Great Western Coffee Shop

It's so good to read of the success of Okehampton, returned to the National Rail fold.  If you could ask Santa to restore another regular national passenger service, where would you ask him for?  You have up to three choices, bearing in mind that even Santa might get tied up in red tape with some of the options.

Please feel free to suggest other options ...

From Templecombe...

North to Bath Green Park and south to Bournemouth West. :P

Matlock to Chinley and associated redoubling.
Scottish Borders Railway, Tweedbank to Carlisle.
Okehampton to Bere Alston and associated redoubling.

Funded from various RIS2 cancellations.

Mark

Portishead would be nice…one day in the dim and distant future.

It had to be Woody Bay.  My grandfather's first job after college was as assistant engineer on the build of the line.

Second choice would be the S&DJR.

From Clevedon.

Mark

I'd have liked to have ticked far more than three, but there you go.

I chose preserved lines that already connect to the national network. Years ago, when I was new to this forum, I suggested the concept of a 'conservation railway' - a bit like a conservation area in town planning terms, but applied to a railway. New thinking and some sort of public/private/voluntary organisation would be needed to retain heritage aspects such as signalling, but with open minds and goodwill it should be possible.

Couldn't bring myself to vote for Buckfastleigh, but would have voted early and often for Ashburton! Pill was a bit of an odd option, without Portishead - or did you have a different Pill in mind? Thornbury would certainly be nice, but so would Padstein, Ilfracombe and a whole host of West Country resorts...

and north west from Evercreech to Highbridge  ;)

Okehampton to Bere Alston has already been mentioned but I'd be pleased with just getting to Tavistock by train.

You have a LOT of likes on that  ;) ... my selection of 20 to ask about was pretty well intended not to ask Santa for too much only limited track relaying - though I will admit that Woody Bay would be a big ask!

"only limited track relaying" in the case of Tidworth that would only get you as far as Ludgershall, I believe the branch and track to Tidworth went courtesy of Dr Beeching. But doesn't stop me thinking it would be a nice to have, more likely than other access to Salisbury Plain, Amesbury connection went at the same time, Larkhill even earlier.

Yeah ... I remembered Ludgershall when I was almost complete in setting the poll, and by that time I was further up the alphabet and it was easier to suggest Tidworth.

Could have added "Ratfin Junction" to my list for another Salisbury Plain option, but that would be a complete relay. And perhaps change at Ratfin for narrow gauge to Stonehenge.

Re-establishing the line to Bude would probably have been top of my list, and might still be, but having recently had the opportunity of taking the Okehampton service, I was quite impressed (at least by British standards) of the onward bus connections at the station.

Rebuild the line between South Brent & Kingsbridge - and then investigate the feasibility of constructing a new extension to Salcombe.

Restoration of a service from Worcester, via Evesham and Honeybourne, to Stratford upon Avon and Birmingham would be great.  As would (sorry, GWSR people) a service restored along the length of the Stratford to Cheltenham line

I know Christmas is a time of wonder, but it's probably best to also keep our feet on the ground.

I would just like to see all of the network stay intact and not see any closures or drastic frequency/capacity reductions (outside of strike periods).  Then as a bonus I would like to see all the committed re-opening/new schemes finished (or started in some cases) as soon as possible. 

If both of those happen then I'll be very pleased with Santa.

I nearly suggested the same myself and was exploring Loddiswell Station only last September (on an open day.... it's privately owned now).
There's a lot of the line still not built on but the road bridge crossing and the embankment at Sorley Farm were removed some years ago.
There's even a relic of the once proposed to Salcombe extension at Snape's Point overlooking Salcombe.  The idea was that the line should reach what is now the Snape's Point National Trust circular walk car park.  From there, a track was speculatively built to the mouth of Batson Creek to steps and a landing where a ferry would carry passengers the short distance to Salcombe town.  The extension never happened and the track is now incorporated into the rather spectacular circular walk affording panoramic views of the ria and its creeks.

Hear, hear ... and it feels like it might be quite an achievement at present if we are more or less "stand still" on the network and with a reliable, operating timetable at about the current frequency and with sufficient capacity for the trains to be comfortable to travel on.

Such does not eliminate change;  we have lost Angel Road, Newhaven Marine, and Norton Bridge in recent years, and service suspended at IBM, and in our own area we have gained much improved service to Severn Beach, and new service to Ebbw Vale (from both Cardiff and from Newport) and Okehampton (and this is not a complete list) so changes have not been absent.   

Times change and we do need changes over coming years (and wouldn't it be great if the time taken from an idea to a running service could be shortened!) but the great care needs to be taken to ensure that any changes do not result in significant backward steps.   RailFuture still talk of a bigger, better railway.  My personal view is that headline should be just a better railway (or perhaps a better public transport network) - the "bigger" being a feature that will come from the benefit / as a corollary of a better system.

I am delighted to see that our members are voting, in the most part, for schemes that will make a real difference and are practically possible (or feel so).  For sure, lots of votes for one "way out" scheme - but we know those things can happen as we have seen from the Welsh Highland Railway!

Brecon. So the Paddington to Hereford train continues, calling at Eardisley, Hay, Talgarth, Llangors, Brecon, Defynnog, Craig-y-nos, Onllwyn, Seven Sisters (Glam.), Creunant, Cil-ffriw, and Neath Riverside.

That got me thinking, wasn't there a line from Abergavenny to Brecon though the now National Park?  That would be a corker!

Ah - now does that go through enough marginal constituencies to justify it?

It's odd. It's an instance of a river valley that naturally eases construction of transport routes, yet a railway was never built to supplant the canal (that's somehow still open today despite needing to be, in places, glued to hillsides)

Mark

Dear Santa,

For Christmas, please can we have a year of reliable train services operating to the published National Rail timetables, and with sufficient capacity for everyone who wants to use them.

We know there's a bit of a shortage of funds at the moment, even for you, but if you could go a service of two further, could you start running National Rail service to Swanage please?  Thirteen of our Coffee Shop forum members have asked for this.  And ten have asked for services to Minehead, Fawley and Kingswear, with Bodmin just behind - sounds sensible too as these are found towns that already rail connected and are of substantial size that will really benefit - Santa - you KNOW it makes sense!

There's railway from Woody Bay already - but alas it doesn't go very far.  We were wondering if you could do a bit of you magic and extend it a little bit back down to Barnstaple Town then along the other old line to Barnstaple Junction where there's a convenient interchange platform.  But we're not greedy, and we apprciate it may take until Summer of 2024 to get it fully operational. 

Many Thanks,

30 of your Friends at the Western Coffee Shop. 

The closure preceded Beeching: the Ludgershall-Tidworth branch closed to passengers in 1955, when the line passed to the War Department, with full closure in 1963. A map of 1904 shows a proposed line linking the Tidworth and Bulford branches; this never happened, though laying it would have easy enough. Ludgershall was once the busiest station on the M&SWJR because of troop arrivals and departures.