I popped in to the Corsham group's "booth" in the centre of Corsham yesterday - they had borrowed a shop that's currently unlet and were inviting shoppers in there to hear more about their campaign for a station ... and much more for a train service that passes through Corsham and is sufficiently un-express for whoever runs it to consider stopping it there. There's only one train per day that's not a London -> Bristol and beyond (or vice versa) service at the current time.
The group was gathering reply cards / names and addresses with a particular vies to the GWRUS response which is now due in within a fortnight.
I'll leave their excellent bullet-point texts to speak for themselves initially:
The question was asked in another thread here whether the was going to be much "TransWilts" content at the event. Well - several of the people there are old friends and very much supporters of the "TransWilts", but the campaign / issues are different but with parallels.
Comment on Corsham:
The GWRUS looked at a Bristol area -> Chippenham service which would have provided a suitable more local train through Corsham, and trains could then call there serving Bath (in one direction) and Chippenham (in the other), both of which are Corsham destinations. However, the roads into Bath / Chippenham are in both cases less than fast, and the buses in both directions used to (still do?) go round the houses in places making a less than fast service.
From my reading of the RUS, the case for a Corsham station itself wasn't examined, and the idea of a Bristol -> Chippenham suburban route was rejected because of the cost of a bay platform at Chippenham in favour of an extra hourly Bristol -> Bath. Without a bay at Bath, I do wonder if they have the capacity to turn trains around there. Looking more bravely / wider ... why not make the service a Bristol -> Swindon suburban one, evaluate the case for a Wootton Bassett station on the Chippenham line, which would then have a 30 minute service (hourly via Corsham, hourly via Melksham) into Swindon. Makes sense, bearing in mind Wiltshire Council's expansion plans for "West of Swindon" by 2026, along with Chippenham and Trowbridge.
I was reminded about the Corsham event by Duncan Hames' tweet (Duncan is the prospective Lib-Dem candidate for Chippenham / Melksham / Corsham / Bradford-on-Avon ... and who should I run into at the meeting but Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, the Conservative candidate.
Support for this one is truely cross-party ... there were strong lib-dem and conservative supporters both manning the shop at the event.
