Rail line vs canal battle is looming
A battle is looming between rival train and canal fans.
A group of rail supporters have been campaigning for years to reopen a defunct train track between Horsham and Guildford.
But now they fear their plans could be scuppered by a group of canal enthusiasts.
The English Regional Transport Association has been promoting plans to reopen the section of Horsham line which has been shut since the 1960s.
It also wants to reopen the Horsham to Shoreham line - both have been closed for more than 50 years but much of the original track beds survive.
However the Wey and Arun Canal Trust - established to reinstate London’s ‘Lost Route to the Sea’ - wants to build a new link near Guildford.
It would provide 1,000 yards of new canal from the Wey Navigation by the A281 bridge to a point near the historic aqueduct on Gosden Meadow by Tannery Lane, Bramley, near Guildford.
But transport association chairman Richard Pill said: “The canal threat seeks to take part of the old railway formation and thus presents a significant blockage to our aspiration to see the railway reopened.”
He is calling on people to lodge objections to the canal trust’s proposals.
The transport association - a voluntary membership-based group - says that reopening the railway line with cycle and footpaths would provide a ‘transport-leisure corridor which could cut congestion, reduce road traffic, save land, make modest development more sustainable and offer many new rail direct journeys currently laboriously lengthy, costly, inconvenient or nonexistent.’
However the Wey and Arun Canal Trust says its plans for what it calls the ‘Bramley Link Phase 1’ will begin to connect the Wey Navigation towards reinstated parts of the Wey and Arun Canal.
It says it would enhance the area with an extension to the existing Hunt Nature Park and provide a new canal lock, two bridges, a canal basin for turning boats, landing stages for canoes, bike racks for cyclists, seats and new paths for walkers.
They say the proposals would also provide a reserve for wildlife with ponds to support amphibians, woodland to support badgers and otter holts. New trees would provide for bat navigation and the waterways would attract ducks, swans and other birdlife.