CANBER - Campaign Against New Beeching Report

You're better off living in Scotland or Wales. At least you are if you like the idea of shiny new stations and reopened railway lines. Admittedly, for many of us, the number of schemes even there has been woefully lacking, but at least there has been a steady stream of re-openings, the latest of note being the Ebbw Vale line in the Cardiff valleys. Passenger numbers on this link alone have already exceeded expectation for two years time. Can you think of a re-opened station or line that hasn't been a great success?

Here is the response from the Government to our petition regarding the withdrawal of the Walsall-Wolverhampton passenger rail service (link below) :
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/walsallrail

"The rail service between Walsall and Wolverhampton operates at hourly intervals taking 15 minutes for the 7 mile journey. It is a shuttle service requiring one single car train to operate it.

Prior to December 2005, Doleham, Three Oaks And Winchelsea used to be served by an hourly service between Ashford and Hastings. However, most of the stops at these stations were withdrawn when this service was expanded to run through to Brighton.

There are now three trains a day in each direction calling at these stations, but these generally run at inconvenient times early in the morning or late at night. As a result, annual passenger numbers have massively dropped as follows (financial years, 2006/07 being the first year to show true impact of service cuts) :

DOLEHAM

1. I'm "John Smith". I live in Tavistock - or Hunstanton, or Fleetwood or Melksham, or Polesworth or Snaith or Galashiels, or Portishead. And I need to travel to Plymouth or Swindon or London or Birmingham or Manchester ... a journey for which rail would be my top choice. Except ... there is no service or the service on offer is inadequate - so inadequate that I'm forced into my car (if I'm lucky enough to have one and be healthy enough to drive) or a bus or taxi.

The petition has now closed with 643 signatures (plus any who signed up before the deadline but have not yet validated their signatures) so many thanks again to all those who signed (link below.)
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/walsallrail/

Calls are growing for the Government to intervene to save the service (link below.)
http://www.birminghampost.net/news/west-midlands-transport-news/2008/10/...

In a development of my interest in local rail issues - particularly the welfare of my own beloved station at Nailsea & Backwell, and the clear need to re-open the Portishead line to passengers – I’ve been looking at other campaigns, which are also worthy of support.

As you probably suspected, from my heading, Corsham Station was indeed closed - in the Beeching era! However, it was nearly re-opened, a few years ago, when finance and planning were approved – but the rail industry then withdrew the only trains that could have stopped at the new station, and the plans were put on hold.

Over the next two weeks, work to install a passing loop on the FALMOUTH line will begin, allowing an enhanced service to operate. First Great Western's Devon & Cornwall customers can also look forward to improved timetables on the BARNSTAPLE, GUNNISLAKE and NEWQUAY lines.

However, in others areas of the country, the outlook is not so rosy.

The new EAST MIDLANDS PARKWAY station, which was due to open in December 2008, "could be seen as a cornerstone of efforts to tackle the region's transport problems", according to its supporters.

Almost daily the country, and wider world, are being rocked by the latest body-blow in the financial crisis. The £50bn 'bail-out' of our major banks announced a few days ago will have a huge impact on what money can be spent by Government in the short-term. Gordon Brown has already said that spending on 'public services' will not be affected. Between them the annual cost of running the two main public services - health and education - costs us around £200bn, so, whilst significant, £50bn does not sound like a killer blow. But where will they find the money from?

Many thanks to everyone who has signed our petition, urging the Prime Minister to reverse the planned withdrawal of the Walsall-Wolverhampton passenger rail service which is due to take effect in December 2008. Over 200 of you have done so already (link below.)
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/walsallrail/

Thanks also to those organisations who are publicising the petition (example links below.)
http://www.walsall.gov.uk/

http://www.centro.org.uk/rail/railintro.asp

http://www.wolverhampton.gov.uk/

http://www.bettertransport.org.uk/canber