Metronet

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Metronet Rail

Metronet Rail is a private company, responsible for the maintenance, renewal and upgrade of the infrastructure including track, trains, signals, civil work and stations, on nine London Underground lines. It has five shareholders: Atkins, Balfour Beatty, Bombardier, EDF Energy, and RWE Thames Water. The Metronet Rail Group consist of Metronet Rail BCV Holding Limited, Metronet Rail SSL Holding Limited, Metronet Rail BCV Limited and Metronet Rail SSL Limited; and it operates under the common name of Metronet Rail Limited.

Since January 2003 the London Underground has been operated as a Public-Private Partnership (PPP), where the infrastructure and support services are maintained by private companies but the London Underground is still owned and operated by Transport for London (TfL). Metronet Rail won a 30-year contract for the following BCV and SSL lines:

BCV (tube)lines

SSL (sub-surface) lines

Under the terms of the contract Metronet Rail agrees to provide LU with trains, stations and related infrastructure to the standards and performance levels required to give the travelling public a reliable service in a safe, efficient and economic manner. LU pays the Metronet Rail consortium an infrastructure service charge (ISC), a monthly payment increased or abated to reflect the networks performance. Revenue to the consortium is reduced if service falls below benchmark levels, and deductions suffered for poor performance are at twice the rate of the increase in revenue for improved performance.

Metronet Rail has promised to modernise and refurbish 150 stations by 2012, with £17billion invested over the course of the 30 year contract. Within their maintenance and capital project management remit they have 347 trains, over 471miles of track, 155 stations, 77 miles of deep tube tubes, and over 2000 points, crossings, and bridges.

In November 2006, Metronet were heavily criticised by the PPP arbiter, Chris Bolt, over their performance from 2003 to 2006. His analysis included criticism that Metronet had not performed in an economic or efficient manner, and had failed to follow good industry practice. [1]

The remaining London Underground lines, (Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly) are maintained by Tube Lines.