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Major projects in the West Midlands include: Stafford/Colwich Remodeling: Stafford has been identified as a bottleneck, limiting the opportunity to fully exploit the capacity offered by the modernised West Coast Main Line infrastructure and causing delays to existing services. A number of options are being examined to take into account current and predicted capacity requirements so more trains, faster trains and more efficient trains can run on the network. West Coast Main Line Power Supply Upgrade Phases one and two of this project have already been completed so the new timetable could be introduced in December 2008. The final phase will take place over CP4 and CP5 and will introduce a full auto-transformer system between London and Carstairs. This new system will reduce delays due to power supply and will remove the traction power supply as a constraint to line speed and capacity. Birmingham New Street: £600m is to be invested into transforming Birmingham New Street station in a collaborative project called the Gateway Project. CP4 will see the first phase of funding to redevelop one of the UK’s busiest stations – tackling overcrowding and greatly enhancing passenger experience. Originally designed to handle 650 trains a day, the station now takes over 1,250 every day. The new concourse will be over three times its current size and passengers will have better, modern facilities in a light and spacious station. Links to the city will be improved and the New Street Gateway will create 3,000 new jobs and deliver economic benefits of almost £2bn Bromsgrove Electrification: This will extend the Cross City Line in Birmingham out to Bromsgrove. The line will be electrified so a service of three trains per hour to Bromsgrove that currently terminate at Longbridge can be extended. A brand new station will be built in Bromsgrove for the new electrified line to run into. Redditch Branch Enhancement This will further increase capacity on the Birmingham Cross City Line. A number of schemes are being examined which will allow an extra train per hour to run to Redditch Station. Currently six trains per hour run on the Cross City Line with four turning around at Longbridge and two continuing on to Redditch. This combined with the Bromsgrove electrification project will mean that three trains per hour will continue on from Longbridge to Bromsgrove and three trains per hour will run to Redditch. West Midlands Resignalling The company is in the middle of re-signalling the whole of the West Midlands. All the signalling is being upgraded and will be controlled from the new West Midlands control centre. Once completed passengers will enjoy increased reliability, better journey times and there will be the capacity to run more trains. Train lengthening In order to increase capacity platforms are being extended across the country so that train operators can run longer trains meaning more seats for passengers. Stations under consideration in the Midlands include: Cannock, stations on Birmingham Cross City Line, Coventry, Wolverhampton, Walsall, Stratford, Leamington Spa and Stourbridge. National Stations Improvement Programme (NSIP) The NSIP programme is a joint industry initiative funded primarily by the DfT. The five year programme aims to deliver £165 million worth of station improvements to a minimum of 150 medium sized stations in England and Wales (excluding Network Rail managed stations) through CP4. Stations included under NSIP during CP4 in the Midlands include: Leamington Spa, Princes Risborough, Warwick, Bloxwich, Bloxwich North, Cannock, Hednesford, Kidderminster, Landywood, Milton Keynes Central, Rugeley Town, Tamworth, Telford, University, Worcester Foregate Street and Wolverhampton. Access for All The following stations have been identified by the DfT as needing to be prioritised to be DDA compliant: Selly Oak Shirley Hemel Hempstead Sutton Coldfield Worcester Park Worcester Shrub Hill Other major projects across the UK include: Thameslink: The Thameslink programme is one of the biggest rail projects ever in the UK and currently Network Rail’s largest infrastructure project. The scheme will see massive benefits to passengers with much longer, more frequent services on the route. The £5.5bn + project (including over £1bn being spent by on new trains) will increase capacity through the heart of London by over 400%, taking the number of train carriages per hour from 64 to 288, or 3,500 seats per hour to 17,000. Delivered in two stages, the first, before London 2012, will see passengers on the northern section of the route main benefiting from 50% longer trains with dozens of stations upgraded and a new station constructed at Blackfriars. The second phase, for completion by 2015, will see the removal of key bottlenecks and a brand new station at London Bridge freeing up even greater capacity increases through the core central London route. Crossrail: Over £2bn on Crossrail – the largest civil engineering project in Europe with the huge redevelopment at Paddington. Taken with the Thameslink expansion there will be viable through-London north-south and east-west routes for the very first time King's Cross: Over £450m is being invested at king’s Cross station to completely redevelop the site which handles 47m passengers per year. By completion in 2013, the project will triple the size of the concourse area, providing more space and shops for people to use whilst waiting for trains; deliver a glass and aluminium concourse roof; improve access, including for disabled passengers, as well as link to underground, Thameslink, and domestic and international St Pancras services. An extra platform will also be added to increase the stations' train capacity. Reading: £425m at Reading untangling railway lines – leading to faster, more reliable train services. New tracks and platforms will be added to improve train speeds, reduce delays and ease overcrowding Scotland: • £300m+ on a new line from Airdrie to Bathgate, a new passenger railway that Network Rail is rebuilding after 50 years of closure. It will be a double track, electrified railway connecting communities in central Scotland to Scotland's two major cities, energising local economies and creating access to work, education and leisure opportunities. • £150m+ Glasgow Airport Rail Link, will provide a fast, reliable service between Glasgow Central station and Glasgow International Airport. The new nine mile link will call at Paisley Gilmour Street before reaching its final destination at a new purpose-built station at the airport East Coast Main Line improvements: • An investment of around £250 million in remodelling junctions, removing or altering level crossings and works to bridges and platforms. Benefits will include capacity for more trains, faster and heavier trains and higher and wider freight containers. This will free up capacity on the East Coast Main Line for more express trains, help increase punctuality and provide alternative routes to help deliver a 7 day railway • Investing some £50m in a new link between the East Coast Main Line and Cambridge to create extra capacity to run more services to and from London every hour, reduce delays to train services by nearly 30,000 minutes every year, and allow us to keep the railway open when essential maintenance is needed, by keeping one link between Hitchin and Cambridge running, whilst the other is being worked on Paddington Span 4 £26m is being invested in restoring the Edwardian roof over Paddington’s platforms 9 to 12. Passengers will benefit from a lighter, brighter station as Network Rail restores the metalwork and reglazes the roof, allowing the light back in. Nuneaton We are investigating plans to invest around £40 million to build a short section of new track north of Nuneaton station. This will allow freight trains from Peterborough to join the West Coast Main Line without the need to cross it at grade, offering capacity benefits and reducing potential causes of delay.