Totally agree. One single focus on reinstating the 5 miles from Bere Alston to Tavistock, with increased frequency Bere Alston-Plymouth North Road as an added benefit, assuming alternate hourly services from Tavistock and Gunnislake to Plymouth. Incidentally, the former LSWR station in Tavistock is up for sale....(maybe it doesn't include any trackbed, though).


 


 

 

They seem to be raising the stakes.............

https://streamlinefeed.co.ke/news/plaid-cymru-demands-historic-welsh-rail-devolution-in-fierce-westminster-railways-bill-debate

 

You can say the same thing about the Severn Beach Line in Bristol though.

It goes a long way round, Temple Meads is in an awkward location for many and almost all of the stations are well served by frequent bus services.

But history proves that almost every time the service frequency has been increased, the number of users has increased. It's still 2 tph for much of the day with slow diesel units but the ridership is 8x in the last 30 years. The reality is that for a significant part of the city's population it is more useful than bus alone, not to mention that it feeds into the wider regional/national rail network.

 
Yup, posturing should be reserved for Tavistock (and regarding Tavistock shouldn't be posturing, there should be progress).

Mark

 
Thinking of through passengers... how much suppressed demand, do you think there is? ('Suppressed' as the timetable's not really an attractive offer to potential through passengers, and if, say, it went half-hourly, with one service as existing and the second one calling at say BoA, Trowbridge, Westbury and then through to Romsey & Southampton...).

(Apologies for the fantasy timetabling. My memories of the Cardiff - Waterloo services when they skipped both Westbury and Salisbury and ran Bath to Waterloo in 2h 10m are far too clear...)

Mark

 

Yes, to a very large extent I would suggest.

 
Here's the advert for the German / Belgian service:



Not the market they're aiming at - and indeed the market has probably gone away - but what a pity there's no cross channel service from Ostende any more

 

Indeed - busy train in sections, though through passengers are rare as hen's teeth.    10 minutes at Westbury, and 14 minutes at Salisbury give people a change to use the station loos.

 
Long time to keep your legs crossed!

05:11 Gloucester to Southampton Central due 08:10
Facilities on the 05:11 Gloucester to Southampton Central due 08:10.

Toilet facilities are not available.

Disabled toilet facilities are not available.
This is due to a fault on this train.

 

Absolutely right.

Areas like Plympton, Plymstock and Laira have excellent bus services into and out of the City Centre.

Tavistock does stand out however as being "out on a limb"

To an extent this is a local MP posturing and he would be wise not to raise expectations.

 
Looking from "afar" - it strikes me that Tavistock could really do with a metro rail re-opening and as it's so close to Plymouth and part of the same economic area ... but once you get to St Budeaux, the line is paralleled by a good road all the way to North Road, from where the road usefully branches away to serve the city centre.   There are, similarly, good bus service from much closer to the centre out past Laira to Marsh Mills.   That does not necessarily rule it out, but there are challenges in providing something that will overlap for so much of the way with other provision already made.

 
Thanks for that reference / link, Mark.


He was awarded an OBE and subsequently a CBE by the Queen.

A remarkable character - I recommend a read of that obituary. 

 
As would a crossover at Ivybridge

 
My concern would be the availabilty of paths without degrading other services to make a CLOCKFACE service feasible, a metro service would need this as an essential. I'd also be concerned if I lived in Calstock or Gunnislake about reduced service to those destinations. A passing loop somewhere on the route would seemingly be necessary too.

 

 

I do remember a Falmouth Paddington portion on Summer Saturday's (waaay back in my youth).

 
GWR are trialling Evening Day Returns on journeys between two stations in the area bounded by Okehampton, Barnstaple, Exmouth, Newton Abbot, Paignton and Exeter St Davids/Exeter Central. The trial runs from 31st May - 12th December 2026.

These Evening Day Returns are valid on journeys arriving after 1800, with return the same day.

Usual Railcard discounts apply. Valid on all operators. Break of journey allowed.

An example fare:

Exeter St Davids - Barnstaple £8.60, saving £2.10 over the Off Peak Day Return.

 
BBC piece - with a more thorough explanation - at https://www.facebook.com/reel/4159769080982891

 

Here's a report from the BBC in 2024, which is particularly relevant to Monday's run. I guess that NR still don't expect payment for this, as in any case part of the line to Corfe Castle is theirs (and they use more of it themselves).

