Major Milestone Marked As Half A Million Journeys Are Made On The Northumberland Line
The title of this post, is the same as that of this news item on the Northumberland County Council web site.
These are the first four paragraphs.
500,000 passengers have now travelled on the Northumberland Line since it opened, train operator Northern has announced.
The operator has been running trains since the line opened in December 2024, with the milestone of half a million customer journeys achieved just eight months later.
Services call at Newcastle, Manors and at new stations in Seaton Delaval, Newsham and Ashington, with a journey along the entire route taking around 35 minutes and a single fare costing no more than £3.
Trains are proving to be particularly popular during school holidays and weekends.
This news release shows how successful and popular reopening disused railways can be and paints a similar picture to what happened in Deven on the Dartmoor Line to Okehampton, that I wrote about in Dartmoor Line Passes 250,000 Journeys On Its First Anniversary, As Rail Minister Visits To Mark Official Opening Of The Station Building.
We should be looking for more similar lines like the Dartmoor and Northumberland Lines to reopen.
These must be candidates.
- The Ivanhoe Line in Leicestershire.
- The Fleetwood Line in Lancashire.
- The Wisbech Line in Cambridgeshire.
At least the government is reopening the Portishead Line in Somerset.
The Anonymous Widower 
Im sure it will easily get up to 2-3m/yr when all stn are open but at £3/journey that will be 6-9m which should cover the cost of leasing the rolling stock and staff and maybe variable access charges. However the £300m spent on it (which was a ridiculous amount for an existing railway) will never be repaid through fares nor even the interest. Of course its the wider economic benefits that the line enables that also have to be counted here and given the high population density it should be advantageous.
Problem is though the majority other projects that were in play had far worse economics although of course get the costs sensible and then the business case improves. So how do we do that? These are largely branch lines but are being built to 100mph standards along with the drive to eliminate LXs so the industry ought to review standards and come up with some suitable for say 60mph. Of course turn it into a tram line and the costs fall away considerably.
Comment by Nicholas Lewis | August 7, 2025 |