Focus of work
West Yorkshire is the largest city region in Europe without a mass transit system. West Yorkshire Needs A Tram (WYNAT) aims to build the political and public support needed to deliver a region-wide integrated mass transit system.
FIT funding supported this campaign in 2024/2025, with activites including:
- Videos produced for social media campaigning, with one video achieving over 130,000 views, 7,753 likes, and 423 comments across Instagram and TikTok. This activity brought in a younger and more diverse audience.
- Creation of a template email for supporters to send to the Chancellor ahead of the Spending Review, welcoming plans to fund an initial two mass transit lines in the region. It also pressed for funding for a full network, with no watering down to bus rapid transit.
- Letters sent to all 370 councillors across the West Yorkshire region, leading to meetings with some party group leaders and supportive posts on social media.
- Competition launched to name the identified 10 corridors for mass transit from the Vision 2040 strategy set out by the Mayoral Authority.
- Commissioning of additional designs and merchandise to give to supportive politicians, including additional “travel by rail”-style posters, t-shirts and tote bags.
- Design of attractive visuals that draw on positive aspects of past and existing regional tram networks, but with a positive and future focussed element. These logos, maps and travel posters are a core element of how WYNAT is building an attractive vision of what tram transport could look like in West Yorkshire. The designs were featured on the front page of the Yorkshire Eventing Post on the 65th anniversary of the closure of the Leeds tram network.
- Adverts taken out at bus stops across the five major conurbations, with more in the large city centres.
- Button badges created for campaigners and politicians to wear.
- Engagement with several trade union branches who, while initially sceptical, have increasingly come to support the campaign.
- Evidence submitted as part of a consultation on initial tram routes.
Impact
WYNAT believes that a tram is an essential part of growing a greener, fairer economy — including creating good, local, and unionised green jobs.
The campaign work undertaken as part of this project has led to WYNAT being recognised as a key stakeholder by the Mayoral Authority and invited to and joined one-on-one consultation with staff on route decisions.
It has built relationships with key members of the Mayoral Authority Transport Committee and is exploring how it can use its scrutiny and veto powers to protect the ambition for a full steel-on-steel mass transit network, with no watering down to bus rapid transit.