Crucial factors to making your reopening dream a reality
IT was a little over six months ago, yet it feels like a lifetime.
On November 15 2019, as battle lines were being drawn ahead of the General Election, Boris Johnson revealed details of a proposed £500 million Beeching Reversal Fund.
Tieing in with the Conservative Party’s mantra to unleash Britain’s potential as the country left the EU, the fund would target the reopening of lines axed as a result of Dr Richard Beeching’s infamous 1963 Reshaping of Britain’s Railways report. Trains would return to communities that had been cut off from the rail network for decades.
The idea, along with the rest of the manifesto, proved popular. Seats in areas that could benefit from the fund were among those that turned Conservative in December.
But was this an idea that peaked as an electoral promise, never to be seen again?
As the new Government got to work in the New Year, it moved promptly to prove otherwise.
Now dubbed the Restoring Your Railway Fund, in January the Department for Transport called for MPs to come forward with proposals for reopenings in their constituencies, supported by an Ideas Fund alongside the £500m that had been made available to accelerate existing proposals. Further backing was also available to reopen lost stations, or to open new ones on old routes.
Even with COVID-19, progress continues to make this a reality, with the announcement of the first round of Ideas Fund bids in May.
But getting to this point was always the easy part. While there may be a strong romantic and political case for Beeching reopenings, the reality of getting these projects off the drawing board and into delivery means that they will come up against new challenges, based more on engineering than electioneering.
The Civil Engineering Contractors Association (CECA) has some ‘skin in the game’ here. Representing the companies that build the UK’s infrastructure, our members are responsible for delivering around 80p in every £1 spent on railway construction nationwide.
Our members have been involved in every substantial railway reopening project in recent years. Their experience will be vital to ensuring that the Restoring Your Railway Fund delivers on its promise.
Since the Fund’s announcement, we have been working with our members to outline how we can make the most of the opportunity. We have examined every stage of a reopening, drawing from the lessons learnt from previous schemes to prepare a report - Reopening the Beeching Lines - that aims to streamline delivery of these projects.
Our research tells us there are some key issues that can make or break a reopening. Perhaps the most important of these is a laserlike focus on the outcomes that the reopening is intended to deliver.
While £500m is an unavoidably large sum, it could easily be swallowed up rapidly if project costs balloon. This will happen if schemes are developed without a clear understanding of the outcomes that need to be delivered, instead allowing all stakeholders to pitch in with goldplated requirements that shift projects away from value.
An important, early decision will be whether to reopen as light or heavy rail. Heavy rail allows full connectivity with the national network, but this comes at a cost. The recently developed Tram-Train concept may be a useful compromise for these projects.
Fortunately, in recent years the infrastructure sector has increasingly focused on ensuring it secures the right outcomes. The Infrastructure Client Group ( which includes among its members Network Rail, Transport for London and HS2 Ltd) has developed a new approach based on enterprise, not on traditional transactional arrangements - to boost certainty and productivity in delivery, improve wholelife outcomes in operation, and support a more sustainable, innovative, highly skilled industry.
This new model, known as Project 13, rigorously focuses on delivering the right outcome and may provide valuable lessons for promotors of Beeching reopenings. Project 13 also engages those involved in the delivery of the project early, enabling them to tackle issues of buildability (such as access requirements and signal siting) that can have a major impact on cost if not addressed at the start.
An essential element of any reopening will be to secure the appropriate consents for the work to take place. At this stage it will be important to ensure that consents provide sufficient space to work, often beyond the boundary of the previous railway. A failure to secure enough space will limit the ability to deliver efficiently on site and may prevent the installation of new infrastructure required to meet modern standards.
Modern design criteria mean that the line/ level of the original railway may not be able to be mirrored into the reopening, because of allowing electrification clearances, building stations on straight/flat areas and increasing line speeds (meaning fewer sharp curves).
All of these issues need to be incorporated into the land-take made available via the planning process.
Another key area to secure affordable outcomes relates to the development of the design for the reopening. Here we are looking
“While £500m is an unavoidably large sum, it could easily be swallowed up rapidly if project costs balloon. This will happen if schemes are developed without a clear understanding of the outcomes that need to be delivered.”
at bringing back into use assets that were built in another era. While often structures can remain remarkably robust, this cannot be relied upon. They may also not meet current requirements and standards.
For example, the drainage on the former railway may simply have gone to the nearest watercourse, something that would be forbidden under current environmental legislation. This would mean that any reopening would have to be accompanied by a fundamental rethink of the drainage for the reopened asset.
Also, in some areas the existing asset will not be fit for purpose. A common concern will be earthworks, which may not have been adequately maintained since the closure of the line. This is an area where underestimates of the costs of remediation can have a significant impact on project viability.
When considering the design, it is vital to make sure that there is constant engagement with those who will manage and maintain the asset once built.
There must be agreement on provision of safe walking routes along the railway cess for maintenance, including which side will be used for access on foot and whether it is used when trains are running.
It is also important to determine where workers should cross the line (as this requires sighting). This is significant as it affects earthworks design, which is an early deliverable.
While some reopenings will be selfcontained, most will have some form of tie-in with the existing network. Controlling the scope here will be fundamental, as these works are likely to require possessions and be on the critical path.
There is huge opportunity to see additional cost creep as work to the existing network gets pushed into the scheme. Clearing these issues out early and getting the work programmed in at the front end of the scheme will help unlock these challenges.
There will often be listed structures, predominantly overbridges, which will have to be refurbished to modern standards. The approvals process for this can delay progress and increase risk, while the structures also dictate overhead line wire heights - hence the track through these structures needs lowering from its historic position undermining the abutments.
Lowering of the order of 800mm can be required, which also affects the longitudinal track profile, including drainage - requiring potentially pumped systems or very deep cess drainage to a new outfall. On occasion, there may be no alternative to rebuilding a bridge.
Many railway reopenings include the need for mineworking remediation. This is a major risk for the project and on previous occasions has been seriously underestimated. This can be best mitigated by developing good-quality ground and site investigation early in the project, to understand the risk and impact on cost.
Once the project moves into construction, the delivery should seek to use modern methods wherever possible, such as track laying plant and wiring trains. These need programming nationally to ensure windows of availability are planned and that the construction programme is built around the availability of this plant.
Another pitfall for reopening schemes will be failing to provide sufficient time for hand-back. Common Safety Method (CSM) requirements should not be underestimated. Hand-back arrangements and ultimate sign-off by the Office of Rail and Road often take an additional six months at the end of the construction. CSM needs dedicated resource throughout the design and build process to reduce this period.
The Restoring Your Railway Fund offers a brilliant opportunity to demonstrate that returning lines and stations closed by Beeching in the 1960s can deliver for communities in the 2020s and beyond.
Doing so with the first wave of schemes will help strengthen the case for further reopenings. But this can only happen if these first projects deliver the goods. We hope our report outlines how this can be achieved.
Access CECA’s Reopening the Beeching Lines report at: https://www.ceca.co.uk/wp-content/ uploads/2020/06/CECA-Reopening-The-BeechingLines-8-June-2020.pdf