Peak District railway restoration plan divides local opinion

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2021/nov/10/peak-district-railway-restoration-plan-divides-local-opinion

Does anyone know where the petition against this is? All the stories only seem to link to the Corporate For Campaign!!

We can’t lose this trail

B

Link

https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2021/nov/10/peak-district-railway-restoration-plan-divides-local-opinion

Any good?
https://www.change.org/p/department-for-transport-save-the-monsal-trail

Thanks I did search

Just signed it myself so thanks for the prompt ;-)

To be honest if I lived in Bakewell I’d probably be more keen on being able to get the train out of there.

I’m in the ‘get it reopened as a railway’ camp.

Freight off the busy roads and get more tourists in by train.

Makes the branch line from Matlock to Derby more viable too, keeping that open.

(I should add I’m a local too).

To be honest if I lived in Bakewell I’d probably be more keen on being able to get the train out of there.

Better transport infrastructure and fewer tourists – win/win!

How are these potential quarry trains going to use a reinstated line? Presumably sidings and loading facilities will be needed as well? Does it go past any working quarries that don’t already have rail access?

As a Derbyshire resident, my opinion is split on this at the moment, – although I admit I’ve not studied the details. Its a great trail, but more rail connectivity (hopefully reducing car usage) can’t be a bad thing can it ?

I didn’t believe that it had any funding?

As a Derbyshire resident, my opinion is split on this at the moment, – although I admit I’ve not studied the details. Its a great trail, but more rail connectivity (hopefully reducing car usage) can’t be a bad thing can it ?

Also mixed views here, but I’m struggling to see what overall benefit opening the line provides over the loss of tourist revenue it creates. Not sure the quarry argument stands, per my previous post.

Be better off reopening the line from Matlock to Bakewell

I’m more likely to use the trail than the train but I do think that reversing the whole Beeching thing would be better overall

It’ll never re-open anyway – just too costly.

Same with the Cromford Canal – too much infrastructure gone, and things built where the infrastructure used to be that would have to be purchased and knocked down.

I agree with Muffin Man – the cost of expanding and running the railways has ballooned in Covid and even the current expansion plans are now unsustainable, never mind any new ones.

Hs2 eastern leg will be the most high profile cut (and long overdue in my opinion), but there will be many many others to follow…

Again as a local I’m completely conflicted about this. Improving sustainable transport links to Manchester would be great for the area but at the cost of loosing a route that stitches together a lot of the local cycling and walking routes together and would make access to the crags in cheedale significantly harder. When it comes down to it tourism is the biggest earner in the area.

There were proposals to re-open the northern part of the line to enable a quarry in the Wye Valley to re-open which I don’t think got far. The usual strategy for re-opening quarries is to say there are essential fluorspar deposits and that the millions of tons of limestone removed will be incidental, although there could be a different strategy here.

Extending the southern portion has been a long term aspiration of the Peak Rail, although the trains they are interested in could hardly be described as sustainable. I’d always understood that the stumbling points were the bridge over the A6 at Rowsley and the tunnel under the back of Haddon Hall which is supposed to have at least been partially landfilled.

I’m guessing that quite a few of the bridges through Millers Dale & Cheedale would need a significant chunk of work to get them up to a standard so it sounds like it is one of those ‘easy win’ common sense solutions that only stacks up until you start looking at the practicalities.

I didn’t believe that it had any funding?

It didn’t get anything in the “Reopening Our Railways” fund although that doesn’t mean it’ll never happen, just that it got a lot more difficult.

https://www.derbytelegraph.co.uk/news/monsal-trail-controversial-rail-plans-6159272

Personally, I think it’s still too costly and there are just too many hurdles. It’s all in PDNP so there are loads of extra rules around construction – most of the challenge with it is not laying down track, it’s getting all the construction machinery and materials onto sites which would involve deforestation, temporary track laying, satellite sites and so on all within PDNP.

