Hull Railway Station must improve

Hull North MP Diana Johnson this week called for an acceleration of the planned improvements to Hull Railway Station at a meeting of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee.

The Committee of MPs met this week to discuss a report by the National Audit Office Office on Maintaining and Improving Britain's Railway Stations.

Diana Johnson believes that further regeneration of Hull's rail terminal should be feasible due to the major regeneration work in Hull town centre, some of it linked to the station itself.

The Hull North MP also spoke at the committee of the more general need for Britain's rail stations to be better equipped in terms of facilities and staff training to handle new obligations to people with disabilities, better toilet facilities and for agencies to work closely together to combat anti-social behaviour and vandalism at stations.

Diana pointed to the example of Leipzig Station in Germany which has linked retail and commercial development with improving the rail station.

Diana Johnson MP said: "An up and coming City needs a modern, safe and attractive rail station.

"Previously one constraint on getting public and private investment into Hull Railway Station has been the chicken and egg problem of it not being used by enough customers. Of course, the state of the station was one of the reasons for this!

"However, with sites such as St. Stephen's next to the station seeing major redevelopment and the demolition of Paragon House in front of the station, I believe that the opportunity now exists locally to attract more retail units and other private investment and be more ambitious about improving Hull Station itself.

"TransPennine Express are already working on a welcome programme of improvements at Hull Station - on cleansing, better ticket office opening and facilities, CCTV catering, roof repairs, better parking and customer information systems. However, I would like to see more momentum to this process of creating a more attractive and safer station for Hull."

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