New West Midlands Mayor Andy Street has promised no repeat of the tortuous delays which held up the opening of the Midlands Metro tram line through Birmingham City Centre last year.

The extension of just one mile famously took almost four years to build and opened almost a year later than initially planned - leaving shops and businesses on Corporation Street frustrated.

One of the mayor's key responsibilities is to run Transport for West Midlands which is overseeing the Metro network expansion.

And Mr Street pledged to pick up the pace on new rail and metro projects and ensure the trams are running on a completed extension to Edgbaston Five Ways by the end of his three-year term in 2020. Work is already under way on the extension to Centenary Square .

“We say it’s going to be done to Edgbaston in this mayoral term - that’s an important commitment,” he said.

An artist's impression of the Midland Metro tram heading to Centenary Square
An artist's impression of the Midland Metro tram heading to Centenary Square

And added that by the 2020 election there will be 'diggers in the ground' on other key projects like the Camp Hill Chords rail line to Moseley .

"There are shorter term things though - we will see the rail franchise awarded in June and we will see it come into force in October - I expect to have discussions with the new franchisee about frequency of service, about length of trains so we can deal with those concerns.

“On the Metro we’ve got to ensure the extension in Wolverhampton, the extension to Edgbaston have been completed in three years time, that we’ve got diggers in the ground on the Brierly Hill extension and permissions in place for the line out through the east of Birmingham.

“Some things will be done, some will be signed off and some will be planned.”

He added that he expects those works completed in ‘much faster’ than the notorious city centre extension which took six years to complete a mile of track.

But with traffic congestion is a problem today he says there will be an immediate review of traffic hotspots to see if lights can be re-phased or road works moved to ease jams.

"The long term solution is investment in public transport but there are some practical things that can be done to ease current traffic hotspots - such as Holloway Head in Birmingham City Centre.

“There are some individual schemes we can get done so there are not traffic jams to the same degree,” he said.