The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) has published new research that suggests the government should invest £15 billion in creating a devolved transport system in the north of England.

It claimed that implementing its plan would be a major step in achieving chancellor George Osborne’s vision of a “northern powerhouse”, which has been backed by the government in the form of recent commitments to extending high-speed rail across the country.

This would involve setting up a new body called Transport for the North (TfN), to be created from the existing Transport for the North alliance, to tackle historically low levels of investment in the region’s transport facilities. It was proposed that the organisation should be run in a similar way to Transport for London.
Ed Cox, director of IPPR North, said: "Northern transport infrastructure is dated, poorly integrated and lacking the large-scale investment it needs, but Transport for the North could be at the vanguard of a coherent economic plan that will fire up the northern powerhouse.”