Karl McCartney MP has today welcomed the news that train services between Nottingham, Newark Castle and Lincoln are to be improved through a three-year service enhancement. The new timetable will deliver faster journey times on a total of 16 services between Nottingham and Lincoln and will reduce the fastest journey time to just 47 minutes.
The Department for Transport has been working with East Midlands Trains, Nottinghamshire County Council, Lincolnshire County Council, Newark & Sherwood District Council and Newark Business Club, as well as local Members of Parliament in order to develop proposals to provide an improved train service for passengers travelling between Nottingham and Lincoln.
The key improvements which East Midlands Trains propose to make include: providing 12 additional trains a day between Newark and Nottingham; reducing journey times on the Nottingham-Lincoln services including journey times cut by 10 minutes on six daily services; introducing 11 additional daily stops at Hykeham to provide broadly an hourly service to both Lincoln and Newark; introducing an additional morning peak train from Lincoln to Nottingham arriving at around 0740; and providing additional calls at all of the intermediate stations between Nottingham and Newark Castle.
Karl McCartney MP said: “Since my election to Parliament in 2010, I have worked assiduously to secure improvements to our City, County and Region’s transport infrastructure.
“These improved train services for passengers travelling between Nottingham and Lincoln are very much a reflection of the representations that I and other Conservative Members of Parliament in Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire have made to Conservative Transport Ministers, both formally and informally, including in the Nottingham to Lincoln Railway Line Adjournment Debate in the House of Commons on 27 January this year.
“As I told the then Minister for Rail in that Debate, the Lincoln-Newark-Nottingham service is well below the normal standard of all comparable routes in all key respects - frequency, speed, capacity and onward connections.
“Therefore these additional trains and reduced journey times are to be warmly welcomed and clearly show that Conservatives in Government are on our side.”
“Unlike under the last Labour Government who, over 13 long years, failed miserably to deliver the transport infrastructure my Lincoln Constituents and the people of Lincolnshire need, want and deserve – despite Lincoln’s former Labour MP being a Transport Minister during some of that time – our Conservative-led Government is listening to our concerns and taking real and positive steps to improve our transport system for the long term.”
Stephen Phillips QC MP, the Member of Parliament for Sleaford and North Hykeham, added: “I am delighted that the Government has pledged more rail investment in our area and that there will soon be a more frequent service on the Castle Line – many of my constituents use it and I know how frustrating it is to spend an hour going only a few miles, so more direct trains will be a boon to a large number of residents.”
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For further information, please contact Karl McCartney MP at [email protected] / 020 7219 7221.