Restoring your railway fund

The Department for Transport has released further details on the launch of its £500 million ‘Restoring Your Railway Fund’.

It comes as MPs, local councils and community groups across England and Wales are being invited to propose how they would use funding to reinstate axed local services and restore closed stations.

It reads: “Investing in transport links is essential to levelling up access to opportunities across the country, ensuring our communities are better connected, local economies flourish and more than half a century of isolation is undone.

“Published in 1963, the Beeching Report was followed by the closure of almost 2,500 stations and around 5,000 miles of track. Whilst most of the closures took place in the 1960s, some continued well into the 1970s. Many communities still remain isolated from the rail network following the closure of their local railway line or station more than 5 decades ago.

“The Department for Transport has launched a £500 million Restoring Your Railway Fund. We are inviting MPs, local councils and community groups across England and Wales to propose how they could use funding to reinstate axed local services and restore stations.”

How the fund will work

The fund will be split in 3 ways to ensure the Department for Transport can support different projects at different phases of development:

• Ideas fund.
• Accelerating existing proposals.
• Proposals for new or restored stations.

Ideas fund

The ideas fund will offer support to proposals to reinstate axed local services, which should be sponsored by MPs working with local authorities and community groups. Proposals will then be put to panel of experts, with successful ideas offered support from the fund to help develop more detailed business cases. There will be at least two rounds of assessment for proposals – one in March and one in June.

Accelerating existing proposals

The Department for Transport is making funding available to accelerate the development and delivery of schemes that already have existing business cases. This will use the standard government assessment framework and DfT officials will support applicants in progressing projects. Funding may also support newer schemes that already have supporting analysis and are seeking a larger sum of support to progress to an outline business case.

Proposals for new or restored stations 

The DfT is running a further £20 million round of the New Station Fund. The fund will open shortly and is expected the core criteria will be similar to previous rounds:

• The business case should demonstrate reasonable value for money – the DfT classification of medium value for money will be used as a comparative indication.
• This includes the strategic case – for example, unlocking housing.
• The proportion of third party match funding available (minimum 25%).
• The security of match funding achieved at the time of the bid.
• The expected quantity of new rail income generated from station/on-going subsidy required.
• Ability to timetable services effectively and likely impact on other passenger transport benefits.
• Minimised passenger disruption during project delivery.

For more information about the ‘Restoring Your Railway Fund’ visit https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/re-opening-beeching-era-lines-and-stations/re-opening-beeching-era-lines-and-stations

Photo credit: Nagmar/Shutterstock

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