Calne branch - past, present, future

[whole diary]

[Robin Summerhill]

We seem to have widened from Calne!

OK - at present the directions that people from Norton Radstock want to travel are north north east to Bath, or north west to Bristol.  And the one remaining ("mothballed") rail line runs the opposite way - south south east to pass through Frome (though not through Frome station) and to Westbury.  Journey times, I concur, via this route to Bath and Bristol would be substantial. But then is Bath and / or Bristol the natural destination in a generation's time?   

Which came first - the chicken or the egg?  The Railway or the housing? 

That's not an easy question to answer because there is no one answer.

Back in 1972 or so John Betjamin hosted a documentary called "Metroland" (I was only watching a VHS tape of it again last week as it happened!) which showed that the growth in commuting along the Metropolitan Railway was the result of the railway's own policy of buying land and selling parcels off to speculative builders. So in that case the railway came first.

Quite a few years ago now the MOD moved its administrative centre from Bath to Abbey Wood and a new station was provided. In that case you could say that the station was provided as a result of a major change to local commuting habits. Yes the railway came first but not in quite the same way as with the Metropolitan - indeed, the existence of the railway may have influenced the MOD decision to relocate there rather than somewhere else.

In the case of Yate the station closed in 1965 just as the first foundations for the New Town were being laid. In that case the housing definitely came first and well before the station was reopened.

The real question that needs to be asked is what are people commuting for (yes of course to get to work, but why they are living where they are living and not a few minutes walk from their employment)? Initially the answer to that was the reasonably well-heeled moving out from the centre of filthy Victorian cities onto the surrounding leafy glades. There is still an element of that but it has also been exacerbated by housing costs. People commute from Frome to London because the houses are cheaper, or from Norton Radstock to Bristol for the same reason.

But whatever the specific reasons for the commute there is one constant, and that is that people tend to commute to large industrial and/or commercial centres with high staff requirements, and that generally means large cities of their environs.

In this neck of the woods, London, Bath and Bristol are going to be the major magnets for commuting for the foreseeable future, and to me that means in a generations time if not longer. Other major centres like Swindon, Reading and Oxford will also have their commuters from this part of the world, although I suspect less in proportion than the three first mentioned. Unless something major and unexpected happens (for instance an expansion of Warminster or similar to a population of 250,000, or perhaps a slump in house prices in particular parts of the country) I doubt that things will change much for many generations.

There is also the global warming/ carbon emissions etc issue of course, but if anything I would expect that to reduce commuting rather than find new destinations for it.

[Bmblbzzz]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

[ellendune]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

People I know commute to Oxford. It's just that from Swindon they do not use the train.  I am sure some people commute to Oxford by train e.g. from Didcot or Banbury or Bicester (that was after all the reasons  for reopening the Bicester line).

[grahame]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

Something else.

Bristol has direct train to ... "Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading".  It doesn't have direct trains to Oxford.

From Bristol, from Chippenham, there was a direct service early in the last decade that built up good custom - I recall a pretty crowded service which in the peak skipped Didcot and I'm pretty sure those were travellers on a daily basis.    Fast forward to today, and you've got to change at Didcot to make the journey (or double back for £££ via Reading) using a train that's just once an hour from Bristol, Bath or Chippenham, with the Didcot train times not appearing to be designed as a well-making connection, and changing into what are local trains for the final section of the journey.   With the lack of reliability and timekeeping, connections are especially unstable too as they double the risks - I've done quite a bit of work in Oxford going up there via Chippenham and I'm very used to the "Didcot Dance" - pulling in there and seeing an onward train pulling out, whether or not the timetable suggests that should happen.

Interestingly, there are others who commute from Bristol (and Cardiff) and intermediate stations in WECA^» (West of England Combined Authority - about) to Swindon who are going to have a significant loss of service from they December ...

[Bmblbzzz]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

People I know commute to Oxford. It's just that from Swindon they do not use the train.  I am sure some people commute to Oxford by train e.g. from Didcot or Banbury or Bicester (that was after all the reasons  for reopening the Bicester line).

Obviously, if you change the starting point you change the likely destinations. I don't know anyone who commutes to Newcastle but I quite likely would if I lived in Sunderland!

[jamestheredengine]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

I think the data seem to back up your perception of things here.

[Red Squirrel]

Another question is to what extent commuting patterns are determined by available transport links and vice versa. I know several people who commute from Bristol to Cardiff, Bath, Gloucester and even Reading, but no one who commutes to Oxford. Is this because it's a bit harder to get to Oxford or because Oxford's job market is less attractive? Or something else?

