Final go-ahead for Churnet’s push to Leek

THE Churnet Valley Railway’s plan to extend into Leek has unanimously been given the green light by members of Staffordshire Moorlands District Council’s planning committee.

The extension, for which £1.4 million has been obtained from the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development, will run from Leekbrook Junction to a new terminus in the Cornhill area of the town at Barnfields, where planning consent for a housing development and a new station has already been approved.

The new station will be half a mile south of the original one, opened by the North Staffordshire Railway in 1849; the site is now occupied by a Morrisons supermarket.

In a report, the council’s operational manager Ben Haywood said: “This will provide for a rail connection to support Leek/Churnet Valley and the surrounding areas, and to encourage and promote further important transport links for the continued regeneration, tourism, employment and growth of the town of Leek and the surrounding areas.

“The land is proposed to continue to be accessible to walkers and cyclists by providing a segregated zone within the railway boundary.”