Great Western Coffee Shop

From The Sewweb team (http://www.sewweb.info) - originally posted last Sunday


Continues at http://www.sewweb.info - with a lot more technical data, pictures, maps, timetables.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/12135242142/permalink/10155492075107143/

Open by next December? Sounds ‘optimisic’.

Ah ... timescale if adopted rapidly and implemented under JFDI principles (Workington North version).

Far too sensible to ever be adopted.

A very impressive piece of work, applaud the effort. Gave me a smile this morning, they'll never be employed in the rail industry coming up with practical plans like this.

Developments like this don't just happen by themselves (even top notch ones such as this one is). It's a matter of both considerable and mystery and interest to me how something like this gets from a light bulb moment in someone's mind to the inaugural service.

Although it does not specifically refer to rail (well not much) this Western Powerhouse article in the Bristol Post is interesting as it seems to be getting some wide attention.


https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/welsh-secretary-wants-bristol-join-1985645

Can't come soon enough. Bath, Bristol, Newport and Cardiff form a natural axis which, with the political brakes off, could become a massive engine for growth. _{Obviously North Somerset would want nothing to do with it...}

It's a nice idea, but the problem is that Wales is devolved in a way that England is not and has its own legislature, so it's difficult to see how you can end up with a joint structure like TfN - at best you're going to end up with a talking shop, joint planning and lobbying, though if that gets Greater Bristol more dosh, electrified railways and the suchlike, then it will be well worthwhile

I wonder whether the problem for the Welsh might be that removing tolls from the bridges is making both working in Bristol more attractive and living in South East Wales more attractive to Bristolians, a trend that will be accelerated by improved rail services. We've heard stories of Welsh businesses who have ended up relocating or opening offices in Bristol to attract IT talent like developers, but at the same time we know of quite a few older families who have relocated to Monmouthshire to take advantage of the cheaper property, schools and other perks of living in Wales rather than opt for North Somerset or South Gloucestershire, both of which are increasingly pricey. I'm not sure whether that will be a problem or not, but it does perhaps risk turning South East Wales into a bit of a commuter belt.   

Yes, that may be one of the biggest obstacles. Before the devolution process gained momentum, Severnside was seen as a logical region by central government (BT had a Severnside region, and the ITV franchise was Wales and the West). But Cardiff has a lot more in common with Bristol than with Aberystwyth, or Llanddewi Brefi for that matter.

For 1st April last year (2018), a group of us put together what was intended as a "joke case" for an improved train service calling at stations in the northern fringes of Bristol and into South Wales.  Problem was that many a true word is written in jest ... that the figures add up, and that there's a really good case for such a service.

SEWWEB has wings - The South East Wales and West of England Business Link.  RailFuture Best New Group in Autumn 2018.  And it has perhaps moved from "Crayonista" to looking at the various elephants in the room very seriously

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/p19_0.jpg)

1. What trains would call there?
2. Who would use it?
3. How would they get to / from the station?
4. Is it a safe place for a station?
5. Will trains be frequent enough?
6. Will they go to the right places?
7. Is there space on the line and in their schedules for the extra stop?
8. What do the local people think?
9. Who will pay for it?
10. Will it just abstract passengers from other stations?
11. Is there a wider economic, congestion, clean air benefit?
12. Who will take the lead in promoting it and take the risk?

An outline of the scheme ...


Some new data

The companies at Western Approach / Westgate who's staff might use the trains
(http://www.wellho.net/pix/p19_1.jpg)
Also showing the traffic route from the motorway junction under construction to(wards)the Pilning Westgate Station.

