Some rail journeys take too long these days

According to Northern’s website Southport to Manchester Victoria by train takes on average takes 1 hrs 35 mins, that’s a fair bit longer than the Manchester – Southport Club trains of some years ago.

I recall my old friend and Southport resident David Tattersall telling me about how much better the rail service between Southport and Manchester once was and I guess there are many other examples out there across the UK where rail services are slower/less frequent than they once were.

I also recall David telling me about the former Club Trains aimed at business people who say worked in Manchester but lived in Southport. When I looked up such trains I came across a web site called Railway Wonders of the World https://www.railwaywondersoftheworld.com/manchester_club.html  and this detail about the former Southport Club Train:-

‘The Southport express follows close on the heels - or, I suppose I ought to say, the wheels - of the 4.55 to Blackpool, passing Dobb’s Brow Junction five minutes later, at 5.19 p.m; but no reduction of speed is needed here, as the Southport train takes the straight line on to Hindley, where it diverges from the Liverpool line to the left to get through Wigan. The passage through Wigan, which is approached by extremely sharp curves, must not be made at more than 30 m.p.h. and, with such a load as this, 27 minutes from Manchester proves to be none too great an allowance for the distance of only 16¼ miles. Rising grades follow to Gathurst, but after that all is plain sailing, and there is a fine straight stretch across the level marches of West Lancashire slightly in favour of the engine, which enables a speed of over 60 an hour to be maintained for some miles, especially if any time has been lost on the congested and difficult earlier stages of the run. St. Luke’s, 32½ miles from Manchester, is reached in 47 minutes, and the main station at Chapel Street, ¾-mile further, at 5.51 p.m.’

So the Club Train expresses took less than an hour end to end. OK, it’s not really a fair comparison as Northern’s trains stop at most stations along the present route but it does make you wonder whether an average of 1 hr 35 mins isn’t just a bit too slow in 2023.

 

Northern Class 150 DMU at Buscough Bridge St - Southport-Wigan-Manchester LIne

It’s not that long ago that government put the Southport Line down to be electrified but then had a swift change of mind even before the dust had settled. Yet, of course, this is an obvious route to be electrified as modern electric EMU's can have quite a turn of speed and with battery technology developing at pace electrification need not be along a whole route.

During my time as Sefton Councillor (1999 – 2015 – 7 years of that as Council Leader) I tried to get anyone who’d listen to think about improving Southport’s northern and easterly transport connections because the Town has long been held back by poor and slow public transport links except, of course, via Merseyrail towards Liverpool in the south.

The barriers I tried to tackle back then are still there today and apart from a lot of political chatter about re-connecting the Burscough Curves, a project OPSTA and others have been championing for 40 years, nothing of note has happened. No Burscough curves, no electrification, no direct train to Preston and elderly diesel trains on the Southport – Wigan – Manchester route in the slow and environmentally unfriendly category.

The Club Trains of previous generations may well have been aimed at wealthy business people who, nowadays, may well be making that same journey via their high end German car. But, unless we seriously grapple with public transport being in the slow lane we’ll never get those drivers out of their cars, our roads will continue to be congested & polluting and the likes of Southport will continue to be held back.

 * This piece was also reproduced in the September 2023 edition of OPSTA's Connexion Magazine