Excellent news to hear in today’s Budget that £337m funding for the new Metro fleet has been approved, and as someone who previously worked in the Private Finance (PFI) industry, I’m particularly pleased the funding is through direct grant and not via PFI. Well done to Tobyn Hughes and his team at Nexus for putting their case forward to government, and thanks to our politicians and those who have been lobbying behind the scenes to support their case.
The new Metro trains will be bi-mode and be able to run on both the existing Metro lines and Network Rail’s tracks, which means the distinction as to whether any new service is “Metro” or “Heavy Rail” becomes more blurred. Which doesn’t really matter. Passengers just want to get from A to B and don’t really care who runs the trains, or what colour they are painted. With regard to SENRUG’s own campaign to re-open the Ashington Blyth & Tyne line, the key thing to note is that both Northumberland County Council and Nexus agree that the route it must take is the current freight route which runs directly from Newcastle to Northumberland Park via Benton Junction, not via the existing Metro line and its 13 intermediate stops. Network Rail cannot be excluded from the process as the section as far as Benton Junction is the East Coast Main Line, and the remainder a working freight route. But they do need to get a grip on their costs and bring them down to sensible levels so that the scheme can move ahead. And then we might just see passenger trains to Ashington running around the same time as Metro introduces its new stock, in 2021.