I think the data seem to back up your perception of things here.

That is an interesting resource!

This view rather makes the obvious point that commuting depends on good transport links: Lots of people commute into Bristol from Weston, but very few from Wells or indeed Norton Radstock... is it too big a leap to assume that more people would do so if it were easier? 'Commute' in this context is arguably shorthand for 'take advantage of economic and educational opportunities'.

[Bmblbzzz]

My "perception" was really more of a thinking-aloud question about the interplay between job market, transport links and housing on commute patterns, and on each other.

But in a way I started from the wrong end. I was thinking of people I know who live in Bristol and work elsewhere, but Bristol is mainly an attractor of commutes and jobs (as is Oxford) rather than an origin.

[Marlburian]

At risk of throwing the points and sending us off on another diversion.

There was a railway, of sorts, from Salisbury to Amesbury via Porton. The extensions to Larkhill and Bulford. I believe it was entirely military so no "venture capital" involved.

And now for something completely different in relation to the chalk downlands. In the 1914 edition of "Notes on Reconnaissance & survey of military railways" there is an exercise to reconnoitre a military railway from the existing railway station at Hungerford to the existing railway station at Chipping Norton. Materials supplied half-inch OS^▸ (Ordnance Survey) map of the area (with railways removed), part sections and suggested answer. The 1940 edition "Notes on Military Railway Engineering" Part 1 (Survey) has similar. Possibly useful as an exercise, in an area the military was familiar with, but unlikely to ever exist as commercial entity.

Warnings:

1. I'm going to continue Sid's diversion (after observing that 20 months ago I explored the trackbed from Calne to Chippenham).

2. My Specialist Subject is "Military Wiltshire 1897-1920", meaning I can be very boring about military railways in the county.

Despite its name, the Amesbury and Military Camp Light Railway carried civilian traffic to Amesbury and on an extension to a civilian station at Bulford. In 1914 a branch was built over the River Avon through Lark Hill Camp and eventually terminating at an airfield close to Stonehenge. Jeffery Grayer, Rails Across the Plain, is an excellent history.

As for the military railway from Hungerford to Chipping Norton, this was obviously a hypothetical exercise, hence the removal of actual railways from the map. Neither town had much military significance (though the former hosted troops camping on the Common and convoys of lorries moving along the Bath Road). My first thought was that the line would go north west through Aldbourne and then one side or other of Liddington Castle to Chisledon, where the MSWJR had found a way to Swindon. The east-of-Hungerford solution would have taken the route to Newbury and, presumably, thence north along the route actually chosen by the Didcot, Newbury and Southampton line.

Any other route between these two would have had to go over hilly country before somehow having to get down the very steep escarpment into the Vale of the White Horse.

Marlburian

[CyclingSid]

Apologies to moderators, split if necessary.

It was a survey exercise, not sure at this distance in time as to whether it was purely a table-top exercise or whether they rode the country.
Proposed route goes east from Hungerford, generally following the line of the R. Kennet. After it crosses the R. Lambourne it routes towards Chieveley then Hampstead Norris where it turns north to Compton.
It continues north between Upton and Harwell (similar to Didcot to Newbury line?). East of Abingdon and than a broad sweep round towards Eynsham, then east of Handborough and Charlbury then follows the R. Evenlode round to Shipton.
Then skirts north towards Churchill and then to Chipping Norton.
Spellings as the original map.

I have a scan of the original map, too big to fit on here (thank goodness think mods!)

[grahame]

Chippenham to Calne timetable - January 1960

Amazing how many lines with an excellent service in 1960 were gone by 1970 ...

[Robin Summerhill]

Time for a thread resurrection 

I haave niw posted the final timetable for the Calne branch to Flickr, together with a collection of tickets from the line I bought in 1965 and a more recent shot of what is left of Black Dog Halt

https://www.flickr.com/photos/93122458@N08/50350173566/

[JayMac]

YouTuber's Paul & Rebecca Whitewick visited the Calne Branch for their latest episode of 'Every Disused Station' uploaded on 15/01/2023.

https://youtu.be/jFfo6TqIumQ

[Marlburian]

Thanks for the link, Jay. A couple of years ago, I walked the route in the opposite direction - and missed the broad-gauge rails re-purposed as fencing posts. And the video happily segued into one about the Lambourn Valley Branch.

[Bmblbzzz]

I've cycled along it a couple of times, though only from the outskirts of Chippenham to Calne. I hadn't spotted them either. Anyone planning on riding or walking it should pick their weather, the section immediately south of that girder bridge over the A4, which incidentally didn't feel at all wobbly when I used it, gets very muddy.