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Trains lack competition regardless. Is someone going to build competing tracks? Can trains pass each-other in a bid for speed? Privatise and they'll bid for the operating contracts of lines and then pass that cost on to the consumer with some added cost for profit and poof expensive trains in Britain.

Also sometimes trains are subsidised by the taxpayer and that's ok. Like here in Belgium the train runs a loss tho the fares are comparatively cheap. I'm damn sure it can be optimised if some overpayed management was replaced, obvious inefficiencies worked out, the weird splitting of services required by the EU reversed, etc

But they also provide a huge societal boon despite that subsidy because we lose boatloads of money on roads like the ring around antwerp and brussels being the most congested in europe which can only get exponentially worse given how much commuting happens here.




> Trains lack competition regardless. Is someone going to build competing tracks?

In the UK, the tracks are owned by Network Rail (publicly owned) and the trains are private, who get to bid on the services.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_Rail


I know. And if they were privately owned there would be a lack of open competition just the same. Society isn't going to allow for building a bunch of competing tracks.




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