... but overcrowding ‘will last till May’
A BOSS at Northern Rail has admitted the overcrowding issues plaguing passenger journeys around Greater Manchester will ‘last until at least next May’.
And the operator’s Sunday cancellations, a source of frustration for months, will also continue into 2019.
In the month to November 11, 1,162 trains had fewer carriages than they should. North Manchester was particularly severely affected, with a shocking 743 short-formed trains, or 14.4 per cent of total services.
Hundreds of passengers faced travel mayhem at Piccadilly station on Saturday evening due to a perfect storm of events including strikes and a busier-than-usual city because of the festive period.
There were scenes of overcrowding and huge queues at the station amid cancellations to services.
Raj Chandarana, stakeholder manager, told a public meeting in Manchester that May’s timetable crisis - blamed largely on Network Rail’s delayed infrastructure works - had led to an ‘horrendous’ shortage of trains. He said delayed electrification meant their plans for new electric stock had to be ‘paused’ and, as they had already committed to pass on many diesel trains to other operators, they had to look for trains to fill the gaps.
He added: “We are doing what we can but in reality until the infrastructure improvements happen we are not able to use the trains that are fit for purpose on electrified tracks and it won’t be until May next year at the earliest that we’ll be in a position to say at peak there won’t be short-formed trains.”
Promising only ‘incremental’ change in 2019, he added: “Up until May we still don’t feel we have a full set of trains we can deploy appropriately to ensure the bigger trains get more carriages during peak hours.