Tyne and Wear Metro

Introduction
Metro facts
Metro stations
Safety and security on the Metro
Other Metro facts

Introduction

The Tyne and Wear Metro is owned and managed by Nexus, the passenger transport executive for Tyne and Wear. Nexus is spending £400 million modernising Metro between 2007 and 2019.

Metro is a modern light railway serving the Newcastle, Gateshead, North Tyneside, South Tyneside and Sunderland districts of North East England.

In recognition of its standard of excellence in customer service, the Tyne and Wear Metro regained accreditation to the Government's Charter Mark standard again in 2007 , with nine areas of best practice singled out.

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Metro facts.

• Track: 77.5km, 18.5km of which was added for the Sunderland extension and is managed by Network Rail.
• Stations: 60, serving the major residential, retail and employment areas of Tyne and Wear
• Rolling stock: 90 Metrocars, built by Metro-Cammell in Birmingham
• Employees: Approx. 1000 - of which 220 are train drivers
• Passenger journeys 2007/08: 39.8 million
• Operated train kilometres per annum: 4.8 million
• The first phase of Tyne and Wear Metro, from Haymarket to Tynemouth, opened in August 1980. The remainder was progressively opened in phases through to 1984. Total cost £284 million (at 1984 prices).
• August 1980 – Haymarket to Tynemouth (1980/81 patronage figures = 10.3m)
• May 1981 – South Gosforth to Bankfoot
• November 1981 – Haymarket to Heworth (1981/82 patronage figures = 27.6m)
• November 1982 – Tynemouth to St James (1982/83 patronage figures = 40.7m)
• May 1983 – Heworth to South Shields (1983/84 patronage figures = 49.8m)
• 1991 – Bank Foot to Airport (1991/92 patronage figures = 40.6m)
• March 2002 – Sunderland Extension (2003/04 patronage figures = 37.9m)
• Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II formally opened Metro on November 6, 1981
• The Queen also officially opened Sunderland Metro extension on May 7, 2002

Metro offers a train every three minutes through central Newcastle and Gateshead during peak periods, between the junction stations of Pelaw and South Gosforth, and every six-seven minutes at other times. There are trains every 12 minutes on other parts of the network, and every 15 minutes evenings and Sundays. Trains run every 24 minutes between Park Lane and South Hylton.

An all-zone annual MetroSaver season ticket costs £425, giving passengers travel anywhere on the system for the equivalent of £1.20 a day. Discount season tickets are available for concessionary pass holders (£12-£25 annually) and students. Under 16s travel for £1 a day on Metro, or anywhere on public transport in Tyne and Wear with a Nexus under 16 card.

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Metro stations

Metro stations are located near the major residential and employment areas of Tyne and Wear, allowing tens of thousands of people in the region easy access to quality public transport. Most Metro stations are above ground, although stations in Newcastle city centre, Gateshead town centre and Sunderland city centre are underground.

All Metro stations have level access to streets, ramps, lifts or escalators. Metro stations in city centre areas often feature Nexus Travelshops, where passengers can pick up travel information and season and discount tickets. Because Nexus acts as an agent for many local and national operators, passengers can also book UK and overseas holidays at Nexus Travelshops. Some busier stations also have shops, take-away coffee stands and cashpoints.

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Safety and security on the Metro.

Metro is a safe way to travel with a low level of crime and impeccable safety record. Passenger safety is at the heart of everything Metro does and we ensure that everyone who works on the system, whether they are out on the trains, helping people at stations or working behind the scenes is properly qualified and trained to help people travel with confidence.

Metro employs roaming and fixed staff to look after passengers throughout the day and night. In addition, it pays for dedicated police units from Northumbria Police (in Tyneside) and British Transport Police (in Wearside) to patrol Metro. The human presence is backed up by one of the UK’s largest and most sophisticated CCTV networks. Almost 600 cameras monitored from six control rooms are sited in and around stations. By the middle of 2009 all 90 Metrocars will also be fitted with digital CCTV.

Metro has been an Alcohol Exclusion Zone since 2004. This is a specific by-law allowing police and staff to seize open alcohol containers and eject passengers seen drinking at stations or on trains.

Since 2004 overall crime on Metro has fallen by around a third. Fare evasion has been halved in the same period to around 5% of journeys. Tracking surveys of customers show passengers feel safer on the system, see staff more frequently and see fewer teenage gangs.

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Other Metro facts: Did you know?

• Metro can claim to be the world's oldest commuter railway. Two of its sections were already operating as passenger railways in 1838: Between Chillingham Road and North Shields, and Gateshead Stadium and Brockley Whins
• Although Metro opened in 1980, most of its route was previously part of one of the world's first electric suburban railways, which began service in 1904
• Metro has become the first underground train network in the UK to install repeaters allowing customers to use their mobile phone in tunnels and underground stations.
• The font used on station signs was drawn up specially for Metro by designer Margaret Calvert when the system opened.
• The original Metro test track was built in 1975 at what is now the Stephenson Railway Museum, North Tyneside. The prototype Metro cars, 4001 and 4002, remain in service to this day and have travelled the equivalent of 60 times round the world.
• A number of disused mineshafts in Newcastle and Gateshead, some of them hundreds of years old, had to be filled in to allow Metro tunnels to be dug
• The journey time from Newcastle’s Haymarket city centre station to its International Airport, 20 minutes, is the shortest rail link of its kind in the UK.
• The Nexus Art on Public Transport scheme has commissioned more than 35 permanent art works across Metro since 1978.
• Metro was the first railway in the UK to use the metric system throughout
• Smoking has been forbidden on trains since service began in 1980; this was one of the UK’s first comprehensive smoking bans.
• Wallsend station is probably the only public facility in Britain in which the signage is in Latin – a reference to nearby Segedunum Roman Fort and Museum at the east end of Hadrian's Wall

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