A note of the employment attractions at Pilning, noting that personal private transport might be a very expensive option for many of the potential staff
(http://www.wellho.net/pix/p19_2.jpg)

The new motorway junction under construction on the M49 allows traffic to reach the Pilning Westgate Station Car park clear of the local roads
(http://www.wellho.net/pix/p19_3.jpg)
Traffic from the M48 may take the A403 from Aust and then also follow the business park roads to the car park, again clear of B4055 and local roads

Let's look at the elephants

1. a. The currently hourly local service from Taunton to Cardiff.
b. An extended Weston-super-mare to Bristol Parkway service (on to Newport and perhaps Ebbw Wale)
c. Some express services - ideal for Grand Union Trains looking to run open access London to Cardiff from December 2020

2. a. Park and Ride from a wide catchment area including Monmouthshire and South Wales via the now-free Severn Bridges
b. Staff and visitors to businesses at both Pilning / Westgate / Severnside and at Aztec West
c. Residents and visitors to Patchway (Patchway station really in Little Stoke) and Pilning.
d. Passengers connection to Metrobus at Aztec West - short hop to Cribbs Causeway

3. a. Walking access for the majority of passengers at Aztec West (but see 2e)
b. Park and ride at Pilning, showing (map below) car parking for 1500 - 2000 vehicles away from local roads
c. Walking access at Pilning from the village and nearby businesses.
d. Cycling / local driving access / separated parking for parish residents (local decision and management)
e. Existing bus an Pilning to Severn Beach and Cribbs Causeway. Potential shuttle bus from car park around businesses; bus also already passes Aztec West Station on way to Cribbs.

4. Yes - both are. Pedestrian crossings would be needed on B4055 between Station and parking.

5. a. With hourly services (1a only) the service would be on the cusp of required local frequency
b. With hourly open access to London (1c), that London traffic would be well served and appropriate.  Longer journeys, people will wait longer
c. With multiple services, giving a 30 minute or better headway, levels will be appropriate to attracting traffic

6. a. These are business stations and services to Bristol and South Wales residential / Suburban services are going the right way
b. Park and Ride traffic at Pilning feeding London services, and business traffic to London - yes, good destinations
c. Adequate trains calling at Bristol Parkway for the Midlands and North too.

7. a. The existing service calls at Pilning in the same timings on Saturdays and traffic levels through the tunnel are much lower without coal
b. Filton Bank is now 4 tracked, so even with the extra expresses and Severn Beach trains on there, there is capacity
c. Extension to Ebbw Vale of an hourly service is linking up with other proposals

8. a. People at Pilning have been working very hard to make the current station busier, and are concerned at switching to a new location
b. Pilning residents and parish council have concerns at extra traffic on the B4055 (which the maps show is kept away from Pilning)
c. Many users of Aztec West Business Area are deeply frustrated by traffic queues in and out and are generally supportive
d. House owners in Pilning have not yet realised how their property values might go up with a fast train to Bristol every day

9. a. I am not a financier, but a cost per passenger journey over 20 years at the new stations is around 35p

10. a. Some abstraction from Severn Beach, but trains from there run on a different route / to different locations.
b. Some abstraction from Portway Parkway as that offers another park and ride into Bristol. However capacity on those trains is an issue
c. May provide some relief / freeing up of parking spaces at Bristol Parkway
d. Some current Patchway users will move to Aztec West. This data may be hidden due to major developments beside Patchway Station.
In each of these cases, Pilning or Aztec West will offer significantly better total journey times

11. a Wider economic benefit to the area served by the stations
b. Bristol city centre benefit as traffic is kept out of the city by encouraged Park and Ride use
c. South Wales access to Severnside employment area, and to South Wales from northern Bristol area
d. Clean air and congestion benefits around M5 to Aztec West pinch points and perhaps wider

12. The project needs someone to adopt it, champion it, lead it.

Don't look at WECA then.

I can understand that reaction - but WECA is the very sort of organisation that's needed on board.

At the initial stage of the project where an idea appeared and everyone had a good chuckle at the jokey elements (but many a true work written in jest, as they soon realised), you / we can't expect the project to have been taken too seriously.  At the point where the well-worn case of  adjustments / updates for Pilning had been gone through so many times, and in their evaluation (shared by GWR and Network Rail) not added up, you cannot have expected yet another look at the same case to be taken too seriously.  But what you have now is not just an update - but a change in which all the elephants are being looked at from early on, and where the ducks are in a line.   You can now look for / ask for / expect a more serious look to be taken.

