New Managing Director for West Midlands Trains

Julian Edwards has been appointed Managing Director of West Midlands Trains, succeeding Jan Chaudhry-van der Velde who is taking a career break.

The pair will work alongside each other until Easter to enable a smooth transition.

Edwards was previously interim MD at East Midlands Railway until the end of 2019 when Will Rogers joined from London Overground.

Edwards has been a director of WMT since 2017. He said: “The last six months has been very difficult for West Midlands Trains. I would like to thank Jan for addressing many of the issues, including settling the dispute with the RMT, delivering a 3% discount for season ticket holders, introducing more rolling stock in December and the recent timetable changes that are already making a positive impact on train performance.”

• For the FULL story, read RAIL 897, published January 29, and available digitally on Android, iPad and Kindle from January 25.
• For the FULL story on Andy Street's calls for DfT to strip Abellio of the West Midlands franchise, read RAIL 896, published on January 22 and available digitally now.