Trains Back on the Tracks!: A cause for concern to Grant Thornton

Dear Andy Smith

From my attendance at CA public meetings there seems to be a far too cosy relationship between yourselves, internal audit and the Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee of the WMCA. The WMCA spending appears to be out of control. Should auditors not be checking, challenging and questioning?

THE SCANDAL - idiocy, incompetence and ignorance:

Not one railway line has reopened since the WMCA formed in 2016 and only one tram line of 2 Kms since Andy became Mayor in 2017 (from Grand Central to Edgbaston Village). And that started before his 2017 election, anyway.

3 transport projects were suspended or curtailed 12 mths ago because they went or, were going, over budget.

One of them is the 700 metre extension that is taking seven years to complete. STILL NOT OPENED.

Another is a replacement station at Brum University to befit the equally prestigious buildings of both the university and hospital on either side. It sees 95% use by the university and hospital only but, still, rush hour traffic jams on the roads! Will the bigger, grander station make any difference?
The third, the Dudley Tram, broke up the UK's very last principal mainline railway "of national strategic significance".
It is expected to be half completed by the end of next year. Phase 2 has insufficient money.

3 Kms of new tramline opened in 24 years!

Very premature track replacement in Corporation Street. A second in Bilston.

5 railway stations planned for years are still not finished. One mainline railway was going to be a tramline but will, eventually, have a 30 mins diesel shuttle service into Grand Central. This is the important Camp Hill line.

The 1986 Dudley bus station gets replaced when work on the ground starts next year.

But the 1886 (not quite!) Kidderminster bus station is like something out of a poverty-stricken Third World country.

Nearby, is supposedly a bus shelter but it looks like a Victorian coffin rest shelter.

Worcestershire County Council is a neighbour of the WMCA. Important because transport has easily the largest slice of the financial pie in the CA budget. What is more, it is not a meagre proportion! Out of the enormous amount, since 1981, hundreds of millions of pounds has been spent on the staff working on achieving one Metro line of 23 Kms of which 19 Kms is on the first mainline railway destroyed by Metro trams! This was because it ran between (the now wasted for years platform 4) at Snow Hill station and St Georges Sq in Wolverhampton - not even to the bus station, mind you, let alone the railway station to which Snow Hill was connected so successfully for 100 years!

The vast expenditure was supposed to have brought us ten tram lines over 200 Kms by the year of our Lord, 2000 CE. By then, 23 years ago, we had 20 Kms. In 23 years it has stretched to the mighty length of 23 Kms in total. Wonders will never cease! By Christmas, it will be extended even further - all of 700 metres to the bus station and and railway station in Wolverhampton.

Yet, we have my nearby town of Kiddi having the most dreadful, disgraceful, slum of a bus station I have ever seen! Broken roof panels, no seating, but a lovely graceful curve of a sort of very long bus shelter with two roof panels missing to shower the passengers with rain and, with the drivers on their rest break standing and smoking at one end and the poor passenger (ME!) at the other end!! Poor signs and information, too.

When there is so much money swishing around for highly prestigious and stunning-looking trams at £4 million each, is there any way you might like to use your power and influence to get a few funds for Worcestershire County Council? To repair or, God forbid, even replace the slum to get a proper, modern bus station like we have in Stourbridge and Halesowen.

Below, in bold, is why we have to have the bulk of the money spent on the Black Country and Brum for "bus on rails" trams to take over from buses directly on roads without the rails but mainly taking over mainline trains. Do we really need to support the Metro trams replacing buses and trains when the money could be used to get a Kidderminster bus station that is not a slum and a disgrace but up to date and attractive?

Dear Andy

From my attendance at public meetings there seems to be a far too cosy relationship between yourselves, internal audit and the WMCA Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee of the WMCA. The WMCA spending appears to be out of control. Should auditors not be checking, challenging and questioning?

THE SCANDAL - idiocy, incompetence and ignorance:

Not one railway line has reopened since the WMCA formed in 2016 and only one tram line of 2 Kms since Andy became Mayor in 2017 (from Grand Central to Edgbaston Village). And that started before his 2017 election, anyway.
3 transport projects were suspended or curtailed 12 mths ago because they went or, were going, over budget.
One of them is the 700 metre extension that is taking seven years to complete. STILL NOT OPENED.
Another is a replacement station at Brum University to befit the equally prestigious buildings of both the university and hospital on either side. It sees 95% use by the university and hospital only but, still, rush hour traffic jams! Will the bigger, grander station make any difference?
The third, the Dudley Tram, broke up the UK's very last principal mainline railway "of national strategic significance".
It is expected to be half completed by the end of next year. Phase 2 has insufficient money.

