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projects, not just announce new ones


Mark Cowlard, head of rail at built asset consultants EC Harris, and the former MD of Atkins’ Rail Solutions business, analyses the impact on rail of the chancellor’s Autumn Statement.


In


     Osborne put great emphasis on creating a ‘Northern Powerhouse’ as a counterweight to the dominance of London: this mode of thinking must be welcomed. Investment in       a way that few other investments are able to achieve, and the proposed rail upgrades set out in the National Infrastructure Plan will have        on important and inevitable infrastructure projects is preventing any local and national       from being realised.


The National Infrastructure Plan and Autumn       the re-franchising of Northern Rail and the TransPennine Express, and replacement of ancient Pacer trains, are already well underway. With a general election approaching next year, what is really needed now is cross-party support to realise these plans, accelerate the schemes, and to deliver any resulting economic 


Public consultation on big infrastructure decisions is important, but it often leads to unfortunate delays for schemes that have clear      are able to move from concept to operation far quicker than the UK. We have the skills to put these plans into place but we need to accelerate our decision making process. Where schemes are badly needed and inevitable from a planning point of view, we should be able to move much more quickly to development. All interest groups have reason to support this, as       


We must speed up existing rail


Library image shows George Osborne touring train wheel 


delivered more rapidly.


For now, focus must remain on the big        critical and the calls for a further trans-Pennine  of these schemes to local needs through connectivity and economic growth is vital to driving plans from conception to operation.


Cities therefore need to think carefully and        local transportation plans, how they will make the case for investment, and how they speed up the decision-making process.


       National Infrastructure Plan is really just electioneering? Political


developments,


including the rise of UKIP and Ed Miliband’s uncertain stewardship of the Labour Party, mean that the result of next year’s general election is even harder to call. All parties, and particularly the Conservative-led government, need to court the northern electorate.


The ‘Northern Powerhouse’ rhetoric certainly plays to this – indeed, for all of George Osborne’s fanfare, no new announcements were        slow decision-making process, the tangible


96 | rail technology magazine Dec/Jan 15 96 | rail technology magazine Dec/Jan 15


      





             from the proposals – have worked hard, independently of one another, maximising the opportunities presented by the government’s localism agenda. But it is my view that whilst cities need to respond with their own local plans to national investment opportunities, collective regional direction would help speed up the crucial decision-making process and deliver             of the trans-Pennine railways are critical and inevitable regional developments, and regional leadership is required to turn electioneering into 


Will these schemes lead to a rebalancing of the economy? They won’t do so on their own, but improved infrastructure through national


and


local railway projects will unlock invaluable human     regional economy.


Mark Cowlard


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