Harborough rail users
Improving the quality of Market Harborough's rail service
The DfT is negotiating a number of short-term franchises with existing train operators. In EMT’s case there would be a further term expiring in October 2017 rather than April 2015. In connection with this, the DfT wrote to interested parties including HRU in October 2014 asking what aspects of the current service provided by EMT we would wish to see protected and what improvements we would like to see. We responded:
We have received a reply from the Secretary of State for Transport via Sir Edward Garnier, MP for Harborough, regarding our questions related to the franchise extension and our desire to see improvements for passengers. The letter makes clear that negotiations are yet to take place and that they are likely to begin later in the year. We will of course push to ensure that we are involved in any consultations.
It is now nearly seven years since Harborough Rail Users ran a successful campaign to protect our twice-hourly off-peak rail service during the franchise negotiations that saw East Midlands Trains supersede Midland Mainline. In doing so we also achieved the additional benefit of an hourly non-stop train to London as part of the off-peak service. It was an exceptional result and came about primarily from the coordinated efforts of HRU and, in turn, the local community pulling behind our campaign. It’s therefore with great interest that we read recently about the extension that has been given to several rail franchise holders – particularly the East Midlands Trains franchise, scheduled to run until April 2015 but extended to October 2017.
As a result of this we have written a letter to the Department for Transport and East Midlands Trains asking the following:
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