Record autumn performance on Scotland’s Railway

Last updated: Friday, 20 December 2019

Unprecedented investment across Scotland’s Railway, including £475 million on new and upgraded trains, has helped to deliver the best autumn for customers in five years.

New figures for the most recent period of performance (17 November – 7 December) show that 84.4 per cent of trains met the rail industry standard public performance measure (PPM) – a five year high for the traditionally difficult period.

Better preparations for the effects of autumn weather included Network Rail ‘leaf buster’ trains treating 20,000 more miles of track than in 2018, having started earlier than in previous years.

Ground-breaking technologies were used for the very first time in Scotland to keep railheads clean. Rapid response crews were based at key points across the network to react more quickly to incidents.

More class 385 Hitachi electric trains are running on the network which also paved the way for the class 314 trains being removed from service, improving the quality of service for customers.

The hard work has contributed to more than 700,000 trains meeting their punctuality target in 2019 – the highest number for a single year in the history of the railway in Scotland.


This also means that PPM MAA (Moving Annual Average) is now 88.3 per cent.

The positive period of performance came in a month when ScotRail opened Robroyston station – the 60th in Glasgow, delivering an additional park and ride facility to better connect people with Scotland’s two main cities. A new platform was also opened by Network Rail at Dunbar station.

Alex Hynes, Managing Director of Scotland’s Railway, said:

“Everyone across Scotland’s Railway has worked tirelessly to deliver a more stable, reliable, and robust service during this challenging time of year, and it’s encouraging to see that we delivered the best autumn performance in five years.

“The fact that more trains than ever before have ran on time shows the impact of the unprecedented investment in Scotland’s Railway to give customers the service they expect and deserve.”