A contract signed today between the Scottish Government and Network Rail will reconnect the Scottish Borders to the rail network, more than 40 years after the Beeching cuts left it the only mainland UK region with no train stations.
Contrary to some predictions, the £294m deal remains within the most recent capital budget estimate, though the timetable for completing the work has slipped slightly from late 2014 to summer 2015.
Under the agreement, responsibility for completing the new ‘Waverley Line’ will be transferred from the Transport Scotland quango to Network Rail. The work will involve 30 miles of new track and seven new stations, in some areas reclaiming track bed that was built over after the line closed in January 1969. The closure provoked unprecedented protests in the Borders, including a blockade of the line.
Some preparatory work to demolish structures and clear vegetation has already taken place along the 35-mile route between Edinburgh and Tweedbank, near Galashiels. Journey time between the two termini is expected to be about an hour.
The contracting process has been troubled, with ministers having to abandon a competitive bidding process last year when two of the three private consortiums pulled out amid doubts about commercial viability.
Although the romance of the Waverley name, evoking Borders author Sir Walter Scott, has played a prominent part in the long campaign to reopen the line, most of the new stations will be in the burgeoning Midlothian commuter belt immediately south of Edinburgh rather than in the Borders region itself.
Transport minister Keith Brown, who signed the contract at the Scottish National Mining Museum at Newtongrange – one of the new Midlothian stops – called the ceremony ‘a very important milestone’.
He said: ‘We expect that this could provide substantial opportunities for the Borders to increase inward investment. It will bring around 400 construction jobs at its height, and it will allow increased housing development because of the improved transport links in and out of Edinburgh.’
Network Rail Scotland route managing director David Simpson insisted that the timescale for completion was ‘achievable’ and that the line represented ‘a hugely important new asset for Midlothian and the Scottish Borders’.
