FURIOUS transport campaigners are predicting more delays and cancellations on the Highland main rail line because of a failure to upgrade it.
They have accused the Scottish Government of failing to deliver on a promise made 10 years ago to slash journey times between Edinburgh and Glasgow and Inverness.
They say then first minister Alex Salmond promised to cut 35 minutes from the average journey time by 2012 but an average of only four minutes has been saved to date. This has left the largely single-track Highland main line from Perth to Inverness struggling to compete with the £3billion upgrade of the parallel A9 road.
“In 2008, then first minister Alex Salmond said that within four years the rail journey time would be cut to two hours 45 minutes, but a decade later it remains on average around three and a half hours – yet A9 journeys are getting faster and faster as road dualling advances,” said Paul Tetlaw, of Transform Scotland, the sustainable transport alliance.
“The public were told that there would be additional rail passing loops and double-tracking, but all that is being delivered is resignalling of two crossing loops.
He said lessons should be learned from the new the Borders Railway where de-scoping has created long single-track sections.
Ian Budd from rail campaign group, the Friends of the Far North Line, said the Highland main line was key to the whole regional rail network as slow journey times and unreliability between Perth and Inverness had a knock-on impact on connecting trains to the Far North Line, Kyle and Elgin and discouraged people from switching from car to train.
“What we have at the moment in no way equates with the government’s stated transport policy,” he said.
Fears were also raised that the current “very limited” upgrade would lead to more freight taken by road instead of rail.
“Everyone wants to see fewer 44-tonne trucks on the A9, but the current very limited upgrade to the Highland Main Line offers little or nothing for rail freight,” said David Spaven from the Rail Freight Group.
“Indeed the worry now is that rather than freight shifting from road to rail – the Scottish Government’s policy objective – we will see the loss of existing rail traffics, as the A9 gets faster and the single-track railway becomes increasingly congested.
“That’s economic and environmental madness.”
The groups are now calling for “firm, committed plans” for doubling and electrification of the Highland Main Line as part of the Scottish Government’s newly-commenced Strategic Transport Projects Review (STPR2).
However a Scottish Government spokeswoman said: “Phase 2 of the Highland Main Line programme is well under way and aims to deliver an hourly service between Inverness and Perth (continuing to Glasgow or Edinburgh), further journey time reductions of around 10 minutes, and more efficient freight operations by Spring 2019.
“While we remain committed to encouraging greater use of rail, the UK Government has unilaterally moved away from the original devolved settlement agreed.”
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