UTG Publishes SYSTRA Regional Rail Report

The Urban Transport Group (UTG) has today published SYSTRA’s report ‘The Transformational Benefits of Investing in Regional Rail: four case studies’. The new research builds upon our 2015 report for UTG, Destination Growth, and illustrates the benefits of investing in regional rail by identifying the value of four different types of services:

• The development of new passenger services on an existing freight route;
• A whole route upgrade approach;
• The linking of two radial passenger routes into a city to create cross-city journey opportunities;
• The transformation of an entire rail network to include tram-train technologies and on-street running in city centres.

Project Director Alan Beswick says “While our research shows that all the case studies represent high value for money in Department for Transport appraisal terms, the real value of the investment goes far beyond this and these case studies illustrate how regional rail can be an effective conduit for facilitating regeneration, economic growth and environmental improvement.”

The full report can be downloaded here