This is a scandal, a disgrace and has gone on for decades.
- 78 Km of unused or goods only, double track rail lines alongside/near congested roads in the Black Country and Birmingham.
- Further 58 Km from Walsall to Derby via Lichfield is still not available for passenger trains.
- 2 important rail curves still not built - after 50 years.
- £750 m (all rail money?) for Grand Central Shopping Centre with the main line station tagged along as an afterthought and stuck in the basement.
- Now, plan for transport money going for subsidising M6 Toll to further reduce the amount of money for urban Beeching rail reversals in the Black Country and Brum.
- The W Midlands Combined Authority remains corruptly biased towards road schemes; secondly, towards super expensive tram extensions in Birmingham city centre; thirdly, £12 m for a second rapid transit mode to duplicate the first, trams. What little money is left over may then go to Brum rail schemes
- Beeching rail reversals continue to be sidelined in the Midlands.
YOU ONLY GET WHAT YOU ASK FOR!
THANKS to all those who saw the forgotten railway on Sunday, 21 Feb. We are forbidden, even after 50 years, to have our trains back. Don't stand for it!
If you think that every mile should be available for us to travel on by diesel train (in the first instance) and from Stourbridge to Walsall (later to Lichfield and Derby) please say so to:
Patrick McLoughlin, Secretary of State for Transport patrick.
Cllr Bob Sleigh, Chair of the W Mids Combined Authority rsleigh@solihull.gov.uk
Cllr Darren Cooper, Vice Chair
James Aspinall, Managing Director, Centro
Laura Shoaf, W Mids Integrated Transport Authority
Stuart Everton, Black Country Director of Transport stuart.everton@wol
Don't forget to remind them that they do have to write an unbeatable business case first!!
Don't forget to ask them to all go down to London and pay a visit to our Patrick and Claire for them to agree the transfer of funds from the two short sections for electric trams to be used instead for the full 21 Km for diesel trains. They have enough money in the bank already (£207 m when they only need £72 m).
THANKS V MUCH! They must be very fed up hearing from me. One person can easily be ignored, as I am. Put all 7 in the one e-mail, if you like. Think up your own cheeky or attention grabbing subject field.
The UK’s only unused, major, North-South main line railway is to be sectioned up into:
from south to north, we have planned, in order,
6 Km: daily, 25 waggon goods trains from Port Talbot to Round Oak, via Stourbridge Jct
4 Km: Light Rail Metro trams (£310 m for 12 Km, inclu 4 Km of road running)
2 Km: Very Light Rail shuttle trams, through Dudley Tunnel to Cinder Bank road
4 Km: Light Rail Metro trams (£310 m for 12 Km, inclu 4 Km of road running)
3 Km: Empty, private space of linear wilderness of shrubs, trees, Himalayan Balsam (an illegal plant)
2 Km: of passenger trains - Bescot to Walsall
TOTAL: 21 Km (approx distances)
This is 21 Km of a 74 Km main line railway between Stourbridge Jct and Derby through the increasingly densely populated and road/rail congested Black Country - the boroughs of Dudley, Sandwell and Walsall, with a population of a million. Diesels and four rebuilt stations is £72 million (based on last year’s rural Beeching reinstatement in Scotland at £6 m per Km).
My reasons for wanting the trains back on every kilometre (at a quarter of the price of trams on 8 Km, plus road running on 4 Km) instead of trams on 8 Km of the main line railway:
- It is the UK's last remaining, easily reinstated north-south main line railway between Stourbridge and Derby. Therefore, the most important unused rail line.
- The only one between train congested Grand Central Shopping Centre/basement station and the Hereford to Shrewsbury Line
- 74 Km between the two towns of Stourbridge and Derby.
- 21 Km between Stourbridge and Walsall that urgently needs to be reinstated first.
- This would be only the 3rd Beeching reversal in 50 years in the Black Country and Brum.
- Only 12 Km needs to have the track relaid and four stations rebuilt to give everyone 21 Km of passenger line, once more.
- COST: 12 Km x £6 m per Km = £72 million, including the stations (based on Beeching rural rail reversal in Scotland last year).
- It reduces chronic and worsening road and rail congestion in the Black Country and Brum.
- Quicker, simpler, cheaper and easier to achieve than 12 Km of road and rail running trams that the councillors and Centro officers have failed to achieve in 35 years of trying.
- If they were ever to succeed, it would destroy for an eternity and beyond, the possibility of passenger trains from London Paddington and the North being seen again in the Black Country!
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