Wednesday 23 Mar 2011
BOOST FOR LIVERPOOL ECONOMY WELCOMED BY NETWORK RAIL AS CHANCELLOR ANNOUNCES £85M PLAN TO SPEED UP TRAINS ACROSS THE PENNINES
- Region & Route:
People in Liverpool could see journey times to Manchester and Leeds slashed after the Government backed a five year plan to provide faster, more frequent trains across the Pennines.
Network Rail has welcomed today’s announcement from the Chancellor that funding has been brought forward for work to develop the Orsdall Chord, a crucial part of the Northern Hub programme. This could allow for faster more, more frequent trains between Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds by the end of 2016.
One assessment of the Northern Hub plans suggested that as many as 23,000 jobs could be created across the North – with an extra 700 trains every day helping to stimulate £4.2bn of benefits to the economy of the North.
The Ordsall Chord, a new piece of railway in Manchester connecting Piccadilly and Victoria stations, could see all fast trans Pennine services going via Manchester Victoria station – a much quicker route – as soon as 2016. With the full Northern Hub improvements this could mean four fast trains every hour between Liverpool and Manchester
Graham Botham, Network Rail’s programme sponsor, said: “We are delighted with the funding announcement from the Chancellor today, which will allow Network Rail to bring forward a stage of development of the Northern Hub plans.
“The Northern Hub will help deliver faster, more frequent journeys between Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds and stimulate economic growth across the North.”
Notes to editors
· The development work of other aspects of the Northern Hub will continue as planned.
· The Northern Hub is Network Rail’s plan to allow for faster and more frequent services between the cities of the North including new Leeds/Manchester/Liverpool/Sheffield services, and will restore and improve Manchester Victoria station.
· It will provide 700 extra trains a day for 3.5million more people to travel by rail every year and allow for the doubling of capacity into the Trafford Park freight terminals.
· The Northern Hub will bring £4bn worth of benefits to the region and could create 23,000 jobs. Including the costs of the new trains this is a return of £4 for every pound invested.
· More information can be found at www.networkrail.co.uk/north
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