Network Rail performs poor in Northern England

Thursday, January 23, 2020

 The rail watchdog has put Network Rail on warning as it is responsible for a large majority of train delays in Britain and has performed badly in central and northwest England.

The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) in its latest figures showed that Network Rail was responsible for 58 per cent of delay minutes during 2019. ORR is responsible for holding the government-run infrastructure provider to account.

As compared to last year the figure was down 1.1 percent , however the rail watchdog mentioned that the region where Northern and TransPennine Express run many trains the performance in terms of its contribution to delay was still a concern.

In 2018 performance in the region deteriorated and failed to substantially recover in 2019.

It was now being investigated by the ORR if Network Rail was doing it reasonably to improve service for passengers.

Chief executive, John Larkinson mentioned that the top priority for passengers is that their train arrives on time and that isn’t happening consistently enough across the country.

There are areas of very good performance such as in Wales and Western region, Network Rail’s performance in North West and Central region is not good enough. That is why they were putting the company on a warning to make sure its improvement plans deliver for passengers.

Due to the result of train operations rather than infrastructure shortcomings the ORR found that there was a recent poor performance of the TransPennine Expresss. From the train operators it has demanded further information on how meeting its obligation to communicate information on service disruption.

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