Report claims single-track infrastructure limits Borders performance

Borders Rail Monitor says that since the Edinburgh-Tweedbank Borders Railway opened in 2015, it has failed to reach its target of 92.5% of trains arriving within five minutes of schedule on at least 215 out of 239 weeks (excluding the lockdown period). It also says there were no cancellations on just 12 of 239 weeks.

The group’s founder, Bill Jamieson, blames the extensive single-track sections (double track only accounts for 9½ miles of the 30½-mile route).

The organisation is calling for Transport Scotland to solve the infrastructure constraints by extending the existing doubletrack section north through Gorebridge station, and by enhancing East Coast Main

Line capacity between Waverley and Portobello Junction (with remodelling of the junction).

It also says Transport Scotland should evaluate why modelling and appraisal processes failed to predict the ridership levels (between 313% and 681% above forecast at the three stations) or the poor performance.

In response, a ScotRail spokesman said: “We don’t accept these figures and believe they have been incorrectly calculated.

“Our official statistics, which are published on a period-by-period basis, show that in September across the franchise we achieved our highest ever performance for the period ”