Leaders from South Wales and western England in the UK have presented a vision for improved rail services in the region.
The vision aims to almost halve present travel times between cities in the area besides significantly enhancing journeys to London and the remaining parts of the country.
According to the vision, the improvements are projected to cost between £1bn and £2bn in the short term for the completion of already committed and planned developments up to 2035.
In the long term, the complete development is expected to be completed by 2050 with an estimated cost of £7bn-£8bn.
It is being compared to the Northern Powerhouse Rail programme, which is expected to entail a £17.2bn investment, as well as HS2, which is anticipated to cost £72.3bn in total.
The area currently stands behind other regions of the country with slow train times in-between key cities and rural communities.
Specifically, Cardiff has been detected by the government as having the “least well directly connected major city” in the UK.
The vision focuses on increasing capacity to enable four trains per hour between Bristol and Cardiff to cut journey times between the cities from 50 to 30 minutes.
With three trains an hour, journey times between Swansea and Bristol are expected to significantly decline from 1.5 hours once an hour to one hour.
The improvements to the South Wales Main Line and upgrading the Severn crossing have been proposed by Transport for Wales.
Western Gateway chair Katherine Bennett said: “With 14 of the 15 largest aerospace manufacturers based here and home to the largest group of high-tech cyber businesses in Europe, we are ready to help deliver a greener, fairer future for the whole of the UK and beyond.
“This vision sends the signal that we are ready for the investment needed to unlock our potential.”
