Is this all that’s left of the “Northern Powerhouse”?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The offer of a draughty village hall with a leaky roof.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
[Article from the Yorkshire Post, 29th May 2019, follows.]<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMinister offers to give away Pacer trains to community groups\u201d<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n It might turn into a competition no-one wants to win, but as he leant on the cab of the Pacer train standing at platform seven in Leeds, the Rail Minister was doing his best to sound optimistic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nso-called railbuses \u2013 bus bodies welded on to a train chassis \u2013 were intended\nby the old British Railways to be in service for only 20 years, but nearly 40\nwill have passed when at the end of the year they are finally retired. However,\nwe still might not have seen the last of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The\nMinister, the Harrogate MP Andrew Jones, was hoping that some of his\nconstituents might be sorry enough to see them go, to want to bid for one as\nthe prize in a competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat\u2019s second prize? Two of them?\u201d <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n wondered the driver of the one on platform seven when the details were put to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr Jones, who hopes community groups will propose ideas for the onward use of three Pacer carriages for the common good, said: <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI could easily imagine them in lots of different uses. Scout huts, doesn\u2019t really matter. I don\u2019t want to put parameters on this.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Admitting that the trains did not have the cachet of red telephone boxes, hundreds more of which were made available to communities earlier this month, the Minister said: <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMost people will be really rather pleased that they\u2019re going. But I think some will have a soft spot for them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \u00a0\u201cThe trains can\u2019t have much value, although there\u2019s always scrap value in metal. But if there\u2019s a way of prolonging their service to the community, then I think we should be encouraging it.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n The trains\nare owned by Porterbrook, one of three large leasing companies created in 1994\nas part of the privatisation of British Rail, It is making three carriages\navailable to the competition winners, who will be chosen in the autumn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Northern,\nthe rail company that runs the Pacers in Yorkshire, admitted last December that\nit had not begun retiring its fleet, as it had promised to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But Mr\nJones said the company had assured him that its schedule was back on track.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u00a0\u201cWe\u2019ve seen quite a bit of progress over the past few weeks. We\u2019re seeing approval of the new trains that are coming into service. They have to be approved by the regulator and we\u2019re now at the point where Northern is able to look at staff training, engineering and renewal,\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Asked how passengers in prosperous south Buckinghamshire might react if a Pacer turned up for their commute to Marylebone tomorrow morning, the Minister said: <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat was appropriate several years ago \u2013 in this case several decades ago \u2013 is not appropriate any more. \u201cI know that when you turn up at the station expecting another train and one of these turns up it can cause a problem. But we are in the middle of a renewal of some scale right across the network.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Some\nprevious Yorkshire Pacers were sold to Iran at the end of their regular life,\nbut the authorities there phased them out nearly 15 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Similar\noptions for the current fleet were \u201ca question for Porterbrook\u201d, Mr Jones said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The North\u2019s\nrail network was still playing \u201ccatch-up\u201d from the effects of the \u201cno growth\u201d\nfranchise that was in place from 2004-16, he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOther parts of the network were seeing investment \u2013 we didn\u2019t get any. We should have been planning for growth.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe are now making progress having had a long period of utter stagnation.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n Mr Jones\nsaid passenger numbers had continued to grow during that time even though the\ncapacity had not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt just led to congested trains and the rolling stock becoming even less fit for purpose,\u201d he said.<\/p> <\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n https:\/\/www.yorkshirepost.co.uk\/news\/transport\/minister-offers-to-give-away-pacer-trains-to-community-groups<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Is this all that’s left of the “Northern Powerhouse”? The offer of a draughty village hall with a leaky roof. [Article from the Yorkshire Post, 29th May 2019, follows.] \u201cMinister offers to give away Pacer trains to community groups\u201d It … Continue reading