£600M lifeline needed to keep Metro afloat

25 January 2007
 
Tyne and Wear’s struggling integrated public transport system will be brought to its knees unless £600M of funding is found, according to Nexus.
The Tyne and Wear Passenger Transport Executive and regional MPs have called for more funding of the Metro this week.
Metro was hailed as a world-beater in providing integrated public transport to a complex conurbation when it opened in 1980, and today, it carries more than 37M passengers a year.
The Government is already under pressure to throw a cash lifeline to Nexus, because it faces a £5.4M shortfall for operating the pensioners’ free bus travel scheme.
The system currently consists of 78km of track dating back to 1838 – the route of the UK’s oldest commuter railway – and 90 original Metrocars, all with more than two million kilometres on the clock.
Nexus believes it needs a 20-year-plan for a massive overhaul and modernisation of the system’s 59 stations, track, tunnels and power supply.
The executive also hopes to refurbish existing trains, purchase new rolling stock as well as the replace ticket machines and introduce ticket control barriers.
Research carried out by Nexus shows if Metro is allowed to decline, an extra 15M car journeys and many more bus journeys would be forced on to local roads – creating serious congestion across the world-famous Tyne Bridge, city centres, and key commuter corridors.
Bernard Garner, director general of Nexus, said: ‘If Metro is not reinvigorated to meet the needs of the 21st century, then the costs, in terms of lost business through congestion and restrictions on movement, will dwarf the amount we are requesting.
‘We have absolute confidence the funding proposal is robust, and while £600M might sound a lot, break it down, and that’s £30M a year for a whole region over 20 years.’

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