Ground-breaking immersive £2.7m training centre to increase safety for rail workers

Friday 18 Aug 2023

Ground-breaking immersive £2.7m training centre to increase safety for rail workers

Rail Minister Huw Merriman MP official opens immersive safety training centre
Rail workers to experience real life safety-critical scenarios in a safe environment
Innovative approach that will allow participants to witness an incident in real-time, encounter the decisions that led to a fatal situation and evaluate how to stop it from happening in future
Multi-sensory rooms designed to replicate working on rail tracks and the consequences of poor decisions
The TRUST safety leadership programme is designed and delivered by Active Training Team (ATT) in a purpose-built centre in Huddersfield

The first purpose-built rail safety centre of its kind in the North of England, has been officially opened by the Minister for Rail Huw Merriman MP in Huddersfield, as part of the multi-billion-pound Transpennine Route Upgrade (TRU).

Everyone working on the major rail upgrade between Manchester and York will undertake a one-day interactive training programme, which uses actors to place participants at the heart of a hard-hitting narrative, witnessing the actions, decisions and events which could lead to a fatal incident on the rail tracks.

Attendees at the TRUST centre participate in a series of interactive, facilitated workshops and engage with the characters in real-world scenarios, including in their home, a police interview and work canteen, learning the communications skills they can put into practice to improve safety in the workplace. They are then encouraged to apply these as they are transported back into the story.

Training at the TRUST centre will appeal to all three sensory learning styles: visual, auditory and kinaesthetic. High-quality production values and industry-leading technology deliver a powerful, immersive experience shown to strengthen learning, memory and positively impact on subsequent behaviour.

Rail Minister, Huw Merriman said:

“This is a major milestone for the Transpennine Route Upgrade. Not only is the programme creating greener and more reliable services across the North, but it’s now taking vital steps to create a well-trained and highly skilled workforce.

“Safety remains at the heart of our railways and this centre will ensure it’s in the mind of every member of staff working on the project too.”

Neil Holm, Managing Director of Transpennine Route Upgrade, said:

“The opening of the ground-breaking TRUST centre embodies the ethos that safety sits at the heart of the multi-billion-pound Transpennine Route Upgrade.

“We want to ensure that everybody gets home safe every day. As we work to bring cleaner, faster and better journeys between Manchester, Huddersfield, Leeds and York, the safety of our teams has never been more important.

“TRUST centre training will be undertaken by everyone working on our programme, both working in offices and on the frontline. It’s important that colleagues from planning, design, delivery and all of our functions understand how the decisions we all make are crucial when it comes to safety. Taking an immersive approach allows workers to absorb and remember their training more clearly and for longer.”

Councillor Cathy Scott, Acting Leader of Kirklees Council, says:

“One of the great assets for our economy here in Kirklees is our connectivity, and the Transpennine Route Upgrade will massively enhance this. But as well as providing a boost to our economy in the future, this huge project is providing work and opportunities for local people right now – and that’s only set to increase as work on the TRU ramps up over the coming years. Investment like this is about long-term benefit, but long before we reach the end point of the upgrade we’ll see economic benefits and a skilled workforce for Kirklees.

“It’s fantastic to see that those delivering the TRU are being trained and upskilled using the latest technologies and, frankly, great creativity – and that the Minister of State for Transport is showing such a keen interest in this work, how it will affect our local area and local people.”

Notes to Editors

Around 40 people per day will be able to train at the TRUST Centre for three days per week. more than 2000 people per year will learn about safety while working on the railway line each year.
This is a £2.7m facility that will be used by the wider rail industry to support and empower colleagues across the country to become a safety leader
The TRUST Centre will support the local economy in Huddersfield by bringing thousands of people to the facility in the city centre
The experience has been designed and is being delivered by Active Training Team (ATT)

Transpennine Route Upgrade will bring passengers:

More trains to choose from and more seats. Our improvements will enable more trains to run between Manchester, Huddersfield, Leeds and York with up to six fast services every hour between Leeds and Manchester and up to two stopping services for local connectivity.
Faster journeys so you can travel to your favourite towns and cities more quickly. Our fastest journey times are forecast to be 63-66 minutes between Manchester and York and 41-42 minutes between Manchester and Leeds.
More reliable journeys with trains that run on-time.
Better stations across the Transpennine route, bringing passengers a better travel experience through improved, more accessible stations
Greener travel, reducing our carbon footprint and improving air quality. Our plans aim to save up to 87,000 tonnes of carbon emissions each year – supporting the government’s Net Zero objectives. We’re also developing a proposal to move more goods by rail (up to 15 more freight trains each day.)
Together, these freight trains are expected to remove over 1,000 lorries off the road each day. TRU will bring local communities:
Jobs for local people. Our workforce will be local, with 80% employment from within a 40-mile radius of the route, and 60% employment from within a 25-mile radius. With a current workforce of around 2000 people, we estimate that could double over the course of the programme. We’ll employ an apprentice for every £4million spent.
Improved natural environments near the railway through 10% biodiversity net gain across the route. This will create or enhance habitats for wildlife

Contact information

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We own, operate and develop Britain's railway infrastructure; that's 20,000 miles of track, 30,000 bridges, tunnels and viaducts and the thousands of signals, level crossings and stations. We run 20 of the UK's largest stations while all the others, over 2,500, are run by the country's train operating companies.

Usually, there are almost five million journeys made in the UK and over 600 freight trains run on the network. People depend on Britain's railway for their daily commute, to visit friends and loved ones and to get them home safe every day. Our role is to deliver a safe and reliable railway, so we carefully manage and deliver thousands of projects every year that form part of the multi-billion pound Railway Upgrade Plan, to grow and expand the nation's railway network to respond to the tremendous growth and demand the railway has experienced - a doubling of passenger journeys over the past 20 years.