Scotland’s electric trains spark optimism for a greener railway. East Kilbride benefits from ‘rolling programme’ of electrification at odds with stop-start in England.
> The line is the latest beneficiary of a rolling programme of projects over the past 10 years to convert Scotland’s railways to cleaner, more efficient electric traction.
> The approach contrasts with that in England, where progress on the process in recent years has been far more stop-start and work on the next big planned project has just been paused.
Quoted this bit but the whole article is worth a read about the different approaches taken at Westminster and Holyrood.
**Edit:** also this bit:
> Scotland’s steady programme of rail electrification has helped drive down the cost of installing wires to below the prices seen in England.
> Liam Sumpter, managing director of Network Rail Scotland, owner of Scotland’s rail infrastructure, told a Scottish parliament hearing earlier this year that costs had fallen over the five years to 2024 from £2.7mn per kilometre of track to £2mn thanks to the country’s steady approach.
> In England, where recent projects have cost about £2.5mn per km, the Westminster government in July announced a “pause” to the planned electrification of the whole Midland Main Line linking London to Nottingham and Sheffield. The route currently has wires from London to just south of Leicester.
This specific line has been a total nightmare. Incredibly badly implemented. It’s pissed off locals all the way along the lines and degraded what used to be a really useful line. What’s even worse is the improvements haven’t actually created any significant benefits for the user, no increase in service, better prices (at least not because of this work) or trains running better.
And in principle I would have been a big supporter of this upgrade.
I’m interested to know if the different administrations have different “value for money” veto systems. It always sounds like every Westminster Ministry can plan whatever it wants using specialised knowledge and then in comes
The Treasury at the end with the smothering pillow of its own value for money tests, and it seems to get to override and kill loads of big projects. Whereas it looks like at Holyrood the decision is about how much budget to give a department, but once the department gets it, there doesn’t seem to be a deadening central treasury override to veto all the ambition out of each department. So in Scotland the Transport Department/Transport Scotland gets its budget and has consistently been putting some of it towards electrification. Exact amounts might change with each parliamentary budget, but it doesn’t look like someone gets to delve into the department from the outside. Am I wrong?
Creating more capacity on lines is better at fighting climate change than electrification imho.
A diesel train filled with people that used to be in cars has more of an impact than the people that were already on the trains sitting on an electric one.
The East Coast Mainline isn’t on any realistic timeframe & fixing the issue at USan/Montrose with single track working was ruled out as not meeting cost benefit
Why are they electrifying all the way out to Dalmeny but stopping short of doing it on the Forth Bridge, makes no sense just to go out to there. I know it’s extremely difficult to put it on the bridge, but there’s not much benefit to only going out to Dalmeny.
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> The line is the latest beneficiary of a rolling programme of projects over the past 10 years to convert Scotland’s railways to cleaner, more efficient electric traction.
> The approach contrasts with that in England, where progress on the process in recent years has been far more stop-start and work on the next big planned project has just been paused.
Quoted this bit but the whole article is worth a read about the different approaches taken at Westminster and Holyrood.
**Edit:** also this bit:
> Scotland’s steady programme of rail electrification has helped drive down the cost of installing wires to below the prices seen in England.
> Liam Sumpter, managing director of Network Rail Scotland, owner of Scotland’s rail infrastructure, told a Scottish parliament hearing earlier this year that costs had fallen over the five years to 2024 from £2.7mn per kilometre of track to £2mn thanks to the country’s steady approach.
> In England, where recent projects have cost about £2.5mn per km, the Westminster government in July announced a “pause” to the planned electrification of the whole Midland Main Line linking London to Nottingham and Sheffield. The route currently has wires from London to just south of Leicester.
This specific line has been a total nightmare. Incredibly badly implemented. It’s pissed off locals all the way along the lines and degraded what used to be a really useful line. What’s even worse is the improvements haven’t actually created any significant benefits for the user, no increase in service, better prices (at least not because of this work) or trains running better.
And in principle I would have been a big supporter of this upgrade.
I’m interested to know if the different administrations have different “value for money” veto systems. It always sounds like every Westminster Ministry can plan whatever it wants using specialised knowledge and then in comes
The Treasury at the end with the smothering pillow of its own value for money tests, and it seems to get to override and kill loads of big projects. Whereas it looks like at Holyrood the decision is about how much budget to give a department, but once the department gets it, there doesn’t seem to be a deadening central treasury override to veto all the ambition out of each department. So in Scotland the Transport Department/Transport Scotland gets its budget and has consistently been putting some of it towards electrification. Exact amounts might change with each parliamentary budget, but it doesn’t look like someone gets to delve into the department from the outside. Am I wrong?
Creating more capacity on lines is better at fighting climate change than electrification imho.
A diesel train filled with people that used to be in cars has more of an impact than the people that were already on the trains sitting on an electric one.
The East Coast Mainline isn’t on any realistic timeframe & fixing the issue at USan/Montrose with single track working was ruled out as not meeting cost benefit
Why are they electrifying all the way out to Dalmeny but stopping short of doing it on the Forth Bridge, makes no sense just to go out to there. I know it’s extremely difficult to put it on the bridge, but there’s not much benefit to only going out to Dalmeny.
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