Looking forward with TransWilts - 22nd May 2024 - in Trowbridge

[whole diary]

[grahame]

On Wednesday, 22nd May 2024, Paddy Bradley, the recently appointed chair of the TransWilts Community Rail Partnership, will address members and guests of the West Wiltshire Rail Users Group.  Coffee available from 19:00, and Paddy will be filling us in from 19:30.  There will also be a brief general rail news update for the area, and an opportunity to network and ask questions. Public very welcome - we (West Wiltshire Rail Users Group) ask you for £2 as a contribution towards our costs as we are an indepedent group funded purely by our members, or you could join on the night for £8 a year (£10 for family).

The event takes place at the Bethesda Church Hall, which is about 100 yards from Trowbridge Station, and will conclude in time for people who are headed home by train to catch their services:
21:18 to Cardiff Central via Bradford-on-Avon, Bath and Bristol
21:22 to Swindon via Melksham and Chippenham (connection to Paddington)
21:31 to Weymouth via Westbury (connection to Plymouth) and Frome
21:52 for intermediate stations to Bristol including Avoncliff
21:58 to Portsmouth Harbour via Dilton Marsh, Warminster and Salisbury

Since the TransWilts Community Rail Partnership was formed some 15 years ago, to help promote use of the rail line from Swindon via Chippenham to Melksham and Trowbridge to Westbury, services and use have been transformed out of all recognition.  From around 10 passengers a day using Melksham station, served only by this line, nunbers have risen to over 200 passengers on an average day, and that's only a part of the story with the same trains also providing a link in just 19 minutes between Wiltshire's largest towns of Chippenham and Trowbridge.  The 20 fold passenger increase has been made possible by a four fold increase in the number of services, and the doubling of the length of the trains which has ensured that there is room on the trains for the passengers.

A success story, yes, which has been helped along by that partnership between the community and the rail indusrty with local and national goverment playing a crucial role too. But this is a story of a project that's still under way. The numbers look impressive as presented above, but the train service at just 9 a day is still thin, and many people tell me that they don't use it because of the inconvenience of the long gaps.  Analysis including comparisons with other similar services and towns in England suggests that an increase to an hourly "clockface" service in which the train leaves at the same time in every hour - that's 16 or 17 services a day - would increase passenger journey numbers to at least 700 per day (using the to / from Melksham measure), and that the quarter of a million annual journeys now made on the line would become more like a million each year.

TransWilts has over the years widened its portfolio - the best description I would apply is that they look to journeys within, to, from, and though Wiltshire, and a great deal of useful activity / excellent work has taken place both within communities and at a strategic level, helping lay a grounding for a positive future with both existing services and additional ones, perhaps serving new stations in the county and destinations beyond.

[grahame]

[grahame]

Today is the anniversary of Melksham Station re-opening ... and an opportunity for me to "bump" this story in various places such as my Melksham blog at http://grahamellis.uk/blog1229.html

Melksham Station - re-opening anniversary

13th May - the anniversary of the re-opening of Melksham Station in 1985 with a very limited service. In recent years, that has risen from 2 trains each way per day to 9, and passenger journeys up from 3,000 to 75,000 per annum. But that service is still so sparse that many potential passengers don't use it - either they drive or they get lifts - either to other stations or all the way to their destination!

A big "Thank you" to GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway), TransWilts, Wiltshire Council, and many others for all the help over the years.

Most stations have "USER Group"s. Melksham didn't until recent years - we had the "Melksham Railway DEVELOPMENT Group" as we didn't have enough users ... but that has changed in recent years and you'll now hear of the "Melksham Transport Users Group". That makes sense - our rail service remains thin, with buses rather than trains providing the most sensible way into Bath, and the only public transport to places like Devizes, Corsham and Lacock.

1985 was a long time ago, and old hands like Gordon Dodge, John Money and Peter Blackburn are no longer with us. Others - so many names - are no longer as active, and the core members are looking forward to the future. Last December, many of us joined together to celebrate 10 years of the improved service, and now we're looking ahead to the next 10 years.

A date in my diary - Wednesday 22nd May 2024, 19:00 for 19:30 at the Bethesda Church Hall just across the square from Trowbridge Station - where at the West Wiltshire Rail Users Group, new chair of TransWilts - Paddy Bradley - will look forward to the Community Rail Partnership's vision and plans for the future. Guests welcome (WWRUG^» (West Wiltshire Rail Users Group - about) ask guests for £2 to help towards their costs). And the meeting is timed to allow you to catch the last train back to Melksham at around twenty past nine.

The Melksham [Transport/Rail] [Users/Development] Group remaining active members will be meeting soon after 22nd May and looking to consider the future path, working with those other groups and partnering as appropriate. Public transport is about linking places and so it's appropriate for us to work for Melksham but also with the other nearby towns and villages and we'll be so better guided in that in 10 days.

[grahame]

Inspirational!  Talk in Trowbridge at West Wiltshire Rail User Group (WWRUG^» (West Wiltshire Rail Users Group - about)) last night by Paddy Bradley, new chair of TransWilts. Looking to build and nurture public transport forward in the community building on strong foundations built over the recent years. We had to scramble for extra chairs - and such was the interest the talk that our chair, Richard Cowell, had to wind up questions so that we could all toddle down to the station to catch our last trains home.

This won't go down in history as just another talk - it will go down as a step in a positive evolution. There is much more to follow - meetings and actions - as we head into a new phase of user and community interaction and positive development and support steps of our trains and buses and the infrastucture and systems that support and promote them.

I have Paddy's slides from last night which I can circulate to members and notes that I'll be writing up too.  Over the next fortnight, further discussions and meetings of core groups and key players.  Watch this space.

[Chris from Nailsea]

Rather than simply 'like' grahame's post, I'd 'like' to add a few more comments of my own. 

The 'scramble for extra chairs' is accurate - they were having to be brought in from the back room as fast as people arrived: I was surprised at the attendance at this meeting! 

'Inspirational!' ?

Yes, it was.  Paddy Bradley introduced himself as 'someone who doesn't really know much about railways' - but then, during his talk and questions demonstrated that he does actually know what he's talking about.

I went away from that meeting with a very positive impression of the ongoing team at TransWilts, working to consolidate and improve public transport services (bus as well as train) in Wiltshire.

[grahame]

This won't go down in history as just another talk - it will go down as a step in a positive evolution. There is much more to follow ...  Watch this space.

This space brings you http://www.passenger.chat/mirror/vision_mtug_20240527.pdf - very much written from a Melksham perspective, where the Town and Parish councils have (re)appointed reps to the local group and we are looking forward.