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Updated 25th August 2010

                                                Up and Down the Line       Other News       Steam News    Archive Newsletters
 Class 158 leaves Galton Bridge
The 05.14 Service ex-Aberystwyth departs from Smethwick Galton Bridge on 29th May last.     



LATEST NEWSLETTER

You can download a copy of our latest newsletter in *.pdf format.

   Newsletter 51 August 2010

Up and Down the Line

Aberystwyth
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 273,410, compared to 218,498 in 2002/2003.

Ceredigion County Council Environmental Health Department has expressed concern at meals being served on the patio area of the Wetherspoon's pub due to problems with pigeons - the area being the old station circulating area in front of the buffer stops.

Plans for Aberystwyth's Station improvement have been revealed by Arriva Trains Wales at a recent ATW station adopters' meeting in Chester. The station name will appear in large letters within the glass frontage, viewed from inside the station; from the outside it will be seen in reverse as shown in the artist's impression here.
 The proposed new station frontage at Aberystwyth


The Student Union at the University has been campaigning for 4 car trains to operate to the town at what it calls predictable times when students will travel.

According to new classification of stations, the terminus is a "Medium Staffed Station". Whether this will allow things like an increase in booking office hours, allow enough staff to provide revenue protection/platform customer service, prominently sign post the nearby bus station, or provide new information screens remains to be seen.

The so called Masterplan, with its bonkers idea to relocate the station about 1/2 a mile further from the town centre appears to be dead in the water because of the recession. In the meantime, a study carried out by the East Suffolk Travellers' Association with regard to a similar ill conceived scheme, has reached the conclusion that 21% of existing users of Lowestoft station would use the trains less often, if at all. The proposals there are for the existing station to be closed and the track cut back by 450 metres.

Borth
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 50,508, compared to 37,040 in 2002/2003 and thats just the people who actually pay!. There are still chronic problems with revenue protection on the section between Borth and Aberystwyth..
No news on the repair of the station canopy.

The station adoption group have been working hard to acquire access to the remainder of the building, with the intention of opening a small railway heritage centre there. Because of the number of agencies involved on today's railway, the bureaucratic hurdles have been considerable.

Dovey Junction
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 1,494, compared to 804 in 2002/2003.
Surprisingly the Aberystwyth line platform, Numbered 2, has not been split into a & b, given that it will be capable of holding two trains simultaneously.

Machynlleth
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 107,346 compared to 81,219 in 2002/2003.

We understand that proposals have been put forward by TraCC regarding improved car parking at the station. As far as we are aware, this involves a new site to the North of the railway, with access to the station via the Up platform or under the road bridge. The situation should be considerably improved if these plans come to fruition.
 An old style BR Totem at Machynlleth


Talerddig
The high speed points have been constructed on site with concrete sleepers and currently (still there in June) await installation.

Carno
Carno Station Action Group (CSAG) have found that making any progress on reopening Carno station has first to overcome bureaucratic finger pointing. A year on from WAG's Enterprise and learning Committees hearing in Carno, the group have discovered that TraCC have done no work towards assessing the group's business plan, citing lack of money and resources from WAG. WAG naturally of course expected TraCC to do all the work. CSAG point out that they put together the business plan using voluntary time.

Caersws
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 33,950 compared to 23,648 in 2002/2003.

The justification for Network Rail's profligate spending here seems to be on "elf and safety" grounds. The metal stockade; wildly inappropriate and no doubt installed at a lot greater cost than an ordinary builder would do has been justified as stopping passengers crossing in front of stationary trains, off the platform ramp. Between the station's opening in 1863 and the installation of the fencing in 2009 there have been no recorded incidents of any accidents involving passengers coming off the ramp and crossing in front of trains.

Newtown
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 110,034, compared to 80,540 in 2002/2003.

