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The new section of track between Witney and Yarnton would “broadly follow” the A40 corridor and the old Witney branch line which was closed in the 1970s. A new station at Witney would also be built as part of the plans, according to this article - https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/260m-oxford-rail-link-proposed/10039187.article

Cowley and Carterton phases are also mentioned.

Mr Stow is a member here - hopefully he can post more details....

From the Oxford Mail (https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/17748186.councillors-reject-call-back-witney-oxford-rail-line/)


Looks to have been on party lines, and been a wider argument boy future development of the area.

In the interests of the environment we probably need more hub caps.

I'd like to say that the WODC councillors' comments beggar belief, but sadly knowing the very car-centric policies of the council, I can believe them all too readily. I did ask (via Twitter) the councillor who commented about "19th century technology" whether he'd describe the 125mph bi-mode trains currently running through West Oxfordshire as 19th century...

I doubt this is the end of it though - on current trends, the current administration could lose their majority in 2020, and at least one party will be plastering "Party X blocked reopening the Witney-Oxford railway" all over their leaflets!

I could understand people being against a railway based on cost, but straight up denying it because the privileged don't want to change paradise? The "19th century technology" line is a "1960's" comment from an individual who clearly doesn't want anything, including other people using cars, to hold up his progress in his own car. I cannot stand this very modern British waiting for technology to get better attitude. Just because it's the latest idea doesn't mean the old technology is redundant. The internal combustion engined motor car is about as elderly as transport technology gets.

We must get away from the thinking that any rail line is simply provided for travelling to london and that this is the only acceptable time that public transport is used. It seems, from many opinions, that the railway is thought to be aimed solely at london commuters and it would not be used to go locally or anywhere else. The media and government are guilty of this type of thinking too. I'm sure everybody on the Witney corridor will benefit from this and probably those that are doing local trips will benefit the most.

I am afraid this attitude is endemic among local politicians of all stripes in Oxfordshire - no development of any type thank you in our backyard unless it's Didcot, Bicester or Witney. I was not surprised (but disappointed) to see a spokesperson for the new Lib Dem/Green ruling group in South Oxon proudly announce on TV that they hoped to halve the number of new homes in their area. Presumably they will deliver their old cardboard boxes to Oxfam for young couples to use as family homes instead.

At least Didcot and Bicester have rail links. Witney has grown enormously over the last generation, and now long queues of traffic sit on the A40 each rush hour. There cannot be many stronger cases for reinstating a rail link than this.

I've had a look on the Ordnance Survey map and the original route as far as the edge of urban development at Witney is fairly straightforward. The landscape is flat and the bridge under the A40 is still available to use and other road crossing points are minimal, perhaps requiring a level crossing at the former South Leigh station (are those still allowed?). The biggest barrier is the trackbed has become the bypass at Eynsham but, with greenery either side of the road, the rail route could run parallel requiring possibly one house to be demolished. There are also industrial units near the path but with a clever bit of access road shifting the line could run through a gap between them. This all seems to be really simple to me. The platform time appears to be available at Oxford to run a through service from the Cowley branch or Didcot Parkway, both near major places of work, so this should take a fair bit of local traffic off the roads and create an Oxford Crossrail or metro type arrangement. Oxford is different to other cities, it hasn't evolved with suburbia in the same way. Partly due to the rivers around the area and partly down to a green belt policy, so it's suburbs are really the surrounding towns and expanded villages, such as Witney, Kidlington, Wheatley and Abingdon. I would suggest that any reinstatement of closed rail lines or stations around these places would be immensely popular as car provision in central Oxford is limited and quite rightly so.

Why not re-instate the rail line as a tram link. NR policy is no level crossings on new/re-opened lines. A tram link could give a greater penetration of the community and thus eliminate the need for a big car park at the station. Smaller car parks at tram stops and people are more likely to walk a 100 yards to a tram stop but not a mile or two to a railway station.

As we can see from the Portishead precedent, no they aren't! Here and elsewhere along the route any former crossings would need to be replaced with bridges, or closed. That's the nature of, er, 21st-century technology.

Tram would probably be better as frequency would be much higher, however more track would be required to give it a reasonable frequency and it's less likely funding would be available for such a project. Tram-train is possible but would require space at Oxford rail station for lower platforms to permit through running. Running into the centre of Oxford on street would be even better but even less likely to get funding with current attitudes. Oxford is a great candidate for tram and tram train operation with all the available track bed in the area and mentioned expanded villages and, if it was on mainland Europe, would probably have it by now. You could have tram/tram trains running to Witney, Woodstock via Kidlington, Thame via Cowley, Abingdon, Didcot and possibly Bicester. That would make a nice three crosstown line system. I'm a dreamer though.

