CENTRAL STRAIN STATION
COMMUTERS USING WALES’ BUSIEST RAILWAY STATION COULD SOON FACE SIX NATIONS-STYLE QUEUES EVERY DAY AS PASSENGER NUMBERS SOAR, A CITY MP HAS WARNED
COMMUTERS using Cardif Central railway station could face major event-style queues on a daily basis as the number of passengers grows, a city MP has warned.
Network Rail, which owns the station, is forecasting that the number of passengers will soar by 3.5 million over the next five years as office developments in Central Square are built and opened.
With the BBC headquarters, the Llanishen HMRC tax office, Hugh James solicitors and Cardiff University’s journalism school relocating to the area, the number of people using the station is projected to rise from 12.7 million a year in 2015/16 to 16.2 million by 2020/21.
With BBC Wales relocating 1,200 staff and HMRC up to 3,600, thousands more people will potentially be using the station at peak times every day.
Network Rail told us that it was “not currently funded to carry out any improvements to the station” by the UK Government and would have to seek alternative sources of finance to make improvements to the station.
Cardiff Central MP Jo Stevens said that Westminster must fund the improvements. She said: “The station is already at or over-capacity. There is already an increase in passenger traffic, aside from the fact we are redeveloping Central Square. There comes a point, and it’s very soon, where we’re not talking about the redevelopment for growth but we’re about us needing that from a safety point of view.
“We see on event days, which staff have got down to a fine art, where people are marshalled into and out of the station but we might end up with that happening for normal commuter traffic.
“From my perspective, it is another example of Wales not getting what it needs from the UK Government. They put funding into Manchester Picadilly and Edinburgh, but they won’t do it for Cardiff.”
Network Rail said it was looking at ways to provide more capacity for passengers on platforms, stairwells, tunnels and the concourses.
“This is all dependant on accessing a combination of commercial funding and public funding, as we are not currently funded to carry out any improvements to the station,” a spokeswoman said.
“We are working with our partners in Cardiff council, the Welsh and UK Governments and Rightacres to look at options of how the station can be improved. We want to create a scheme that provides a real difference for passengers, an impressive gateway to our capital city and delivers value for money for the taxpayer.”
Passenger numbers at the station are already growing rapidly. In 2015-16, 12.7 million passengers used the station. That was up 800,000 on the year before. Network Rail forecasts this will rise by 5% each year for the next five years.
Both the BBC and HMRC developments include few parking spaces. In the tax office development there will be just 14 parking spaces and 158 bike spaces. In the BBC development, plans show spaces for broadcast trucks and a handful of parking spaces. There will be 200 bike spaces.
It comes as no further progress has been made public on the city’s bus station which is being described as a bus interchange, in a bid to persuade more people into using public transport.
Discussions are ongoing, according to a council spokesman, to secure tenants for the commercial floor of the building.
A Department for Transport spokeswoman said: “We’re working with Network Rail on a number of options to improve journeys for passengers in Wales, including improvements to Cardiff Central station.”