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Abellio EMR, who take over the East Midlands Railway franchise on 18th August, have today confirmed that they have ordered a complete new fleet of inter-city trains for the Midland Main Line, which serves Market Harborough. The £400m contract is for a fleet of 33 five-car trains, which will start operating in 2022. They will regularly operate in 10-car formations (two units coupled together) and will operate on electric power where possible and diesel elsewhere. The trains will be built by Hitachi in County Durham and are the latest version of a type of train entering service with numerous other operators across the country including GWR and LNER. An image of the new train appears below, courtesy of Abellio and Hitachi.   Harborough MP Neil O'Brien took the opportunity during House of Commons Transport questions today, 18th July, to ask the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Andrew Jones MP) about the intended cycle hub for Market Harborough station:
'East Midlands Trains, my local rail users group and I are bidding for funds for a cycle hub at Market Harborough railway station. The Minister, who has recently visited, knows that many more people are taking that healthy way to the station in the morning. Will he look favourably on our bid?' Replying, the Minister said: 'I thoroughly enjoyed my recent visit to Market Harborough to see the work taking place there: the significant upgrade to services, the straightening of the line and a new station. The new east midlands franchise will deliver over £17 million of investment in station facilities across the route, including extra cycle spaces, 100 of which will be delivered at Market Harborough. I am very happy to champion that, and to encourage smooth and early delivery.' We now look forward to rapid progress towards implementation of this long-awaited scheme to provide more, better quality and more secure cycle parking arrangements at the station.
Network Rail have released a time-lapse video of the 2019 line upgrade work at Market Harborough, showing the main stages of the project from installation of the footbridge back in February 2019 to the first train on 3rd June. It can be seen at https://vimeo.com/insideoutgrp/mmluprademarketharboroughjune2019.
The temporary speed restrictions through the station have now been removed, allowing trains not stopping to pass through at speed. |
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