Increased business means Eurostar should look again at Midlands extension, says MEP

Growth in business on Eurostar trains means a Midlands extension could be viable, believes MEP Liz Lynne

An unexpected rise in business on Eurostar trains to Paris and Brussels should be the impetus to look again at a direct service to Birmingham and the regions, says LibDem MEP Liz Lynne.

Eurostar announced today that sales rose by 6.8% compared with the same July to September period last year. In total, 2.6 million passengers used the service during the quarter, compared with 2.4 million a year ago.

Now West Midlands MEP Liz Lynne has renewed her call for Eurostar to revive the idea of running trains direct from the Channel Tunnel to the regions as a commercial proposition.

Liz Lynne said: "Birmingham needs a direct Eurostar link. We can't afford to wait another ten years for the north London high speed route to be agreed and built. But we don't need to.

"When I first became an MEP ten years ago there were plans for a Eurostar service from Wolverhampton, Birmingham and Rugby via the Tunnel to Brussels. The trains were built, the service even appeared in the 1999 timetable, but it never ran.

"Ten years on things have changed, there are massive environmental reasons for shifting traffic from air to rail. But there is also now a high speed link from just outside St Pancras all the way to Paris and Brussels, and the West Coast route has been improved. It would be easy to run a three hour service from Birmingham International direct to Brussels using the existing main line to London.

"It would be nice if this could be supported by government as the regional service was promised to the Westminster Parliament when the Channel Tunnel was built.

"But I think there are realistic grounds for thinking Eurostar could now run regional services as a fully commercial operation. I am sure Birmingham businesses and the Council would bend over backwards to help them. They should look at it again.

"Even without the dedicated high speed route that we all want to see, a through Eurostar service to Birmingham and Wolverhampton could compete directly with short haul airlines and divert traffic from air to rail, with huge savings in carbon emissions.

"I would certainly use such a service and so would the growing numbers of business people and leisure travellers forced to use short-haul flights instead of surface transport."

ENDS