What’s coming down track for Lancashire?
FIVE potential Lancashire rail projects were submitted as part of the third round of the Restoring Your Railway “ideas fund” earlier this year – bidding for a 75 percent government contribution, up to £50,000, of the costs of economic studies and the creation of business cases to support the proposals.
However, only one of them – to reconnect Rawtenstall and Manchester – was successful when the outcome of the process was announced late last month.
There is now no imminent prospect of studies into the other suggestions – to reopen Midge Hall Station in South Ribble, which closed in 1961; to reinstate the 1.4-mile stretch of track known as the “Burscough Curves”, which would allow for direct train travel between Preston and Southport; to build a new station at Coppull in Chorley, over 50 years after the previous stop closed; and to make various improvements in and around Pendle.