 
Yesterday morning I wrote ...


Today, home in the last couple of hours.  Up to 85 trains from the 80, and we have added one Rotterdam Metro, one ship, and one bus.   All ran perfect to time.  Home, 12:00 recovery time needed for a few hours. 

Two issues would have failed the "perfection" test. 

1. The lift (which we need) at Liverpool Street was out for maintenance, and whilst there were printed directions on the barriers, and a partial map, these directions replaced the one fit by six steps which were not easy to remember and took us a very long way.   We palled up with a your couple with a child and pram, also transferring to the Elizabeth line, and between the five of us (though the baby/child was not much of a help). 

2. Our train arrived Melkdham 11:29. The hourly bus that passes our house had passed the top of Station Approach at 11:20 (and buses don't stop there anyway - from the days of "what's the point?" when there were just two trains a day - before the first bus and after the last one.    We did walk down to the stop and got a different route - the 4 x a day 69 that runs at least as far as the Market Place.   Noted incorrect times labelling on that bus stop ... probably should report.  The "MyTrip" App helped / wonders!

 
Usefully, Northern's Explorer tickets aren't time-limited on weekdays to off-peak only. Presumably that restriction on the National Railway's rover tickets is a rather uninspiring attempt to avoid said tickets being used to abstract fares income from full fare travel.

Mark

 
Running to Swanage was just an extension of 3Z00, which ran morning and afternoon on a round-trip out of  Effingham Jn. C.H.S.. That's a base for MPVs and RHTTs, but these terms are confusing - RHTT can refer to a single-purpose train or to an MPV doing that job; they also spray herbicide and de-icer (not usually at the same season). RHTT and de-icer runs need to be repeated frequently while "on", so have timetabled paths (in the national TPR). Herbicide runs are covered as one-offs; 3Z00 was inserted as VSTP.

3Z00 has train service code (TSC) 95999801, which is used for all kinds of track maintenance work, leaving us none the wiser. TSCs are odd things - some are very specific, to role, operator, and even depot; others like this one are used very broadly. But given the time of year weedkiller seems most likely. From reports in the last few years, June has been the end of that campaign, and also when NR have extended an MPV run to Swanage to provide this service to them.

 
A number of rover tickets cover the area and seem to offer better value. Multi day tickets are flexible e.g. 3 days in 8

 
Given last nights events that among other harms, dragged in Belfast's public transport system, this article on one Werner Heubeck is worth a read: he headed up the city's bus services during the seventies.

Mark

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/oct/25/werner-heubeck-obituary

 

Nice thought but I rather fancy that the publication in question would have jumped on that story if there was a much a whiff of a suggestion that this might be the case...."Former passenger heralds start of branch line reopening campaign"....or some such headline.  But you never know!

 

I'm intrigued by the new Northern Explorer ticket: https://www.northernrailway.co.uk/tickets/northern-explorer

Basically a flat-rate, go-anywhere ticket for the Northern network. Northern is, of course, a DfT-owned operator. I wonder if this is a very tentative experiment in go-anywhere ticketing given the success of such tickets in mainland Europe.

 
04/06/26 - Exeter To London
DIG 1114 (OT) > EXD 1124 (OT) : 2T15 EXM > PGN : 1 x 166/2 (3 Cars)
EXD 1143 (OT) > PAD 1417 (OT) : 1A81 PGN > PAD : 1 x 800/3 (9 Cars)
TfL Underground Paddington > Stratford (Elizabeth Line) + DLR Stratford > Stratford International

Tickets (All With Senior Railcard, 2 Pax▸ , Price Per Person):
DIG > PAD Advance Single £32.30
TfL Underground/DLR Single £2.05

On 2T15 both tickets & ‘passes’ were requested but the guard then didn’t hang around to check my digital railcard! The train PA was barely audible and wouldn’t have helped anybody who didn’t know exactly what they were doing.
To describe 1A81 as lightly loaded would have been an exaggeration - in our Coach C there were only about a dozen pax. Not for the first time there was no ticket/railcard check.
The short DLR run between Stratford & Stratford International was a useful way of avoiding the walk through Westfield which during most of the day resembles the Serengeti Wildebeest Migration.

