New trains as contract terms start to kick in

Sundays will now see a half-hourly service on Northern Rail’s Harrogate Line, which also serves Horsforth. The Sunday service previously ran only every hour.

Sunday trains between Bradford and Ilkley will run hourly instead of every two hours.

Northern was ordered by the Department for Transport to introduce the extra services as part of its new franchise deal, which took effect in April 2016.

The contract also requires it to lay on four trains an hour in each direction between Leeds, Horsforth and Harrogate on weekdays by 2020, and to add two extra carriages to the busiest services between Leeds, Ilkley and Skipton.

The Ilkley and Skipton lines will eventually see new trains, while the much-criticised “bus-on-rails” Pacer carriages will disappear from Northern’s services within three years.

Paul Barnfield, the firm’s regional director, said it would begin to roll out 286 “new, purpose built carriages” next year.

He added: “The changes are part of a wide-ranging modernisation programme that will also see us add more than 2,000 extra services each week by 2020.”

The company faced criticism earlier this month when it began fining passengers on some lines £20 if they tried to buy tickets on board their train, with one MP warning its franchise was at risk.