Missing Main Lines

Reconnecting communities to the national rail network by restoring closed branch railway lines is popular, with many applications to the Department for Transport’s Restore Your Railway fund. Government announced the first go-ahead on 19 March 2021 which should lead to regular services from Exeter to Okehampton later this year1 .

But are there lines of regional or even national – as well as local – significance that also should be brought back into use? Main lines instead of branch lines? In “Disconnected: Broken Links in Britain’s Rail Policy”2 authors Chris Austin and Richard Faulkner devote a chapter to this question when they looked at missing main lines

Lost Main Lines

Alongside various local lines that have been lost, their book covered five main lines that have been closed in the last 60 years. Maybe other strategic routes such as the East Lincolnshire Line which connected Grimsby, Louth and Boston with services to London should have qualified as a main line too. Greengauge21 has certainly advocated its reinstatement elsewhere3 .

The longest of the selected five main lines is the Great Central – although its suburban route from Aylesbury into its London terminus at Marylebone remains in use today. While serving a string of cities through the East Midlands and onwards to Yorkshire, the Great Central largely duplicated a rival railway company’s service offering. The authors conclude that the biggest loss from closing the Great Central main line from the north side of the Chilterns is capacity. Interestingly, this is the same corridor served by the eastern arm of HS2, although by missing the cities the Great Central served, this part of HS2 has minimal released capacity benefit4 .

The most northerly main line loss is the Caledonian Railway from Perth to Aberdeen along Strathmore, serving intermediate towns such as Forfar. This route was superseded as long ago as the 19th century when completion of the Forth and Tay bridges created a more useful route to Aberdeen via Dundee. Authors Austin and Faulkner conclude that when the Caledonian line closed, the greatest loss was rail connectivity to the small intermediate towns it served along Strathmore. They conclude simply: ‘it would be hard to argue for the restoration of the line today’.

Three missing main lines that could be reopened:

The first of these is the line from Stratford upon Avon to Cheltenham via Honeybourne. The report authors say that the loss of this connection as a useful diversionary route is a critical factor in the case for its re-instatement. We agree and alongside linkages between Oxford and Stratford upon Avon

Disconnected: Broken Links in Britain’s Rail Policyby Chris Austin and Richard Faulkner. Greengauge 21 have looked at the lines and looked at how they might - or might not fit into a future rail plan

(of great value to tourism flows), there is the ability to re-create a linkage from Cheltenham to Stratford and on into Birmingham’s Moor Street – which is set to become a new rail hub, alongside Curzon Street HS2 station.

Much of the line exists today as a heritage line, and applications have been made to the DfT ‘Restore Your Railway’ fund to re-open the line in stages.

Besides new passenger services, it could provide a useful freight route including for intermodal traffic between national distribution centres in the Midlands (for example, at Daventry and East Midlands Airport) and South Wales (and the South West in due course), overcoming network limitations in the Birmingham and Bromsgrove areas.

As is often the case with such schemes, the biggest problems arise in urban areas. The route southwards from Stratford-upon-Avon station remains unhindered by property development but would need major highway bridging work. The route northwards across Cheltenham is now a valued walk/cycle-way and is regarded by report authors Austin and Faulkner as in effect lost for re-use as a railway. A short new connection across open country north of Cheltenham is more likely be an acceptable approach.

The second is the Oxford-Cambridge line, closed in 1970. It has already been partly restored and a company, East West Rail (EWR) established, with full Government support and funding. It serves places of considerable prosperity and growth potential, including the two university cities at either end of the route and Milton Keynes.

It has from time to time been suggested that this line, which crosses the route of HS2 near

Claydon in rural Buckinghamshire should be the site of a new interchange station between EWR and HS2. While superficially attractive, this makes little sense. Besides the problem of introducing a station call on a 360km/hr section of HS2, it would create a point of maximum accessibility and place huge development pressure in a part of deep rural England. This very prospect was in fact examined by the consultants who carried out the early studies into north-south high-speed rail in 2000-15 . Development at this location at the time was seen to be completely incompatible with local and regional spatial development plans.

There are other key intersections between the east-west Oxford-Cambridge railway and northsouth main lines that should be exploited. One of these is at Bletchley/Milton Keynes on the West Coast Main Line (WCML). Services into Milton Keyes from EWR need to operate over the WCML from Bletchley. HS2 will remove fast non-stopping services from the WCML and a major timetabling restructuring will take place. It is to be hoped that this will facilitate the creation of direct Oxford-Milton Keynes rail services in due course.

The final main line closure considered by authors Austin and Faulkner is the route from Exeter to Plymouth via Okehampton and Tavistock. Today the only line between Exeter and Plymouth (and, indeed, Cornwall) is Brunel’s line – distinctly not his finest: “a difficult section of railway, with steep gradients between Newton Abbot and Plymouth over the notorious South Devon banks and there is a vulnerable coastal stretch of line”.

The authors continue: “the line has been closed on 19 occasions, varying from part of a day to eight weeks. The average closure periods for interruptions is six days”.

The link between Okehampton and Bere Alston closed in 1968. The line from Exeter to Okehampton was not listed by Beeching for closure and has remained open, although with minimal use (and maintenance) in recent years. This route has just been announced for ‘re-opening’, and over £40m is being spent to bring track and signalling up to scratch.

But the big prize is re-creating a through route again, filling in the 15 mile gap between Tavistock

The vulnerable coastal route between Teignmouth and Dawlish (Greengauge 21) The abandoned trackbed at Brentor (Greengauge21)

and Meldon. On this prospect, Austin and Faulkner conclude as follows: “If the line […] were restored, it would provide an additional route between Exeter and Plymouth, improve rail access for West Devon and provide a closer railhead for North Cornwall. However, decisions are never straightforward… Re-signalling the whole route from Crediton to St. Budeaux would be required… The first part of the route [the existing Exeter-Barnstaple line]… is in the flood plain”

“Clearly the first priority is to protect the existing [coastal] route… However, the added value of the Okehampton route is clear and had it not closed, it would today be both a valuable line of regional significance serving areas of Devon and Cornwall that are remote from a railhead. With rising sea levels, and the need for higher levels of maintenance of the coastal route, it would also have clear added value as a diversionary route”.

“Apart from that, Plymouth with its population of a quarter of a million is the only city of that size with just a single rail line with the rest of the country. In 1968 that was not seen as an issue. In 2015, it is, and a second line is needed, not just because of the vulnerability of the single route at Dawlish, but because from time to time it will be closed as a result of failure or incident, and quite frequently for maintenance. Something better than the present arrangement is needed for the 21st century.”

Conclusions

Of the five main lines examined for re-opening, the biggest (the Great Central Railway) could not be re-created today through the cities of Leicester, Nottingham and Sheffield without very costly and disruptive works. But its modern equivalent – HS2 – is a viable successor, although its route between the East Midlands and Yorkshire needs to be reviewed. Either way, this will provide the eastern side of the country with a new high-speed route into London: something that the Great Central always lacked.

The loss of the Caledonian main line from Perth to Aberdeen is no doubt regretted by many, but its re-instatement would bring only local benefits.

The three remaining lines have full re-opening plans. These are not exercises in nostalgia. Their