Cumbria rail crash report to question safety of 1960s track technology

· State of 700 sets of points called into question
· Network Rail braces for outburst of public concern

Dan Milmo, transport correspondent
Monday August 27, 2007
The Guardian

The safety of up to 700 sets of points used across the rail network will be called into question next month as a key report outlines the causes of last February’s fatal train crash in Cumbria.A study of the Grayrigg derailment, due to be published over the next fortnight, will provoke concern about decades-old railway technology that is still in widespread use.

The rail industry report is expected to state that Network Rail will examine the design of groundframe points after a faulty set derailed a Virgin train travelling at 95mph on February 23 2007 killing one person and injuring 22. If the equipment needs to be replaced the rail infrastructure firm would have to change up to 700 sets of points at a cost of millions.

Network Rail is braced for another outburst of public concern about the safety of the railways once the report is published. Confidence in the railways has recovered significantly since the Potters Bar crash which killed seven people in 2002, but industry sources have warned that the Grayrigg report will make alarming reading because of the incident’s similarities with Potters Bar, which was also caused by faulty points.A rail industry source said there are question marks over whether groundframe points, designed in the 1960s, are robust enough for modern rail travel: “The issue of whether they are the right type of points needs to be addressed.” The source added that a wholesale replacement programme might be needed because doubts over the points could force Network Rail to step up track inspections, which could in turn delay trains.

“If Network Rail ends up having to inspect these points every three days instead of every seven days it could interrupt services. So they could mitigate that by replacing these points altogether.”

A Network Rail spokesman said yesterday that the analysis of what caused the crash will be hard-hitting. He added that, despite the emphasis on problems within local management, the report would recommend changes at a national level.

“The report will be sobering reading for Network Rail,” he said. “It will be the first time that the rail industry has ever published anything as thorough as this. Right from the start we have held up our hands about the incident.”

The industry report, produced with most of the input coming from Network Rail and Virgin Trains, will be followed later this year by a further report from the Department for Transport’s Rail Accident Investigation Branch. That report is expected to raise concerns over the groundframe points in more detail. Roger Ford, technical editor of Modern Railways magazine, said groundframe points posed a threat only if they were inspected infrequently. “They need to be maintained regularly and properly. Quality and frequency of maintenance is the key,” he said.

Alongside concerns over the points, the study’s focus will be a breakdown in communications among Network Rail’s Cumbria workforce which contributed directly to the crash. It is expected to state that track inspections were not carried out as planned, that records of inspections were flawed and that safety certification used by some engineers had expired.

Industry sources also confirmed reports yesterday that two different inspection teams thought the other had inspected the points prior to the crash and therefore failed to inspect a crucial stretch of track at Grayrigg. As a result, a Virgin Pendolino train travelling from London to Glasgow on the night of February 23 was derailed by a broken set of points that should have been noticed earlier by track inspection teams.

British Transport police have arrested a 46-year-old Network Rail employee in connection with the crash. Network Rail executives were forced to freeze their own bonus payments in May. They performed the about-turn hours after saying they would pocket the payouts despite suspending bonuses for 119 fellow employees in the wake of the crash. Four current and former executive directors are due a total of £286,000 in bonuses. The 119 employees, who will be told whether they get their payouts once the investigation is completed, are mostly maintenance workers in the Grayrigg area.

The report is expected to put the executive bonuses under pressure, but Network Rail executives are adamant that the main causes of the crash were due to a failure of the local maintenance system and did not reflect problems at a national level.

Billions pledged for rail upgrade

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6912930.stm

Overcrowding is still a problem for many passengers on the network

Billions of pounds are to be spent on creating a “bigger, stronger” railway, carrying twice as many passengers by 2030, the transport secretary has said. Ruth Kelly said £10bn would be invested by 2014 to increase services and lengthen trains.

Among pledges were an extra 1,300 train carriages and upgrades at 150 stations.

Consumers raised concerns about fare rises, while Lib Dems said the plan was a “missed opportunity”, and Tories said it was “reheated announcements”.