I personally think it is rather ridiculous to not be able to trust the public with new level crossings, certainly on quiet rural roads. I guess we are no longer responsible for our own actions or safety.

The Didcot Garden Town Plan includes proposals for a 'Garden Line' for public transport between Culham and Harwell through Didcot, repurposing some existing corridors, plus running through currently open countryside although to reach Culham would also need bridging the Thames. Unfortunately it only refers nebulously to 'autonomous vehicles' without even suggesting what these could be. The route would be shared with a cycle / walkway but I am not convinced there is enough width available in the corridor in parts of Didcot for both without one needing to be elevated, probably the vehicle one. Plus it might find particular difficulty in the space to the north of the main line where if elevated this would pass close to houses on the first floor level.

You may say you're a dreamer - but you're not the only one...

Exactly that. You'd have to tread carefully at Eynsham to avoid affecting the site of Eynsham Abbey (which is a Scheduled Ancient Monument), and I suspect you may end up demolishing one of the industrial units and possibly closing Station Road to through traffic, but it's nothing too complex. Otherwise the route is unobstructed as far as the A40 at Witney, where you'd stay south of the road and terminate at Ducklington.

At South Leigh it might be easiest to divert slightly to make room to put a bridge in - or just stop up the road, to be honest. The old bridge is still standing at Tar Lane.


Electrify it from the off and send some Oxford terminators up there - either 387s or the IETs which aren't continuing up the Cotswold Line. If you're reopening to Witney you wouldn't need the North Cotswold Line Taskforce's nutso scheme to have 4 tph to Hanborough, after all.

Looking to get an idea of this suggestion ... added the old trackbed onto a map (red as far out as Witney and blue beyond).

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

I have - but a long time ago - had a number of memorably long holdups on the A40 just west of Oxford and I know it's a road to avoid at all costs.   As (!!) is driving in and out of the centre of Oxford.  Don't know about the new traffics it would develop as London dormitories, but a good service from a significant park at ride at Ducklington would, surely, help improve the commute of many from quite a wide catchment.

Sometimes my mind wanders ... and I was thinking of themed tickets from DUCKlington to SWANley ...

A new alignment from Witney/Carterton to Hanborough was being looked at by the North Cotswold Line Taskforce I believe, rather than using the old alignment direct to Wolvercote.  Though I'm not sure why!

OK - I can crayon that on the map too - in orange.   
Advantages
1. Trains also provide service at Hanborough
2. Might be able to reach Carterton / Brize Norton with significant military traffic??
3. Closer to Witney
Disadvatages
1. Longer and new alignment may throw up issues
2. Station where the lines meet would be called Combe Junction which could get confused with Coombe Junction
3. Eynesham not served

At the early stage of a project, multiple options are suggested and we should look for the one that best meets what we're looking to achieve, and not just something which is good (or even excellent) in that direction. I would not like to call either way with my minimal background, but what an excellent opportunity to use what I was taught in sales training as the "alternative close".  Ask the local council whether they want option (a) or option (b) and have them chose - they'll take pride in their decision and not even notice that you didn't offer them a park and ride or guided bus solution at all.  ;D
(http://www.wellho.net/pix/westoxonx.jpg)

It's hilly (so you'd need serious earthworks) and in, or bordering, the Cotswold AONB (so you wouldn't be allowed serious earthworks). There's huge amounts of housing development going on around Eynsham - too much to miss. I'm slightly surprised it was ever considered!

Steady on Isambard Kingdom Ellis!

Richard S is right, and I think the East Gloucestershire Railway promoters, who started what ended up as the Fairford branch (red and blue lines on your plan) got the first stage of their proposed direct route from Oxford to Cheltenham route, the red bit, right. I think it was originally intended to go via Burford and Northleach, and through a tunnel under the Cotswolds. The money ran out, so they changed the route to provide a single line branch to Fairford instead.

Now, wouldn't the original proposal now make a project of Victorian grandness! It would of course have to be broadgage (7ft 0.5 inches between rails, not meat and two veg catering on all trains...) for a smoother ride and larger trains - the New East Gloucestershire Railway!

I am off to get my stovepipe top hat, waistcoat and watch chain, grow some muttonchop sideburns and buy a carriage and four so I can ride around visiting the landed gentry and town merchants raising support. New East Gloucestershire Railway three and a half percent preference loan stock, anyone?

On a slightly more serious note, I am not sure I endorse all RG's suggestions.

and
Oxford still has substantial suburban areas with no old track bed available - most of the eastern suburbs north of Cowley for example, where much of the early to mid 20th century growth took place (Headington, Risinghurst, Barton, Marston) are all well away from any old rail routes, with nothing between the Bicester line and the Cowley branch/old Thame line).

