Interview
to bring his 7 Series BMW into our car park, then he doesn’t want to believe that he’s going to be so squeezed that when he comes back it’s going to be covered in dents.’ There are many hurdles to jump through before GNER and GNWR get the go-ahead. Initial talks with Network Rail have, he says, been a lot more positive than last time around, when he was trying to get Grand Central off the ground. But, of course, it’s the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) that really needs convincing. ‘The ORR made it quite clear to us last September that,
because it’s such a wide-ranging series of proposals we’ve put together, they weren’t prepared to consider it until we proved that we’d got the investment.’ Yeowart is hoping that the consultation on Alliance’s proposals will start in November and he would like to get a decision early next year, though he knows it could take longer. When it gets the go-ahead, it will be three years before Alliance is in a position to run its first train. ‘The consultation is where we tell the rest of the
London King’s Cross
Alliance’s proposed GNWR route
you have a train that’s capable of switching from one to the other.’ Several Roscos have expressed an interest in funding
the trains so far. Alternatively, says Yeowart, Alliance could potentially buy the trains outright. If these, admittedly very ambitious, plans for rolling stock come to fruition, they could be very good news for the UK rail industry. There would be nothing to stop the government ordering some bi-mode trains for use on franchised routes, once Alliance had acted as a guinea pig. ‘The investment levels we’re proposing are of such
magnitude, that the industry – at a time when its own investment is being curtailed – has the potential to expand through investment purely from the private sector. We are hoping that the government will see this. The argument in the past has always been about abstraction of revenue, but, to be honest, if somebody can introduce a fleet of new trains to the UK at a fraction of the cost of IEP, for example, then the value of that to the UK as a whole is astronomical, compared to whether or not someone loses a few million pounds because an open access operator competes on a flow.’ Another investment plan Yeowart has is to build
additional car parks at six stations to attract motorists who would not usually take the train. Alliance would pay for the car parks and negotiate with Network Rail as to how it would get a return on this investment. ‘We’re looking at around about £2m per station. We’ve picked the ones we’d want to do, usually because of their accessibility from the motorway network.’ The design of the car parks will be part of the passenger experience. Yeowart wants car parking spaces to be bigger than the standard size. ‘If we’re going to persuade some guy
industry what we’re planning, why we’re doing it and why we don’t think it’s anything other than a good thing. When you think about it, the two routes – the East Coast and the West Coast – miss a huge chunk of population across the north because they don’t go there.’ He believes that the plans could actually help the West Coast and East Coast operators, as they could concentrate on their core flows and send faster trains to Scotland with fewer stops, while GNER and GNWR would fill in the gaps. The fares will be kept simple and low cost, with
no advance fares. Customer service will also be a key consideration. ‘We’ve said we wanted to be better than Christopher Garnett and GNER at its very best. Virgin has set a very high benchmark, but our argument is that they don’t necessarily take people where, ultimately, they would like to go.’ Does he have a plan B, if the proposals don’t get the
green light from the ORR? ‘Plan B?’ he scoffs. ‘Well, the go-karts look good!’
Curriculum vitae
1951 Born in Aylesbury 1973 Train crew roster clerk and ticket office relief clerk with BR at Toton diesel depot
1980 Travel centre manager at Penzance 1990 Travel centre manager at York with Intercity 1991 Area manager (retail) for South Yorkshire 1993 Area manager (retail) for West Yorkshire. 1994 Company safety manager for Regional Railways North East
1995 Created the Grand Central and GNER brands and worked with a team bidding for two franchises. Sold GNER brand to Sea Containers
2000 Resurrected the Grand Central brand for open access 2009 Formed Alliance Rail Holdings, resurrecting GNER and GNWR brands
OCTOBER 2010 PAGE 21
Halifax
Hebden Bridge Rochdale
Manchester Victoria Eccles Parkway
Dewsbury Huddersfield
Guide Bridge Parkway Stockport
Alderley Edge
kway thorpe
Habrough Grimsby Town Cleethorpes
Maryport Wigton Workington Whitehaven Sellafield Barrow-in-Furness Ulverston Carnforth Lancaster Blackpool North
Kirkham & Wesham Preston
Newton-le-Willows-Parkway Winsford Parkway
Bradford Interchange Leeds
Crewe Carlisle
Tamworth Nuneaton
Kings Langley Parkway
London Euston
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