01.07.15
New Priorities
Source: RTM Jun/Jul 15
Is Sir Peter Hendy the right man to get Network Rail’s control period back where it needs to be?
It was an open secret that the Department for Transport wanted new blood at the top of Network Rail, and it is hardly a surprise to see a pause in Midland Main Line electrification either – there is only so much money, only so many engineers and only so much plant to get this ‘rolling programme’ of electrification done, and the delays on the Great Western made the old timetable for all the other lines look increasingly divorced from reality.
To the extent that any single person can make a difference, Sir Peter is a good choice. His record in London is much-admired, as his political nous and his lifelong enthusiasm for public transport. Richard Parry-Jones wanted disruptive innovation at Network Rail – more focus on research and technology to solve the long-term problems. This is all well and good, but at a time of project pressure and political intrusion, a different set of skills are perhaps called for.
Virtually every project we have written about these past few months has suffered some kind of delay. Signalling renewal schemes, station upgrades, electrification, civils – it’s seemed almost across the board. It’s not just the big enhancement projects and it’s not just anecdotal: as the ORR has recently reported, overhead line renewals are 77% behind schedule, signalling is 63% behind and track renewals are 7% behind plan.
If the DfT is right to think that individuals can turn things round – and can also be to blame – then there must also be more examination of the roles of Mark Carne and Dr Francis Paonessa, whose terms in charge cross over uncomfortably with this downturn in Network Rail’s reputation and achievements. HS2 has pinched some big names from Network Rail, and Network Rail has often turned to TfL to fill its own high-profile vacancies. Will we see more such shufflings as CP5 goes on?
Some anti-HS2 protestors have been crowing at Network Rail’s struggles with its expensive, high-profile projects, suggesting these provide more evidence that big projects always bust their budgets and come in late. But building a new railway is a very different challenge to upgrading an existing live railway. Indeed, these delayed projects actually do more to puncture a key argument made by those who campaign against HS2, who often like to suggest it would be better to spend more money improving the existing network to squeeze extra capacity out of it. Clearly, it’s not as easy as that.