22nd Jun 2007 07:02
Department For Transport22 June 2007 Stock Market statement DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT ANNOUNCES WINNER OF EAST MIDLANDS FRANCHISE More services and extra capacity for the Midlands THE DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT today announced that Stagecoach Midland RailLimited (a subsidiary of Stagecoach Group plc) has been awarded the contract torun the East Midlands franchise. The new franchise will begin on 11th November 2007and end on April 1st 2015.However the DfT has the right to terminate the franchise after six years if theoperator is failing to meet agreed performance targets. The franchise will deliver increased capacity, better performance and theintroduction of smartcard technology by 2010. The East Midlands franchise brings together current Midland Mainline servicesfrom London St Pancras and the eastern section of Central Trains. It willreceive a subsidy in the early years of the franchise and pay a premium in thelater years. Over the seven year and four month life of the franchise a premiumof £133m (NPV) will be paid to the Department. Benefits to passengers include: - An extra hourly Kettering - London service, with agreement to extend this to a new station at Corby - A new direct daily service between Lincoln and London - Two trains an hour between London and the new East Midlands Parkway station from 2008 - A 9% increase in peak capacity into and out of London St Pancras, plus more carriages on the busiest trains between Liverpool and Nottingham. - More than £5m of improvements at stations and more than £20m on enhancing rolling stock; - Provision of at least 1250 new car parking spaces and 400 more bicycle spaces; - Forecast 90.4% punctuality and reliability by the end of the franchise The Government will continue to limit annual rises of regulated fares in linewith national policy, which is currently RPI+1% . As with all franchises, unregulated fares will be the responsibility of theoperator. In the East Midlands, Stagecoach Midland Rail Limited is expected toincrease unregulated fares by an average of RPI+3.4% per annum. Passengers will benefit from new arrangements to be compensated for delays andpoor performance. ENDS Notes to Editors: 1. The premium profile for the East Midlands franchise is: Mar-08 Mar-09 Mar-10 Mar-11 Mar-12 Mar-13 Mar-14 Mar-15 35,651* 64,291 36,461 424 (43,842) (77,355) (98,315) (154,978) (Nominal, £000s, part years indicated with asterisks, premium numbers in brackets) 2. The parties invited to submit bids for the East Midlands franchise wereArriva Trains East Midlands Limited (Arriva plc); First East Midlands Limited(First Group plc); NXE Trains Limited (National Express Group plc); StagecoachMidland Rail Limited (Stagecoach Group plc). 3. The new passenger refund system, Delay/Repay, will compensate seasonticket holders for delays to journeys they have actually taken, not on the basisof overall performance. This is the same compensation system as currentlyoperates for single, return and weekly ticket holders. Refunds will be on thebasis of the proportional daily cost of season tickets, with a 50% single refundfor delays of 30-59 minutes, 100% single refund for delays of 60-119 minutes,and 100% return refund for delays of 120 minutes+. This system will be rolledout nationally during the term of each new franchise. 4. More details are available on the Department for Transport website at www.dft.gov.uk This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock ExchangeRelated Shares:
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