In which case you have to go for which one is most likely to progress.
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An alternative route between Plymouth and Exeter, via Okehampton, should be built
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In which case you have to go for which one is most likely to progress.
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Other than it would cost more and have a worse business case (of the previous report into options is anything to go by).
Which in this case is electric buses, at a far greater frequency than rail can provide, at cheaper fares, and with better access both in Tavistock and Plymouth.
I meant to specify rail. Tavistock has buses coming out of its ears, so electric ones, while improving the carbon footprint, won't provide the boost to connectivity.
Why not?
Have you looked at a map of Plymouth? The railway is, unfortunately, very badly placed for access to most of the city. For the minority of journeys further afield, a rail connection would be better, but for the vast majority of journeys it just can't compete with road transport. Major employment destinations like the hospital and the biggest trading estates are literally miles from the railway. Spending the (imaginary) money for rebuilding this line on urban transport within Plymouth would be far more beneficial for many more people
irish_rail
On Moderation
Ie a Tram system. The city is crying out for trams quite frankly and would be very suited to trams. Geographically it is alot like Sheffield, fairly spread out and lots of hills!
I've walked around Plymouth from the station. A rail link isn't just about getting into the city itself, it's about linking to the rest of the network as well.
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Because buses already run around the city.
tbtc
Veteran Member
Have you ever wondered why there are so many buses from Tavistock to Plymouth city centre but yet the Tavistock - Okehampton bus is only roughly every hour and a half (https://bustimes.org/services/118-tavistock-okehampton), with the service seeming to be based on linking various intermediate hamlets that a train wouldn't penetrate
There's a whopping one bus a day from Tavistock to Exeter (https://bustimes.org/services/dart-first-exeter-moretonhamstead-princetown-tavis) and no bus service from Okehampton to Plymouth
Okehampton has a bus roughly every hour to Exeter but via three different routes and intermediate places and some awkward gaps
That tells me that the only link in area where heavy rail would stand a chance is a simple Tavistock - Plymouth service (Stagecoach 1 every fifteen minutes, albeit the bus serves the Hospital and actual Plymouth City Centre rather than the awkward distance that the train station is from the heart of the city)
Funnily enough I made that comparison recently to a colleague who was having a holiday in Torquay - that's what I love about Plymouth - it feels so familiar (the size of the city, the post-war concrete/ town planning, the fact that there's an post-industrial shadow hanging over the place and the abundance of lovely countryside nearby even if some of the urban areas aren't the prettiest!) - I feel more at home in Plymouth than most English cities
A link from a commuter town to the nearest city is absolutely about the city. How many people, of the 11,000 in Tavistock, do you think make journeys further afield than Plymouth every day? I would guess it is in the hundreds, at the very most. A station for Plympton would be far more valuable, yet there isn't a thread for that
But this is the point. A regular and frequent bus service connects key locations in Tavistock with key locations in Plymouth. A new, expensively provided, train service could only connect one location in Tavistock (the station) to one location in Plymouth (the station). It also would not be as frequent.
Therefore the train cannot improve public transport connectivity, as the connections already exist, and they are pretty good.
What the railway could do is improve journey times. But then so could the bus, through bus priority measures, and cutting out stops (eg Express from Tavistock to Plymouth station, then into the city). You could even have through fares, and then changing from bus to train at Plymouth would be as simple as changing from train to train.
And all for considerably less cash up front, and less ongoing.
Aictos
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Pardon the question but why does any such route HAVE to go via Okehampton between Exeter and Plymouth when it's actually ONLY between Newton Abbot and Exeter that any diversionary route needs to be built.
I agree, it is a bit weird that there's no pressure on here to add stations for the mid-sized towns on the mainline, which would have a much better economic case, and be much more practical than Tavistock. There are 30k people living in Plympton, and an hourly stopping train that could give them easy connections to both Plymouth and Exeter. If possible, I'd add another tph by extending the Gunnislake train to Ivybridge (in alternate hours probably just going to St Budeaux) , creating a West Devon Metro, that would finally give a decent service in this area.
