COVID-19 had a profound impact on people and industries across the world, with lasting changes to the way many people work and travel. Passenger rail was significantly affected, as at the onset of the pandemic operators had to contend with a sudden, steep drop in ridership. A new report, Boosting passenger preference for rail, by the International Union of Railways (UIC) in a partnership with McKinsey & Company, found that depending on the region, passenger numbers declined by between 40 and 100 percent, with a global average of around 70 percent. As the pandemic-related restrictions were lifted, operators put measures in place to restore rail services and adjust their offerings to suit customer’s changing needs, which aided recovery—although passenger rail traffic had not fully recovered at the beginning of 2022 when the research for the report took place, particularly in North America and Western Europe.
Even as the rail industry works to overcome the effects of the…
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