Now - put yourselves in WECA's shoes, look at it from their viewpoint ... and look at how the achievements of this suggestion, and the team behind it, would align with their overall objectives.  Be quite open about taking that look - and see how the whole comes together - all the jigsaw pieces lining up, and with very much more a request / push for partnership to work together on things rather than on protest; that does not stop us being the candid friend at times, but it does mean establishing a trust.

SEWWEB, perhaps tailored and tuned to make it even better,  should be very attractive to those who specify and organise our transport and economy.   There's so much in place already.   There's a crying need. There's a big gain for what - in this business - is a small outlay.  There's a fitting together of elements already coming or in the longer term plan.   There's a quick win on popularism - be it for the folks involved in delivery (who may not actually be too worried about that) and for the folks who get elected in every 4 or 5 years, who would really like to claim this success.

If I'm asked to do something ... and it looks sensible, lots of people ask for the same thing, and it saves me the hassle of having to look for an alternative which may not be so popular ... guess what I will tend to do  ;D ;D

This leads me to ask about what awareness WECA have regarding SEWWEB and what sort of noises they are making about it?

It would be very unwise for us to let it come to them as a complete shock from left field, and it would be wise for us to throw the a ball in their direction is such a way that they're more minded to catch it and see what it looks like than dodge out of the way.  Having seen what the ball looks like, there's then the question of how everyone runs with it.

There is a good community of excellent people around, and people who are really committed to really good solutions. The community (on public authority, transport industry and community sides) isn't as big as you might guess and there's a real desire to get it right. But that's far easier said than done when being pulled in one direction by politicians looking for short term election wins, another by rail companies looking at the bottom line within a 1 to 4 year direct award, and in a third by some community elements pressing cases which - when looked at in the hard light of day - do not stack up for the wider good.

So it's very much about how you break the idea at the moment. There's that old adage about quietly making a good suggestion and then letting the recipients think it was their bright idea all along.

Some might see grahame as being slightly cagey there, but as someone who has worked with him from the beginning on the SEWWEB concept, I totally understand where he is coming from. What you may not know is that since our last proposal release, we've had a huge range of conversations with relevant groups, organisations and individuals, and I'm sure you'll understand that there is no way that everyone would agree on everything during such a process.

Let me tell you where I personally am coming from. As some of you will know, I've been involved with the campaign for improved services at Pilning since 2006, and marvelled at how people and groups as diverse as Chris Grayling in 2006 (https://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2006-11-30c.1281.0&s=Pilning+Chris+Grayling#g1291.1) through to the fantastic efforts of Pilning Station Group (http://www.pilningstation.uk/) today have rallied to the cause. You don't go through that without becoming attached to the current Pilning Station site, and I definitely have over the years. Will I think it wonderful if they succeed in getting more trains to call at the right times at the current Pilning Station site? Of course I will. Will I be there cheering them on when those first trains arrive? You bet I will. Do I have my doubts as to whether this is likely to happen at the current station site? I'd be lying if I said I didn't, and that's why I've assisted grahame in formulating plans to relocate Pilning Station.

In order to be as sure as we can be that we are persuing the right way forward, we examined 3 different options side by side to better understand the challenges involved with bringing them to fruition. As the architect of the current SEWWEB proposal, grahame examined the case for relocation of Pilning Station to the B4055 (the Pilning Westgate option). As a long-time campaigner for improved services at the current Pilning Station site, I examined the case for a renovated/rebuilt/expanded station on the current site. As a third option, the late Simon Norton (http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=21080.0) examined the case for a relocated Pilning Station to a site on the A403.

