Plans to ease overcrowding on the Wharfedale and Airedale train lines have been criticised as “not ambitious enough” by transport authority Metro.

Network Rail, which owns and operates Britain’s rail infrastructure, has published a draft proposal, called the Northern Route Utilisation Strategy (RUS), outlining how it intends to tackle rail problems.

The RUS backs a report from 2009 which suggested train lengthening, additional services and higher capacity rolling stock were sufficient to conquer overcrowding that plagues routes from Skipton and Ilkley to Leeds.

But Metro, West Yorkshire’s Integrated Transport Authority, said those plans still did not go far enough to solve problems on the Wharfedale and Airedale corridor lines, which have seen patronage double in the decade since the turn of the century.

In a draft response to Network Rail, Metro said ‘smarter’ decisions were needed to beat overcrowding.

“With regard to the Skipton and Ilkley lines, Metro believes that the recommendations are a prime example of a plan that is simply not ambitious enough, recognising however the remit Network Rail had under the Network Licence,” Metro’s response said “To suggest that simply monitoring of the situation will suffice is, in Metro’s view, simply putting off the inevitable that a plan needs to be developed to deal with growth on these corridors.

“Metro believes that more could be done from a demand management point of view in terms of the use of smarter choices and pricing to spread peak demand.”

However, Metro said it was pleased plans for new stations at Apperley Bridge, Kirkstall Forge and Low Moor still featured in the RUS under the Leeds City Region major schemes.

Metro also said it was supportive of plans to improve journey times between Bradford Interchange and Manchester along the Caldervale line.

Tim Calow, chairman of the Aire Valley Rail Users Group, said the RUS lacked a strategic approach and instead proposed a number of “sticking plaster solutions” to the current problems.

In terms of train lengthening, he said there was a case for moving from four carriages to eight carriages, missing the proposed change to six carriage trains. But he said this would require platform lengthening at a number of stations, something that should be started sooner rather than later.