£680 million investment for West Midlands Trains

A £680 million ($897million) order for new trains has been welcomed by West Midlands Rail (WMR), a consortium of 16 local councils set up to manage the regions rail services. The order, made up of 413 carriages, comes from West Midlands Trains (WMT) who will run local services on behalf of WMR and Department of Transport (D0T) from December onwards to help increase capacity and improve journey times. WMT will operate local services until March 2026.
October 19, 2017 Read time: 2 mins
A £680 million ($897million) order for new trains has been welcomed by West Midlands Rail (WMR), a consortium of 16 local councils set up to manage the regions rail services. The order, made up of 413 carriages, comes from West Midlands Trains (WMT) who will run local services on behalf of WMR and Department of Transport (D0T) from December onwards to help increase capacity and improve journey times. WMT will operate local services until March 2026.


WMT is made up of Abellio, JR East and Mitsui and the order is part of a near £1 billion ($1,319 million) investment into the franchise.

513 Bombardier Trains and Construcciones y Auxilar de Ferrocarriles (CAF) will manufacture 107 new trains for the next West Midlands franchise. CAF will also produce 80 diesel carriages to provide dedicated services for journeys to towns and cities around Birmingham.  

A total of 333 of the new trains will feature air conditioning, free Wi-Fi and in-seat power sockets provided as standard – produced by Bombardier in Derby.

Cllr Roger Lawrence, chair of WMR and transport lead on the West Midlands combined authority, said: "This is a very significant investment in new trains that will bring more space, more services and improved comfort for passengers.  

"We know a key issue for passengers is overcrowding at peak times so we are pleased that these new carriages will provide space for an extra 85,000 passengers on rush hour services into Birmingham and London.”

Related Content

  • An innovation lab – not a burden
    June 27, 2018
    Travellers want to be able to book multimodal journeys easily – and to be informed of problems and alternatives as they go. Adam Roark might just be able to help, finds Ben Spencer. The global shift in transportation towards members of the public wanting access to multimodal journeys is rapidly changing how people pay and plan ahead. Buying tickets from a machine and dealing with the frustration of discovering your train is cancelled is a scenario commuters want to avoid through technology’s ability to
    Read More
  • ITS instrumental in reducing Texan congestion
    September 4, 2018
    ITS projects in the Houston area have seen costs crunched – and even a system failure has proved valuable in analysing performance. David Crawford reports on developments in the Lone Star state Savings by Texan public agencies are major factors in the recent ITS Texas awards, recognising beneficial initiatives in bridge strike prevention and traffic intersection control. In the first, the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT)’s Houston District, covering the state’s most populous city and its surround
    Read More
  • Developments in travel information display systems
    August 1, 2012
    David Crawford looks at recent developments in travel information display systems. It is important to remember that we are investing in Real-Time Passenger Information [RTPI] to increase ridership," says Robert Burke, Managing Director of New Zealand transit tracking technology specialist Connexionz, which has been involved in at-stop and remote passenger information since 1995. "Superior information improves the perception of public transport reliability and gives the passenger more choices and greater con
    Read More
  • TagMaster wins order from Bombardier for São Paulo Line 5 Project
    July 25, 2012
    Sweden-headquartered TagMaster has received an order from Bombardier Transportation to provide its advanced RFID solution for a project to upgrade and extend the signalling on Line 5 on the São Paulo Metro in Brazil. Bombardier has placed an initial order for Heavy-duty (HD) readers and ID-tags which will be delivered over a 12 month period beginning in August 2012. Additional orders for TagMaster’s Heavy-duty ID-Tags and system spare parts for the project are anticipated during 2013.
    Read More

Highlighted Content