Transpennine Route Upgrade

Infrastructure and Construction

Record date: 31 March 2026

Whole-life cost: £10.7bn
Published schedule: 01/07/2017 – 17/10/2041
NISTA delivery confidence: Not disclosed
Senior responsible owner: Farha Sheikh

What the project is for

The Transpennine Route Upgrade (TRU) is a large-scale upgrade of the railway between Manchester, Leeds and York and will provide more capacity, and faster, more reliable, greener journeys. We are investing £11bn in TRU, £7.3bn of which has already been committed. This is the largest rail investment in the north of England and the second biggest nationally after HS2. TRU is well underway and delivering successfully to time and budget. A rolling programme of upgrades will deliver benefits incrementally over the next decade with some being delivered now. It will support passengers by electrifying the 70-mile route, addressing pinch points, remodelling stations, adopting digital signalling and introducing new trains. This will facilitate the introduction of a new, enhanced timetable for passengers, delivering more reliable and quicker journeys between key cities. TRU is developing options to benefit freight by facilitating up to 15 freight paths (using the largest wagons available) in each direction per day across the north of England, the equivalent to removing 1,140 lorry movements a day. Such a modal shift from road freight to rail would ease congestion and reduce pollution.

Departmental delivery commentary

Compared to financial year 23/24-Q4, the Infrastructure Project Authority's Delivery Confidence Assessment rating at 25/26-Q4 remained at AMBER. This is primarily due to continued strong programme performance and integration of programmes across the north of England. To date, £7.3bn has been committed to the upgrade, with the Prime Minister announcing in March 2025 an additional £415m to maintain programme delivery and support passengers to travel by rail whilst major works are taking place along the TRU route. Infrastructure delivery continues to be delivered to time and budget with electrification works on the line between York and Church Fenton completed in August 2025 enabling electric operations on 25% of the Transpennine route. Major works were commenced at Huddersfield station in September 2025 with new bridges and longer platforms delivered as well as a new train stabling facility at Hillhouse. Benefits delivery remains on schedule with the bulk of improvements being delivered by the end of the 2020s (when the line of route between Huddersfield and York will be fully upgraded) and the remainder by the mid-2030s (when digital signalling and the section of the route between Huddersfield and Stalybridge will complete). 95% of the programme is now in either the Design or Delivery phase with several significant blockades taking place in 2026 to renew track and install overhead electrification. Comprehensive customer handling plans are in place and routine assurance by DfT teams is carried out to test their suitability; to date disruption across the route continues to be handled well with high passenger satisfaction scores. TransPennine Trains' existing diesel-only fleet will also be replaced to maximise the new electrification capability. A procurement has been undertaken and a contract award is expected in summer 2026. A Cost Efficiency panel, chaired by DfT's Non-Executive Director to the programme, continues to oversee activities to deliver the identified cost efficiency targets. In February 2026 a new Shareholder Forum was established to enable the Accounting Officers within the Department for Transport and Network Rail to consider programme delivery and future challenges to benefits realisation.

Schedule

Compared to financial year 24/25-Q4, the project's end-date at 25/26-Q4 remained at 17/10/2041 and was informed by a baselining exercise that aligned all Key Output realisation dates with Programme Business Case 2 (PBC2) commitments. The bulk of TRU's benefits will be delivered by the mid-2030s, with additional digital signalling capability becoming available by the early 2040s. The programme has a stable integrated schedule based on Baseline 2.1 agreed by Enterprise partners which maintains Key Output dates for KO1 to KO5b as agreed at PBC2, as well as the PBC2 funding position for all infrastructure sub-projects. Baseline 2.1 created a stable programme baseline position with a realistic and achievable critical path now committed to with both delivery Alliances as part of the W34 and E234 contract awards. It also forecasts P50 and P80 delivery dates and timelines for benefits delivery. The approval of the TOC-Business Case in March 2025, confirmed alignment of train-operator related delivery plans with Baseline 2.1. KO2 (electrification of services between Manchester Victoria and Stalybridge) was completed ahead of schedule at the end of 2024, and KO3 (electrification of TransPennine Services between York and Church Fenton)was delivered on time in summer 2025.

Cost

The departmentally agreed Whole Life Cost at FY2025/26 Q4 increased from £11,056m to £11,199m. This is stated in nominal terms. This is primarily due to re-alignment of portfolio budgets with the current forecast as the previous budget position was not sufficient. The current forecast has changed marginally from £11,204m to £11,210m.

Benefits

The departmentally agreed Benefits at FY2025/26 Q4 remains at £2,978m. This is stated in Present Value 2010 terms. The estimate continues to reflect the baseline set at Programme Business Case 2 (May 2023). This estimate is expected to be revised over the period to the next Annual Report, assuming the current draft Programme Business Case 3 is approved. This is not a significant update, and the scope and outputs of the programme remain stable.