Rail & the Liverpool City Region - The Track to Growth

This week I was fortunate enough to be invited to an event in Liverpool called “Rail & the Liverpool City Region - The Track to Growth”. The event was an opportunity for city, transport and business leaders to publicly give their full backing to Transport for the North's (TfN) Strategic Transport Plan (STP), and it was also an opportunity to celebrate 5 years since the formation of the Liverpool City Region, and the £340m that has been invested in rail over that period.

As part of the STP, Transport for the North have set out £40bn worth of investment in rail which amongst other things will see Liverpool connected to HS2 and Manchester by a dedicated 2 track high speed line. This is something the city has been demanding since the route of phase 2 between the West Midlands and North West was announced. Whilst business and political leaders have been supportive of HS2, with benefits coming to the region from 2026, they were never fully satisfied with Liverpool's connection to HS2 being as far south as Crewe.

Rather than seeing HS2 connectivity as an insurmountable challenge the LCR and TfN have worked together to see how HS2 could be extended and integrated with a new line which provides Liverpool with direct connectivity to HS2, but also to Northern Power House Rail heading east to Manchester and Leeds.

Also this week a proposal was put forward for a new railway station to be built within Liverpool city centre, which would be connected to NPR. The new station would ideally have platforms 400m in length to take full advantage of the new longer trains that will be used on the HS2 core network. Currently Liverpool Lime St is limited to trains of around 260m in length (the length of an 11 car Pendolino). Lime St is also about to reach the limits of its capacity, this despite the recent the upgrade to the track approaching the station and the construction of a new platform. Very soon new services to Scotland and to Chester via Halton curve will consume the new capacity created. HS2 itself will also introduce 2 new services each hour to Euston from 2026. Therefore city leaders say that it is vital that Liverpool gains a new station and dedicated connection to HS2 and Manchester via NPR.

LCR estimates the HS2 link could provide £15bn worth of economic benefits and attract an additional 3.9m visitors per year to the region. Claire McColgan MBE Director of Culture Liverpool spelled out just how important having good transport links is to the tourism economy in the region, but also how vital tourism and culture are to the region's economy. Ms McColgan made it clear that event organisers want to host events in the LCR “because they know that the city transport sectors work together”. Pointing to success stories such as the Giants Spectacular last year which attracted 1.4m visitors across Liverpool and the Wirral, and the sailing of the 3 Queens along the River Mersey, which saw 1m people line the River on both sides to see the ships sail in.

Liverpool City Region

The event wasn't focused solely on the STP, it was also a good opportunity to celebrate some of the success stories over the past 5 year, since the formation of the LCR. The LCR led by by Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram brings together Liverpool City Region’s six local authorities – Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton, St Helens and Wirral working in cooperation to tackle issues that face the region. Not just transport for but housing, skills and Energy. In terms of transport though the LCR was able to bring together local transport plans, Network Rail's RUS and the needs of businesses to identify key infrastructure improvements that were required to help unlock the potential of the region.

The result of the collaborative approach was a £340m package of measures that would improve rail connections across the region and would help to enable new services and improve reliability. The largest of the measures was the work undertaken at Liverpool Lime St, but improvements were not focused solely on the city centre. A long held aspiration to re-instate bi-directional running at Halton Curve linking the North Cheshire railway to the WCML at Runcon has been realised, and a brand new station named Maghull North has been constructed.

Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram

Shortages of rolling stock has meant that services using the now complete Halton Curve have been delayed, but it is hoped that Transport for Wales Rail will begin to operate services between Chester and Liverpool, calling Helsby, Frodsham, Runcorn and Liverpool South Parkway in May this year.

Skills

It is clear that Liverpool transport, business and political leaders fully support HS2 and the TfN STP, but a word cropped up again which has the potential to threaten any future investment, that word was skills. Echoing the challenges outlined by the NRIL – Building New Railways report, Northern Powerhouse Rail Director Tim Wood made it clear that "the major risk to the programme is not money, it is skills” (or the lack there of). This is something I have written about for many years, in fact I first wrote about the skills gap back in 2015 when it emerged that GWML electrification was going to be delivered late and over budget, and that electrification of the Transpennine route was to be "paused".

