Ah - right.  So that means you can never reliably travel in either direction from Melksham, with gaps up to 2 hours 40 minutes, and only once a day in one direction only do two trains run at better than your definition. 

It makes a huge difference to the users or potential users.   I have just turned up (elsewhere) for a service that runs every 30 minutes, knowing I can get a train soon - and I did; catching up from the train.  I am now working out how to get home - and the last leg is the interesting one.

 
By 'reliably', I meant throughout the day, regularly. Say at least every hour?

 
yup, that's them!

 
Isn't that what this planning change is all about; more housing.

As for infrastructure move the crossing to Coleford junction to make a dual track and not two single tracks. It should have been done when the original Okehampton was improved. It would benefit Barnstaple travellers as well.

Isn't Newton St Cyres already ear marked for housing? Yeoford, Crediton, Newton St Cyres will all come under the new Greater Exeter.

 
Ah, possibly Lakeland Dairies.

Mark

https://lakelanddairies.com/food-service/international-business/milk-butter-portions

 

Why would GWR be asked to quote on the second platform reinstatement at Yeoford?

Anyway, having visited Yeoford I really can't see how this is ever likely to happen.  There's not much of a problem reinstating the platform itself, but I am sure the residents of a small, lovely and charming sleepy village would object strongly to a load more housing being plonked in a place that sits in a natural valley.  The tight winding roads in and around the station would then see more traffic and to turn it into a place which is the size to justify a service every 30-minutes to Crediton and Exeter and an hourly service to Okehampton would need hundreds of new houses completely destroying the character of the small village.

None of the narrow roads without footpaths leading to the station can be easily widened and I'm sure modern planning regulations would insist on expensive upgrades to ensure pedestrian safety immediately around the station.

As you mention, the pathing is very tight between Exeter and Crediton and with the Okehampton service having a little as 5 minutes turnaround, so there would need to be further infrastructure improvements to support the 3-4 minutes additional time the line would be occupied between Crediton and Okehampton per hour if the train was to stop in each direction.

I'd estimate at least £25m.  Money that would be much better spent elsewhere.

 
Cancellations to services between Swindon and Westbury via Melksham

Due to a fault with the signalling system between Swindon and Bristol Temple Meads some lines are blocked. Disruption is expected until 16:00 22/08.

Train services between Swindon and Westbury via Melksham will be cancelled.

 

More so than many other services - the 07:04 from Bath Spa to Filton Abbey Wood has run on 19 out of the last 20 days (so 5% cancellation rate) and has averaged just a 3 minute late arrival.

 
175003 has been entrusted with Newquay today. It is the most reliable train.

On Thursday it completed its full passenger diagram starting at 0655 Exeter and finishing there at 2237.
Also running backwards and forwards between Exeter and Plymouth was 175006+175115 completing 500 miles with no incidents. It wasn't in passenger service just mileage accumulation.

At Exeter it coupled up with 175003 in a 2+3+2 and returned to Laira as 5P28. The first 7 car formation.

It was planned to repeat it on Friday but cancelled due to staff shortages.

 
Yeoford has second platform that only needs re-instating. GWR would probably quote £10m.

I've lost all faith in GWR in the southwest unless someone else is paying.

Paignton station since the fire which still hasn't fully opened platform 2 for nine car trains. Supposed to be next week. The ticket hall and booking office don't look to be open for weeks. The damage was smoke related. The frontage has been boarded up across the car park. The toilets on platform 2 in a shed further along have been open when staff are present. There is a new back door fire escape to the staff accommodation that has been installed since the fire. The repairers don't work weekends; no urgency.

On a Saturday the toilets close at 1630 and the staff all go by 1700; yet that station is still busy. All the tour trains and their has been one virtually every Saturday and some midweek all depart about 1730. Because they cannot stop in platform 2 to pick up (11 coaches and a diesel at each end) Paignton has lost a lot of business.

 

Use the ferry from Malpas to Falmouth its more reliable.

 
SEmi-skimmed UHT Dairy it is - but I can't remember the brand....

 
The sachets of 'Milk' (can't recall if it's actually dairy, but no matter, it's effective) - can anyone recall what it is and where it's available retail?

Mark

 
Distance - By actual service train.

[Can you reliability travel via Rhubarb Loop?]

 

Not so much track as a second platform? 

The only think we know about the "real" next GBR generation is that we don't know what it will bring ...

 
Catalogue of errors with awful consequences.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cn4n55g2dejo

 


Same again today......

Cancellations to services between Truro and Falmouth Docks
Due to more trains than usual needing repairs at the same time between Truro and Falmouth Docks fewer trains are able to run.
Train services running to and from these stations may be cancelled. Disruption is expected until the end of the day.

.......one of the options on offer is "Consider postponing your journey until our service returns to normal" - extremely helpful - if anyone has a crystal ball handy!

 
Torbay Council have proposals to develop Paignton Station and car park, the short term car park opposite, and the bus station into flats. A new multi-story car park would be built out of site behind the library in Station Lane. The are plans for flats at Victoria Square within a stones throw of the station and is a temporary car park now.

I've also thought housing could be developed at Yeoford. Trains every half an hour, roads are terrible. It would need track infrastructure improvements which GWR wouldn't do unless someone else pays. Maybe the new GBR would?

 
After being quietly suspended for a while during a denial of service attack, I am re-enabling the espresso facility. I have also automate the default so that it becomes month-to-date without me having to go in and change it manually at the start of each month; I still have to remember on 1st January each year to update the year!

This is not a facility that gets huge use, nor would I expect it to be - but if you want to find out what we were talking about  in (say) March 2012, it will help. 

Espresso now has an https wrapper which will help ensure that members don't get lots of security warnings in their browser when they use it, and may also help our search engine and AI feed visibility. I will be keeping an eye open just in case it generates significant server loads.  And I will be adding back the facility to navigate around it better too.

 

I would agree. 

With (any) development there will be positive and negative factors and planning discussions result not in a "100% yes" or "100% no" agreed outcome.   The various elements of the NPPF we're talking about help swing some of the factors - give extra weight to some of the elements and perhaps substantial weight that makes a difference in some cases.

I see that the Conservative-elected, Reform-representing MP for Bedwyn and Pewsey is making the local press concerning the NPPF for those two stations and the Wiltshire Gazette article has a picture of an IET at a rural-looking Bedwyn station. But then as I read the maps, Bedwyn is just outside a top 80 area.  Those are potentially an interesting watch from the sidelines. 

Across the South West, most of our MPs represent parties who are not part of the government - Conservative, Liberal Democrat, Reform and Green - and they have the luxury of being able to represent their electorate without facing the hard national consequences where difficult choices which are in the country's intrerest but not in the interest of the views of their electorate, and you might expect pushback from a wide variety of places.  As I understand it, these "station rules" are only one element, and factors like building on flood plains (and railways tend to follow rivers) are still significant to put it mildly.

The "Top 80" rule does help exclude places like Lelant Saltings - there might a station there, it might be practical to stop 2 trains an hour each way, and there might be unused close to the station - but the question to be asked is "travel to WHAT work?"

 

Journey time shorter - via Swindon.   
Normally least changes on scheduled passenger trains - via Swindon (1 change)
Physical distance shorter - via Thingley Junction and the Rhubarb Loop

https://my.railmiles.me/mileage-engine/


or add these who

 

http://25kv.uk/fictitiousliveries.php

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/149467a0

 

They go a short way onto the Filton Chord so that they're in behind BL2052 signal to shunt back into Filton Abbey Wood.

 
I’m told that rains actually go some way along the Henbury line before reversing, rather than turning at Filton Abbeywood.