Key challenges identified with the case for the Pilning Westgate option included strong local opposition to anything perceived to increase traffic along the B4055. Indeed, it is because of such opposition that the main entrance to Westgate is round the other side on the A403 - https://www.gazetteseries.co.uk/news/10709564.damage-limitation-campaign-launched-to-offset-impact-of-westgate-development-in-pilning/

Also, due to local concerns raised about the anticipated increase in volume of through traffic upon completion of the new M49 junction, South Gloucestershire Council have authorised significant traffic calming measures in Pilning and Easter Compton in order to counter this - https://consultations.southglos.gov.uk/consult.ti/Easter_Compton_Pilning_TC/consultationHome

The Pilning traffic calming measures extend all the way along the B4055 from Redwick Crossroads right through Pilning village to our proposed Pilning Station site - https://consultations.southglos.gov.uk/gf2.ti/f/971970/43213861.1/PDF/-/T424198003_GA_REV_A.pdf - and anyone trying to access our site by car along the B4055 is going to find that very difficult to do as a result, and will make a very visible addition to local traffic as they struggle through.

Having weighed up the challenges involved with all 3 potential sites, we came to the view that the Pilning Westgate option still represented the best way forward, but we took on board everything we had learned from the process and adjusted the Pilning Westgate proposal accordingly. Therefore, when you compare the latest proposal that grahame has posted with earlier iterations, you will see that we have dealt with the challenges identified, and also how we have dealt with the challenges identified.

As a result, I feel that the overall SEWWEB proposals are even more robust as a result, and I am happy to commend them to anyone.

From Wales online (https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/official-house-price-figures-confirm-15823890)


Very much a new market for a park and ride just in England then?   People who live in the newly-opening South East Wales and Monmouthshire areas, and are working in places like the the centres of Bath, Bristol ... and headed for London.   The original thought might be for people to use Bristol Parkway, but somehow access to that station from the motorways to the west doesn't always seem very easy.

Give them a year or two suffering ever worse jams on the M4 and Bristol workers relocating to South East Wales may want to catch a train from as near home as possible.  My 30 mile commute to work is possible to do in 30 minutes by car in light traffic, but the homeward journey can often be 60 or 70 minutes due to the jams between Magor and Newport.
Just need a high-frequency electric service between Cardiff and Temple Meads and there will be no contest between taking the car or the train.

But what would a station at Pilning add for those commuting into Bristol or Bath and coming from just across the bridge that would be better than them using Severn Tunnel Junction?  I can see the attraction for those commuting to the big new industrial park off the M49, but there again, from the Welsh side, if you have to drive to a station, it will probably be easier to cross the bridge and use the new junction. There are never any queues on the M49, nor over the bridge now.

Let's wait and see what the summer brings.

A car park accessed easily off the motorway?   I would need to research on the ground, but a look at various maps suggests that Severn Tunnel Junction is close to the motorway as the crow flies, but not so close at the car drives. And that drive might take in residential streets where the extra cars would be really unwelcome.  Inputs welcome.

Assuming you have a car, and use of that car during work hours, yes.  Does everyone of working age in Wales have their one car, though?


Depends on just what those final miles are to and from stations.

Remove the bottleneck on a popular road and attract more traffic ... and you get a new bottleneck just up the road.  Is it Magor to Newport now?

Note the talk of Llanwern, St Mellons, and through services to Ebbw Vale.   Just because there's a suggestion of a well sited station at Pilning Westgate doesn't mean its well sighted for every single journey - that's why we have over 2,500 stations each in a different place (OK, I grant you that 2 in St Budeaux are in the same place  ;D )

But your original suggestion was that with the removal of tolls, wouldn't that make a Park and Ride on the English side attractive. "Very much a new market for a park and ride just in England then?".  It's that argument I was challenging. If the removal of tolls is causing a big increase in house prices on the Welsh side, it's fairly clear that at the moment it's those with a car driving that increase. And so I was questioning why it makes more sense to cross the bridge. And environmentally it's surely better to minimise car mileage and get them on the train in Wales.  It's a fair point about the accessibility of STJ though. Not sure those in Pilning will like a massive parkway and traffic either though.

And yes, in answer to Adrian, you can get queues where the M49 joins the M5 on summer Friday/Saturday, but they wouldn't affect commuters from Wales using the new M49 junction.   

I set out in quite some detail in my earlier post the process we went through to understand and act upon the concerns of locals regarding any potential for extra traffic through Pilning, and the update grahame posted on Sunday (31 March 2019) sets out in equally great detail how we intend to prevent that from happening.

