Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham along with other mayors in the North of England have written to the chancellor and secretary of state for transport in a bid to get rail services back on track. Mr Burnham called an emergency meeting of the Rail North Committee, which he chairs, following what the committee described as a spate of cancellations, overcrowding and 'Do Not Travel' warnings on Sunday, which have impacted services in Bolton . It is feared that without intervention, the situation could get worse, affecting confidence amongst shoppers and travellers at the busiest time of the year.
The committee say the situation must be reversed in the interest of passengers and the region’s businesses, especially those in the retail and hospital sectors. The meeting saw leaders question the operator’s remedial plan to get services back to an acceptable standard as swiftly as possible. It followed a notable spike in cancellations, with the past week – half-term for many schools – seeing around 1,600 trains cancelled across the network - almost 10 per cent of services - with a lack of mitigations in place such as ticket acceptance with other operators.
READ MORE: MP brings Northern rail ‘scandal’ to Parliament after Bolton woman fined Northern tells passengers to 'avoid trains' for fifth time Weekend travel, particularly on Sundays, is worst hit, with Greater Manchester now regularly seeing between 30 per cent and 40 per cent of services cancelled. ‘Do Not Trave.