The Tyne and Wear Metro will soon have a second depot with work now having started on the construction of a temporary depot at Howden in North Tyneside. This depot is due to be ready for use by summer 2020 and is required to provide accommodation to trains whilst the current depot at Gosforth is rebuilt ahead of the delivery of the new trains.
This new depot is located on a former landfill site in Howdon and will be used for the cleaning and preparation of up to ten of the current trains during the work at Gosforth. It will also play a key role in the phase delivery of the new trains from the end of 2021 when they start to arrive in the northeast.
Tobyn Hughes, Managing Director of Nexus, said: “We need a temporary Metro depot while we transition to permanent new maintenance facilities and the new Metro train fleet. Our main depot in Gosforth is going to be completely rebuilt and this work will happen in stages, so we must have a bespoke location to store and maintain our trains while that project is delivered over the next few years. The site in North Tyneside is ideal for us, and it can also be used as the delivery point when the Metro new trains start arriving.”
The location of this new depot is on the coastal route north of the River Tyne on the section between the city centre and North Shields.