A little less conversation… a little more action

For many years I have followed stories in RAIL of proposed rail reopenings in England, only to see little progress.

Skipton-Colne, MarchWisbech, Stratford-Honeybourne, Lewes-Uckfield, OkehamptonBere Alston, Wolverhampton-Walsall, Bicester-Cambridge, BristolPortishead, the lines north of Newcastle, Chingford-Stratford… the list goes on.

Perhaps the problem is that there are just too many bodies involved in every case. Network Rail, the Department for Transport, train operating companies, the Office of Rail and Road, ‘partners’, ‘stakeholders’, local authorities, quangos… again the list goes on and on.

How can so many organisations actually organise a meeting, never mind a consensus and a strategy? At a simpler level, I now read in

RAIL 855 that the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Unitary Authority has announced that it will be 2030 before Soham station will reopen - a town of 11,000 people where every other of many consultancies (another problem) think it would be a good idea to just get on with it.

In 2009, floods hit Workington in Cumbria. Network Rail managed to knock up a temporary station within days to ease transport in the area ( RAIL 633). Why cannot the same be done in Soham (and elsewhere) until all the other bureaucratic issues can be sorted out?

The railway industry needs another Chris Green character who can say: “This is what needs to be done, this is how we will do it, and we start now!” Otherwise, nothing will happen.

Geoff Hutton, Hornchurch