I have announced today that Southern Railway Ltd (a subsidiary of Govia Ltd) has been awarded the South Central franchise.

The new franchise will begin operation on Sunday 20 September 2009. The franchise will last for five years and 10 months, with the final year dependent on the franchisee achieving agreed target performance. It will be possible for the franchise to be extended by up to two years, at the Department for Transport’s discretion.

The new South Central franchise will provide a premium of £534 million net present value over the core five years 10 month franchise length.

Bids were also received from Nedrailways South Central Ltd (NedRailways Ltd), NXSC Trains Ltd (National Express Group Plc) and Southern Trains Ltd (Stagecoach Group Plc).

The new franchise will provide additional capacity at peak times (linked to the Network Rail programme of platform lengthening), delivering a key element of the high-level output specification in relation to London. In addition the franchise will provide more services such as enhanced late evening weekday frequencies (and weekend frequencies in south London), later last trains on Friday and Saturday nights, additional late night Brighton to Worthing services and hourly Sunday Brighton to Southampton services.

By December 2013 the new operator will provide 158 additional vehicle arrivals into London in the morning peak (a 14 per cent increase), 172 additional vehicle departures from London in the evening peak (a 16 per cent increase) and eight additional vehicle arrivals/departures into/from Brighton in the morning/evening peaks (24 per cent increase).

The department will continue to limit annual rises of regulated fares in line with national policy, which is currently RPI+1 per cent.  Furthermore, individual regulated fares for the 2010 fare rise are capped at RPI+1 per cent. This policy applies whether July RPI is positive or negative. As with all franchises, unregulated fares will be the responsibility of the operator.

The new franchise sets a public performance measure (PPM) target of 93.1 per cent to be achieved by March 2014 with improvements in delay minute and capacity targets over the franchise. This compares against the current performance of 89.6 per cent PPM as at the end of April 2009.

A key element of the franchise is the delivery of a number of major infrastructure projects including platform lengthening, East London Line and Thameslink. The franchise is drafted in such a way to facilitate the delivery of these projects.

Alongside the department’s Access for All and National Stations Improvement Programmes, the franchise will enhance 34 stations. Seven stations (Brighton, Haywards Heath, Hove, Lewes, Redhill, Three Bridges and Worthing) will undergo a major refurbishment as part of the showcase station project, with further station enhancements to be carried at another 27 stations.

At least 1,000 extra car parking spaces and 1,500 additional secure bicycle spaces will be provided and every station across the network will be cleaned and refreshed.

The Government have also required the operator to set targets for passenger satisfaction and provide additional investment if these are not achieved.

All stations and trains on the South Central network will be fitted with CCTV by June 2011. Secure station accreditation will cover 95 per cent of footfall across all stations including almost all south London stations and there will also be an increase in British Transport Police presence across the franchise improving security.

New gatelines will be installed at an additional 22 stations on top of the 14 south London stations being gated prior to the franchise commencement with these staffed for longer to increase security and reduce ticketless travel.

There will be an increase in staffing at stations across south London to ensure stations are staffed from first to last service on each operational day (except four stations and on Boxing Day) and all stations across the franchise will maintain or increase customer facing staff presence.