What was true in 2015, unfortunately is still true today, we simple do not have enough skilled engineers in the UK to undertake the work that is necessary to get the North moving. It is frustrating in a number of ways, one because it seems as if people read on a daily basis in the main stream media, that the government should cancel HS2 and invest in the North and how it will solve all of our problems, but it just wont. And it's frustrating because we should be getting on with building infrastructure in the North, but we can't, not yet.

Let me give a example of why cancelling HS2 today would not improve railways tomorrow. In simplified terms HS2 is new railway and as such is moving towards the heavy civil engineering phase in which earth is moved, tunnels are excavated and structures are built. This requires a certain type of engineering skill set, such as earth work contractors and tunnelling experts. If they stopped work today and were moved up north to build something, what would it be? There are no detailed plans for NPR, no shovel ready civil engineering projects for them to begin work on.

What people might be thinking when they say “improvements” are upgrades, which is understandable, but those tunnellers and earth work engineers aren't correctly skilled to then start upgrading the railways. Most of the egineers who are correctly skilled to upgrade our railways are already doing so. Tens of thousands of them working tirelessly usually at night to improve Britian's railways.

Now I know it is probably a bit over simplified, but it does demonstrate that you simple can't down tools on one project and start another, and especially not by just throwing money at it.

The skills gap is going to take years to fill, and while good progress is being made with universities working in cooperation with TfN and NRIL and the formation of National High Speed Rail college, there is still a long way to go. Getting children ready to become the engineers of tomorrow needs to begin in primary and secondary schools.

We cannot allow there to be another lost generation like mine, which was told university is the only avenue available to you if you want any sort of career. I know in my school careers in science, education and IT were promoted, but the idea that you could have a successful career in engineering just never came up.


One last word on HS2, it was clear from yesterday's event that the LCR and TFN who represent 19 local transport authorities from across North thoroughly reject the notion that we should scrap HS2 and invest in the North instead. Tim Wood spelled out the message from TfN again "Let me be clear, we absolutely need HS2". The simple fact is we need both HS2 and NPR.

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Transport for the North's long term ambition

Last week I wrote about the “Building the North's New Railways” report which was launched at an event hosted by the Northern Rail Industry Leaders. Within the piece I described some of the challenges that are facing the industry, as set out in the report and how the industry is looking to work together in order to deliver rail upgrades across the North. In this blog I want to look more broadly at what a “Northern Powerhouse Railway” may look like and look at the wider transport planning framework as set out by Transport for the North.

First of all I should point out that the headline £70bn figure for transport investment between 2020 and 2050 covers both rail and road upgrades and is formed in part by money that it is already assumed will be invested in the North over the period. TfN assumes that £39-43bn will be invested in the North based on current levels of committed investment outlined in the Highways England Road Investment Strategy and Network Rail’s Control Period. This means a further £21-37bn will be required if TfN is to deliver the upgrades it says are needed to the road and rail network across the North. The £70bn figure is a huge sum of money, however it equates to only £2.3bn of investment each year over the next 30 years.

If current levels of committed investment are continued to 2050, £1.3bn to £1.4bn will be invested per year over the period. Therefore TfN are seeking a further £900m per year in order to achieve a full package of road and rail upgrades which would go far beyond that which Highways England and Network Rail have already proposed.

It is now up to Transport for the North to prove that there is a viable business case for the proposals that it is suggesting. The NRIL report forms a crucial part of proving the business case as TfN and NRIL need to demonstrate that there will be sufficient numbers of skilled workers in place in order to undertake such a large package of works in the North over 30 years. Without having the workforce in place and without investment in new technologies, schedules could slip and costs could spiral.