The economic case for it (especially given that it is currently an economic gain in terms of tourism / leisure) is tenuous at best. You’d be losing one existing revenue stream of tourism and the related employment in the hopes of a rail-related revenue stream “at some point”.

Also, the tunnels would need re-boring for freight, they’re not wide enough for W12 gauge.

They’d be far better off doing HS2 and NPR in full. Do the two big projects properly alongside a full national rolling programme of electrification. Stop tinkering around with a branch line here and an upgrade there.

You can’t turn the trail off on Friday and turn the railway on come Monday, there’ll be years if not decades of disruption just to get it in and then decades of a piss poor service before anyone admits that it wasn’t worth it.

I did my A-level geography dissertation in 2000 on the prospect of reopening the Monsal trail railway, it’s been knocking around a while :D

My sense is that there’s a lot of these schemes floating about, and that some of them will get some seedcorn funding for feasibility studies and the like to keep the electorate happy, but the vast majority lack the business or economic case to go anywhere…

They are reinstating the Oakhampton to Exeter line so who knows that is a good cycle trail apart from the last nasty bit of road into Buxton.They did repair the bridges at Millers Dale the other year.

Personally, I think it’s still too costly and there are just too many hurdles. It’s all in PDNP so there are loads of extra rules around construction – most of the challenge with it is not laying down track, it’s getting all the construction machinery and materials onto sites which would involve deforestation, temporary track laying, satellite sites and so on all within PDNP.

United Utilities have put 30km of pipeline with a 40m easement through the LDNP including a 1.3km tunnel

It can be done

United Utilities have put 30km of pipeline with a 40m easement through the LDNP including a 1.3km tunnel

Anything can be done if you throw enough money, time and resources at it.

The question is whether it’s actually worth doing. I’m assuming the pipeline is water related in which case it’s probably “essential infrastructure”?

A railway line along Monsal is a “nice-to-have”, it’s far from essential. Especially considering the loss of amenity and habitat to reinstate it.

Especially considering the loss of amenity and habitat to reinstate it.

Unless they are dropping ancient woodland then I expect reducing the number of dogs disturbing wildlife will be a massive gain over time. If you want a economy which is more than minimum wage jobs you need to provide an alternative means of transportation to the car for the future.

There’s a railway line that runs through Stafford ALL THE WAY to Stoke!
Can you imagine it?!

However, usefully timed commuter services dont run on it.

Decouple the notion that someone getting paid to create working, maintained railway infrastructure (e.g. the Ghost of Carillion Past), means any “useful” services will run on it.

Another local here. It would be a shame as it’s a great connecting trail to get from one side of the Peak District to the other. On the other hand it would immortalise my KOM along it so…. what matters most?

As a Derbyshire resident, my opinion is split on this at the moment, – although I admit I’ve not studied the details. Its a great trail, but more rail connectivity (hopefully reducing car usage) can’t be a bad thing can it ?

This (although I’m not in Derbyshire, but only by about a mile)

But it wouldn’t reduce car use because there are no actual plans to improve the railways. 99% of people would still drive because they don’t want it to take a week and cost £200 to get there.

Railways are only any good for people that are on it who want to travel anywhere else on it.

It’s great that our genius local MP believes that destroying a major local recreational trail and tourist attraction – it really is an awesome family trail what with the tunnels and viaducts – will increase tourism. He is an idiot. Given the chance he would probably tarmac the entire Peak District in the name of ‘levelling up’.

I’m a High Peak local and not particularly conflicted tbh. Fortunately I can’t see how this is ever going to be a viable scheme. And don’t even start on the whole thing where ‘railway enthusiasts’ hope to convert the Longdendale Trail to a railway and reopen the the tunnels which are currently home to massive high votage electricity cables.

Get it built.

And then But first close a road route off to make it ped/horse/cycle use only.

