Humza Yousaf, the Scottish transport minister, announced that he had ordered a full operational review to investigate the problems of the new Borders railway, a new 56 km line from Edinburgh Waverley to Tweedbank.
“The reliability of the service has not been to the standard I expect. I have therefore asked ScotRail to present me with an improvement plan for the line, which will reassure passengers with enhanced reliability as quickly as possible,” Humza Yousaf said.
ScotRail and the Scottish government said the line had been far more popular than the original projections, a high traffic that itself caused delays. Several problems added to this. According to ScotRail, the second-hand Class 158 diesel trains used on the line are unable to deal with the steep gradient on a part of the route. At the same time, according to campaigners, axle counters have suffered repeated faults, causing trains to stop.
Since October last year the line has never had a week where more than 70% of services were on time, and in some weeks the figure has been as low as 30%.
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