Except that buses are slow, uncomfortable and get caught up in congestion.
daodao
Established Member
The siting of a city's main station relative to the actual city centre and other key destinations in the city is crucial with respect to the potential/actual viability of local/suburban services. Unfortunately, the remaining main station in Plymouth is badly situated, so developing/promoting local rail services (including potentially to Tavistock) is likely to have a poor business case. The same applies to Cambridge and Bristol (Temple Meads). Contrast this with the situation in Cardiff, where there are 2 main stations (Central and Queen Street) adjacent to the city centre (with one very close to the main sports stadium).
Buses are far more useful in Plymouth than developing local rail services. The only exception is the rail service to Bere Alston and Gunnislake, which has had to be retained because the river geography prevents decent road access to the villages served by the Tamar Valley line.
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So basically we're back to the fact you don't like buses as the justification for an expensive and in all probability lightly used new rail link.
Maybe start by linking Tavistock to Gunnislake or Bere Alston with a dedicated bus link which links to the trains - if it's a success you can argue for rail extension or improvement. On the other hand if the numbers barely fill a Transit, then we know it isn't worth it.
I would argue that
a) they aren't alone in that regard, although buses are getting better with on-board "the next stop is...." and much more widespread use of real-time information being rolled out.
b) the fact that buses do/don't run isn't always a reliable indicator as to how useful a rail link is. If it were then we'd not be getting a line to Okehampton. Whilst it's useful, it's not incom uncommon to see rail performing better than buses.
On that second point, where I live had site some time 2 buses per hour to the nearest large town. It has always had 2tph. Yet the numbers using the train from here had always been much higher than using the bus, even though the season ticket for the bus is quite a bit cheaper.
In fact we've lost our bus service in the other direction due to lack of use, yet rail continues to be well used for those local journeys.
I assume your home community and said large town have well located stations? In which case people who can afford it will prioritise speed over cost.
I assume the same point over convenience applies? An extreme case is Cononley (pop 1k+): 2bph when I moved there in 1990 and a recently reopened station. Once the Leeds NW scheme was complete, the bus service to and from Skipton dropped to (now) 4 offpeak journeys per day
Except in this case:
1) the train from Tavistock - Plymouth would be in the region of 35 minutes. An express bus would easily do it in 25 minutes with normal traffic conditions (from the part of Tavistock where the station would be, to Plymouth station). Clearly this would be longer with congestion, but adding a few (more) bus priority measures would cost less than doing any rail feasibility work, and probably finish more quickly too.
2) bus comfort is a factor of what type of bus you supply. A high quality coach style bus would be at least as good as a Sprinter.
3) congestion only appears at certain times of the day / week.
Clearly there is the issue of through ticketing, but this could be very easily solved.