St Mellon's is probably the last place I'd add a local station between Newport and Cardiff (it looks about as promising as Baglan, and for much the same reasons). Splott, Rumney, Marshfield, and Tredegar Park would all be better locations for where people actually live – the estates in the east of Cardiff would be better served by Rumney as it would fit the bus network better. But I'm not sure that feeding anything more into the exercise in excessive compactness that is Cardiff Central is a good idea – if we're doing crayonism, let's have the Taff Vale line descend into a tunnel at Cathays, have its own underground Queen Street station out of the way of the Rhymney line, and then rise up again for Splott.

But there are huge office developments in St Mellons. 

Some thoughts.  No real conclusions - rather, inputs. Not even really sure if it should go in this thread, or in a "Transport Scholar" thread where we look at the whole theory. Delighted to see - just as I post this and preview - that others are posting too on the South Wales element.  Good - I don't want to frighten off contributions with what looks like a wordy epistle

---

With the removal of Severn Crossing tolls, you reduce the demarcation between the hinterland on the English side and the hinterland on the Welsh side.  Where before there was a financial barrier to living in one country and driving to a station in the other, there is now far less of that.

Many / most households are multi-person, and whilst a move across the Severn may suit one members's employment or advanced education which perhaps canals be moved, it may not be so easy for the other family member(s).  Similarly, you may have a car owning family, but that may not mean the car's available and afforded for one of them to drive it to work and have it laid up all day.

Looking back x years, where "x" is an increasingly large number, people lived and worked in the same town much more than they do today.  The work force does not walk or cycle through the gate in the almost-uniform way it did; for sure, some still might. But we live in an age of much more specialisation,  and much larger clumps of both housing and employment, and that puts routine travel distance up.

At the same time, looking back y years, where "y" is also an increasingly large number, in many jobs people can be flexible in where they work - "work from home" some, most or even all of the time.  And actually that's very much the more climate friendly / greener way of doing things, even if it also brings social problems of people becoming more isolated at times.

With the increasing specialisations - and a specialisation of leisure activities too, the need for regional travel (as opposed to inner suburban or very long distance) travel on a routine basis increases. I am minded of the Cardiff to Portsmouth train which passes through our area of interest in this thread ... how that's gone from "the line that they forgot" to strength, and then from strength to strength in my timearound. Look at the growth at stations as diverse as Oldfield Park and Bradford-on-Avon, and at the same time consider carefully just how few journeys are actually made end to end.    Passenger trains between Cardiff/Newport and Bristol have increased over the years, but just like the MetroWest leg from Bristol via Bath (and Bradford-on-Avon to Westbury) there might be sensible suggestion for a further service to be added, bringing the 'all stations' service up from hourly to half hourly.

Modern communications and regional planning strategies encourage change that's not piecemeal, and that fits the neighbourhood (talk to me about my local neighbourhood plan  ;) ) and the logic of development of a smaller scheme is to fit it in with the bigger plan.    Take a look at this:
Now ... if you were adding a significant NaPTAN (National Public Transport Access Node) in the middle of this map, where the public transport black and white railway with the node crosses the yellow line ... and you had lots of people going there, would it not be pretty logical to bring them in via the road towards the bottom left which - look - has already been built with the connectors needed ... this particular site is very lucky to have such a set of connectors ready and waiting, and a flat area between them and the access node itself which is separated from residence and of the size for suitable car parking. You also have sense in keeping the private cars away from the pinch point of the NaPTAN bridge, and you're working with the residents in nearby streets - have mutual benefits - in keeping traffic slow, low and safe.

And equally the concern that Grahame hinted at re STJ could be addressed, and probably more easily.  There is brownfield land immediately to the south of the station for a car park, just a couple of hundred metres away some very recently disused slip roads to the M4, and they are connected by a road. So I don't think it would be any more difficult than what you are proposing, but would still probably take ages, such is the way of development these days. STJ could also be a parkway for the north, with direct trains as far as Nottingham.

