LIVERPOOL South Parkway, Merseytravel’s award-winning interchange, is reaping the benefits of its environmental credentials while attracting record numbers of customers to public transport.

Its giant rainwater harvesting system is saving some 700,000 litres of mains water a year, while geo-thermal heat pumps have saved more than 33 tonnes of CO2 emissions a year – exceeding their targets.

Also contributing to annual CO2 reductions are its enhanced roof insulation, which saves 3.4 tonnes, and the solar photovoltaic cells on its south-facing windows which supply the building’s electricity and save around 1.5 tonnes.

Latest figures show that the station, linking public transport with Liverpool John Lennon Airport, is being used by 26,000 passengers every week – an increase of 150
per cent and more than double the combined weekly total of 10,000 passengers at the former Garston and Allerton stations it replaced.

From the December timetable, services calling at Liverpool South Parkway will be increased by one service each hour from the East Midlands and Manchester Piccadilly and one to and from Birmingham each hour.

The station will then have a total of four trains each hour to Liverpool Central, five to Liverpool Lime Street, three to Manchester and two to Crewe and Birmingham.

More bus services are to be linked to the rail network via the interchange in the next three months and additional train services are on the cards with development of new timetables.