tbtc
Veteran Member
Agreed - a line needs to be able to "wash its face" in terms of everyday passengers - like the people doing short/ simple/ boring journeys from a town like Tavistock to the nearest large city
Too many threads focus on either seasonal trade (especially the people who want to go to Whitby/ Dartmoor etc on their summer holidays) or the "diversionary resilience" (which might be a couple of weekends a year)
Looking at the six markets between the four places in Devon we're discussing (Exeter - Okehampton - Tavistock - Plymouth) it's clear that there's good demand from Exeter to Plymouth (busy dual carriageway, regular trains, the hourly Stagecoach "Falcon" etc) and good demand from Tavistock to Plymouth (four commercial buses per hour)
There's no public transport from Okehampton to Plymouth
There's a rambling bus every couple of hours connecting the villages between Okehampton and Tavistock
There's one bus a day from Tavistock to Exeter on what looks more like a "day tripper" service than anything else
Okehampton has roughly one bus an hour to Exeter, but irregular and with a variety of intermediate routes plus extension to Bude (so if the Okehampton - Exeter train kills off the bus service then that presumably kills off some of the services to Bude and to the villages between Bude and Exeter that the train won't touch)
Plympton has a ten minute main service into Plymouth (plus other services) and the population of Plympton is double the combined population of Tavistock and Okehampton
If we were looking logically at a railway that existed to serve actual passenger demands then we'd focus on places like Plympton and forget about places like Okehampton. However we are condemned to keep having the same argument over and over again about the same routes through empty countryside and the same fairly small settlements
Threads like this are very instructive on whether people are interested in genuinely solving actual problems or are just wanting to crowbar in your favourite long lost rural route as somehow being a priority for the twenty first century
The Forum seems full of seat-fetishists complaining that all modern trains have terrible seating and are uncomfortable (although if there were trains from Okehampton to Tavistock there's a good chance they'd be 1980s DMUs, possibly with 3+2 seating)
Meanwhile we've got modern buses with high specification like Stagecoach Gold (but a lot of people's idea of buses are still based on what they last used in the 1980s)
Heavy/Light Rail will generally perform better than buses on a corridor where all things are equal (comparable fares, good access to city centres etc)
The reason I keep bringing up bus services though is that the existing bus service is an indication of where people actually want to travel and whether there's a market for a future rail service
Alloa had a frequent service to Stirling for many years (before the train cut into the market) - the 60/62/63 were every ten minutes, the services from Dunfermline/ Falkirk to Stirling too
Ebbw Vale had good bus services to Cardiff (and Newport)
Galashiels had a half hourly coach into Edinburgh (and Gorebridge/ Dalkeith had a frequent service - obviously all of these have been cut back now that the trains are running, which has had a knock on effect on places like Hawick which have seen a reduction in their buses to Edinburgh even though they aren't served by the trains)
Levenmouth has good bus services to Kirkcaldy/ beyond, so will probably do well for heavy rail
Ashington/ Blyth have several bus services into central Newcastle so that line ought to sustain a train service
Portishead has good buses into central Bristol so looks a reasonable market for a re-opened line
However Bathgate only had an hourly-at-best service to Glasgow, AFAICR there were no commercial bus services from Bathgate to Airdrie and no commercial bus services from Airdrie to Edinburgh, so the underwhelming passenger numbers on the Airdrie - Bathgate route are understandable
Reston couldn't sustain much in the way of buses, which doesn't bode well
Colne has no buses to Leeds, despite the repeated suggestions that the people of Colne would all love to commute to Leeds each day in search of gainful employment
The bi-hourly service from Aberystwyth to Carmethen doesn't suggest to me that there are going to be loads of people who'd use a train between the towns (especially given the fact that the bus serves intermediate places that the any train wouldn't be able to penetrate)
Matlock and Bakewell seem to have more buses to Chesterfield and Sheffield than they do to Buxton (the through buses to Manchester didn't last)
If you can't get enough people travelling between A and B to make a minibus service commercially viable then the you're going to struggle to pay the much higher costs required for train drivers/ guards/ signalling and maintenance staff etc
It's obviously not an exact science but it's worth using as a bit of data for whether a line passes an initial "sniff test" (e.g. there was a thread recently where people were suggesting re-opening the line from Worksop - Dinnington - Maltby - Doncaster. Dinnington and Maltby are reasonable sized towns (positively megacities compared to Okehampton!), but the demand is into Rotherham/ Meadowhall/ Sheffield - that's where the bus routes take people to - a train linking them with Worksop/ Doncaster might "put the towns on the map" but it wouldn't be linking them to the places that are the main "destinations" from the towns so any campaign to re-open the lines seems more about the tokenistic obsession with re-opening lines for the sake of re-opening lines rather than trying to solve an actual problem
(I don't think that the re-opening to Okehampton is purely about the BCR btw)
Not the best example, as it has a pretty good service to Skipton, which is where the railway would run to - and which no longer has a bus service to Leeds.
(It also has a reasonable service to Keighley, which passes through a traffic desert from Laneshawbridge to Cowling.)
However, this is a bit OT.