I am not sure Oxford is suitable for on street trams either - the town centre streets are surely not wide enough, and if we can no longer countenance level crossings out of town, why is it thought trams in streets (especially ones heavily populated with students on bikes!) are acceptable?

Shouldn't we be looking at trolley buses instead? There will still no doubt be objections to the overhead lines, but there would not be the additional substantial capital investment in laying rails in streets which would trap cyclist's wheels. A rail trolley/ bus interchange at the station, between "real trains" from the current network and Witney and trolley buses on the routes radiating to Oxford's suburbs and its park and rides, their routes safeguarded by bus only lanes in appropriate places would surely be more cost effective, improve Oxford's poor air quality and benefit most of the commuters and visitors to Oxford.

[it's also nice for us Reading folk to be able to be able to tell those Oxford folk how to run their city!]

Logic, especially GRIP and even JFDI all tell us in the early stages to consider all options. So that does mean looking at a pretty full selection of modes and routes. Some of these rapidly show to be impractical. Others may meet (or seem to meet) differing objectives, or evaluate close enough to each other to lead to some really tough decisions having to be made.

From another project (http://www.sewweb.info/april2018.html)

In Reading or any town of Oxford's size I would suggest trolleybuses. This forgotten and much derided mode is surely the answer in a lot of small and medium sized places where the unsightly appearance of the overhead is outweighed by the practicality of it. I went for the tramway option for Oxford to reduce the impact of overhead in the centre, plus there is already a campaign underway for trams in Oxford. Tram running in the centre can be battery, or better still, the third rail arrangement as seen in places like Bordeaux. Although Oxford's suburbia is not as populated as some places, the city requires something to take the extraordinary amount of buses, and tourist coaches don't forget, out of the centre. A simple route for tram trains through the centre could potentially run from a junction just north of the rail station (or on dedicated tracks from Wolvercote), through Frideswilde Square, Park End Street, New Road, Queen Street, turning south at the Carfax, along St Aldate's, across Folly Bridge, along Abingdon Road to join the rail alignments near Redbridge park and ride. All wide enough for tram running. Adding a route into Oxford's eastern suburbs from the Carfax would only require a tramway to run along the High(street), which is more than wide enough to accomodate it,  and possibly down the Cowley Road or up to the Hospital. The three routes suggested in my previous posts would pass near three of the current five park and ride sites, while the car park on the eastern side at Thornhill would just move further east nearer the suggested route to Thame at the motorway service site. This is the sort of arrangement that would probably happen if Oxford was on mainland Europe but here is simply me dreaming away again. There would be all manner of objections, feasibility studies, cost benefit ratios, other odd types of modes considered and various other time delaying tactics that a simple (former) bus driver like me would not understand.

Anyway it's slightly off topic. I'm daydreaming again.

I would agree within the City itself, but there is the wider travel area. 

It is clear that Witney, Bicester, Abingdon, Didcot and Wantage ant the Cotswold line stations are all on existing or former rail routes.  What about an Oxford Metro including the Science Park?

Wallingford would be rather circuitous and Thame is has been ruled out before for reinstatement.  But Abingdon (Station in Audlet Drive Car Park or just east of Thames View) and Witney.   

The science park would be served on my far fetched plan with a stop on the former rail alignment to Thame, which would only need to be tramway standard after Morris Cowley works. The idea of running tram trains is that some will run on current existing rail routes where as former alignments such as Witney and Abingdon will only require tram standard running lines. So a train in some places and a tram running on street in Oxford. All would be able to serve the centre of Oxford (probably the most popular destination from all these areas), the mainline rail station and create convenient interchange on the street running section for all other routes to places such as the Science park. All this would not require any more platform space at Oxford rail station. So most major towns in the Shire would be in direct link with Oxford and it's station, and only one change away from any of the other points including those longer distance places available from the station.

If we're running people in Queen Street over with trams and drawing magic-marker maps, here is one from my archives:
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48212888346_b7535dea72_b.jpg)

Nice work. I still find it incredible that Queen Street is fully pedestrianised looking but buses still come down it every three minutes.

Half the pedestrians are surprised by it too.

This argument always intrigues me (and was also used in relation to the Weymouth Quay Tramway)

Hpw do cyclists manage in places like Amsterdam and Rotterdam? Full of cyclists and full of trams.

Or are our cyclists simply thicker than their Dutch counterparts, or indeed thicker than their grandparents and great grandparents who were riding their bikes amongst the tram lines all over the UK pre-WW2?