The town's Tesco store was finally opened in late February; it can be clearly seen on the Welshpool side of the station. The associated roadworks and new traffic lights have made life a nightmare according to some locals, including those trying to access the station by car. The towns bypass has been scheduled to start by 2014. Support for the proposed new road has proved less universal than many local politicians thought, with WAG's consultants only offering six choices of route to solve Newtown's traffic problems, drawing heavy criticism as alternatives have not been explored.

Representations were made to the local AM, Mick Bates regarding the hourly service at a meeting with SARPA on 12th July. We pointed out that an enhanced timetable would enable some relief to people from Newtown who chose to use the train. This well in advance of the construction of the proposed bypass. Indeed, an hourly service Eastwards from Newtown would be a possibility without any infratsructure enhancements.

Another Cafe called Fiero's Cafe has sprung up on the station this time at the Caersws end of the UP platform which was occupied by an IT firm. It can sell refreshments to passengers. One hopes that the inspiration for the name was not a 1980s motor car!

The Somerfield opposite the station entrance has been converted into the town's now only Co-Op and seen an upturn in usage. Newtown is of course the hometown of the founder of the co-operative movement Robert Owen.

Under a Welsh Assembly (WAG) initiative to promote sustainable tourism, the middle section of the station is being considered as a cycle hire centre to an accompaniment of upgraded cycle routes in the area.

 The Wuppertal Monorail in Germany
A solution to some of Newtown's traffic problems? Here we see the Wuppertal Monorail in action. The system is over 100 years old but uses trains built in the 1970s. Further modernisation has been carried out since 2004. Joking apart, the gantries appear to be relatively lightweight and being affixed to blocks in the ground, construction would surely create far less disturbance at street level than conventional light rail schemes. Maybe the concept is ripe for revisiting? Of course, in the rest of Europe, there is a much more enlightened attitude to public transport......


Welshpool
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 95,778, compared to 60,538 in 2002/2003.

Problems with misuse of the car park by non rail users persist, with the situation being particularly bad on Mondays. Things have improved slightly with the closure of the Smithfield Market in the town and its move to a new site at Buttington.

No progress has been made on repairing the station footbridge, although Arriva have informed us that the situation has been noted and that some attempt has been made to liaise with other stakeholders of the bridge..Further work on restoring the double track south of Welshpool has taken place, though completion is unlikely before the implementation of the new ERTMS signalling system.

Middletown
At the site of the former station at Middletown (Closed 1964) there is a lane which crosses the railway over a wooden decked bridge, with cast iron piers. There are now substantial saplings growing out of the wooden deck from the outside of the parapet. One wonders whether this state of affairs is either advisable or safe over the longer term.......

Shrewsbury

Footfall for 2008/2009 was 1,595,812, compared to 1,258,246 in 2002/2003.

Network Rail commissioned the new semaphore signal at the south end of platform 3 on July 3rd: this allows passenger trains to depart southward towards Sutton Bridge Junction enhancing the operational flexibility of the station. Passenger services have been concentrated on the island platform since the end of the 1960's as well as passenger facilities, the Island's two through and two bay platforms being deemed sufficient for the traffic that remained. Recent increases in frequencies, new services and longer formations combined with abortive attempts to make cross platform connections have exposed the reduced layout's weaknesses and the re-use of Platform 3 is something of a cheap attempt to remedy this.

Platform 3 can only be accessed from the island platforms by traversing the subway and going through the ticket barriers and out of the main entrance, turning left and through a narrow door up a set of stairs. An elevator is also available but you have to go right out of the entrance and through some not very obvious doors. Concerns have been expressed about passengers having to make tight connections. The current ticket office occupies what was the main staircase to the platform. Passengers for Aberystwyth using Shrewsbury station need to be aware that trains can now (and have been seen to) depart from Shrewsbury using Platforms 3,4,5 & 6. It's also possible to depart toward Aberystwyth from Platform 7 but not if the train has come from the Wellington direction.

