Plans for half-hourly York-Scarborough train is ‘moving in the right direction’ says mayor

A lack of drivers is one of the issues holding up the doubling of train services between York and Scarborough, which currently has one train an hour run by Transpennine Express.

David Skaith, the elected Mayor of York and North Yorkshire, has said that he is working to “put a training plan together, a recruitment to bring those drivers in” as well as additional rolling stock.

Speaking to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), on Tuesday, April 1, he said that 23 drivers were needed and that progress had been made.

He added: “That’s a couple of challenges that we are working with now, but things are moving in the right direction and we are really positive about having that [half-hourly service] brought in.”

Alison Hume, the MP for Scarborough and Whitby also attended the event and said she was “very excited that the mayor will be taking over running of the buses going forward”

Ms Hume said: “Whitby has a train service to Middlesbrough, but only five services a day, and I think that that will improve in time under Great British Railways.

“But importantly, we need a more frequent route from Scarborough into York. We need to have it every half hour rather than hourly, and that train service needs to be frequent and cheaper.”

Mr Skaith has said he is also looking at developing stations including at Scarborough, Seamer, Thirsk, Malton, and Haxby.