The core of a new timetable for rail services in and around
Manchester has been approved for December 2022, focused on
improving the performance of rail services and providing more
punctual, reliable journeys for passengers.
The timetable follows an extensive public
consultation that was launched in January 2021 and has the
support of both government and Northern leaders. Once finalised, it
aims to reduce delays for passengers by around 25%, benefitting the
150,000 regular passengers on Manchester’s rail network as they
return following the pandemic.
The new timetable will see:
- direct Manchester Airport connectivity for Liverpool, Chester
and North Wales retained
- an hourly service that will run between Southport, Wigan and
Manchester Oxford Road all day
- a second hourly service from Southport to Manchester Victoria
and Stalybridge all day
The final details of services are being refined ahead of launch
and there will be ongoing public involvement in the process.
Changes to services will ensure that the wider Manchester area
remains closely connected while bottlenecks become unclogged. The
new timetable will improve the service mix across a number of
‘hotspots’, including the congested Castlefield area in
Manchester.
This bottleneck has constrained the flow of rail services for
years and has generated millions of minutes of costly and
damaging delays.
The timetable was jointly produced by the cross-industry
Manchester Recovery Task Force, comprising the Department for
Transport, Transport for the North, Transport for Greater
Manchester, Network Rail and the train operators Northern and
TransPennine Express.
Local views have also been reflected in what is the first step in
a wider strategy, including ambitious infrastructure plans being
developed. Early phase infrastructure is targeted to start in the
middle of this decade, which will help deliver better journeys
for passengers and create a modern rail network for Greater
Manchester and the North.
Rail Minister said:
This new timetable has been built around the voices of Manchester
that helped design it, focused on cutting delays on Manchester’s
railways and boosting punctuality.
Our plan for rail sets out our commitment to putting passengers
first when it comes to our rail network. The work we are doing to
fix Manchester’s railways, which were bursting at the seams
pre-pandemic, is all part of us building back better from
COVID-19.
, Chair of the Rail North
Committee, representing Northern leaders on the task force, said:
This part of the network is the buckle in the belt of the North’s
rail network. It has to be able to do its job. The interim
service solution in this consultation is, inevitably a
compromise, but it allows us the chance to run more reliable
services until the task force can deliver on infrastructure
solutions to enable the network to run as it needs to.
What’s important is that we now have a commitment from government
and the rail industry to develop and deliver a railmap which will
enable us to build back services in a smarter and more
intelligent way and provide an exit strategy from the temporary
timetable we need in the interim.
Louise Gittins, Interim Chair of Transport for the North, said:
While rail travel has been significantly suppressed by the
COVID-19 pandemic, all our data suggests that in a relatively
short time this rail corridor will, once again, be under severe
pressure unless we take action now.
The task force has, in phase 1 of this consultation, put forward
a strategic framework for rail services, which rail operators
will now consult with the public on in detail. What really
matters is that, while this work is going on, simultaneously,
significant work will be underway to address some of the
fundamental structural issues of this network that need fixing.
