Supplementary note by the SRA (REN 41A)
Thank you for the letter of 7 May about rail
speeds in the North of England.
The SRA does not specify nor monitor line speeds.
I cannot therefore confirm the accuracy of the speeds that have
been quoted by a witness in the course of the enquiry"Railways
in the North of England". Passenger Service Requirements,
which describe minimum service levels in existing franchise agreements,
specify among other things, stopping patterns and maximum journey
times. The line speeds which you quote may have been deduced from
these journey times for the distances involved but I have not
attempted to check whether this is so. The maximum journey times
for each of the routes quoted are as follows:
Leeds-Bradford29 minutes [ATN
(WYPTE Route F2) Leeds-Bradford Forster Square]
Leeds-Preston130 minutes [Leeds-Blackpool
North. ATN (Route A7)]
Leeds-Lancaster144 minutes
[Leeds-Morecambe. ATN (Route C4). Direction specific]
Leeds-Sheffield61 minutes
[Fast service. ATN (Route C5) via Wakefield Westgate. Direction
specific]99 minutes [ATN. (WYPTE Route F8 and SYPTE Route
G3) via Barnsley. Direction specific, though 65% must not exceed
84 minutes]
Sheffield-Huddersfield88 minutes
[ATN (SYPTE Route G5 and WYPTE Route F10) Direction specific,
though 80% must not exceed 80 minutes]
Manchester-Blackburn59 minutes
[All stations except Clifton. FNW (GMPTE Route V) Direction specific,
though limited stop services may not take more than 50 minutes]
Manchester-Buxton62 minutes
[All stations. FNW (GMPTE Route M). Direction specific, though
limited stop services may take not more than 55 minutes]
Liverpool-WiganNo PSR specification
for a maximum journey time.
Newcastle-Sunderland28 minutes
[All stations. ATN (T&W PTE Route E1). Direction specific]
Most of these services are jointly or exclusively
specified by the PTEs who in many cases have a preference for
stopping services within their conurbations: the more station
stops, the longer journey times.
I hope this is helpful.
James Watson
May 2003
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