Railways: Weather

(asked on 18th October 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to help improve passenger safety on the rail network as a result of unpredictable weather patterns due to the climate emergency.


Answered by
Chris Heaton-Harris Portrait
Chris Heaton-Harris
Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
This question was answered on 26th October 2021

Maintaining a safe rail network, and ensuring that it is resilient to changing weather patterns and extreme weather events, remain key priorities for my Department.

The amount available to manage earthworks and drainage on the rail network has increased significantly, from £952m in Control Period 5 to £1.3bn in Control Period 6. This has enabled Network Rail, in its capacity as the infrastructure manager of Britain’s railways, to undertake additional work during this period to address the challenge of a changing climate and its impact on the railway. Resilience will be a key theme of planning for the next periodic review for Control Period 7.

Network Rail has worked hard to ensure that lessons learnt from the Carmont derailment in August 2020 are implemented across the entire rail network, building on the findings of two expert-led taskforces that resulted in the Mair and Slingo reports published earlier this year. These measures include a renewed focus on management of earthworks, proactive inspection of slopes following high rainfall using drones and helicopters, upskilling of the workforce to use weather data and technology more effectively, and trialling new technology to improve early detection and risk assessment. My Department and the Office of Rail and Road will be closely monitoring progress in implementing these recommendations.

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