Recently the media spoke about major new investments for the North. It appeared that the long promised new link from Liverpool to Hull, with a new station at Bradford would happen. Cynics might be forgiven for thinking this is like promises to dual the A1, which persistently failed to happen and cost Ann Trevelyan her seat. But it isn’t. It will take some time, but persistent lobbying from northern mayors means work will start during this parliament.
With these projects there is always money for making a business case and planning first. I would suggest it might be a good idea to spend some of this on taking the people planning it along with the regional mayors on a trip to France to see how they manage to deliver projects like this so much more quickly than we do. They can stay in a budget hotel to keep costs down. I was very impressed when I visited Nice to discover it took four years to deliver the first tramline, compared to 6 years for the Edinburgh system, which was nearly cancelled at one point. Nothing has happened for the proposed Leeds system, despite the fact that a city of that size has no rapid transit system, despite a lot of noise from Tracy Brabin, the mayor.
I noticed that the headlines talked about “Major investment in the North” but when you read them more carefully there was no mention of anything North of York. That apparently is where the North stops. It was interesting to see that the only mention of anything further north than that in the “i newspaper”, a publication which is usually pretty fair, was a painting of the opening of the Stockton to Darlington line in 1825 where a dog is overtaking the train. Perhaps they were trying to make a point.
Railway expansion in the North East
I turned to the Journal which did mention what our mayor, Kim McGuinness and her deputy, Martin Gannon, who previously chaired the Regional Transport committee, had secured for the North East. The Metro is to be extended to Washington, using existing track. Washington is the biggest town in the country without a rail connection so good luck with that. There is also a promise to carry out a study of the case for the reinstatement of the rest of the Leamside line from Washington to Ferryhill.
Railway aficionados have banged on about the Leamside line for as long as I can remember. The East Coast Main Line goes from four tracks to two tracks at Northallerton. Two tracks go to Teesside via Yarm and there is a connection from Stockton to Ferryhill to rejoin the mainline. This is currently used for goods traffic. The line would then have continued from Ferryhill to Gateshead, but that has been taken up to save it from scrap dealers.As a result the line between Northallerton and Scotland is very congested.
Reopening the Leamside Line is not just a project for train enthusiasts. If the new East West Line is opened and more trains run between Liverpool, Manchester and Hull, and join the Mainline at York, the existing line to Newcastle and beyond will not be able to cope, so it is essential that freight and local traffic be switched to the Leamside Line which would also mean a possibility of opening stations in Ferryhill, Shincliffe and Belmont.
Shifting from trains to buses
Good luck to Kim and all the other local politicians pressing for it, and I must pay tribute to Martin Gannon who has beavered away at this for years. But glamorous rail projects and photos in Hi-Vis jackets must not take our attention away from something which could be delivered much more quickly to improve public transport in the North East. Improving bus services. Dr Beeching is remembered for closing railway lines, but his report in 1963 also stressed that rural connectivity could be improved by improving bus services if uneconomic railway lines were closed. That part of his report is seldom mentioned. The Conservative Government of the time moved quickly to close the railway lines, but neither it or its successor did much to improve bus routes or the infrastructure such as shelters and bus stations which goes with them.
The case for improving bus services is overwhelming. An aging population means more people will rely on them, particularly if older people have to give up driving because of more stringent driving tests. A bus is much more environmentally friendly than people using thirty-odd cars. Bus ridership outside London has declined from 4.6 billion in 2009 to 3.6 billion in 2024, or 21.7% according to Government Statistics. Professor Waterson of Warwick University attributes this to the fact that the cost of bus travel has risen more than prices generally. My own experience is one of reliability. Wages for bus drivers are not competitive with delivery drivers, and it is often not possible to run a reliable service simply because there are not enough drivers. NHS efforts to put on buses for hospital visitors haven’t been successful because people simply do not trust that buses will turn up. Kim McGuinness is making efforts to improve bus services and hold down fares, but until more funding is available it is difficult to make the improvements we need. If Labour wants a quick result, improve bus services outside London.
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