Until 1950 Shrewsbury had 9 platforms, and then they were renumbered and reduced to 7. Until 1961 there was an overall roof and a footbridge at the south end of the station connecting Platforms 4/5 to 1/2/3. The south facing bays Nos 1 & 2 were only accessible from the Sutton Bridge Junction direction and were retained as sidings until the mid 1980's, No.3 being used for occasional football and other specials. The now unused bays mainly catered for local services to Welshpool, Minsterly, Hereford and the Severn Valley line.

Telford
The new £8m International Railfreight Park at Telford is being used for.....parking trains. The level of revenue earning traffic has been spasmodic since opening in June 2009, with just 10 trains running to the terminal in 2010. Four of these were moves to place surplus roling stock into secure store and one was a railtour.

The trains sent for storage at Telford are SouthEastern Class 508 EMUs, which are surplus to requirements and have been hauled from Stewarts Lane by DB Schenker Class 67s. The trains themselves are owned by Angel Trains. Currently (Mid July) there are 5 units stored in the railfreight facility.

Birmingham New St
Footfall for 2008/2009 was 25,191,945.

Franchise changes
The takeover of ATW by Deutsche Bahn (DB) was announced on 22nd April and has since passed all hurdles with regard to monopolies and the EU. DB is paying £1.59bn for the company. This should have many benefits for Mid Wales, if there is integration of the Wales and Borders services with those of Wrexham and Shropshire and Chiltern, providing a better service between Shrewsbury and Birmingham. The prospect of a Von Cambrian Coast Express has been raised.

Rolling Stock News
There are now plans to refurbish the Class 158 Fleet used on the Cambrian. As we understand it this will involve new interiors and the removal of one table seating bay. As far as we believe, this is to allow the replacement of luggage space removed for the installation of the ERTMS equipment. An artists impression of the new interior was shown by Arriva at a station adopters meeting at Tywyn on 7th May.

 Proposed new interior of Class 158
A delivery of new rolling stock for use on the West Midlands commuter lines out of Birmingham Snow Hill will trigger a rolling stock cascade with Class 150 DMU's being transferred elsewhere. This will allow First Great Western to give back 4 of this type of unit to ATW which had lent them to FGW in 2007. This means that the Class 158's ATW currently use between Cheltenham and Maesteg will be freed up. ATW planned to use these for their proposed Marylebone service. There are currently no short term plans for their redeployment, however ATW and WAG have confirmed a long due refurbishment programme for the Class 158 and 153 fleets. Details are yet to be released but it seems likely that the extra units released by the cascade will allow refurbishment to take place without affecting current deployments.

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Other News

NEWS IN BRIEF

Archive Newsletters
We have now started to include an archive of previous newsletters on this site. We hope eventually to include all of these, right back to 2001. These are *.pdf files and they have an added advantage over the photocopied originals in that you can see all the photographs in full colour.

You can access the archive by
Clicking Here.

Line Speed Improvements. Network Rail, Shrewsbury - Wolverhampton
Following an extensive review of the scope and cost of work needed, there is now a viable business case to support the line speed increase, and a funding contribution through the Regional Funding Allocation has been secured.

Consequently, Network Rail are looking to start the design phase shortly, with a proposed implementation timescale of late 2010/early2011. It is proposed to integrate delivery of the enhancement works with a programme of track renewals, to minimise disruption to train operators.

The enhancement will raise the line speed from 70mph to 90mph between Wolverhampton and Shrewsbury over approximately 20 miles in the down direction (to Shrewsbury) and 23 miles in the up direction. This is because the speed increase will be applied where most benefit is to be gained (there are some sections where trains would not be able to reach 90mph anyway).

Delivery timescales are subject to confirmation, but the good news is that the project is now able to progress. (Via Dave Koring, Shropshire Council)

Engineering Work on the Arriva Network
There is a substantial amount of engineering work due to take place on Arriva's network during 2010. This includes train being replaced by buses between Barmouth & Pwllheli on the Cambrian Coast Line. Some of this work is scheduled to be carried out on weekdays and may disrupt your journey. For further information, please use this link to look at the map.

