Ambitions include construction of a new ‘super hub’ to accommodate east/west services beneath Manchester Piccadilly station and improving freight train speeds across the Pennines, which can be as slow as 16mph.

Addressing immediate concerns with the existing rail network could help with the post Coronavirus economic recovery, the ‘Revisiting High Speed North’ study adds.

It also says that northern rail investments should follow the model of building the UK’s motorway network, where improvements were made incrementally in ‘financially digestible chunks’ that built up to an overall plan.

Construction of a Manchester Piccadilly super hub would see a tunnel built underground from Ordsall into the station from the west, allowing fast trains to pass through the city from Chester, North Wales and Liverpool to Leeds, Sheffield and York. It would, say report authors Jim Steer, David Thrower and Ian Wray, transform Piccadilly into one of the best connected transport hubs in the country.

Capacity constraints impact on freight traffic too, they say, with goods trains often held in passing loops to allow passenger services to continue. At the moment freight trains operating between Liverpool in the west and Drax power station in the east see an average speed of only 16mph. These issues cannot be allowed to continue for another 20 years, the report says, and there must be more of an emphasis on expanding the role of rail freight powered by electric traction.

The study also points out that after the Coronavirus pandemic, the north “will not want to return to normal” because regarding its rail network “normal was not working”. Visible progress is needed in the next five to 10 years, it adds, rather than waiting for grand schemes which are unlikely to benefit the region until 2040. A plan is needed, it goes on, “which provides modular incremental development”.

In summary, the co-authors say: “Simply put, the rail network in Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield does not work; the north deserves better. It is not enough to provide fast links between the major cities of the north, it is also essential to overcome existing bottlenecks.
“Ultimately we do need a grand design. But we need a realistic delivery programme too.”

(Photograph: Network Rail)