3 Kms of new tramline opened in 24 years!

Very premature track replacement in Corporation Street. A second in Bilston.

The 1986 Dudley bus station gets replaced when work on the ground starts next year.

But the 1886 (not quite!) Kidderminster bus station is like something out of a poverty stricken Third World country.

Nearby, is supposedly a bus shelter but it looks like a Victorian coffin rest shelter.

When there is so much money swishing around for highly prestigious and stunning looking trams at £4 million each, is there any way you might like to use your power and influence to get a few funds for Worcestershire County Council? To repair or, God forbid, even replace the slum to get a proper, modern bus station like we have in Stourbridge and Halesowen.

Below, in bold, is why we have to have the bulk of the money spent on the Black Country and Brum for "bus on rails" trams to take over from buses directly on roads without the rails and mainline trains. Do we really need to support the Metro trams replacing buses and trains instead of a Kidderminster bus station that is something other than a slum and a disgrace?:

Wednesday, 21 June 2023 blog post

4 reasons why we all love trams

The trams are attracting people out of their cars and onto public transport.

For the last 70 years of tram and train destruction, there is only evidence that it is that policy that has made public transport worse, less attractive, caused road congestion, crammed trains and worsened the climate emergency.

They also make public transport users feel like they are not second-class citizens.

First class citizens like lawyers and other VIPs all use public transport. It was 10th rate work by our councillors and transport planners who are responsible for the complete wipe out of the trams in the 1950s followed by the double tragedy of urban commuter railway lines being turned into trading/housing estates, roads, innovation centres and test tracks that is STILL going on in this decade in Dudley.

They beat buses for speed and comfort.

In fact, 95% of bus stops are request stops but the tram MUST STOP at every tram stop.

Trams beat buses for speed only when you have the former mainline railway turned into a tramline running parallel to the traffic choked A41 between Wolverhampton and Brum. Even then, the average speed is only 15.5 mph for the trams and 12 mph for the vehicles.

Comfort is also a misnomer when my posterior comes to a sudden juddering halt as I sit on a tram seat with only a thin piece of cotton between my bum and the very hard plastic seat!

I think it is a good investment in local infrastructure.

Such a good investment that in over 40 years of rebuilding the tram network on the railway network, we still have only ONE tramline between Brum and Wolverhampton St Georges Sq, not even to the bus station, let alone the railway station. 200 Kms was promised by 23 years ago. What a truly pathetic performance for the hundreds of millions spent and £15 BILLION MORE by 2040!

Such a good investment that the 2nd Brum mainline, after 40 years, is no longer to get trams but is still awaiting its commuter trains and the 3 stations (Kings Heath, Moseley and Stirchley) - now delayed 12 months!!

Such a good investment that all work on current Metro extensions (£1.3 billion) have had to be suspended or curtailed, since 12 mths ago.

FROM Nick V:

The original trams ran in the roads. SELF: Yes. The new trams mostly reuse disused railway lines, keeping them apart from the buses, cars and bikes. In the W Mids, very nearly all railway lines are used for trams. A lot in Manchester, too. Hence, the very poor railways in northern England. They chose trams over trains that we are copying. Far better to put the trains back on the urban railway lines at a fraction of the cost in both price and in weight of greenhouse gas emissions. If they had maintained the old tram network then the roads would have had to be changed. Nonsense. 100 year old successful railway lines were turned into roads. Complete idiocy. Buses were a better alternative at the time. They were most certainly not! All other European nations modernised their tram networks over the years. Eccentric England, once again. England always has to be the odd one out in Europe.

The train network was cut as it was uneconomic. Yes. Beeching was right in closing railways seeing very few passengers as we all went out and bought cars. He did not expect his closed railway lines to be wiped off the face of the earth. English folly! What idiocy! If it had not been cut then the rail network would probably not exist at all today. No! Beeching only cut the loss-making services. Our transport experts and train spotters, ever since did and still do, the real destruction.

Best wishes

Tim (Weller 0791 380 4363)

PS bonus in the best tradition of British satire/humour - my pathetic attempt: