The public would welcome a revival of the country’s rural rail network
sir – I am a keen walker and am slowly working my way through the national walking trails of Britain.
I have lost count of the number of times that I have ended a day’s walking (usually on a Sunday) in very close proximity to the site of a former railway station. Since virtually no rural bus services run on a Sunday, I have to rely on taxi firms to transport me back to a working railway line. I keep a journal of my walks and it is surprising how many times, as I criss-cross overgrown disused railway lines, I have recorded the name of Dr Beeching, whose report set out plans to axe thousands of stations in the Sixties.
I appreciate that railway construction is an expensive business, but I am sure that any moves by a new Conservative government to reinstate parts of the rural rail network (report, November 15) would be warmly welcomed by all. Lyndon Gainham
London W13
sir – Five hundred million pounds is not going to buy much reopened railway. The Bathgate to Airdrie link in Scotland alone cost £300 million for 13 miles, and the mainly singletrack Borders Railway cost about £295 million for 31 miles.
By and large, the infrastructure of closed lines no longer exists in continuous form. Station sites have been sold off for housing and retail, viaducts and bridges demolished, embankments bulldozed, cuttings used for landfill waste, and track beds sometimes adopted for highway improvements or industrial purposes.
Five or 10 billion pounds might get us somewhere. Robert Humm
Stamford, Lincolnshire sir – It is said that Workington epitomises the type of seat the Tories must capture to secure a majority. The town lies on a line offering stunning views of sea and mountains – but few visit or wish to invest there because of clapped-out, unreliable trains. This makes it hard to live the fulfilled lives people demand. It is lines like these, and not HS2, that the North needs. John O’donnell
West Mersea, Essex
sir – Grant Shapps (Commentary, November 15) is correct to focus on railways as means of reconnecting villages. However, he should first review the structure of the industry.
Government-owned Network Rail, which maintains the track and signals that are responsible for over 60 per cent of delayed journeys, is largely uncooperative towards the train operating companies, which use leased rolling stock running through rented stations at substantial cost.
The rail franchising system needs to be reformed as a matter of priority. Clifford Baxter
Wareham, Dorset
sir – It is nonsense to spend £500 million on reopening railway lines that people have got used to living without.
What does Boris Johnson expect people to do – sell their cars so they can wait on cold and windy platforms, carrying everything with them, then walk home from the station?
The car is not a capitalist toy, as the socialists would like to think: it is the only way to go where you want, when you want, carrying what you want. It is thus the most democratic and social machine we have. Philip Howells
Manchester