Map: Key locations for improvements

Other key proposals from the White Paper included:

• The aim is to carry at least 180m more passengers within seven years
• More than 150 stations are to be upgraded and refurbished at a cost of £150m – London Bridge and Blackfriars stations to be upgraded by 2015 and 2011 respectively
• £5.5bn Thameslink modernisation programme approved, trebling the number of stations on that cross-London network
• £425m for improvements at Reading Station
• £128m for improvements at Birmingham New Street station
• Punctuality target of 92.6% of trains by 2014, up from the current 88%
• No closures for rural rail lines
• Protection remains on regulated fare rises – which must be no more than 1% above the annual rate of inflation

The government believes its plans will allow trains to carry twice the number of passengers and freight by 2030, but acknowledges that estimate might be outstripped by demand.

If that is the case, “more radical options” may have to be considered, particularly on the London-Birmingham-Manchester corridor and on London’s busiest commuter routes.

HAVE YOUR SAY Proper investment in high speed rail links would minimise the need for internal flights Kay, Liverpool Send us your comments New look for ‘ugly’ station

It favours extra long trains of up to 16 carriages over double-decker trains, but says a high-speed magnetic rail link and dedicated freight lines were too expensive.

Ms Kelly told MPs that the government had drawn up “the most ambitious strategy for growth on the railways in over 50 years”.

She said the challenge was “to provide a railway that carries more passengers, on more and better trains and on more frequent, reliable, safe and affordable service.”

She added: “We can’t know precisely what our railway will look like in 30 years’ time but now we can be confident of making it bigger, stronger and more flexible.”

But fares will have to cover some of the cost as Ms Kelly said government subsidies had nearly doubled during the “difficult years” of Railtrack.

“It is right that we now seek to return it closer to historic levels,” she said.

She said most people used “regulated fares” which were capped so prices could not rise more than 1% above inflation.

But the transport union TSSA said passengers faced a 34% rise in fares.

‘False dawn’

Also in the White Paper, Ms Kelly said the government was committed to Crossrail, a proposed high-speed rail link from Berkshire to Essex via central London – and was currently trying to “pin down” private sector funding, to match government funding.

But Conservative Theresa Villiers said it was another “false dawn” for the £15bn scheme, saying it was “getting more distant by the day”.

She added that overcrowded trains were packed so tight “it would be a criminal offence to transport animals in the same conditions”.

And Lib Dem transport spokeswoman Susan Kramer said the White Paper was a “missed opportunity” to get people out of cars and planes and onto the railways and suggested most of the money outlined had been announced before.

She said it “seems extraordinary” that the government had not made more mention of Crossrail in the paper.

George Muir, director-general of the Association of Train Operating Companies, described the proposals as the “first plausible plan for expanding the railway” in recent years.

But passenger groups have been angered that some train companies have raised off-peak prices by up to 20%.

Those carriages aren’t going to be put into place until 2014 so that’s a long wait and passenger numbers keep going up Julia Thomas Transport 2000

Julia Thomas, of campaign group Transport 2000, told BBC Radio Five Live that the White Paper was a “major step in the right direction” but she had two main concerns.

“Firstly, those carriages aren’t going to be put into place until 2014 so that’s a long wait and passenger numbers keep going up,” she said.

“Secondly, although they are concentrating on bottle necks like Reading and Birmingham New Street where there are major delays, there are quick gains to be made through signal improvements, looking at time tabling that would help passengers now.”

TSSA general secretary Gerry Doherty said: “Passengers will be forced to pay twice for improvements which are meant to benefit them, first as taxpayers and then as rail users.

“Ministers claim they want to encourage rail travel and then kick passengers in the teeth with huge regular hikes in fares. They are pricing people off rail and onto the roads.”

FGW will be using a hired-in Midland Mainline HST set until the end of the year to cover fleet shortages. On 3 April 2007, the set was formed between 43028 (with white FGW branding) and 43155. It is seen passing Dawlish forming the 06.43 Penzance-Paddington.

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