Agenda item

To receive a report by the Cabinet Member for Environment and Transport and Corporate Director for Growth, Environment and Transport  on how Kent County Council (KCC) adopted its principal rail policy with the publication of the Rail Action Plan for Kent in April 2011. This new rail policy initiative, developed primarily to inform the new franchises for the Southeastern and Thameslink networks, was based on the future needs of the county for a rail network which would have sufficient capacity to support economic growth

(Report by Mr D Brazier, Cabinet Member for Environment and Transport and Ms B Cooper Corporate Director for Growth, Environment and Transport)

(Mr P Crick, Director of Environment, Transport and Enforcement, and Mr Stephen Gasche, Principal Transport Planner – Rail, were also present for this item)

1.            The Director of Environment, Transport and Enforcement, Mr Crick, and thePrincipal Transport Planner – Rail, Mr Gasche, introduced the report on the work undertaken through the Rail Action Plan for Kent and negotiations with the Department for Transport, the office of Rail Regulation and Southeastern Railway and Govia Thameslink Railway to enable a significant increase in rail capacity in Kent.

2.            The Chairman outlined the concerns; he had received by letter, from a member of the public, Mr J Baker, regarding the lack of car parking and taxi spaces at the Canterbury West Station. Mr Gasche advised that he was aware of the issues and aware that there had been some improvements made at Canterbury West Station by Southeastern Railway that owned the station car park and Canterbury City Council that ran the adjacent car park but they had reached the limit of available space short of decking, which was an option that had been carried out at other stations. One of the problems of High Speed was the demand for car parking exceeded the capacity at the stations.  Further discussions would be held with Southeastern Railway and Canterbury City Council but there was not much more KCC could do.

3.            Mr Crick and Mr Gasche noted comments and responded to questions by Members which included the following:

a)    Mr Crick advised that he would take up the issue of trains arriving at Teynham, Sittingbourne and Newington with four carriages rather than eight with Southeastern Railway.

b)    Mr Crick advised that he was aware of the possibility of Peel Ports, Sheerness, using the rail head at Sheerness for freight movements and this was encouraged.

c)    Mr Crick noted the comments regarding car parking in Canterbury.  He advised that KCC was promoting Thanet Parkway Station, a new station between Minster and Ramsgate, which would help, further east of the County, with car parking and have an indirect benefit to Canterbury.

d)    Mr Gasche noted the comment made regarding Canterbury City Council’s Strategic Plan stating that over 400 car parking places were being withdrawn which would add to the issues of lack of car parking spaces. 

e)    Mr Gasche advised that the journey time from Thanet Parkway to London Stratford would be approximately one hour which would rely on the journey time improvement scheme and other improvements scheme.

f)     Mr Gasche acknowledged that there had been some issues at Kings Cross and Paddington Station with routine engineering work.  The track record with network rail planned engineering work had been very good in terms of being on time.  The Southern part of London Bridge was delivered on time.

g)    Members congratulated officers for the work undertaken to increase the rail capacity in Kent.

h)   Mr Crick explained that he was aware that Westenhanger and Sandling Stations were not being served by the High Speed Rail Network and would not be. Where services were not served by High Speed, KCC met with the train operating companies, Network Rail and the Department of Transport on a quarterly basis to encourage them to improve the service to stations served by the classic rail network. Mr Gasche advised that Kent raised this issue with the Department of Transport and they costed the proposal Kent put to them of one train per hour from Victoria Station via Maidstone East Station and for this service to be extended to at least Folkestone Central or Dover Priory stations, which would deliver two trains per hour and the response to this was that it was not viable with the criteria they used.  Mr Gasche considered that a possible option for the future would be if Sandling Station became a stop, but this would slow the High Speed service down by two minutes from Dover to Folkestone but this would be a controversial option.

i)     Congratulations were given to Mr Gasche on negotiating the return of the Maidstone East City service.  Mr Crick thanked Members for their comments and advised that the Rail Action Plan which was adopted by Members in April 2011 gave Kent a firm platform to be able to influence decision makers in London.

j)      Mr Gasche advised that the Maidstone West Station to Gatwick Airport was a short lived service as the benefit case of this service verses the cost ratio was unviable and was not going to be accepted by the Department for Transport.  The only viable way to get to Gatwick from Maidstone was from the Maidstone East Station to Victoria Station then boarding the express service to Gatwick.

k)    A comment was made that it seemed that travelling through Kent was more important than travelling in Kent and that this was where the economy would improve Kent.  Mr Gasche advised that the timetabling was a balance of people wanting to get as far as possible as quickly as possible and those that want to travel within Kent and that it was a matter of getting the right balance.

l)     Mr Gasche advised that work was being undertaken to improve train journey times in North Kent but if railway stations were to be withdrawn from the routes there would be complaints. 

m)  Mr Gasche welcomed the reinstatement of the Sheerness rail service to Victoria Station.

n)   Members noted that a Rail Summit was due to be held on 18 May which Members would be invited to.

4.            RESOLVED that the responses to questions by Members and the report be noted.