But we are experiencing fast-growing passenger numbers, with a large proportion of journeys in the UK now being made on the Elizabeth line, making us one of the busiest rail lines in the country.
We’re seeing some 4.1 million passengers a week. We recorded 701,000 passenger journeys on Thursday 6 July alone. I think the volume of passengers we’re attracting, and the popularity of the service, speaks for itself.
It’s been incredible to see the Elizabeth line helping to drive passenger and economic growth in the capital, a success that has been achieved with the help of our strong partnership with our client, Transport for London.
What are you doing to retain, or even increase, passenger numbers?
As a team, our focus is on delivering consistency. When the Elizabeth line runs well, it runs incredibly well; when we have disruptions, it’s not such a great experience. This is because the line cuts journey times so significantly that, when in disruption, the inconvenience is greater.
Our priority is to operate the timetable: running trains on time, ensuring all the information systems are correct, and ensuring customers have a fantastic experience. Delivering a reliable, high-quality service is essential.
What are your suggestions for RSSB members that want to see their passenger numbers return to pre-pandemic levels?
Focus on the basics. Run your trains on time and provide a great customer experience. Some parts of the rail network are doing that, and some parts aren’t. I think the ones that are delivering a good service are seeing better growth. Passengers want consistency. They want to know that the train service is reliable. They want clear passenger information. We see that in particular with our customers who travel to Heathrow Airport. These passengers are often less familiar with the Elizabeth line so need even clearer information and consistency of service.
How is the Elizabeth line benefiting other rail services?
In terms of passenger numbers, we interconnect with other train operating companies (Great Western Railway, Southeastern, Thameslink, and Greater Anglia) and London Underground lines, often being part of a much longer journey.
We think those TOCs are benefiting from the Elizabeth line, in that we encourage more people onto their services because we can connect them more effectively.
Then there’s the technology. We’re using industry-leading tech such as Communications-Based Train Control (CBTC), a railway signalling system, to run 24 trains an hour with greater efficiency. It’s important for the rest of the industry to see how we can utilise technology to improve the railway, including in areas such as signalling.
This is a good news story so far, considering Crossrail was met with some criticism due to delays, cost and the transportation needs in the north of England.
Crossrail is truly a national project that has national benefits. During construction, contractors were based in the north and west of England, as well as Scotland and Wales. Today, we’re seeing the benefits connectivity brings to passengers across the country.
When you recognise that so many journeys in the UK are now made on the Elizabeth line, you can see that a lot of those passengers are connecting to other places, travelling far beyond London and bringing benefits to those communities.
What are your priorities over the next 12 months?
We’re working tirelessly with our rail partners to improve service reliability, because we’re still not as consistently reliable as we need or want to be. We have new technology on the trains and signalling, and that’s still embedding in.
What is rail’s biggest underappreciated strength?
Being able to carry large numbers of people from A to B quickly and sustainably. Rail connects communities in a way that other modes of transport can’t do as efficiently and effectively.
How can industry build on those strengths?
By offering passengers a consistent, reliable and accessible service at an affordable price. If we do that, people will see the value in rail as a sustainable and accessible means of travel, and passenger numbers will continue to grow at a faster pace.
A lot of effort goes on behind the scenes to make that happen. The Elizabeth line, for instance, has step-free access at most of its stations, meaning we can offer a much-improved service, particularly for mobility impaired passengers and
those with greater accessibility needs. The industry has an exciting future and an opportunity to further transform how people use rail, connecting communities and better serving the needs of all passengers.
