Britain announces new Bradford station expected by mid-2030s
Northern Powerhouse Rail promised since 2014 now capped at 45 billion pounds, steelworks pay 30 pounds more per megawatt-hour than French rivals
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A Great Northern train at Bradford Interchange station, where the new station will be built. Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images
theguardian.com
Britain will build a new railway station in Bradford on the site of the present Interchange, the government has announced, with through trains between Leeds and Manchester and completion expected by the mid-2030s. Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander called it "a brand-new station that will transform how people travel across the north," and the Department for Transport promised a "turn-up-and-go railway" — trains frequent enough that passengers need not check timetables.
The station sits at the heart of Northern Powerhouse Rail, first promised by the Conservatives in 2014; no firm funded plans followed for the proposed line linking cities from Liverpool to Hull. In January, Keir Starmer's government announced the scheme would be delivered in three stages, beginning with improvements to existing lines around Yorkshire, under a funding cap of £45 billion that local contributions could top up. The Treasury has already refused the underground station at Manchester Piccadilly that Greater Manchester's mayor, Andy Burnham, championed, and the industry now expects work on Manchester–Birmingham links to replace the scrapped northern leg of HS2. Henri Murison of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership called the Bradford decision "a long-term commitment to the city and the wider north."
The same week, the industry body UK Steel reported that British steelmakers pay almost £30 per megawatt-hour more for electricity than their French competitors, the widest gap in three years. Sixty-five British listed companies issued profit warnings in a single quarter, the most in nearly two years. Bradford council, for its part, counts more than £1 billion in economic benefits from the station and the proposed Leeds tram.
In South Yorkshire, the combined authority and Doncaster council are buying Doncaster Sheffield airport from Peel Land, which shut it in November 2022 after judging it commercially unviable, in the hope of restarting freight next year and passenger flights by spring 2028. Subject to formal approval, mayor Oliver Coppard said, the deal "puts the future of DSA back in our hands."
The station is expected in the mid-2030s. The steelworks' electricity bills arrive monthly.