05/06/26
Elizabeth Line Stratford > Tottenham Court Road followed by a pleasant stroll to the London Transport Museum. I did not know that on term time Fridays it features guest pianist sessions on a baby grand - very entertaining if you like that sort of thing (I do).
Our return to Stratford was severely disrupted due to problems caused by an Elizabeth Line signal failure at Gidea Park.

06/06/26
Jubilee & Circle Lines from Stratford to South Kensington, Via Westminster, for a visit to the Science Museum. On the Jubilee Line between North Greenwich & Bermondsey the semi-continuous very loud, high pitched noise, presumably due to wheel / rail misalignment, was most unpleasant and I would suggest using a different route if possible. At South Kensington we came up against the absence of the long planned lifts and having to carry an occupied, by our grandson, pushchair up two sets of stairs when surrounded by large crowds was pretty difficult. And then we had to do it again at the museum end of the subway. TfL need to pull their fingers out - planning permission was granted in 2023.
After the visit a walk in the rain to Knightsbridge, Piccadilly Line to Green Park & Jubilee Line to London Bridge for the main event - Afternoon Tea at The Shard Shangri-La - which was absolutely excellent.
A return to Stratford using the Northern & Elizabeth lines, walking from Moorgate to Liverpool Street, so as to avoid being potentially deafened on the Jubilee Line.

07/07/26 - London To Exeter
TfL DLR Stratford International > Stratford + Underground Stratford > Paddington (Elizabeth Line)
PAD 1336 (1353) > EXD 1610 (1631) : 1U84 PAD > PNZ : 2 x 802/0 (10 Cars)
(EXD 1616 > DIG 1628 - Missed Connection)
EXD 1651 (1653) > DIG 1701 (1703) : 2F18 PGN > EXM : 1 X 150/2 (2 Cars)

Tickets (All With Senior Railcard, 2 Pax, Price Per Person):
TfL Underground/DLR Single £2.05
PAD > DIG Super Off Peak Single £43.75

We were originally booked PAD 1536 > EXD 1810/1816 > DIG 1828 but decided to leave London early due to the poor weather. If we had travelled as intended it appears from RTT that we would have arrived home as scheduled.

On the way to Paddington I used RTT to check the status of the next Exeter service which was the 9-Car 1U84 from Platform 1 at 1336. Another check after arriving at PAD showed that 800304 had been reallocated to 1D26, the 1322 Oxford train, and 1U84 was now leaving from P2 as a 10-Car service. And then the fun commenced; RTT has no information on the arrival of the two 5-Car units but the process of coupling them up turned into a monumental cock-up. After several attempts the mating ritual succeeded but a fairly significant electrical issue, which prevented the doors from being opened, appeared. When that was eventually sorted(ish) and boarding commenced there was no power to the external bodyside information screens or internal reservation displays and coach end displays.
The train was rammed with some coaches full & standing. The late change of rolling stock also apparently put paid to the on-board catering, although oddly there was a customer host present who suggested during the journey that catering might be available from Taunton (it didn’t happen!).
The coach end digital displays miraculously activated as we passed Grove / Wantage. 
The journey delay was reduced from 17 to 10 minutes by the time we got to BRI but that improvement was subsequently more than wiped out by 1U84 having to follow the 2C79 BRI > EXD stopper all the way to Exeter. 2C79 was routed into it’s booked P4 so our train used P1. Understandably no ticket/railcard check was performed on the PAD > EXD journey.
2F18 was also full and standing. There appeared to be a significant number of CTCRM recruits - most of them ‘suited & booted’ so perhaps newbies - on board which was a bit odd because the train did not stop at LYC.
 
I submitted our PAD > DIG Delay Repay claim on Monday 8th June at around 1300. I received email approval of the claim at 0703 on Tuesday 9th June. For the second trip in a row good work by GWR.

 
Or might it have been a training type of exercise where the heritage railway provided a quiet line for the RHTT to use at no cost to NR?

 
So was this a "paid for" service by the heritage railway (eyes water at the thought) or does it mean that SWR will be running trains to Swanage?

 
The railbus - though still undergoing restoration work has been / is in some use on the Swindon and Cricklade railway already (and worth the trip).  Yes - it will be lovely to see the work completed by 2030 but it is already in public use - so is that date being oversold?  Or is the tale of "public use" relating to suggested re-openings of the feeder branch(es) from Kemble - Trouble House Halt, with the countryside around - might be a wonderful place for a new town to use a re-instated railway; 2030 sounds optimistic ...