Over the past few years I have written at length about the challenges that face not just the North, but the UK as a whole. The Northwest Electrification Programme and GWML electrification, which both ended up over budged and years behind schedule demonstrate what can happen if there are not enough skilled workers in place to undertake the work that is being proposed.

Now that TfN and NRIL have identified the challenges and are now seeking to ensure that the industry trains enough new workers and invests in new innovative technologies, it may just be possible that the ambitious plan set out by TfN can be achieved

So let's take a look at what is being proposed....

Rail

Rail forms a key part of TfN's plan as infrastructure improvements in the right places can bring about transformational benefits to the entire region. Cutting journey times and increasing capacity on the railways would serve to encourage people to switch from road to rail and help to bring the north

together.

Electrification of the Pennine route between Manchester and Leeds has been talked about for years and was supposed to form part of Network Rails Control Period 5 (CP5) package of upgrades. However due in part to the issues raised above and in my previous blog, this hasn't happened and at one point it looked as if electrification had been scrapped all together

So far Network Rail has upgraded signalling and stations at key locations along the Calder Valley route. These upgrades should provide benefits to passengers when new trains finally begin to arrive in the North, starting from this year. I will be taking a look at the improvements that have already been completed in detail in a future blog.

Plans for what is now being called the Transpennine Route Upgrade (TRU) have been submitted to the Department for Transport for considerations, which it is hope will include electrification. The £3bn package of works aims to, in the words of Network Rail deliver “faster, longer, more frequent and more reliable services across the north of England, from Newcastle, Hull and York towards Manchester and Liverpool via Leeds”. Work is expected to begin in spring/summer 2019 and take up to 5 years to complete.

Transport for the North's own proposals which are much larger in scope are set to be submitted to the Government for review in 2020 and it is hoped that if approved work could start in 2024. The points below taken from the TfN's Strategic Transport Plan shows the scale of the ambition that TfN has. The building of new lines, stations and significant upgrades are proposed to take place between 2020/4 and 2050. Links are proposed to connect HS2 to a new Northern Powerhouse Rail which will provide connectivity from Liverpool to Hull.

• A new twin-track line linking Liverpool to HS2 and onwards to Manchester and other Northern cities, via Warrington and Manchester Airport

• Significant upgrades and integration with HS2 linking Leeds and Sheffield

• Significant upgrades between Sheffield, Leeds and Hull

• Significant upgrades of the Hope Valley corridor between Manchester and Sheffield 

• Significant upgrades between Newcastle and Leeds 

• Hub concepts for Northern Powerhouse Rail stations

Ultimately TfN suggest that “all passenger routes to be served by a minimum two trains per hour. Long distance services to achieve average journey speeds of at least 80mph. Inter-urban services to achieve average journey speeds of at least 60mph. Local and suburban services to achieve average journey speeds of at least 40mph. Rail to directly serve each of the North’s international airports. Infrastructure to be available to enable a weekday inter-peak level service on Sundays and public holidays. Major ports in the North to be served by a network that will support movement and future growth of rail freight. A 50% improvement in the average speed of freight services by 2028.”

It is hoped that a new line connecting Leeds and Manchester could deliver a Leeds to Manchester journey time of 40 minutes and a York to Manchester journey time of 62 minutes. As for capacity, TfN suggests six inter-urban services per hour should operate formed of eight carriages, and up to two local services per hour should operate, in both directions.

[Click to enlarge]

Map source: Trnasport for the North's final strategic transport plan 2019

Key

1. Junction on HS2 mainline for Leeds – North East services
2. Junction on HS2 Leeds spur to facilitate through services via existing Leeds station
3. Junction on HS2 mainline for Sheffield – Leeds services 
4. Junction at Manchester Piccadilly to support Northern Powerhouse Rail platforms
5. Junction on HS2 Manchester spur for Manchester – Liverpool services
6. South facing junction on HS2 mainline for London – Liverpool services

• Light Puplre - Upgrades
• Dark Purple - Transpennine Upgrade
• Light Green - Northern Powerhouse Rail new line
• Dark Green - Linking Liverpool to HS2
• Blue - HS2

Roads

Reading the report it doesn't seem as if there is one grand proposal which will connect East with West, however a number of individual schemes are being assessed. Proposals range from grade separation of the A69/A68 and A69/A6079 junctions through to building a new link road connecting the A534 west of Congleton with the A536 to the north.

