Rotherham Council leader says Gateway Station plans 'on track' despite pause on electrification
It's after the government paused plans to electrify the Midland Main Line.
Plans for a long-awaited new railway station in Rotherham are still on track despite the Government’s decision to pause electrification of the Midland Main Line, the leader of Rotherham Council has said.
Councillor Chris Read told councillors the announcement was “regrettable” but confirmed it would not affect the business case for the proposed Rotherham Gateway Station.
In a letter to Councillor Mick Bower, Cllr Read explained that Government rules on transport appraisals only allow the benefits of other schemes to be considered when they are “near-certain to be completed”, such as when applications for the required consents have been submitted.
Cllr Read wrote that at the time of the decision, the Midland Main Line electrification was at a very early stage and no consents had been lodged.
“Therefore, the project did not meet the threshold of certainty
required to be considered as part of the business case for Rotherham Gateway Station – it was not sufficiently certain for us to be permitted to consider additional benefits electrification might bring.
“As such, the delay does not impact the business case – which did not assume electrification would happen.”
He added that this approach was designed to manage risk and ensure schemes were not reliant on projects which may never materialise.
Cllr Read confirmed the Gateway Station project remains at a relatively early stage, with final details on services still to be determined. However, many of the trains expected to call at the station will run on lines outside of the Midland Main Line and so will be unaffected by the Government’s pause.
The Government considers the Midland Main Line to end at Sheffield, meaning the proposed Rotherham station was never included in the electrification plans.
Despite this, Cllr Read said the decision was “a blow to improved connectivity between Rotherham, South Yorkshire and London, a blow to decarbonisation, and a missed opportunity for the Gateway Station to bring about more benefits than estimated in the business case.”
The London to Sheffield railway line has already been upgraded to take electric trains as far as South Wigston in Leicestershire, but the Department for Transport (DfT) confirmed in July that further extension of the project was on hold. A government spending review said funds would instead be focused on other transport schemes.
If it goes ahead, the new Rotherham Gateway Station could cost up to £100m. Funded by the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA), the scheme aims to bring additional rail services to the borough with faster journey times and “direct connections to regional economic centres”.
Proposals include a new railway station on the Midland Main Line adjacent to industrial and potential new housing developments, with the aim of encouraging public transport use among residents who might otherwise travel by car.
The scheme also features a tram-train stop to boost usage of both the tram and rail networks. According to SYMCA documents, funding of £99m is needed for the station, with a further £7m required for the tram-train stop. The combined authority is expected to approve £1m to develop the scheme further.
If approved, the station would return mainline train services to Rotherham for the first time since the 1980s. Likely to be built on track in the Parkgate area, the project would provide faster services into Leeds, Manchester and Nottingham without changing at Sheffield or Doncaster, with the possibility of direct London services also being explored.