Some services were axed from the Tyne and Wear Metro's timetable last year due to a lack of working trains, but the service's new boss says she has no plans for further cuts

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Tyne and Wear Metro bosses are not planning further timetable cuts yet, despite the system’s ailing trains being on their last legs.

As the wait goes on for the Metro’s delayed new fleet to finally enter service, the trains that have carried millions of people around the region since 1980 have become increasingly plagued by breakdowns. A lack of functioning carriages was one key factor in the network recording its worst ever punctuality figures during a four-week period in late 2023.

It is almost a year since transport chiefs decided to reduce the Metro timetable to reduce the burden on its ageing trains, removing the extra peak services that ran during rush hour. But, despite the ongoing problems and further setbacks with the new fleet since then, officials say they are not yet being forced to slash services again.

Asked by the Local Democracy Reporting Service whether more timetable cuts were in the offing, Nexus managing director Cathy Massarella replied “not yet”. She added: “I will be watching and we will have conversations and plans if we need to.

"But at this moment in time, no. Every day we have full analysis sessions with Stadler [the firm responsible for the fleet’s maintenance] about the failures we are seeing – and they are across a whole range of 15 classifications. The point you would get to for the next phase [of timetable change] is when you would see a real honed-in problem because that is where the fleet would be starting to fail and we would have to think again.”

Ms Massarella said that, as a daily Metro commuter, she was “not blind” to the frustration felt by passengers fed up with delays to their journeys. She added that the Metro’s existing trains are “really struggling” and already a decade past their expected lifespan, leading to problems that engineers have “never seen before”.

Efforts to keep the fleet moving have included cannibalising trains for functioning parts and bringing in specialist heaters used by airlines to help during freezing winter weather. Just 61% of Metro services arrived on time in the four weeks to December 9, a record low, though the situation has since improved – with a figure of 79% reported from January 7 to February 3.

Ms Massarella added: “I am not satisfied that it has improved sufficiently, but I know we are doing the best we can do. I would never sit here as a Metro user and defend the [current level of] service. But what I would say is that we and Stadler are doing our absolute best to do the best we can do and get the best service out we can. It is a challenge but we continue to try our best.”

QOSHE - No Tyne and Wear Metro timetable cut planned despite trains 'really struggling' - Daniel Holland

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No Tyne and Wear Metro timetable cut planned despite trains 'really struggling'

Daniel Holland

Chronicle Live

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29.02.2024

Some services were axed from the Tyne and Wear Metro's timetable last year due to a lack of working trains, but the service's new boss says she has no plans for further cuts

We have more newsletters

Tyne and Wear Metro bosses are not planning further timetable cuts yet, despite the system’s ailing trains being on their last legs.

As the wait goes on for the Metro’s delayed new fleet to finally enter service, the trains that have carried millions of people around the region since 1980 have become........

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No Tyne and Wear Metro timetable cut planned despite trains 'really struggling'

Daniel Holland

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