Devizes 52-year wait for train station could end

[grahame]

From The Gazette and Herald

MORE than 50 years of waiting for a train station in Devizes may come to an end after a new working group said it has found the ‘perfect’ location for it.

Despite only forming in December, the Devizes Development Partnership wants to have the Devizes Parkway station built by 2022 and that it should be by the old Clock Inn pub along the A342 – three miles from Devizes.

The group, made up of rail experts, town and Wiltshire Councillors, put forward its plans to Great Western Rail Service representatives last week in discussions to improving train services across the county.

[continues]

[bobm]

By chance I was in Devizes yesterday and had half an hour to spare so took a walk down Station Road to see what remains of the original railway.



The railway used to run under the town centre and emerge shortly before the station.

I didn't have time to explore the other end of the tunnel which hasn't been "commercialised".

Much of the station site is now a car park - and for the first time I saw a car charging point actually being used..

[bignosemac]

Elon Musk has penetrated deepest Wiltshire I see.

[paul7755]

By chance I was in Devizes yesterday and had half an hour to spare...

Left to your own Devizes, as they say... 

Paul

[grahame]

Very interesting to hear the case / background (including the third party and funding support routes) for this station at the Trowbridge DfT consultation.

The recast of the Berks and Hants regional services (as opposed to the hell-for-leather London to Plymouth+ expresses) provides a solid base of trains that could stop on a sensible pattern (frequency still for discussion for future years).  Traffic at Devizes would supplement traffic from other stations all along from Newbury to Taunton making for a better case for more rather than less trains all along, with excellent connections made off the train coming in regularly from the Reading direction via both Trowbridge and Warminster, as well as helping to secure a clock face service with connections for arrivals at Westbury via Trowbridge and Warminster headed for the West Country.

[Bmblbzzz]

Elon Musk has penetrated deepest Wiltshire I see.

The most rural places I've seen Teslas are a village, or hamlet, called Hoarwithy on the banks of the Wye between Hereford and Ross, where it was parked in an open-sided "garage" scooped out of the earth bank of the roadside, and Whittington near Cheltenham, where I had the unusual experience of being overtaken by an almost silent vehicle as I laboured up a steep country lane. And non-Tesla plug-ins all over the Cotswolds.

But to address the subject of the thread, it all sounds good and I'm sure Devizes is too big not to have a station; but what's the likelihood?

[Red Squirrel]

But to address the subject of the thread, it all sounds good and I'm sure Devizes is too big not to have a station; but what's the likelihood?

What do we want?
A station, soon!
What are the chances?
Negligible!