Great Western Coffee Shop

Cambridge Business Park, Cambridge Science Park, St. John's Innovation Centre and Park, and Cambridge Regional College all lie within a triangle formed by the A14 road (to the north), the railway from Cambridge to Ely (to the east) and the guided busway completing the south east chord. There is massive employment / education within this area but little or no residential accommodation, and teh result is a massive net inflow in the morning, and outflow in the evening.   The A14 junction clogs badly, as does the A10 Milton Road. The guided busway brings in some people (from the countryside toward St Ives), but in practise the main traffic for the busway is from the St. Ives area to the centre of Cambridge, with alternate buses bypassing the science park, leaving gaps of up to 38 minutes there on the inbound service at the end of the working day. The railway line is curently near-useless for people travelling to and from this hive of employment and education, with the nearest stops being the main "Cambridge" station about 3 miles to the south, and Waterbeach which is about 3 miles to the north. 

I do a lot of work in this triangle - away from Melksham, Cambridge is the place I spend the most time, and the majority of that work time is in this technology triangle.  So I've been delighted to see plans afoot to open a "Cambridge North" station at an apex of the triangle.  Without doing a full business case / reading that up, I can't quote you BCRs, anticipated passenger flows, etc - but this one feels like a "no brainer".  The market's not only for traffic to the triangle, but also commuter traffic from the Chesterton, King's Hedges and perhaps Fen Ditton areas of the city, and as a guided busway and car interchanged onto trains from Long Stanton, Swavesey, St. Ives and the developing countryside.  Readers may feel that with Cambridge Station "only" 3 miles away, that should be sufficient ... problem is that the bus takes up to 25 minutes across the city - or indeed I have taken 50 minutes on a bad day (that's an express bus off the busway, but running on City streets). I conjecture that you can tell that rosd-side transport to the current station is broken when you see the swarms of taxis there - and indeed I'll be using a taxi there later this week as I have no choice when I arrive / for where I'm going.

Cambridge is not in GWR / SWT / XC territory - so why am I writing about it here?   Because it's a useful example of station development with which we can compare / benchmark, and we have a number of well-informed members who drop in here from time to time who can comment and help us learn better.  Such learning will help inform other proposals - such as Wilton, Porton, a second Cranbrook Station, and so on;  yes - we have a lot of experience especially in the Exeter area already, but that bit more can't harm.

From the Ely News (http://www.ely-news.co.uk/Overhaul-unveiled-new-Cambridge-North-station/story-28451156-detail/story.html?)


So how is progress on this - which (on earlier plans) I should have been able to use just before Christmas, and again next week.

Not so re opening stations on timetable change dates only - cf Chiltern & Oxford Parkway...

Indeed, Chris ... Newcourt opened on 4th June, Borders railway opened 9th September 2015, Oxford Parkway on 26th October.  Lots more scheduled to be opened at dates which may not be May or December - Bermuda Park, Ilkeston, Kirstall Forge ... but then all of those were supposed to be open by now but have slipped; most openings are indeed at timetable changes, but not all.    I didn't write the Ely News article, just quoted it  :D

Annoying to see, once again, a useful new station getting bogged down with the myriad of unnecessary delays that they all seem to fall foul of.

Cf the Cambridge Guided Busway!

On this occasion, better it got right first time?

Well there is a proposed 1tph XC service in each direction, along with a daily through train from the old GW region!

You have me scratching my head on that one ... "old GW Region".   I'm thinking at extra XC train from midWales / Borders .... please put me out of my misery / tell!

The 0822 New St to Stansted Airport starts back from Gloucester on weekdays.

(Interesting that my mac auto-corrected Stansted to stagnated.  Hmmm...)

Living just off the Milton Road, in Chesterton, I have been awaiting this station since moving to the area two years ago.

The three mile trip to Cambridge station is impossible on public transport outside "core" hours.  For many trips, I often think that if I'm driving to the station, why don't I just drive the whole journey.  Sadly this means the railway also misses out on my custom.

In addition to this station, there is another new station planned at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge.  There is also speculation that there may be discussions regarding a new station at Hinxton (where I work) if the Wellcome Trust go ahead with their massive Genome Campus expansion plans.

I was up there again on Thursday ... 5 p.m. finish at the place on the Buckingway Business Park, but not onto a train until the 7.15 p.m. ... really frustrating as I'm working with 200 metres of this bus stop:
(http://www.wellho.net/pix/gwrrhs000.jpg)

Or (here's part of the problem) former bus stop ...


And there's the problem with one impractical leg of a whole journey - the whole journey becomes an effort / impractical and drives people away from public transport ...

John beat me to it!

Video of the station under construction from a passing train.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrjwsTqM2jw

Attachment - screen capture frame from the video

I have mentioned my first use of the new station at Cambridge North the other week - and I know that I'll be there next month too.  Fortunately walking from the station as according to The Daily Mail (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5194857/Cambridge-train-station-chaos-caused-traveller-group.html) the station car park has already been full - if not entirely with rail users as planned.

I wonder if the TOC will be using their byelaw powers to recover the costs of removing the vehicles and/or prosecuting for obstructing the car park?

I hear it was invaded by a crowd of pik......sorry I mean peaceful, law abiding, tax paying travelling folk?  ;)