Rollercoaster

The National Express Group’s main board will be like a dog with two tails this morning, in spite of a premium of £1.4bil payable to DfT rail. News announced yesterday that it secured the East Coast main line railway franchise from December at one and a half times the annual premium of GNER puts NatEx almost back on the rail map, following a series of losses. NatEx once held nine rail franchises. Before East Coast and following the loss of Midland Mainline, it was down to just c2c and One. Silverlink and Central depart from Birmingham one month ahead of the East Coast.

Ironic that last month NatEx announced it was to merge its coach, bus and rail divisions into one, because rail had shrunk so much and effectively ceased to be of any real significance. The UK reorganisation is expected to cost 100 posts but save £64m over five years. In fact, it’s reported that half of NatEx’s profits now come from outside the UK – from Spanish coach services and north American school bus operations.

Meanwhile, just when we thought that the scheduled road express market had reached maturity (economists’ speak for saturated low volume growth), record numbers are travelling by NatEx. It is fitting, therefore, that from 20 July, the first six of NatEx’s fleet of 20 14.2m 61-seat triaxle Caetano Levantes entered service, linking Stanstead with London. The route operates up to every 10 minutes using 42 vehicles and competes with Arriva-operated easyBus' 20-minute minibus service, new from June 2007 . easyBus sees 43 departures a day againstNatEx's 152.

NatEx views coach express growth in high frequency shuttle services such as this, probably in the south east. And NatEx has also launched its new Milton Keynes to London 'commuter coach', catering for a niche not otherwise filled by other public transport.

Meanwhile, NatEx has abandoned its plans to trial biofuels, citing environmental concerns. It will wait for the second generation biodiesels, as both Arriva and First press ahead.