In order to show, meaningfully, how recorded passenger numbers have changed over the years, we’ve done a helpful graph showing that numbers have more than doubled over 11 years. It’s a generally upward trend, except in 2012-13 where the lower numbers were probably mostly down to prolonged closures for the rebuilding of Stalybridge station.
SMART’s view is that it provides ample justification for increasing the service to 2 trains per hour, especially bearing in mind that the recorded figures based on ticket sales substantially underestimate the real number of passengers. The recorded figures do not include ticketless travel, and do not include ale trailers (unless their tickets are either to or from Slaithwaite & Marsden, which will not generally be the case).
[from the Huddersfield Daily Examiner, 5th December 2014. Comment asserting that the increase in recorded passenger numbers at Slaithwaite & Marsden is down to ale trailers removed, because iwhoever wrote it didn’t bother to read the bit about how the data was collected and analysed.]
A 10% rise in rail passenger numbers has been hailed by transport campaigners.
But there was a note of caution from watchdog Peter Marshall in the wake of news for local passengers in this week’s Autumn statement.
The number of journeys in and out of stations in the Huddersfield area soared above the 8.5m mark last year and Mr Marshall, chairman of the Huddersfield-Sheffield-Penistone Rail Users’ Association, said:
“It is great news for all of us promoting rail travel.
“I think the boom is partly down to the fact that the economy is picking up and more and more people are travelling to work.
“We were told by the Chancellor this week that the old Pacer trains in this area will be replaced by new and modern trains.
“I am cynical and I believe the new trains will be the electric ones when the transPennine line is electrified by 2018 and the modern ones will be the ones surplus to requirements there, passed on to other services”.
Slaithwaite and Marsden stations showed big increases in passenger numbers, up from 185,594 to 208,418 and 166,910 to 182,170 respectively.
Huddersfield station was the fourth busiest in Yorkshire, behind Leeds, Sheffield and York, with 4,816,107 journeys (4,656700)
Totals for other stations compared to previous year were: Batley 296,046 (263,850), Berry Brow 25,360 (25,987), Lockwood 50,648 (50,148), Honley 55,852 (50,506), Brockholes 59,260 (49,460), Denby Dale 181,880 (177,036), Dewsbury, 1,669,753 (1,603,702), Mirfield 420,718 (393,08), Shepley 68,874 (69,020), Deighton (97,798 (93,022), Stocksmoor 26,648 (21,232) and Brighouse 371,666 (349,036).
Passengers crammed into rush-hour trains will be little surprised to learn that the busiest rail stations, including Leeds, are getting ever-more crowded.
Some London stations handled upwards of 8% more passengers last year, with the total for the busiest of them all – Waterloo – approaching the 100 million mark. Of the 10 busiest stations, Euston had the largest increase last year, rising 9.4%.
The only non-London stations in the top 10 were 10th-placed Leeds, where numbers were up 5.3% to 27.73 million, and Birmingham New Street, which was in 8th place and where numbers rose 8.3% to 34.75 million.
From the Office of Rail Regulation, the figures were based on estimates of entries and exits at stations for the period April 1 2013 to March 31 2014.
On this basis, Waterloo was the busiest station with 98.44 million passengers – a rise of 2.6% on 2012/13.
Next was Victoria, where numbers rose 5.2% to 81.35 million, with Liverpool Street third with a rise of 7.8% to 63 million.
Other busy stations in 2013/14 included Glasgow Central (27.15 million passengers), Edinburgh (20 million), Brighton (16.94 million), Gatwick Airport (16.18 million) and Glasgow Queen Street (15.76 million).