TWO of East Anglia's railway operators have ranked top in satisfaction and punctuality stakes, it was revealed today.Anglia Railways was revealed as the best train operator on the UK mainland with overall customer satisfaction rating of 90 percent, according to a report from the Strategic Rail Authority.

TWO of East Anglia's railway operators have ranked top in satisfaction and punctuality stakes, it was revealed today.

Anglia Railways was revealed as the best train operator on the UK mainland with overall customer satisfaction rating of 90 percent, according to a report from the Strategic Rail Authority.

Meanwhile, Essex train operator First Great Eastern proved to be the most punctual rail operator in the country – apart from the Isle of Wight's Island Line.

The results are published as part of the SRA's six monthly On Track report which shows how train operators are performing in terms of customer service and train running indicators such as punctuality and reliability.

Anglia Railways score of 90 per cent (against an industry average of 73 %) for passenger's overall opinion of journeys was bettered only by Island Line Railway, who registered 92 percent.

The figures reveal the efforts of Anglia Railways in recovering customer confidence in the aftermath of the Hatfield rail accident and the need to operate a temporary timetable with longer journey times.

Compared to the previous quarter, First Great Eastern's punctuality levels improved dramatically rising to 91.3% of trains arriving within five minutes of the scheduled time in the fourth quarter of 2001/02 – ten percent better than the average for London and South East. It was ahead of Anglia Railways which showed 82.3 percent for long distance trains measured to 10 minutes late.

But Anglia Railways also achieved good results for its train performance. The On Track report reveals in national punctuality results Anglia Railways topped the long distance operators league table with 77.4 percent of trains arriving on time on the Norwich – Ipswich – London mainline for the 12 months to March 31 2002.