NEWS
King’s Cross concourse work complete
Rail unions have declared a ‘na- tional dispute’ after Network Rail refused to give a guarantee of no compulsory redundancies in the control room restructuring pro- cess.
Strike ballots will be held by the RMT, Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association and Unite.
Major construction work has now finished on King’s Cross station’s western concourse, which forms part of the £500m development of the major London terminus.
The works have provided a brighter and more spacious concourse with a wide range of new shops and improved facilities for passengers, Network Rail said.
Work began in 2009 and the ma- jority of redevelopment across the station will be completed by 2012, in time for the Olympics. The entire upgrade is due to finish in 2013, when the Cubitt facade will be re- vealed properly.
When completed, 50 million pas- sengers will use the new station each year and it will provide inte- grated transport links with neigh- bouring St Pancras, and London Underground services.
Ian Fry, Network Rail’s King’s Cross project
director, said: “With the major construction completed on schedule we can focus on fitting out the retail units and installing the new passenger facilities so pas- sengers can take full advantage of their new station when it opens in next year.”
Network Rail successfully com- pleted several major projects as part of its Birmingham New Street rebuild over Christmas.
The works included extending the Navigation Street footbridge by exchanging old sections with new ones and removing redundant structures such as the old Palla-
sades shopping centre link bridge and escalator.
Additionally, preparatory work was started on platforms 1-7 as well as the construction of new train crew accommodation above platform 1.
Chris Montgomery, Network Rail’s project director, said: “The
The dispute involves 150 staff, with 70 jobs due to go by 2017 when the number of control cen- tres is cut from seven to two.
Bob Crow, RMT’s general secre-
tary, said: “The electrical control room operators deliver a critical service in terms of running the nation’s railways and the network cannot operate without them.
“We have sought through nego- tiation a perfectly fair and realistic agreement on no compulsory re- dundancies at this time of major reorganisation but Network Rail managers have failed to accept that and have plunged us into this dispute as a result.”
But a spokesperson for Network Rail said: “As part of these dis-
cussions, we have proposed a working party with the unions, to discuss in more detail the com- pany’s thinking, before Network Rail is in a position to put forward a formal proposal.
“The unions have asked for a guarantee of no compulsory re- dundancies, without which they would not engage.
“We have reaffirmed our intention to manage the process through redeployment and voluntary means and we want to continue further discussions.”
work we have completed over the Christmas break represents a major step forward in our exciting plans to rebuild Birmingham New Street for the thousands of pas- sengers who use it every day.
“Undertaking projects on this scale in the heart of Birmingham city centre represents a huge lo- gistical challenge and we planned the work carefully to minimise disruption to passengers and Christmas shoppers visiting the city centre.”
Geoff Inskip, chief executive of Centro, the region’s transport au- thority, said: “Whilst a lot of the work so far has not been visible to passengers, the installation of this new bridge clearly shows the ex- cellent progress being made to- wards delivering a bigger, brighter and visually stunning New Street station – a world-class facility the whole West Midlands can be proud of.”
The DfT has launched a consulta- tion for views on the Great West- ern franchise, set to be renewed in 2013.
Residents from the Thames Val- ley, the south west and south Wales are invited to contribute on the changes and improvements they would like to see. First Great Western chose not to extend its franchise from 2013.
6 | rail technology magazine Dec/Jan 12
Transport minister Theresa Villiers said: “The franchise will be one of the first to be let on a 15-year term.
Kevin R Boyd
“We will expect the train opera- tor chosen to run the franchise to provide high quality services, de- liver improved levels of passenger satisfaction, roll out smart ticket- ing for thousands more journeys, and invest in improvements that will benefit passengers.”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92