Despite many rumblings about Pershore and Hanborough, all that has happened on the Cotswold Line is Charlbury gaining a couple of extra spaces when lines were painted and the car park given a proper surface, i.e. ensuring that people parked sensibly. There's talk of the former allotment area being used as an overflow car park now that the redoubling team have finished with it. Anyone have any updates on that?
It was an awful lot more than a couple of spaces actually - also at Kingham - since without markings people tend to give their cars very generous amounts of space. A bid went in during the spring for money from the station enhancements fund to turn the Charlbury site compound on the allotments into permanent parking. A decision is thought to be imminent.
At Pershore efforts to achieve improvements have been frustrated for years because of the piecemeal way former railway land was disposed of around the station. A land swap with one of the adjacent businesses has pretty much been finalised now, which will create a rather more logical parcel of land for station parking and allow extra spaces. Honeybourne has just gained half-a-dozen as a result of the footbridge work and remarking.
your point about Ascott is farcical
In what way? The station is right next to the village. Given a proper service, not just one a day each way, more people would use trains. Amazingly enough that's what has happened at Pershore, Hanborough and Honeybourne since more trains started to use them. In the early 1970s the first two both had one train a day each way, like the halts, while Honeybourne was closed at that time.
What is farcical about giving people the ability to leave their car at home, never mind at a station? I do not believe that surrounding stations with ever-bigger car parks is necessarily a good thing. It creates congestion and pollution - just ask anyone living near Bicester North.
Oh I swear one day I'll get a bulldozer and flatten them myself!!!
Are you sure you'll be able to find them? You didn't understand the geography of the area around Combe and Finstock or Ascott and Shipton when raging against them, you didn't know that Shipton doesn't have a car park. You used to advocate withdrawing stops at Charlbury, the busiest intermediate station on the line (on current evidence, the only thing you have ever changed your mind about).
I'm glad you finally acknowledge demand at the West of the line! People have deserted the line in droves. I'm sure the tiny car parks at pershore and hanborough would be full whatever so using the "Evesham traffic chaos" argument is silly.
I have never disputed there is demand at the western end of the line - I know there is demand because there are lots of people on trains arriving at Moreton-in-Marsh from Honeybourne and leaving in the other direction - some of them may even live in Worcester. What I have disputed and will continue to do are:
a. The number of people who actually drive all the way to Warwick and Birmingham International (risking delays on the M5/M42/M40) because of the sheer awfulness of the Cotswold Line service.
b. That there is sufficient demand in Worcester to justify the cost of running super-express services for one of the smallest cities in the country. It is too far away for regular commuting to London, and small cities mean fewer people who need to travel.
Would the car parks at Pershore, Honeybourne and Hanborough be full if their service towards Oxford and London in the morning peaks was reduced to the following (based on September 12 timetable)? The car park at Evesham is full, so is not any kind of alternative for people in the Vale.
Pershore: 05.45, 07.05 (halts train to Oxford only)
Honeybourne: 05.35. 07.19 (assuming a call by the halts train were reinstated to make up for the lost London trains)
Hanborough: 6.16, 6.38 (actually the car park is so small it is full after these first two trains but oddly enough some people don't want to set off quite so early), 8.01 (halts)
*Ascott is a tiny village. Comparisons to Pershore are ridiculous. How many such places does the
WCML▸ ,
GWML▸ etc. pass through. Do they have stops? No - because fortunately, they weren't in a marginal constancy. How long do you think the traffic jams are going to be if people drive a couple of miles to the next station? Sorry - still farcial.
*There's no reason why 10 mins can't be axed from Pad -
OXF» fasts after Reading and when there are 125mph trains on all services. Improving the timetable and axing a couple of stops could get the journey time below 2 hrs. Plenty of people commute for 2 hrs (e.g. Ramsgate). However, Evesham would definitely be commutable from (1.5 hrs). Luckily there'll be plenty of spaces in the car park after Chiltern Evergreen 3. Anyway, I'm not just talking about commuters, but businessmen and daytrippers. You don't know how frustrating it is to race to Oxford and then stop at every village for the next 1.5 hrs! Thank goodness Chiltern have seen the light - I can get my sanity back.
