A new report has warned Merseyrail’s winter failings could be repeated.
Services across the network saw trains suspended for several hours amid January’s cold snap as the operator struggled to deal with snow and ice.
The chaotic scenes left thousands of commuters stranded and prompted Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram to swiftly commission an independent report.
Greater Manchester’s transport commissioner Vernon Everitt delivered the findings to the Liverpool City Region’s transport committee on Friday.
A 61-page report revealed that without changes to the rail network from the combined authority, Merseyrail and Network Rail, similar issues were ‘likely’.
Mr Everitt made nine recommendations to the transport committee on how to improve performance and avoid more ‘highly unusual’ levels of disruption.
“Dealing with ice on the third rail is something that is a challenge for every operator of third rail railways, they are an existence here on Merseyrail and London Underground,” he told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
“Generally, the way in which you mitigate the risk is to lay an anti-icing fluid on the third rail, which loosens the bond between ice and the rail, it doesn’t melt the ice, but what it does it makes sure that the ice doesn’t bond.
“Then it relies on trains then passing over that ice with their conductor shoe or with a scraper on other railways and removing the ice.”