Ashley Hill
Established Member
Clearly from comments on this thread no lines in England should ever reopen. I've never seen such negativity about a possible reopening scheme as unlikely as it will ever happen. Unless it's on a new alignment built for 125mph running that's all some people are interested in. Let's shut everything hand it over to Stagecoach and retreat into our comfortable holes of yesteryear.
It’s a very slow drive into Leeds, mostly 30mph with a lot of cameras. Too long for buses to be an attractive option the whole way, hence train from Skipton.
I would also hesitate to call the Portishead bus service good, despite the large population increase in recent decades the frequency of buses has declined (was once three an hour), although some are a bit faster as every other one bypasses Pill these days. They do however serve the actual city centre, which the trains will not (though I note that the walk from Temple Meads is a lot better these days due to ongoing improvements to the ‘pedestrian realm’. It sounds like Plymouth has a similar issue. Gives me an idea for a new thread...
I think I proposed resiting poorly placed stations as a worthwhile major capital scheme once, so I'd be interested in speculative discussion of practicalities of that.
As for negativity, looking at priorities and limited cash I personally just don't think the moors line is worth it, and my own proposal was at least a *little* serious, if highly unlikely - but not remotely as nostalgic. I'd have loved to meander off to Bude by rail too, but I alone aren't enough to pay for it...
As for negativity, looking at priorities and limited cash I personally just don't think the moors line is worth it, and my own proposal was at least a *little* serious, if highly unlikely - but not remotely as nostalgic. I'd have loved to meander off to Bude by rail too, but I alone aren't enough to pay for it...
Annetts key
Established Member
I’m not at all sure about some of the comments relating to the location of the stations in cities.
Are the following really unreasonable:
Bristol Temple Meads station to the Harbourside (“the centre”) is an 18 minute walk (about 0.9 miles).
Bristol Temple Meads station to the nearest part of the main shopping area (The Galleries) is a 15 minute walk (about 0.7 miles).
Plymouth Railway Station to Guildhall Square is a 12 minute walk (about 0.6 miles).
Does the railway serve everywhere in a city, of course not. But generally there are regular bus services (or at least, should be, and there should be through ticketing and coordinated timetabling) that go to various popular destinations. And if you want to be driven to somewhere that a bus does not go, then maybe you can book a taxi.
And some large cities have numerous smaller stations.
For example, as well as Temple Meads, Bristol currently has Parson Street, Bedminster, Lawrence Hill, Stapleton Road, Montpelier, Redland, and Clifton Down. Further out there is Sea Mills, Shirehampton, and Avonmouth. Even further out there is St. Andrews Road, Severn Beach, Filton Abbey Wood, Bristol Parkway and Patchway. Is this enough? No, of course not. But there are plans and some funding for others as well. Although what actually opens is another matter.
Realistically, there will never be enough money to reopen many of the closed former lines. Either because there is currently not enough demand for passenger services or because the line of route is no longer reasonably practical. Keep in mind that in the past the railway earned a lot of money from goods and freight as well as from passenger services. And when many of these lines were built there was little competition from the car or bus.
And yes, or course, busses have plenty of disadvantages.
In the large cities, I would like to see metro or similar tube or MRT systems, but the construction cost of these means that politicians run away as soon as you mention money… Even though these would almost certainly be well used.
So hoping for former branch lines in mainly countryside areas with a low population density to be funded seems unrealistic to me.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m pro railway. I would love to see lots of former railway lines and stations reopening. I enjoy travelling by train. But we live in a world where money appears to be more important than people.
Are the following really unreasonable:
Bristol Temple Meads station to the Harbourside (“the centre”) is an 18 minute walk (about 0.9 miles).
Bristol Temple Meads station to the nearest part of the main shopping area (The Galleries) is a 15 minute walk (about 0.7 miles).
Plymouth Railway Station to Guildhall Square is a 12 minute walk (about 0.6 miles).
Does the railway serve everywhere in a city, of course not. But generally there are regular bus services (or at least, should be, and there should be through ticketing and coordinated timetabling) that go to various popular destinations. And if you want to be driven to somewhere that a bus does not go, then maybe you can book a taxi.
