Judge: TfL’s Tramtrack legal action is ‘absurd’

1:47pm Saturday 25th March 2006

Legal action intended to force the company that runs Croydon's tram network to increase passenger numbers has been thrown out by the High Court.

At the High Court last Friday, Judge Justice Tomlinson ruled that the action brought by Transport for London (TfL) was "absurd".

TfL applied to the High Court to try to force Tramtrack to increase the number of passengers travelling on the system by either lengthening existing trams or adding extra ones.

The tram system which is designed to carry up to 28million passengers a year and operates between Croydon, Wimbledon and Beckenham opened in May 2000. It carries 22million passengers a year.

But Judge Tomlinson said that as stated in its contract Tramtrack, which was awarded the concession for Croydon's tram link in 1996, should be free to exercise its judgement to determine how best to maintain standards of efficiency and reliability of the network.

Tramtrack's managing director Paul Davison said: "We felt it was important to establish as correct our interpretation of the contract with TfL.

"An adverse ruling would have had serious implications for all those investing through PPP initiatives such as those involved with the London Underground as it would have cast doubt on the terms of their agreements, increased their risks and reduced their capacity to invest in infrastructure.

"We now look forward to working more closely with TfL to continue to deliver to our customers a successful and efficient tram service and hope to foster a relationship with TfL based on trust and co-operation, rather than litigation."

A TfL spokesman said: "It's a disappointing result, though perhaps not unexpected. What we were trying to do was to work with Tramtrack to see if they could increase the capacity. They stuck firmly to the letter of their contract and the judge agreed that they were entitled to do so.

"We're trying to look years ahead to see if there is any flexibility on their behalf and see what options are open to us."

Roger Harding, general manager of Tramtrack, said: "When we set the contract up it was done on the basis that we were left to our own devices because we put up half the cost of the system."

One plan to increase passenger numbers is to make a timetable change which would increase the frequency of trams on the Wimbledon line.