Great Western Coffee Shop

Travel journalist Simon Calder takes a journey from Portishead to Minehead in Down The Line, a BBC West documentary exploring the legacy of the Beeching railway cuts, to be broadcast on BBC One West at 4.25pm on Sunday 26 October (link below.)
http://www.portisheadrailwaygroup.org/html/bbctvprog.html

Simon examines the arguments for reopening some of the branch lines axed by Dr Beeching in the Sixties.

BBC West Down The Line is one of 10 regional programmes each looking at the impact of the Beeching cuts on their areas.

We've had lots of interest in our Beeching film going out on BBC One (West) this Sunday, as Simon Calder takes to the road - by car, bike and train - to see for himself branch lines axed by Beeching which Calder says should be re-opened as a priority. Simon Calder's Beeching journey is part of  BBC4's continuing season of programmes celebrating the Golden Age of Steam.

Ray Tostevin
director - GRACE Productions
http://www.agraceproduction.com/projects.php?pid=39&type=p

Welcome to the forum, Ray, and I look forward to watching the programme.

While not specific to the Portishead or Minehead lines, another BBC video report covers the Beeching cuts of railway jobs in southern England in the 1960s: see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7689725.stm

Ray ... thanks for following up Lee ... and for making this ;) - a good program which I watched and enjoyed (and I agree the sentiment).

It's very poigniant to read at the end that your Portishead Commuter has given up on her car and moved into Bristol.  And the question comes "how does one actually MAKE the political will to sort out Portishead ... and Minehead ... (and may I add my own home town in Wiltshire too, with a 11 hour 54 minute gap between trains from 07:17 that render the service useless.  But perhaps we still have that service only to stop us claining to be the largest town in the UK that's not rail connected!)

I know a commuter who gave up on the bus and moved out of Portishead....
http://www.canber.co.uk/?q=node/38

 ;D

As usual its politics that stands in the way of getting these and many other lines in England reopened. They don't seem to have that problem north of the border with lines reopening in Scotland with talk of more to come.

For those interested in a summary of the programme: from the BBC - see http://www.bbc.co.uk/bristol/content/articles/2008/10/17/beeching_feature.shtml

However, despite the BBC's claim that
... it isn't, so far.  ::)

(See also http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=3744.0 for other disappointed viewers)

Hi - thanks for the positive comments on last night's film.

For what it's worth, my personal view is that its incredible that 6 years after ^15m of Government subsidy (ie taxpayers' money) was put towards the reopening of the freight rail service at Portbury, that the people of Portishead are STILL waiting for their passenger rail service to reopen. Why the continued delay? Perhaps the local authority is too busy having behind-closed-doors meetings with Network Rail, when it could be lobbying the Dft to stump up the extra cash, so this branch line can finally reopen....

But then, as transport consultant David Henshaw said in the programme, that would require real political will - and perhaps that isn't quite yet forthcoming.

Incidentially, you may well be interested to know that 6 of last night's films are due to be repeated on BBC 4 next month. Dates and times to be confirmed.

Ray Tostevin
director - GRACE Productions

Friends Of Suburban Bristol Railways will launch their Portishead and Northern Bristol Rail Campaign at Temple Meads Station on Thursday 30 October. Supporters will be holding maps of the rail network and a large postcard addressed to West of England Partnership. The event will start at 11 am on Platform 1 and last about 15 minutes (link below.)
http://www.fosbr.org.uk/news.php?newsid=0000000171



Edit by Chris to include link to coverage in Western Daily Press, at http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/wdp/news/Campaign-reopen-Bristol-Portishead-railway-line/article-430443-detail/article.html

'Down the Line' is showing on BBC4 at 20:30 on 30th November

Ah, will this version be on iPlayer, or will we get to watch different regions?

Ray, yes it was an excellent program. So well done. The item on the West Somerset Railway might have made reference to the limited through service from Minehead to Bristol which ran last year. As s family who rode on the FGW HST Charity special to Minehead this year (a great day, and well done to FGW for facilitating it) it struck us that a daily through service to Minehead in the summer would provide a lot of income to businesses in Minehead through day trippers.   

From the BBC, in response to my complaint:

Further press coverage:


See http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/clevedon/news/Rail-campaign-gathers-steam/article-437200-detail/article.html

while were on the subject of iplayer

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00dvtlw/Coast_Shorts_Brunels_Railway/

An interesting development on the WSR is the news that they have put in for planning permission for a platform at Norton Fitzwarren, just off the main line. This will be on the running line, not the newly constructed triangle, and thus could take services from Taunton. It's due to be operational by Aug 2009.

http://www.wsra.org.uk/nf01jan2009.htm

Although nothing is being mentioned, a shuttle service from Taunton (or even just 1 or 2 trains daily) to Norton F would take less than half the time that the previous shuttles to Bishops Lydeard were taking (20mins+ IIRC), particularly now the down relief has been raised to 40mph. And hence be much more viable, and even possible in layover time of units at Taunton.

I guess there would be some interesting questions re signalling trains from both directions into the platform, but it is not impossible that a second platform is then built on the parallel side of the triangle for services arriving from and departing to BL.

So maybe 2010 will see a more regular link with the WSR and the main line.

Meanwhile, anyone know if we are likely to see another charity special to Minehead next year? I know it wasn't well supported last year, but with the glitches in advertising sorted out, and enough advance notice, it could be a real winner.       

and Network Rail today publicise the line speed improvement at Taunton, and make reference to special trains to the WSR.

http://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/Content/Detail.asp?ReleaseID=4039&NewsAreaID=2&SearchCategoryID=7

Brilliant: thanks for posting this, John!  ;)

Out of interest, I wonder which news organisations (if any) have made anything of this press release. I accept it's probably not the most earth shattering PR release there's been, but I suspect given it's good news, it won't be reported.

Except on the Coffee Shop that is! 

No, they're all busy calling for heads to roll over WCML and Euston problems!  ::)

theres something more going on with the wcml.... its more than a coincidence

Its because the upgrade was done in the cheap - it only cost 9 billion. It was also scaled down.

What does it give us? Answer: 125 mph tilting trains (yes - less than what we had in the 70s - so that's scaling down to nothing IMO!).

Progress? Value for money?