AMBITION FOR FULL TRANS-PENNINE ELECTRIFICATION

Scope of Manchester to Leeds upgrade to be confirmed early next year

THE GOVERNMENT has released £589 million of funding to begin work on upgrading the trans-Pennine line between York, Leeds, Huddersfield and Manchester. It is also to establish a new Northern Transport Acceleration Council, dedicated to accelerating vital infrastructure projects and better connecting communities across the North’s towns and cities.

Trans-Pennine diesel haulage: Direct Rail Services loco No 68033 hauls Nova 3 set TP08 at Colne Bridge on 31 July 2020 with the 12.34 Scarborough to Liverpool Lime Street service. TransPennine Express has a pool of 14 Class 68s leased from Beacon Rail in its own livery, with Nos 68033/034 in DRS livery also modified to work with the Nova 3 sets if required; this was the first day on which both DRS-liveried locos had been in use on TPE services.

Russell Wykes

Russ MacMillan, Senior Responsible Officer for the programme at the Department for Transport, told Transport for the North’s board on 29 July the route upgrade would increase capacity from six to eight trains per hour and would deliver modest journey time reductions, with a six-minute improvement on Leeds to Manchester schedules and seven or eight minutes cut from York to Manchester journeys.