What is clear though is that road schemes are equally susceptible to cuts as they are for rail. For example schemes to improve the M62 and M53 have been in the words of the report “re-scoped”. Now to be honest I don't know what that means in the context of the report, but to me it sounds like kicked into the long grass?

Proposals to improve the the M56 between Altrincham and Manchester which were due to begin in 2019 have been delayed to 2020 (or after the completion of works taking place on the M62 between junctions 10-12), Highway's England states that the decision was “based on feedback from our customers and stakeholders of their experiences on our network“

Highway England has reassessed the SMART motorway upgrade as a whole and as a result the upgrade of the M6 between junctions 21a-26 has been deferred, with no new start date given. However the completion date for the upgrade of the M62 between junctions 10 and 12 remains unchanged as work is already underway and is due for completion in spring 2020. The start date for work between junctions 20 and 25 of the M62 also remains unchanged and will commence in Autumn 2019.

Proposals to dual the remaining sections of single carriageway on the full length of the A66 from the A1(M) to the M6 are still in the planning phase. However in the meantime major improvements should be made to two junctions on the A69 and should be completed by 2020

A study into the area which covers the M60, M62, M602, M61 and M66 has concluded that there is a strong case for the “substantial” upgrade to the M60 to improve journey times and East–West connectivity.

It looks like the proposal to construct a Trans-Pennine tunnel connecting Manchester and Sheffield have been thrown out, TfN states that “although a long tunnel under the Peak District National Park would be technically feasible, the cost would be prohibitive and offer poor value for money”. TfN is now working on an alternative which includes proposals for partially tunnelled route on the line of the existing A628 and enhancements to M60, M67, M1 and M18/A1.

I must admit to skimming over some of the 86 page report, but I got the feeling that while road enhancements form part of the proposed £70bn investment, the vision on how they can be improved in order to connect East and West was not as clearly defined as the vision for rail enhancements.


Hopefully over the coming 12 months we will begin to get a clearer picture of what Transport for the North is proposing and whether or not the Government will release the additional £21-37bn over 30 years that TfN is asking for.


My thoughts about SMART

To be honest I'm not sure if the postponement of SMART upgrades is a blessing or a curse, anecdotal evidence from regular commuters suggests that SMART just doesn't work. People complain of the hard shoulder not being used by motorist even when it is open to traffic and dangerous changes to speed restrictions between gantries (when working in combination with speed cameras).

My experiences of SMART is on the M6 heading into Birmingham and I did see cars sat in lanes 2, 3 and 4 driving below the speed limit when lanes 1 (hard shoulder open at the time), 2 and 3 were clear. Never mind middle lane hogging, witnessing lane 3 and 4 hogging while drivers were driving under speed limit and the carriageway ahead was clear, was a new one on me.

I have also experienced the speed limit changes, with gantries displaying speeds of 60mph, which would then drop at the next gantry to 40mph, with speed cameras in operation. This speed differential causes drivers to use the brakes, which has the potential to lead to the dreaded “phantom traffic jam”, which leads to congestion. Highways England say that gantry signals should be sufficiently visible that drivers have the time to slow down without braking, but I would dispute that statement. Reducing the speed of a car or indeed HGV by 20mph from the time of seeing the gantry sign to reaching the gantry and possible speed camera is difficult.

I do fully understand the principles behind the SMART motorway, controlling the speed of traffic has been shown to smooth the flow and opening the hard shoulder in effect increases capacity without the need to widen the motorway. But sometime what looks good on paper doesn't always translate to the real world, not when you factor in driver behaviour (or misbehaviour).

