The Tyne and Wear Metro will now be able to train double the number of new drivers following the expansion of their training programme it has been announced by Nexus. This is the biggest expansion of training in Metro’s history and comes as a response to a high turnover of staff in recent years.
As from 2nd September the annual Metro driver intake was increased from 24 to 48 trainees with six courses per year instead of the previous three. Nexus are currently selecting new trainee drivers from the 2,346 people who applied earlier this year with the successful applicants then joining a waiting list to enter training courses over the next two years.
Chris Carson, Metro Services Director, commented: “This is the biggest expansion of our driver training programme since Metro opened in 1980. We have doubled the number of Metro drivers that we can train in a year. This will allow us to draw down greater driver resources and offset issues we have faced due to a higher turnover of staff. I know that passengers get frustrated when they see trains taken out of service due to resource issues. We have worked tirelessly to address this. The clear way ahead was to increase the number of drivers that we can train up and this is now happening. We were inundated with thousands of applications when we advertised earlier this year and it’s great to see the successful candidates starting their training.”