It's still the least awful route between the Station and Magdalen Bridge. I have visions of double deckers accidentally being routed via the Broad and getting stuck under Hertford College...

And beyond. My dad recalled cycling over tram lines in Reading's King's Road in the 1960's. They were never a problem as he had eyesight.

I think Queen Street is only used by the routes that turn in town that don't get as far as the station. The Iffley Road route definitely uses it. I'm not quite sure why a turning circle wasn't included in the Westgate redevelopment, maybe Oxford City Council have similar planning abilities to Reading Borough Council when it comes to public transport, or possibly it may affect the quick turnaround of Stagecoach/OxfordBus vehicles and they are being stubborn about it. Either way I think the council still should make it obvious that it's still a roadway.

You might want to have a look at this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzKXM1UGnSw


The surviving Cholsey and Wallingford "points the wrong way", so if reinstated as a "real" railway could form part of what is in effect the "Reading Metro" formed by all the existing rail services that radiate out from the town. Perhaps we could then right the wrongs of the 1974 local government reorganisation and repatriate Wallingford to Berkshire!


Tram rails appeared breaking through the surface of the Duke Street bridge until the late 1970s, but the gaps alongside where the wheel flanges used to run were long since filled with tarmac, and I expect the same was true in Kings Road too bearing in mind the last tram ran in Reading in 1939.

That might be one way of looking at it.

There's no doubt that tramlines are pretty nasty for the unsuspecting cyclist, and if you are going to introduce them where there were none before then it seems reasonable to at least take steps to try to minimise the hazard. At a guess though, plenty of people were injured falling off bicycles because of tramlines before the war; which doesn't make it OK. They also had rickets, diphtheria and Hitler, and we don't think much of them these days either.

The Cholsey and Wallingford link could be re-instated as a tramway route whilst I accept this would upset the railway preservationists at the site.

There is nothing wrong in riding a bike in a city with numerous tram lines, you just avoid poking the front wheel into the part of the tram lines where the wheel flanges go. However if you watch cyclists on Bristol Harbourside they deliberately poke their front wheels that way but the wheel flange gaps are so packed solid with dust that their front wheels don't disappear into the underground.

Melbourne is a city to see for tramlinks. A number of less remunerative rail links were closed and converted to tram links. At the out of city destinations the converted tram links were then connected into the local tram lines so the populus had an express tram service from downtown Melbourne to the suburb then a stopping service in the suburb, Port Melbourne and St. Kilda were two such places that I remember from my visits.

They still do on the London Street side from time to time. A small section was removed a few years back, but a piece of pointwork is still under the road. On the other side of the I.D.R a section appears from time to time outside the Great Expectations pub. Because of the undulating nature of the road, I am still convinced that tram rails are still under parts of Erleigh Road even though evidence from historians suggests that the Corporation removed them. They also said they removed them in London Street too.

 The Reading Corporation trams ran on a grooved rail that seemed relatively shallow. If you wander down along the railway behind Southcote Estate between Circuit Lane and Southcote Farm Lane you can see several pieces of Corporation tram rail being used as fence posts 80 or more years (depending on which part of the system they came from) after trams last ran along them!

Nice quote from "Capstick Comes Home" c.1981 by the late Tony Capstick.

If anyone's got a couple of minutes to spare:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2AcJSkUw6M

;)

There have been problems with cyclists and the Edinburgh trams. I believe there is a court case imminent or in the process.

I will still never understand it. Each time I ride a bicycle I'm looking as to where and what the bicycle is riding on. It could be suggested that drains pose a problem to cyclists, or cattle grids. If I rode my bicycle, got it caught in a tram line and fell off I would see this as my fault for not looking where I was going rather than the fault of something that is far bigger and more important than me as an individual. So, much like level crossings, the risk is that we are no longer responsible for our own actions.

Absolutely. And as the one who started this sub-thread within a thread in raising this topic, I would add that I too am a cyclist (although more of an ex-cyclist with failing eyesight these days) who has ridden in "tram infested" areas like Manchester city centre, and I take tram lines to be just one of those hazards that one has to cope with when cycling.

Road gullies (drains) were considered a hazard many years ago when most of the grates were laid with the bars going parallel to the kerb (so the slot was in the direction of cycle travel). These were called long-bar gully grates. However, this has been recognised as a safety hazard by highway authorities as an issue for over 40 years now and so very few (if any) long bar gully grates remain now.   

Most new road gully drain covers these days are 2 inch thick slabs of wrought iron with 2 inch diameter holes and you'de have to be a contortionist to push your front wheel of a push bike down a 2 inch diameter hole.