Great Western Coffee Shop

The Coventry to Nuneaton train servive was withdrawn in the "Beeching era" and re-instated some decades later.  Bedworth Station re-opened at around that time, with new stations at Bermuda Park and Coventry Arena opening much more recently. Service is provided by a single carriage train shuttling up and down.

No two lines have quite the same characteristics, And I've often said that the RransWilts has some especially unusual features.  But travelling on the Coventy to Nuneaton line yesterday, I was struck by similarities.

Both lines run between two major junctions and interface there with long distance trains, sometimes (as we saw yesterday at Coventy) with the results that replatforming and other changes are needed as the little train threads its way in.

Both lines have a busy "shoulder" around the peak, and both lines have traffic that's double ended - there are significant connections made at both ends. Both lines appear to have a health mix of year round users, and as already commented both lines are run by a "153" single carriage at present.

There are differences too. The "Bedworth line" is hourly in each direction, wheras the "Melksham line" is almost 2-hourly, and that with gaps.  The Bedworth line is double track throughout, where the Melksham line has a significant single track section.

Noting that both lines carry freight traffic from Southampton Docks which is headed for the north of England, and how that's accommodated at "Bedworth", I find myself wondering if we're getitng to the point where "the Melksham line" should be redoubled - in part to provide extra freight and diverionary capacity for the West of England main line, but also so that we can move up to an hourly service. "More Trains" was one of the biggest responses to our recent passenger survey, which is quite remarkable seeing as it wasn't an option offered on the form and so had to be thought about and written in ...

Including a dodgy name by the looks of it.

That was Graham slipping into his best Scooby-doo impression!

Slightly more helpfully, the Vale of Glamorgan line has many similarities to what you describe, especially the stretch between Barry & Bridgend where passenger services were re-introduced in 2005 after a Beeching imposed break of 41 years.