YP Letters: Crossed lines from rail companies that can hit passengers

This is one of the new trains that Northern plan to introduce to the local network.

YOU report that Northern (The Yorkshire Post, February 3) is to modernise its rolling stock. You yourselves comment in the same issue on the under-funding of the county’s rail infrastructure and how Northern ought to be lobbying for greater investment.

Yet there are things that this railway company and others could do to provide better communications, and at little or no expense.

Take the Scarborough to Hull line, for example. In May of this year both TransPennine Express (TPE) and Northern will introduce new timetables for routes from Scarborough to Liverpool (TPE), and Scarborough to Hull (Northern).

Many people use these services for work, business and leisure, often making a change of trains at Seamer to take them on to Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool, or York for travel to London or further north and to Scotland.

At present, connections work reasonably well, but they will be adversely affected from May. As a result of proposed timetable changes, passengers travelling towards Scarborough to catch the TPE will have at most four minutes to change trains and in some cases less.

The return journey is worse, leaving only one minute to change trains on all services between 8am and 6pm. Clearly these timings are unworkable and will, in many circumstances, lead to missed trains with an hour to wait for the next. Given the Government’s readiness to improve transport communications in the North, the new timetables proposed by TPE and Northern appear to run contrary to Government expectations.

From: Roger Backhouse, Orchard Road, Upper Poppleton, York.

I WELCOME Shadow Transport Secretary Andy McDonald’s support for better rail transport in Yorkshire (The Yorkshire Post, February 3). As Transport Secretary, Chris Grayling has proved a great disappointment despite making all the right noises at first. Yorkshire has lost out. However, we need more detail from Mr McDonald on what exactly a Labour government will deliver.

Trans-Pennine routes need radical upgrade and that won’t be easy in densely built up areas. Smaller improvements elsewhere like an extra platform at Malton Station or double tracking the Poppleton to Knaresborough line in full would help too. I wish Andy McDonald well, but he still has much detail to give on what Labour will do.