But the tone of the response, slightly patronising I thought, makes me feel that you don't want any debate or challenge to your project. That's fair enough, if slightly disappointing.

I'm sorry you feel that way. To take your last point, we've actually spent the last few months debating this with several relevant groups, organisations and individuals, and the whole point of the latest update was to take on board their concerns, act upon them, and modify our proposal accordingly to take that into account.

All I wanted to do in my post was to make you aware of our earlier posts that set out our efforts to address the concerns of local residents regarding their fears of extra traffic as a result of our proposal, and what we intend to do to prevent those fears being realised. It did appear to me that you might not have spotted those earlier posts - My apologies if this was not the case.

It was also not my aim to patronise ypu, and again I'm sorry if I inadvertently did. It has been pointed out to me in the past that my style of writing can come across that way, and it's not intentional.

Regarding STJ, i would actually be delighted if it thrived into the future and became the best it could possibly be. I spent a lot of time with the Severn Tunnel Action Group in the mid-2000s - great people, who were always very supportive of our TransWilts campaigning, as we tried our best to be in return with theirs.

I look forward to debating the respective merits of both cases with you in the future, and again, sorry if I caused any offence.

OK - came on to answer but I note Lee has said much of what I might.

Just a thought ... while Severn Tunnel Junction and Pilning Westgate have some overlap in their traffic / market reach - some element of abstraction, both have substantial traffic / prospects which could / would / should be met by one but not by the other. You are neither going to walk from Severn Tunnel Junction to Tesco or any of the other distribution sites, nor are you going to get a direct train from Pilning Westgate to Nottingham.

Railway projects from "A" to "B" where "A" is in one jurisdiction and "B" is in another get interesting as there's no one necessarily responsible / wanting to take ownership ... so many cases where "it would be so much easier if" ...

Heart of Wessex ... five authorities along the way and the CRP has struggled for support and funding as it's tried to align them.

Swindon to Oxford ... crosses what's felt to be an "iron curtain" between the South East and the South West

West Wiltshire to CUBA (Counties that used to be Avon) ... transport flow maps/models that runs out around Batheaston

As an complete aside, there was a Pilning to Severn Tunnel car carrier service which operated from 1924 to supplement the Aust ferry.

Blimey, I never knew that. Did it finish with the opening of the first Severn Bridge just like the ferry did?
There must have been some loading/unloading infrastructure for that and I wonder if any of it still is in evidence?

I have quite a collection of old pictures, timetables, etc ... the whole "Severn before the first road bridge" story is fascinating. But as you say "complete aside" and time for another thread on a quieter day.

Couldn't resist ...

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/pipa_006.jpg)

Seeing the tarpaulin over one of the cars in grahame's photo reminds me of a tale told me by an old friend whose family used the service on more than one occasion:

It goes without saying that cars on open trucks steam-hauled through the Severn Tunnel came out a different colour than when they went in; worse, they were covered in clinker. For a nominal fee (maybe 6d) you could have your car 'protected' by an old tarpaulin, which most likely was covered inside and out (not that they took care to work out which was which) with grit. The upshot of this is that paying the extra was a really bad idea, and seasoned travellers relied on the wind blowing the clinker off when they got back on the open road...

Ceased in 1966 with the opening of the bridge. Photo taken in August 1963 on a South Wales shed tour. It shows the bay platform. we travelled over the Severn on the Aust Ferry

As a commuter to Aztec West, the point I was trying to make is that it is the jammed up section of the M4 around Newport (typically from J28 to J23a) is what makes the train an attractive mode for me to travel to work.  Park and ride at STJ or Pilning wouldn't help me, but a station at Aztec West would.  The other thing that would make a difference is an increase in the frequency of the stopping service to half hourly or better.  Although I have no evidence, I would expect it is particularly people working in North Bristol who are buying houses in Wales and commuting over the bridge.

I first commuted over the old Severn Bridge in the early 1990s, and jams were the exception rather than the rule.  It doesn't take much to cause gridlock now, and with the projected growth following the removal of the tolls I reckon the jams will continue to get steadily worse, and there will be more and more people like me who aim to avoid using the M4 altogether for the peak hour commute.

