The
recovery


of
the
passenger
rail
business
is
continuing
in
the
wake
of
the
Covid
pandemic,
according
to
new
figures
released
by
the
Office
of
Rail
and
Road.


But
the
proportion
of
journeys
made
by
commuters
is
still
declining.

Annual
revenue
has
topped
£10
billion
for
the
first
time
since
2019,
and
totalled
£10.3
billion
in
the
year
to
31
March
2024.
This
was
a
13
per
cent
increase
if
compared with
the
£9.1
billion
in
the
previous
year,
when
adjusted
for
inflation.
In
the
last
year
before
Covid,
2019-2020,
revenue
from
passenger
services
was
£10.4
billion.

The
number
of
people
travelling
by
train
and
the
distances
they
covered
have
also
continued
to
rise.

A
total
of
1.61
billion
journeys
were
made
between1
April
2023
and
31
March
this
year,
which
was
an
increase
of
16
per
cent
compared
with
the
previous
year,
although the
total
in
2019-20
was
1.74
billion.
This
was
the
highest
figure
recorded
since
the
1920s,
although
there
is
an
element
of
statistical
inflation
because
modern
journey
totals
count
each
train
used
during
a
trip,
and
cannot
take
account
of
split
ticketing.

Passenger
kilometres
were
also
up,
at
60.1
billion.
This
was
a
13
per
cent
increase
on
the
53.0
billion
in
2022-23,
but
still
below
the
66.7
billion
kilometres
travelled
in 2019-2020.

The
earliest
equivalent
figure
available
in
historical
records
is
for
1934,
when
it
was
approximately
34
billion
kilometres.
Until
modern
times
the
highest
totals
were
recorded
during the
Second
World
War.
The
peak
of
56.7
billion
kilometres
was
recorded
in
1945,
when
many
thousands
of
demobbed
troops
were
travelling
home.

Meanwhile,
the
number
of
commuters
is
still
falling.
The
proportion
of
journeys
made
using
season
tickets
is
down
from
34
per
cent
in
2019-20
to
13
per
cent
in
2023-24,
and
this
was
two
percentage
points
lower
than
in
2022-23.
Commuters now
account
for
fewer
than
one
in
eight
passengers,
compared
with
one
in
three
before
the
pandemic.