THE WEST Midlands Railway (WMR) train fleet has carried more than 12million passengers since it was rolled out a year ago and has picked up a prestigious national award.
Passengers on the Cross City Line, which connects Lichfield to Bromsgrove and Redditch via Birmingham, first boarded the new Class 730/0 electric train fleet in March 2024.
The full roll-out officially completed on September 26, 2024.
Each three-carriage Class 730 train has capacity for 546 passengers. As the trains run in pairs on the Cross City Line, providing six carriages for customers to use, every service can comfortably carry more than 1,000 people.
In their first year, the new trains have proven popular with commuters and leisure travellers alike with more than a million journeys made every single month.
WMR reported a 19 per cent rise in customer satisfaction on the route since the new trains entered service, citing their spacious carriages, intelligent air conditioning and modern features as factors behind the uplift.
The new trains – part of WMR’s £1billion investment in the railway – brought a significant increase in capacity to the line as well as customer benefits including air conditioning, improved accessibility and power points at every seat.
Jonny Wiseman, West Midlands Railway’s customer experience director, said: “This new fleet is the flagship for our £1billion investment into new trains and infrastructure.
“We want to provide the best possible passenger experience, and we are so pleased that the Class 730/0s are making such a positive impact on customer satisfaction already.
“The Cross City Line is the busiest commuter route outside of London, so boosting capacity was hugely important to us.
“The new three-carriage trains run in pairs, comfortably offering space for over 1,000 people on every Cross City Line service.”
Award-winning
The roll-out of the new fleet was recognised at the prestigious National Rail Awards ceremony in London on September 17 where it won for ‘Fleet Achievement of the Year’.
The National Rail Awards is run by RAIL magazine and is often referred to as the ‘Oscars of the railway’.
Judges said the trains had made a significant difference for passengers in the West Midlands.
John Doughty, WMR engineering director, said: “The introduction of the Class 730/0 fleet represented the biggest upgrade to the Cross City Line since the 1990s.
“The trains have proved incredibly popular with our customers and their arrival has certainly contributed to the increasing number of passengers we are seeing using the route each year.
“Introducing a new train fleet is never an easy task with a lot of moving parts and I am pleased to see the hard work of everybody at West Midlands Railway in bringing the trains into service recognised at the National Rail Awards.”
Another accolade
As well as serving Birmingham New Street, the line includes the award-winning University Station, which saw over 3million passengers use the new fleet in its first year, since the transformation.
As well as the Cross City Line, Class 730 trains run on routes connecting central Birmingham with destinations including Walsall, Wolverhampton, Rugeley and Birmingham International.
Visit: westmidlandsrailway.co.uk/travel-information/whats-new/new-trains/class-730-fleet for more on the Class 730 fleet.