I do think there is a good case for adding more parking space at Severn Tunnel Junction on the south side of the tracks, but I reckon this will be of most benefit to people living in the Magor / Caldicot / Usk area who need to travel to central Bristol.   The new open access operator might consider stopping their trains at Severn Tunnel Junction too.  It's not convenient to get from STJ to London - except when the 0730 Cardiff - Portsmouth is short-formed and the 0629 SWA - PAD routinely stops there.

Ah, OK, thought your point was about traffic east of the bridge.  I completely agree with your points re M4 traffic around Newport and the usefulness of a station at Aztec West.

I'd agree also that it is probably those working in North Bristol who are buying properties over the bridge. For those working in the centre the train is still more attractive, so removal of the tolls won't probably encourage many to move. 

Good news for passengers at another station in the SEWWEB orbit as Patchway sees the deck of its new footbridge lifted into place this weekend, with the bridge due to be open for passengers by the summer - https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/patchway-train-station-closed-easter-2770599

Can't find anything about this on the South Glos Planning Portal, but according to NR:


I'm intrigued that Patchway (usage 2017/2018: 110,632) warrants lifts, whilst nearby recently-extended Filton Abbey Wood (usage 2017/2018: 1,048,000) doesn't...

Plenty of room for very long ramped access at Filton Abbey Wood,hence no need to install expensive lift equipment, nowhere near the amount of room that would be needed at Patchway,so they got lifts instead.

Ease of doing Abbey Wood with slopes ... no need for lifts.  Patchway sight might be rather tight for slopes?

Pilning Westgate will be slopes too ... even with 165,000 journeys (low estimate) per year.  Aztec West will need lifts - no realistic way to put in sloped access on that site.   Will it be the only lift with 3 levels on it - 2 different platform levels and a street level - on the system?

I think there might have been room to squeeze in ramps on the Rolls Royce side of Patchway Station, but on the other side I think it would have taken out a lot of the parking / waiting area.  I wonder if that's even land owned by the railway?  Maybe, because the Patchway footbridge had to be replaced for electrification, it came out of a different budget?

I wonder if Patchway will become the only station on the network with lifts but no real-time train displays?

Is the Bristol Post is a bit behind the news? This image from Jun 2018 seems to show the new bridge already in place: https://goo.gl/maps/hxsrrTyN2jKnxnWcA

Perhaps it's just the lifts they're doing this weekend?

That's the temporary footbridge.  The proper replacement is going more-or-less where the old one was.

And indeed a shiny new Patchway footbridge did appear over Easter, including (empty) lift towers.  It's not in use yet, though.  I wonder how long it will remain graffiti-free?

Five years on this still makes sense.  And indeed there are plans in place to work towards new stations on the South Wales section, significant improvements at Patchway and Gypsy Patch Lane and with the Metrobus there, and local trains running north to south across Temple Meads - from Weston-s-M via Stapleton Road.

A hole remains at Pilning, where there current service is the perverse victim of historic cheapness and regulation and unfit for any practical purpose for current passengers, and at Aztec West where a review based on office use post-Covid makes sense but would probably still make a case for the station.   There is also an opportunity for consultants to look at rail access to the Wild Kingdom as Bristol Zoo will be in its new location, and The Wave, both of which I might have included in SEWWEB in 2023 rather than 2018.

A Hole remains at Pilning ,have you seen the state of the car park lately!..
On a serious note,now that things are starting to return to PFC pre Flu Condition,Pilning is not doing well and could really benefit from an injection of some support.

On that serious note, we have Pilning Station now in the heart of "Dan's Vans" land and it could be a really good source and destination of journeys especially on Saturdays - though I'm not sure how demand responsive (unscheduled) transport connects with scheduled trains, especially ones that only run once in a blue moon.

At Pilning, there remains a need to mix the local (village) desires for a village station with a regular service with the needs for the somewhat wider area / region which would be economically viable and the operational issues of the line and an accessible platform for the trains to actually call at.