Its almost time for the Greater Nottingham Light Rail Transit Committee to meet again and as we know by now that also means that the latest operational report on Nottingham Express Transit is released. This includes points of interest such as performance statistics.
The report covers the three months from the start of November 2023 until the end of January 2024 and in this period reliability of the tram service was 94.7% and the punctuality was at 93.7%. This both compare fairly favourably with the figures for the previous three months which were at 94.6% and 95.1%.
Despite these fairly high figures the report lists a number of challenges:
- Storms bringing flooding, snow, high winds and freezing temperatures.
- Increase in city footfall and traffic congestion leading to service delays. This has included pro-Palestinian marches on most Saturdays which blocks the tramways at times.
- An increase in third-party incidents including minor collision near the Fletcher Gate car park, Meadows Embankment, Radford Road and Berridge Road
- 30th November – a collision between a tram and a wheelchair which saw the Police close the road for seven hours. Investigations found that a brake had not been applied correctly by the person pushing the wheelchair when they turned to close a gate. Although the tram driver responded quickly to apply their brakes, the collision was unavoidable and the wheelchair user sustained head injuries. Welfare support has since been provided to the tram driver.
- Heavy rainfall and stormy weather in December led to localised flooding and debris being blow onto the tracks and overhead. This included the level crossing barrier blown onto the overhead line at Bulwell Forest.
- Storm Henk in January – took the River Trent to record levels and flooded a section of track at Wilford Lane.
- A cold front later in January saw temperatures fall to -10c which caused issues with frozen screen wash and motors.
In more positive news, during 2023 there was a focus on recruiting and training more drivers to allow additional resilience to tram services. This had a good impact during these three months and improved service performance levels.
This latest report gives no update on the status of some of the trams which are sidelined with faults/damage. This includes 232 which derailed last summer.