YOUR report on a closure of Queen Street high level station in Glasgow for a substantial period in 2015-16 as part of EGIP (Edinburgh-Glasgow Improvement Programme) was met by only a partial denial from Network Rail ("Closure option for Queen Street station", The Herald, September 2).
Contrasting with the four years (2010-14) required for completion of Liverpool-Manchester electrification, it looks as though Edinburgh-Glasgow electrification, first announced in 2006, will not be fully completed until 2019.
At the stakeholder meeting on the project held in the Transport Scotland offices on August 30, it was confirmed that - though electrification was now speeding up -there were major problems in providing clearances in the Winchburgh tunnel and in undertaking essential track work near the tunnel entrance to Queen Street high level along with unresolved issues on the wider transformation of Queen Street station and adjacent land. This will involve considerable disruption of services, though ways of minimising this are being examined by Transport Scotland and Network Rail. Transport Scotland also stated that, though some services between Queen Street high level and Edinburgh will be electrically operated from December. 2016, there will be delays in the supply of new electric rolling stock, postponing full electric operation on the Falkirk line until later in 2017 - though with this being followed by the extension of electrification to Stirling, Alloa and Dunblane by December 2018.
For a major Scottish project, this position is unsatisfactory. There needs to be pressure on the Scottish Government and related bodies to announce by November this year more information on how disruption will be minimised and the measures being taken to reduce this. It is also desirable that orders for new electric rolling stock should be placed in time for such stock to be in full operation on the Glasgow-Falkirk-Edinburgh line no later than March 2017. This would allow a much-needed release of existing diesel trains to improve services and train capacity elsewhere in Scotland.
Tom Hart,
President,
Scottish Association for Public Transport,
11 Queens Crescent,
Glasgow.
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