Maybe it's a case of driver education, many people haven't even driven on a SMART motorway yet and would not be fully aware of the rules when they do enter a sections of SMART motorway. But I also believe better policing of lane hogging drivers is needed and that a more gradual decrease in speed between gantries could also help.


The TfN report can be found here: https://transportforthenorth.com/wp-content/uploads/TfN-final-strategic-transport-plan-2019.pdf

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Northern Rail Industry Leaders, Building the North's New Railway

We want a faster, more reliable, high capacity railway in the North and "we deserve it" the words of Mike Hulme Co-chair of the Northern Rail Industry Leaders speaking today at the launch of the "Building the North's New Railways" report. I'm certain these words will resonate with any commuters from the North who perhaps looks to South at projects like Crossrail and think, why haven't we got a Crossrail of the North?


As a passionate campaigner and supporter of the railways, but still, somewhat of an outsider, it was fascinating to hear what each of the speakers had to say as to why the North does not yet have its own Crossrail. I came away with a clearer understanding of the challenges facing the industry which could act to stifle investment in transport in the North, but also a sense that we are at the cusp of a seismic shift in the future of the railways right across the North.

Mike Hulm, Co-chair of NRIL

But first I want to skip to the very end of the conference, I was the guy sitting at the back who asked the awkward question, a straightforward question I thought about improvements to the Oxford Rd to Manchester Piccadilly corridor, which as far as I knew was up until fairly recently a shovel ready project which was almost about to begin. My two-part question, was "what has happened to the project" and "are they starting from scratch?" with regards to design and funding of the project, which at one stage formed the backbone of what was called Northern Hub. Admittedly possibly a question for another time, however, I asked the question, the room fell silent breifly, but I did get answer of sorts (no disrespect to Mr. Wood who did answer) but he said that the area in question is particularly challenging, with high-frequency passenger services mixed with slow-moving freight trains powered sometimes by diesel, sometime electric, which means that untangling the corridor is not straight forward, adding we will know more in the summer...

Why bring this up? One, my own curiosity, but also to get a sense of where Transport for the North is up to with regards to investment and unblocking a bottleneck at a key part of the East-West railway network. The answer I got though did underline one of the challenges facing the North as a whole, the East-West corridor is extremely congested, it serves, local, regional, intercity and freight services all competing for only a finite number of train paths. It would seem then that providing greater capacity and reduced journey time is a monumental challenge. But a challenge TfN and those within the industry are willing to take on in order to unlock a potential prize of £100bn worth of economic benefits by 2050.

 

Q and A  panel from left to  right 

• Mike Hulme, Co-chair NRIL
• Justin Moss, Co-Chair NRIL
• Tim Wood, Transport for the North
• Lucy Prior, RTS solution
• Daniel Cochlin, Head of External Affairs Northern Powerhouse Partnership
• Professor Simon Iwnicki, University of Huddersfield

The focus of the report however, wasn't directly about the technical challenges or what Northern Power House Rail will look like, it was about something often overlooked and something which as it turns out could potentially be a greater hurdle than the engineering changelings that lay ahead. Northern Powerhouse Rail Director Tim Wood said something that is crucial for future of rail investment in the North; that the Treasury will not release funds if TfN cannot prove that there is the skilled workforce in place to undertake the improvements that are being proposed.

When people talk about investment, they usually talk about how much a project will cost or how the Government should invest more in the North. What I took from the speaker's comments is that Government is willing to invest but there is a massive skills shortage facing the industry and it is up to the industry to train the skilled engineers required to undertake such a massive undertaking as connecting East and West with a fast, high frequency rail network

In response the industry via this report seems to be saying that they need a steady stream of work so that they can be confident enough to invest in training the thousands of workers needed, not just engineers on the ground but, architects, project managers and procurement professionals, to name but a few. Not only that the but also to invest in new technologies that will be required to help deliver additional capacity, better customer interfaces and help to deliver projects on time and on budget.

