UK: Reconnecting Oxford and Cambridge represents an opportunity for the rail industry to ‘reset its reputation’, according to David Hughes, Chief Executive of project promoter East West Railway Co which he said has undergone ‘a 180 degree shift’ to be ‘much more like Crossrail Ltd’.
Speaking at the annual Railway Industry Association conference in London on November 6, Hughes said the new Labour government’s inaugural Budget on October 30 had given fresh certainty to the scheme. A key milestone was reached in mid-October when an inaugural test train ran over the Bicester – Bletchley route which has been rebuilt as part of ‘Connection Stage One’.
Hughes said the full EWR scheme ‘was now happening’, with the Oxford – Milton Keynes service expected to begin revenue-earning operations in the second half of 2025. The second phase of the programme covers a major upgrading of the existing Bedford – Bletchley line to allow more trains and higher speeds — this work will be undertaken in 2025-30 within a budget of £240m.
The third and most complex phase of EWR covers construction of a new alignment between Bedford and Cambridge. The route being taken forward for consultation will serve new towns at Tempsford and Cambourne, before meeting the existing network near Cambridge South.
Hughes acknowledged that this route option ‘was not the most direct’, but it fulfilled many of the wider socio-economic aims of the project, including ensuring better access to jobs and housing for both Cambridge and Oxford.
Hughes said he was ‘optimistic’ that the cost of the third phase of between £5bn and £6bn could be met, and that ‘spades would be in the ground by the end of the decade’.
This section of the project is to be taken forward through a Development Consent Order which EWR Co hopes to secure in the next couple of years. The promoter also plans to consult on changes to the operating scope of the Bedford – Bletchley line, where one option is to consolidate the 14 current intermediate stations into nine to boost the throughput of the corridor.
A changed remit
Hughes was appointed EWR Co Chief Executive in June, since when he has driven significant cultural change at the organisation as its remit has changed.
Hughes told the audience that when the EWR scheme was first launched, then Transport Secretary Chris Grayling envisaged it being ‘a new and separate organisation’, in order to accelerate the process of obtaining legal powers to reopen the route. The new structure would also ‘secure private-sector involvement to design, build and operate the route as an integrated organisation’, Grayling said in December 2016.
However, the progress of rail reform, the macroeconomic challenges through the pandemic and the recent change in government have all contributed to what Hughes termed ‘a 180 degree shift’ in what EWR Co is. Now, it is a delivery body that will hand over a railway to Network Rail or a GBR-led successor. ‘We are much more like Crossrail Ltd’, Hughes said. To reinforce this change in function, he has moved the EWR Co headquarters into NR’s large office complex in Milton Keynes.
Reflecting on the challenges faced by other major rail projects in the UK over recent years, Hughes felt EWR would benefit from having a ‘clear vision’ of ‘why we are doing it’, which is to boost the ‘world-leading knowledge economies’ of Oxford and Cambridge. While two trains per hour are envisaged to run along the full Varsity corridor, four trains/h will run on the sections at each end, linking Oxford to Bletchley and Bedford to Cambridge. ‘This shows the priority is improving access to the cities, not the end-to-end journey’, Hughes said.
‘We know as the next major rail investment programme coming up, we offer a chance to reset rail’s reputation’, he insisted. Asked by the audience about EWR’s recent decision to adopt discontinuous electrification, Hughes felt this reflected the promoter’s desire to deliver a cost-effective outcome, even if this limits opportunities for electric traction to be used for freight services in the longer term.
