They managed to increase rail's share of overall transport. Reversing long running trends from before.
> Commuters end up using the train because they're more or less forced to [...]
Rail transport had been losing passenger share. Did the private companies somehow figure out how to 'more or less force' people to take the train? Why couldn't the government rail do that before?
> Why couldn't the government rail do that before?
They didn't want to. Privatisation was the era of Thatcher and Major, the discovery of North Sea oil reserves, and of the same general desire to culturally align with US (including car culture) that to the uban design found in Milton Keynes 30 years earlier.