Rail Rambles
Rail rambles are walks from railway stations in Wales and the border counties of England. The walks themselves are free to join (but of course you have to pay your rail fare!) Each walk is planned to be accessible by a day return rail journey from a number of main line and connecting stations. Rail fares are very reasonable and good value with many discounts available. You do not have to be a member of any organisation to join a walk. All you have to do is appear at the station from which the walk departs and make yourself known to one of the leaders.

The revival in rail travel in recent years has certainly helped expand the scope of the programme over the years and the enthusiastic involvement of Arriva Trains Wales (ATW)) has also been key. "We run 970 services and 249 local stations, and things are definitely improving year on year," says Ben Davies, stakeholder liaison manager at ATW. "We're looking at connections to more rural communities in mid-Wales and encouraging more scenic walks from trains, on the Cambrian Coast Line in particular. As well as providing £1,000 towards Rail Rambles' annual costs, ATW also subsidises the walks leaders' train travel. It's a welcome concession for the volunteers, all of whom hail from local Ramblers groups.

There have been walks with starting points at various stations on the Cambrian section throughout 2010 and which we have featured previously on this page.

For more information take a look at the Rail Rambles website:- http://www.railrambles.com

Freight Revival?
Over in America, the notable investor known as "The Oracle of Omaha", Warren Buffet has bought the railfreight operator, BNSF for $44 billion. His Berkshire Hathaway INC investment company announced that it would buy the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad in what Buffett referred to as "a wager on the economic future of the United States".

It seems a good time to buy as since the start of the recession, there probably are not that many people who can write $44 billion cheques right now. Buffet will probably have bought the company cheaper than he might have done had he waited.

Its nice to know that somebody believes in railfreight, even if it isn't over here. If something like this can happen in a country so dedicated to road transport, one might expect some glimmer of hope for railbourne merchandise traffic in the UK. Indeed, such has proved to be th case as a new freight terminal is proposed for Holyhead, as part of a 'land bridge' linking the continent with Ireland. Consultants are now preparing a business case for the project, to be completed in March this year.

Cambrian Rover Fares

The Cambrian Coast Day Rover tickets cost £8.50 for adults (£5..70 railcard concession), £4.25 for children or £16.90 for a family (2 adults and 2 children). They offer unlimited travel on the Cambrian Coast Line for the day after 0900. Cambrian Coast Evening Family (1 adult and 1 child) Rover Tickets, valid after 1830, are also available for £5.10.

Cambrian Rover and other rail tickets can be purchased from the Railway Stations at Aberystwyth, Machynlleth, Barmouth and Newtown or from the Conductor on the train.

ATOC
The Association of Train Operating Companies (ATOC) is promoting longer length franchises of between 15 & 20 years as the magic formula to bring in stability, planning and private sector investment into the rail industry. Passengers in the Wales and Borders franchise area wait with baited breadth as the 6th year of the 15 year franchise draws to an end and wonder what private sector investment is heading their way.

Meanwhile the organisation has suggested reversing some of the Beeching era closures in England, concentrating on settlements of population of 15,000 plus as a having a viable potential customer base to justify business cases. Of the 106 settlements in Wales with a population over 4000 no fewer than 45 of them have no railway station.

Suggestions of closure reversal in Wales have met with a Damp Squib by Network Rail who remarked to WAG "It is not for us to tell the Assembly Government how to spend its money, but...(We)... would caution that the rights of way on both those lines....(between Mid and South Wales)... are long gone and are in private hands. Both lines run through areas of outstanding natural beauty and reopening them would be so prohibitively expensive that it would negate any socioeconomic business case from our perspective".

Oh, so that's really encouraging and exciting then.....and don't expect even to think about travelling to Cardiff by train any time soon. Really, people having the temerity to want a decent rail network should be severly dealt with!




Scruffy Stations.
At last the penny has dropped that stations have had a raw deal out of privatisation with all the fragmented players copping out of looking after them as they'e not specified to do so. Government still believes franchising can be "made to work" and recommendations that Train Operators (TOCs) are specified to maintain stations when franchises are let have been made.

