The future of our railways - the Great Western Plan

Network Rail produced a new strategy for the Great Western area, which covers most of the routes in the South West in addition to the main lines from Paddington, in 2010.

The draft Route Utilisation Strategy was published in 2009 and went out to consultation. Now the final document has been published.

Many of the recommendations will be welcome in the county, and they come on top of the significant recent announcement about electrification of the main line from Paddington to Bristol and the routes to Oxford and Newbury. This will have a knock-on implications about the number and type of trains which will serve routes in Wiltshire, including routes that would still rely upon diesel operation.

Other welcome recommendations are an additional platform at Westbury, modest increases in capacity on the route between Wales and the south coast, particularly between Bristol and Westbury and the redoubling of the Cotswold line between Swindon and Kemble.

Conservatives on Wiltshire Council had previously refused to make the relatively small investments needed to get a better service, preferring instead to waste large amounts of money on working up road schemes such as the fatally flawed Westbury bypass.

Liberal Democrats welcomed proposals that could see improved rail services for the county. The proposals which support Lib Dem calls for a hourly service between Salisbury and Swindon could result in significant reduction to peak time congestion on roads.

Here's my response to the consultation on the draft document:

"I welcome the proposals in the RUS which have the potential to offer significant benefits to travellers in Wiltshire. Specifically the references on p9 to resolve problems of crowding on trains on the Cardiff to Portsmouth and Bristol to Weymouth routes through the county and to improve service provision.

6.9.10.4 p136. The ideal solution would be a regular Salisbury to Swindon service via Trowbridge, Melksham and Chippenham. Wiltshire Council should support this service because of the benefits to commuters and other travellers and the potential to relieve pressure on the road system.

I would also ask that consideration be given to establishing a new station at Staverton (Wilts), just south of the junction between the Bath Spa and Melksham lines. This would serve the large new development at Staverton Waterside. There is an opportunity to develop a station here as the site is allocated for development but not yet built on so a project could be designed in collaboration with Wiltshire Council and the site developers."

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The bits of the final document which affect travellers in South West Wiltshire are:

1. Overcrowding on Portsmouth to Bristol and Weymouth to Bristol services. Five peak services on the Portsmouth - Bristol route and two on the Bristol - Weymouth route will be extended. On the Portsmouth service one morning peak train and one evening peak train will become faster by cutting out small stations between Westbury and Bristol, with an extra slow train to cater for passengers using the small stations. Network Rail has also established a joint Cardiff to Portsmouth Route Improvement Project Group with First Great Western to improve performance generally.

2. The Salisbury to Swindon route. An hourly service was recommended in the draft. A problem emerged during consultation in that Network Rail realised their ticketing data at Melksham was inaccurate. They find themselves in a Rumsfeldian paradox. They know that not many people take trains from Melksham, but they don't know how many people would use the trains if there were a decent hourly service instead of a couple of trains a day. They're recommending more work by done to establish the need. The suggestion is that Wiltshire Council take the lead in getting better data on public demand for the service. However they are satisfied that an hourly Westbury to Swindon service could be provided economically and are recommending it go ahead.

3. Westbury station is to be improved, by adding an extra platform face by creating an island platform from the existing Platform 1. This scheme is likely to be brought forward to help with diversion routes during the planned upgrading of Reading station and work on the crossrail project.

4. The setting up of new stations at the White Horse Business Park and at Staverton Waterside has been recognised as a longer term aspiration.