Satisfaction guaranteed for Metro passengers
A MAJOR national survey of tram passengers has recorded high satisfaction levels amongst users of the Midland Metro.
The first ever Tram Passenger Survey by influential transport watchdog Passenger Focus saw a 92% approval rating from people using the line between Birmingham Snow Hill and Wolverhampton.
This compares favourably with other recent Passenger Focus surveys which found that 88% of bus and 83% of rail passengers in the Centro area were satisfied with their journey.
A total of 87% of Midland Metro passengers were satisfied with the punctuality of the service, while just 7% experienced some delay to their journey.
The Midland Metro is run by Centro, the region’s transport authority and operated by National Express UK Bus.
Paul Griffiths, Metro programme director for Centro, said: “It is great to see how highly passengers rate their experience of using Midland Metro, particularly when we are in the middle of a major project to expand the fleet and extend the route.
“Our new fleet of modern trams will make a huge difference to passengers and hopefully give even higher satisfaction by the time of next year’s survey.”
Peter Coates, managing director of National Express UK Bus, said: “It is great to see that 92% of our Midland Metro customers are satisfied with our service.
“However these results are not the end of the road for Metro improvements in the West Midlands, they just prove we are on the right track.
“Over the next 12 months we will be improving our service further by extending our route and bringing £40 million of new trams into service.”
A new £40m fleet of Urbos 3 trams will begin running on the Metro from this summer.
They are a third bigger than the Metro’s existing trams, carrying around 210 passengers compared to 156 on the current T69 model.
This, together with a frequency of 10 trams an hour, will increase overall capacity by 40%, easing the overcrowding that sometimes occurs during peak times.
The £128m extension of the Metro from Snow Hill to New Street is due for completion next year and is expected to create more than 1,300 new jobs and boost the regional economy by more than £50m a year.
The survey questioned 566 passengers on the Metro last autumn, part of a total of 5,250 tram passengers nationally.
Other areas surveyed were the Blackpool tramway, Manchester Metrolink, Nottingham Express Transit and Sheffield Supertram.
