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You can, in fact the UK _does_ have competing services via "open access railways". The issue is they only exist where routes are profitable - which is almost n

• seabass-labrax 2y ago
  Open access operators have generally not been allowed to directly compete with franchised Train Operating Companies (TOCs). Many of Britain's railway routes are profitable, but open access operators aren't allowed to compete with franchised TOCs for a slice of those profits. As a prerequisite for approval, the Department of Transport requires open access operators to show that their services would create additional value of their own, not just abstract existing revenue. Lumo, an open access operator and a part of First group, run trains between London and Edinburgh. They stop at Morpeth for no other reason than to fulfil their requirement to create value, in this case by stopping at a station previously underserved by the DfT franchise of the route. In other words, Lump had to make compromises in return for being allowed to get in on the action on one of the profitable railway lines. I'd be confident in claiming that there has never been any true free market competition for British passenger rail services since privatization. The existence of private capital doesn't automatically create free markets!