London Ticket Restrictions
There has been confusion over restrictions on tickets for passengers traveling to/from west of Shrewsbury on the Cambrian with some recent instances where TOC staff have been advising that valid tickets are not valid. We have checked this out and the only restrictions on Off Peak marked tickets travelling to/from London Euston are that you must not arrive there before 1014 or depart there before 0930. Off Peak fares are valid on the 1643 departure from Euston which is in the evening peak. If you are challenged we would advise politely reminding TOC staff that whilst you understand that the ridiculous rules can be confusing for all concerned travel to/from Euston from west of Shrewsbury is one of the few areas left without draconian restrictions. Do not be confrontational but firmly stand your ground making a note of the train, time, day and name of staff member.

We have written to both Virgin and ATW to remind them to train their staff properly on such validity.

If problems persist ask the person challenging to forward a copy of the ticket ruling from the fares manual justifying their actions to SARPA Chairman Gareth Marston (they will not be able to do this). If they are a Virgin employee, you could also gently explain that their instructions are a load of bollocks. Though maybe you should actually click the link first!

Cardiff
Deputy First Minister Iuean Wyn Jones launched the 5 year National Transport Plan on the 15th July. Whilst mega expensive road expansion schemes in South Wales were scrapped and the road lobby chucked its dummy, real investment in public transport was missing from the plans. There was also a lot of John Prescott-style rhetoric about integrated transport. As we all know, delivery is always more important than promise. A full look will appear in a later newsletter. Overlooked by the media but spotted in the consultation document was a commitment to introduce an hourly service from Aberystwyth to Shrewsbury by 2011.

Iuean Wyn Jones has made some interesting comments in the Senedd too. When speaking on 4th November last in response to questions from Mick Bates about rail services in Mid Wales he said;

"I accept that there is a desire to see improved rail services in....(Mid Wales). I receive many letters from people who want to see such improvements. When we undertake to improve the infrastructure, we would like to reach an agreement with Arriva Trains on the provision of additional services. However, one of the problems that the Government faces is the fact that we would have to contribute to the cost of such services where they are not included in the franchise. Another consideration at present is that we, as a Government, purchase the stock itself, which would mean one capital cost rather than an annual revenue cost. I can assure you that the Government is giving careful consideration to this in conjunction with Arriva Trains. When we come to the conclusion that we are able to buy the stock, it will be a matter of prioritisation in terms of services."

At a meeting with Mr Wyn Jones in March 2008, the SARPA delegation suggested that the Welsh Assembly consider the purchase of new rolling stock as a means of reducing the cost of services over the longer term, rather than continue to pay exorbitiant hire fees for old trains. It seems that somewhere, the penny might have dropped.

Station Footfall
The Office of Rail Regulation has released the figures for 2006/2007 station usage. As always these have to be taken with a pinch of salt. They show tickets sold from/to stations and therefore miss out rover ticket sales, ticketless travel whether intentional or unintentional, traffic from excursions and in our case doesn't show passengers travelling between the coast line and Shrewsbury (and beyond).

As always to use the figures and trends you have to understand what's behind them. So for our 7 stations the total footfall is now officially 609,800, though with the missed out categories added a figure around 700,000 would probably be more accurate, and remember this is up to the end of March 2007, and since then there been a further 18 months growth with all the evidence pointing to accelerating growth in that period..