You can’t turn the trail off on Friday and turn the railway on come Monday, there’ll be years if not decades of disruption just to get it in and then decades of a piss poor service before anyone admits that it wasn’t worth it.

We all thought this about the Borders railway that was reopened a few years back – it seemed ludicrous as it it does is go to Gala from Edinburgh

Its been a huge success and not just commuters

It’d be cheaper and more useful to run a tram along the A6. The track doesn’t run close enough to anywhere useful, Bakewell Station is up a hill. A few walkers might get off to do a linear route perhaps, but subsidising a few tourists to the tune of many many millions and well, your business case flies out the window. There’s a reason it was closed and that wasn’t Beeching.

I did my A-level geography dissertation in 2000 on the prospect of reopening the Monsal trail railway, it’s been knocking around a while

Could be the best study done so far – what was your conclusion?

So we get the line back. Tourists can come in and then…..what? The Peak isn’t the easiest to get around without a car. Or it makes one of the most expensive towns in the area due to its location and the quality of the drugs available at Lady Manners School even more out of reach of locals as it becomes Manchester commuter belt

Its been a huge success and not just commuters

It’s also one of Scotland’s most poorly performing railways; a combination of ancient rolling stock, overly ambitious service expectations and aging infrastructure that was not sufficiently upgraded at time of reopening (cost cutting measures to only build single track cuttings and viaducts even when there was space for double track).

Standard UK fuckwittery – half-arsed “cost saving” measures, do it half right half the time and end up with a substandard system as a result.

I am also local and it will never happen, because it doesn’t in reality connect anywhere! A train on the Monsal Trail itself between Bakewell and Buxton doesn’t connect to the villages on route, Tidza, Taddington etc. The only one it hits is Miller’s Dale and at push Great Longstone.

Bakewell has no train line and Buxton is the end of a long slow line from Manchester. So on paper yes it would connect Bakewell to Manchester but via a circa 1 1/2 hour slow Journey. Not something that is going to be in demand for commuters. For people living around the Monsal Trail a bus is going to be a lot more effective.

Beaching recommend closing the railways AND replacing them with busses so they could better serve the local population. Shame they didn’t follow his recommendation.

Sections of this trail would seem wide enough for both a cycle path and a railway surely? With a barrier between obviously.

Sections of this trail would seem wide enough for both a cycle path and a railway surely? With a barrier between obviously.

🤣🤣 and most of it isn’t!

They are struggling for funding on other more viable rail projects – how on earth is something like this ever going to happen? Same for the occasional mutterings about the Penrith to Keswick line.

e.g. Here is a project to modernise and re-open one (existing) short curve of track and one (existing) station that will link together existing lines between reasonable sized towns and housing developments. It is pretty much universally supported by councils, residents, campaign groups, MPs etc. But still no cash is forthcoming.

https://www.lancs.live/news/lancashire-news/preston-southport-rail-link-plan-22058087

They are struggling for funding on other more viable rail projects – how on earth is something like this ever going to happen? Same for the occasional mutterings about the Penrith to Keswick line.

A lot of it is just political circle-jerking.

Politicians of all colours like grandiose schemes, especially schemes where they can claim the other side was at fault for buggering it up in the first place.

However they also know that major projects like reopening a rail line cost a FORTUNE. We’re not talking a few hundred grand for some pothole repairs or even a few million for some junction improvements; we’re talking tens, potentially hundreds of millions of pounds for all the survey work, tendering, build, and then the minor thing of running the trains along it.

So they know that, as mere Councillors or even MPs, they have very little chance of ever actually having to DO anything other than talk about it, show up at some campaign fronts for it, write a letter to DfT every once in a while… But it shows they are “supporting their community”. And by the time anything is actually done about it for better or worse, they’ll be long gone but they can always claim they were the driving force behind the campaign to reinstate X.

🤣🤣 and most of it isn’t!

Good point, but surely some sort of link up could be designed in to preserve the parts of the route that are currently viable?