Warning new Liverpool to Manchester line ‘must not affect borough rail links’

As announced last week, Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram, Mayor of Liverpool, believe the new line will boost the economy of the North West and increase opportunities for businesses and residents.

The plans were announced after the mayors, along with other local politicians, recently launched the Liverpool-Manchester Railway Board to improve links between the two city regions.

Warrington’s Bank Quay station has been earmarked for redevelopment as part of Northern Powerhouse Rail’s proposals.

Details of how the link could potentially affect rail connectivity across the St Helens borough have not been released and it is unclear at this stage whether the new line would extend into the borough at all.

“It must be in addition to our route, not instead of”

However, local political leaders are understood to want assurances that the new line will not lead to cuts to existing services from stations such as Lea Green and Newton-le-Willows.

The clear message to the new rail board is that it “must be next to our route, not in place”.

In a statement released to the Star, St Helens Council deputy leader Seve-Gomez Aspron wrote: “The advantage of our geography has always been that we sit right in the middle of two major cities. So we benefit from the fact that both Manchester and Liverpool are well connected.

“We know that Lime Street is a bottleneck at the moment and needs serious investment from the Government to help alleviate this pressure. The deep sandstone cuts make it more expensive.”

“And we have also benefited from a number of new services through our borough in recent years, such as Transport For Wales, Northern, TransPennine Express and the future Lumo. [which would see Manchester to London services run through Newton] provide exciting opportunities.

“As a borough we would like to be assured that any new route between Manchester and Liverpool via Warrington was not at the expense of the services we currently provide on the original Liverpool-Manchester route.

“It has to be in addition to our route, not in place of it. And we were clear about that.”

The Newton councilor added: “We currently get services that put Newton-le-Willows and Lea Green within 19 minutes of Manchester and Liverpool and an hour from most of Yorkshire.

“And any new route must protect our access to these rapid services as well as local commuters.

“In particular, the new services extend our north-south corridor, which is why the Sutton Oak connection is there [the former line between St Helens Junction and St Helens Central] is also important.

“So while we support increased capacity and investment in both Lime Street and Liverpool Central Station, we will continue to aim to maintain our services in our borough to serve up employment and housing opportunities for years to come.

“Freight is also a key aspect from Liverpool Docks through the proposed SRFI at Parkside.”

Big plans

Plans to improve services between the cities also include a tube station at Manchester Piccadilly, along with improvements to Liverpool Central, the busiest tube station outside London.

Announcing the plans at the UK Property and Infrastructure Investment Forum in Leeds, Mr Rotheram said the first board meeting of the Liverpool and Manchester Rail Company took place 200 years ago this week.

Six years later, the world’s first intercity railway line was completed between the two cities.

But Mr Rotheram said the journey time between the two cities today is comparable to what it took in the early days of steam.

If the new plans go ahead, it will cut the journey time between Liverpool city center and Manchester Airport, which is now well over an hour, to 25 minutes.

Mr Rotheram said: “It won’t be like HS2 and promise after promise and nothing delivered.

“This is going to happen. We have a budget, we want to increase it, but we also really have the best interests of the cities of Liverpool and Manchester and Liverpool City Region and Manchester City Region at heart.

Last year, the government finally confirmed that the northern section of the high-speed rail link to Birmingham and London would be scrapped, saving around £36 billion.

The government has promised that some of the money will instead be spent on other transport projects in the north of England.

Mr Burnham added: “The economy will grow if you build the railway in the right way.

“Steve and I have received confirmation from the government that £17bn is still in the plan, the integrated rail plan, to build this new railway.

Mr Burnham said the £17bn of public money was only a “starting point” and the board would be a public-private partnership.

He added: “It was the first railway in the world. Why can’t we have the ambition now to make it the most innovative and greenest railway in the world, as we will run it 200 years later?

“It’s going to be a really exciting project to work on, and that’s what real tweaking should always be, right?

“It’s us, we’re doing it for ourselves, we’re setting our own ambitions, where hopefully the UK government will allow it, so in the end all the pain of the rail debate we’ve sort of ended up at the right station.”