Since 2002/2003 footfall has increased by c.105,000 or 21.4%. So much for the decline predicted by the SRA in its Wales and Borders franchise specification! This has averaged 5.4% per annum, however between 2005/2006 and 2006/2007 growth was only 3.9%. In fact growth stalled at Aberystwyth and Borth but was close to 8% from the Montgomeryshire stations. Why? Remember that the period includes the infamous pollen summer of 2006 when pollen maliciously attacked ATW operated Class 158's. Revenue protection was not as tight due to irate customers and a drop in travellers because of the awful punctuality would account for some decline, but we also must remember that July that year saw the extra WAG funded carriages introduced. However these were only east of Machynlleth and didn't go to Aberystwyth. Can we speculate that the extra carriages allowed significant growth at Newtown and Welshpool etc. after the woes of the pollen season but because they didn't go to Aberystwyth the Ceredigion end did not see the same upsurge? In the same period (2002/2003 to 2006/2007) the coastline has only grown by 1.2%. However the story here is one of falling school rolls - which is a big political issue in Gwynedd. The two main stations that generate the schools traffic are Barmouth, down by 26.5%, and Harlech, down by 25.6%. Yet growth in non schools traffic has just about counterbalanced this drop. It must be born in mind that the (Harlech) schools traffic goes up the coast on one train on a weekday morning and back down it on one train on a weekday afternoon. Whilst these trains may be quieter than five years ago the others have certainly got busier.

For a full view of passenger numbers using stations on the Cambrian lines, see the website of the
Office of Rail Regulation and click on the link for Station Usage Excel sheet.

These figures are a listing of all stations in Great Britain, ranked in order of importance, based on the number of people using them. They exclude journeys made using Travel Passes, Rover tickets bought off the line, as well as staff travel passes. There is a clear growth in use for stations on the Cambrian Main Line

UK Network Timetable
You can now download the whole UK timetable (and its completely FREE!), in place of a printed copy, should you so desire from the Network Rail website. Be warned, however that it's a very comprehensive document at more than 62mb, so not for either the faint hearted or those folk still using dial-up modems to access the internet .

You can also obtain a printed copy on real paper, though you have to pay for it. Its available from The Stationery Office or
W H Smith. and will cost you £16.00. We understand that this will be plus delivery, if you order from The Stationery Office.


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Steam News

The Cambrian steam service has once again been running from Machynlleth to Portmadog and Pwllheli this summer operated by West Coast Railways. The service began in the last week of July and runs throughout all of August. The last service was originally pencilled in for Friday 3rd September but this has now confirmed as Monday 30th August (Bank Holiday Monday).

Loadings this year have been good, despite the rather minimal publicity in the local area; indeed many people are competely unaware that "The Cambrian" exists. The service operates more like a proper train than other main line steam services in that any number of journey permutations are possible, like for intstance, Tywyn to Barmouth or Machynlleth to Harlech. Single tickets are available.

The train is (or can be part of) a great day out and offers rather better value for money than other main line steam providers in that the fares are affordable; you don't have to get up at the crack of dawn or return at midnight in order to use it and there is complete freedom from over-zealous train stewards who think their sole mission in life is to stop people from leaning out of the windows Haulage this year is by a Stanier Black Five, No 44871. This locomotive achieved fame by being one of the locomotives to haul the last steam train on British Rail on 11th August 1968. Interestingly, the class were not permitted over the Coast line during days of BR service, though that doesn't mean it never happened!

We said last year that 2009 may be the final year of Cambrian steam operations because of the impending introduction of the new ERTMS signalling system. Owing to the prolonged development and installation time for the technology, steam is safe for at least this year. Conversations with people in the rail industry would indicate that West Coast Railways are intent on running "The Cambrian" in 2011 too.

As yet, no steam locomotive has been fitted with the necessary equipment for the new signalling system although Network Rail has indicated that it is indeed possible. At present, the plan is to fit the computer equipment into some manner of support coach, with just the sensors on the locomotive, together with a display in the cab. Whilst this may indeed work, it means that the steam locomotve would have to be shunted by a Class 97 diesel when it comes to remarshalling the train or running round.
 Black 5, No 44871 at Morfa Maddwch
Steam is back again on the Cambrian this summer, with a Stanier Black Five. Here, 44871 runs through Morfa Maddwch with the service on 27th July. Photo by Kate Jones

Full details of all steam traction on the main line can be found at http://www.uksteam.info/tours/trs10.htm




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