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I'm not sure why you're so cynical about the Creigiau line. The corridor through Faiwater and the new Plasdwr suburb is preserved and accesing the Cityline would involve demolishing around 3-4 existing properties at most.
I think you must be assuming that the line would diverge at Waungron as...
I frequently travel between south and north Wales and the section between Shrewsbury and Wrexham is often very busy - mainly with students. Despite the border running through the middle, Wrexham, northern Powys and Salop do seem to be something of an educational and economic sub-region.
The...
IIRC correctly W&S were losing £2-3m pa when the closed - peanuts for a company like Alstom. I suspect this may be a "toe in the water" excersise for what is a very large international operation.
I think I'm right in saying that the Wesh Government paid for sheds in Wrexham for the W&S. I'm...
And nor should they until rail is fully devolved. The UK Government seems to want to have its cake and eat it - refusing to devolve rail and Barnetise projects like HS2 and Network North while expecting the Welsh Government to cough up for improvements to lines they don't own.
I think that's correct. The City Line is currently a mess. I can understand why the Welsh Government wanted to take ownership of the CVL given the historic lack of investment by BR/Railtrack/Network Rail in the valley lines. However, it's left the City Line as something of an orphan.
The...
Is the Onllwyn washery even operational? The Global Centre for Rail Excellence bought the site back in 2022 so I doubt if the washery is still in use. I assume the coal from Aberpergwm must be washed somewhere but its own washery was dismantled when British Coal closed the mine so quite where...
Not really. All that would do is to essentialy duplicate what exists already. The journey time from the Bay to Central would be roughly the same as it currently is, just without the need to change trains. Added to which, Central is already pretty much at capacity with the provision of extra...
Callaghan Square has never really worked as a public space and there has been talk of changing it almost since it was completed in the early 2000s. I guess those improvements might have taken place anyway, regardless of the rail plans. This is probably a case of two schemes being rolled in...
It would be interesting to see just how many passengers make that journey. Obviously with major employers like the Welsh Govt. and Cardiff University nearby there will be some but a daily commute of two hours a day is pretty challenging and I'm guessing the numbers aren't huge.
To return to the original point of this thread, I think it's a mistake to regard heritage or preserved railways as a monolithic block. Some are large busineses, albeit with a supporting volunteer base, others are essentialy hobby railways with a mile or two of track and a handful of employees...
Even if it is physically possible, from my experience on severely overcrowded XC and GWR trains, the crew (rightly, in my view) priortise things like distributing bottled water and ensuring toilet access over checking tickets.
Indeed. You only have to see the heavy usage of the 600 bay Trefforest P&R and the Radyr P&R to see the demand is there. That said, if the proposed Taff Well MSCP is close to people's homes I have some sympathy for them.
It's slipped again - Feb 29th. At least this time it's official!
https://nation.cymru/news/transport-for-wales-confirms-reopening-date-for-treherbert-line/
The NW mainline announcement was desperate back of a fag packet stuff by Sunak. HS2 was (rather shockingly) designated as an England and Wales scheme by the treasury. There was no way they could get away with that for Network North unless at least some money was promised to Wales.