West Coast Main Line Route Modernisation

The West Coast Main Line is a key strategic railway line in the United Kingdom. It links the cities of London, Glasgow, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Preston. Virgin Trains took on the franchise to run train services on the routes in 1997 and as part of the agreement wanted an upgrade to the railway line to allow for faster more frequent trains to grow the business. The upgrade started in 1998 and was completed in 2009. It came under parliamentary and media scrutiny because of cost and schedule overruns. Further improvements such as the Norton Bridge rail flyover were completed after these dates. The project is sometimes given the acronym WCRM - West Coast Route Modernisation.

Previous modernisations

In the middle of the twentieth century the line was upgraded substantially as part of the 1955 Modernisation Plan. Further electrification was discussed in 1968.
The line north of Crewe was modernised by further electrification from Weaver Junction to Glasgow in the 1970s. Some innovative electronics technology were used on the project including lighter catenary and extensive use of headspans.
The Advanced Passenger Train concept was in effect a part of that upgrade. It relied on tilting trains to increase speed on the route rather than major civil engineering interventions.

Post privatisation modernisation

The late 20th and early 21st century modernisation began without public sector involvement but with Railtrack. However, the Strategic Rail Authority was concerned about cost overruns. Railtrack asked the government for more money to complete the project but the Labour Party Secretary of State for Transport Stephen Byers put the company into liquidation. This and other problems with this project and its cost and time overruns, is usually considered the cause of the liquidation of Railtrack. In 2002 Bechtel were invited to join the project. The upgrade went substantially over budget. Regular updates were then conducted by the UK Parliament accounts department. The Strategic Rail Authority published a document in June 2003 which re-examined and clarified many of the assumptions and specified the direction and scope of the whole project.

Technical aspects

The upgrade involved:
* Major remodeling of Rugby railway station
* Proof House Junction in Birmingham was also remodelled.
* Many Level crossings were either removed or modernised - 77 in total.
* Over 800 points, switches and crossings renewed, improved or removed
* Overhead line renewals
* Power supply upgrade to autotransformer system
* Track renewals- 430 miles
* Over 2000 signals modified or renewed with better line of sight etc.
* Quadrifying the two track section in the Trent Valley including TAME viaduct

Benefits

The benefits of the project are claimed to be capacity improvements, journey time reductions of up to 28% in some cases and improved safety. Although Virgin Trains were part of the driver for the project, the client is actually listed as the Department for Transport. The length of the project was just short of 11 years (110 months) and the final contract cost of approximately 9 billion pounds. The Campaign for Better Transport (United Kingdom) has stated that the benefits are 1) Road congestion reduction. 2) Carbon emissions reduction. 3) Economic and 4)Passenger benefits. It is claimed it was part of the reason that the BBC
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