YORK STATION is being given a £1.5 million facelift in time for next month's European finance summit.

Railtrack contractors are working against the clock to spruce up the historic railway station to make it a fitting gateway to the city for international delegates and journalists attending the ECOFIN conference.

The fast-track improvements, which have been brought forward specially for the occasion, include:

* Re-pointing, cleaning up and repairing of stone and brick work, and re-painting of woodwork.

* Re-surfacing of several platforms and entrance to car park, and replacement of Platform 11 canopy.

* Tidying up of lineside and station approaches.

Railtrack London North Eastern claims the work programme, drawn up in consultation with station operators GNER, represents the biggest single contribution to the success of ECOFIN by a city industry.

Meanwhile, another idea being mooted by Railtrack in the London area could jeopardise long-term hopes of a super-fast link to the Continent from the North.

The company has offered to rescue the proposed Channel Tunnel rail link to London after the consortium behind the project, London and Continental Railways, said it could not go ahead without being bailed out by the Government.

London and Continental's plan involved building a new line all the way to St Pancras including a new 12-mile tunnel, providing a direct connection to the Continent for trains from the North and cutting the potential York-Paris journey time to less than five hours.

But it has now emerged that under Railtrack's lower-cost plan, the new high speed route might end short of the capital and then connect to Waterloo station via existing slow lines.

Railtrack believes the 12 miles of tunnelling would not be commercially viable but points out that everyone will at least benefit in some way if the new rail link goes ahead at all, even if only from Dover to London's outskirts.

A direct York-Paris Eurostar service has long been promised, using a slow circuitous route round west London, but this has so far failed to materialise. Eurostar still insisted today that it intends to provide such a service, but is unable to say when it will be laid on.

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