Scottish Greens’ Forth Tunnel proposal

THE SCOTTISH Green Party has released plans for a £22bn rail development, which includes the rather radical idea of building two nine-mile-long tunnels beneath the Firth of Forth. The 20-year Rail for All programme is formulated from a report commissioned from Deltix Transport Consulting by the Party’s transport spokesperson MSP John Finnie. The Firth of Forth Tunnel would relieve the existing bottleneck at Haymarket, with services heading for Dundee, Aberdeen and Inverness leaving in an easterly direction to two nine-mile, single bore tunnels that would surface at Seafield, between Kinghorn and Kirkcaldy.

The plan would require building a double-ended underground station at Leith and could reduce potential journey times by 25 minutes. The estimated cost for this would be between £4bn and £6bn. The plans also include more rapid electrification of the ScotRail network, to completed by 2030, ahead of the Scottish Government’s current 2035 target. In circumstances where electrification is not practical the report advocates battery-powered trains but fitting them with pantographs to use overhead wires where available. Perhaps surprisingly, it rules out using hydrogen-powered rolling stock because ‘green hydrogen’ from renewable sources is a limited resource.

The use of electrification and dynamic loops would help speed up the Highland Main Line, with the aim of achieving a Perth to Inverness journey time of 1hr 40mins. Similar work on the Aberdeen to Inverness line could reduce journey times to 1hr 45mins. Other proposals include the grade separation at Portobello Junction, double tracking of several Glasgow suburban routes, and a new overground terminal station at Argyle Street. Ten new stations are also suggested, which would mean all towns in Scotland with a population of more than 5,000 would have a rail link.