reddragon
Established Member
News from the GWSR today
I will not post the rest until it goes fully public
This section of the old line is owned by Railway Paths Limited (RPL), which is in effect a subsidiary of Sustrans the national cycling charity. This section of line was one of a number of such redundant railway lines which were transferred to RPL by the Department for Transport (DfT) some years ago, with the intent that they be turned into cycle routes.
We were contacted by RPL earlier this year, and at a subsequent meeting were told that RPL had decided that it had no wish to convert this redundant railway line into a cycleway and had resolved to dispose of it. It had decided that the obvious party to approach about this was GWSR and offer it.
There is apparently a clause in the transfer Agreement with the DfT to the effect that if RPL wants to dispose of any redundant railway line to a third party, it has to seek the prior consent of the DfT. RPL applied for permission to transfer this redundant railway line to GWSR and the application was refused.
The reason for the refusal is that it is now the policy of the DfT that heritage railways are unable to give a sufficiently strong covenant to secure the continuing maintenance of road bridges which cross these redundant lines, and therefore consideration will only be given to transferring ownership to a body such as a local authority which by definition has the necessary resources.
I will not post the rest until it goes fully public