This potentially could leave the industry, TfN and Government at an impasse with neither the Treasury or industry willing to budge. However, and now comes the good news, the industry has taken up the challenge and in the words of Mark Hulme, "today is a call to arms". A call from the 8 companies who helped produced the report to the industry, from SMEs and large companies to Universities and government bodies, on how the industry as a whole can overcome the shortages of skilled men and woman and how they can use technology and big data to improve efficiency.

Throughout the report and today's talks there was a common theme, that the industry needs a smooth and stable pipeline of work, with a working figure of between £2b and £3bn each year over 30 years. But also crucially that industry if willing to change, modernise and train the skilled workforce needed in order to deliver a transformation upgrade of railways across the North.

It's worth mentioning not once did I hear the phrase we need HS3 (Northern Powerhouse Rail) instead of HS2, it's clear to business leaders and the rail industry in the North that we need both. In the words of Tim Wood "we need HS2 and we need East West capacity as well, it is about capacity not just speed"

In the next blog I hope to set out key objectives of the report and if there are any clues as to what a new Northern Powerhouse East-West railway might look like.


One last quote to finish on, which gives a good sense of the mood within the industry in the North currently; "Northern Power House Rail and HS2 are coming and we need to be ready" Tim Wood

Read part 2: Transport for the North's long term ambition

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TransNorth set to revolutionise transport in the North

Plans for a 'TransNorth' rail network as well as road investments will be set out by Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne and Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin today.

The Chancellor will announce the first Northern transport strategy produced in conjunction with Transport for the North (TfN) which brings together northern transport authorities. The strategy report will contain a comprehensive transport strategy covering roads, rail, freight, airports and smart ticketing.

It is the Government's intention to 'connect up the north' in order to create a single economy, which it is hoped will allow northern towns and cities to pool their strengths in order to create "Northern Powerhouse"

Plans set out in the report include:

• Slashing journey times between major northern cities with investment in high speed rail
• Developing new east-west road connections including a road tunnel under the peak district
• Introducing Oyster-style smart travel cards and simpler fares across the North.

A key focus of the report is to develop the concept of "High Speed 3" which will form the backbone of a ‘TransNorth’ network.  This 'TransNorth' network will provide fast rail links between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Newcastle and Hull.

With trains reaching 140mph in some sections it is hoped that a journey time of 20 minutes could be achieved between Liverpool and Manchester. A target of 30 minutes between Manchester and Leeds has been set, with a time of just 45 minutes between Leeds and Hull. It is also claimed that journey times between Manchester and Newcastle could be cut by 25%

Studies produced by Network Rail set out different options for creating a network along with cost estimates.  Options produced include upgrading existing routes to building new lines. The government will provide funding in order to develop the options identified.

The Government will also set out how it will deliver HS2 in the North sooner by preparing a dedicated hybrid Bill to lay during the next Parliament. The aim of bill will be to bring HS2 to Crewe sooner than planned.

As well as improvements to rail services, the Government is to continue with major improvements to the North’s road network. The M62 is to be expanded to to four lanes between Leeds and Manchester and the M6 will also be upgraded to 4 lanes

The A1 will be upgraded to provide continuous motorway standard between London and Newcastle and the M1 will be widened to 4 lane running between Yorkshire and Humber.

It is expected that Transport for the North will become a representative body for the whole of the North of England and will be led by an independent chair. The Government will provide up to £6.4m in order to support Transport for the North’s strategic work and rail option development.

Update: Link to the he Northern Powerhouse document

2013 work progressing on upgrading the WCML between Warrington and Preston

2015 New electric services between Liverpool and Manchester

Work to increase capacity at Manchester Oxford Road is due to start early 2016

In early 2016 work will also begin to add an additional 2 through platforms at Manchester Piccadilly

Government proposals could see HS2 reaching Crewe earlier than planned.