Parkway station an environment disaster

Canterbury is extremely fortunate in having two railway stations within easy walking distance of the city centre, as well as a high speed line to London.

So I fail to understand the idea of replacing these stations with an out-oftown Parkway station which, with new access roads, would be an environmental disaster and require everyone to use secondary transport to get to it.

The high speed trains appeared in Canterbury some years ago as if by magic, taking everyone by surprise, including Network Rail who hadn’t upgraded their line for them to be able to operate; but now they provide an excellent fast comfortable service to the capital.

The problem with both stations is that they were only designed to have access to the public from one side of the tracks. East station has a pedestrian access on the other side, but at West station the extra freight lines that used to deliver oil to Canterbury many years ago, prevent access on the down side from London.

As I understand it Network Rail owns land to the north side between Canterbury West and Roper Road, so the obvious solution is to provide at least a pedestrian access here, or preferably a ‘drop off and pick up’ access which would relieve the chaos when packed trains arrive from London – and would incidentally divert some of the traffic from the St Dunstan’s level crossing. Mike Armstrong Queens Avenue, Canterbury