If today’s white paper is to be believed UK rail customers can expect better scheduling and more logical pricing.

Entitled Great British Railways – The Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail – the 116-page document sets out what the government says will be “the biggest change to the railways in 25 years, ending the fragmentation of the past and bringing the network under single national leadership”.

The new public body will be responsible for setting fares and organising schedules amongst other things.

Former rail manager Mark Smith, now of Seat61.com calls it “the biggest reform since privatisation”.

He goes on to say that “The key difference between Great British Railways and the former British Rail is that BR used its own staff and ran trains directly. GBR will outsource, using contracts to incentivise everything.

It remains to be seen how this will happen.

When it comes to fares we are promised new flexible season tickets to suit the needs of part-time workers or staff who may have no need to commute daily to the office.

But for individual trips reform is needed. As readers will have seen last Monday the gap between off-peak and peak pricing on a main route like Manchester-London is ludicrous.

So too is the price gap between the main Manchester-London operator and those who provide an alternative albeit slower route.

Manchester-London by train for £35 return

It is unclear what the future holds for open access operators.

And The Scotsman’s Alastair Dalton asks what it will mean for Scotland.

While experienced rail user Philip Dyer-Perry asks “Are they serious ?  [Great British Railways] sounds like the name of a TV travel series with Michael Portillo … “

Developments will be awaited with interest.