And some large cities have numerous smaller stations.
For example, as well as Temple Meads, Bristol currently has Parson Street, Bedminster, Lawrence Hill, Stapleton Road, Montpelier, Redland, and Clifton Down. Further out there is Sea Mills, Shirehampton, and Avonmouth. Even further out there is St. Andrews Road, Severn Beach, Filton Abbey Wood, Bristol Parkway and Patchway. Is this enough? No, of course not. But there are plans and some funding for others as well. Although what actually opens is another matter.
Realistically, there will never be enough money to reopen many of the closed former lines. Either because there is currently not enough demand for passenger services or because the line of route is no longer reasonably practical. Keep in mind that in the past the railway earned a lot of money from goods and freight as well as from passenger services. And when many of these lines were built there was little competition from the car or bus.
And yes, or course, busses have plenty of disadvantages.
In the large cities, I would like to see metro or similar tube or MRT systems, but the construction cost of these means that politicians run away as soon as you mention money… Even though these would almost certainly be well used.
So hoping for former branch lines in mainly countryside areas with a low population density to be funded seems unrealistic to me.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m pro railway. I would love to see lots of former railway lines and stations reopening. I enjoy travelling by train. But we live in a world where money appears to be more important than people.
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Railwaysceptic
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Most closed railway lines should not be re-opened. Many should not have been built in the first place. Questioning the merits of re-opening a short stretch of abandoned railway running through very sparsely populated countryside does not indicate negativity. It indicates common sense. It's noticeable that those advocating this re-opening use very shaky arguments: e.g. Okehampton, population 6000, is a "large town."
Those suggesting that a new high speed Dawlish avoiding line would be more beneficial to more people have not recommended closing any existing minor railway routes.
They are unreasonable compared to the bus, which is a zero minute walk from the above. Once you add in luggage, pushchairs, shopping, mobility issues etc. it’s unattractive. Compare to Leeds for example where you rock up two minutes walk from the heart of the retail district.
At least there has been development around temple meads of housing and offices, that must now provide a draw, whereas there used to be very little. A shame the old harbour line has been almost completely developed over, that would have provided a nice start for a metro type service. Iirc there was once a proposal to run reinstated Portishead services to Wapping Wharf, which would have been better placed though not good for onward connections. They’re building flats on that site right now.
In Plymouth it's not really the location of the city centre station that's the issue in the context of a Tavistock re-opening it the fact that all the modern development has taken place alongside the main road to Tavistock and it stretches to the city limits at Roborough about 5 miles from the station.
The railways on the other hand were built to serve the maritime sector which were Plymouths big traffic generator, Millbay and Devonport were more important than the city centre at the time.
Nearly all the passengers on the bus service have destinations that are before the station or city centre are reached. So if they were to transfer to rail they would have to then get a bus back towards Tavistock through the worst of the congestion.
Interconnectivity would be nice for public transport fans who live in Yorkshire conurbations to reach Tavistock once every 25 years but the fact is that the vast majority of people in rural areas have access to private cars because it is a necessity for them. On their once every 10 years trip to London they will drive to Exeter or Tiverton and catch the train from there because its quicker. A train line to Plymouth won't change that.
The railways on the other hand were built to serve the maritime sector which were Plymouths big traffic generator, Millbay and Devonport were more important than the city centre at the time.
Nearly all the passengers on the bus service have destinations that are before the station or city centre are reached. So if they were to transfer to rail they would have to then get a bus back towards Tavistock through the worst of the congestion.
Interconnectivity would be nice for public transport fans who live in Yorkshire conurbations to reach Tavistock once every 25 years but the fact is that the vast majority of people in rural areas have access to private cars because it is a necessity for them. On their once every 10 years trip to London they will drive to Exeter or Tiverton and catch the train from there because its quicker. A train line to Plymouth won't change that.
I haven't seen a lot of negativity on this forum about re-opening the Newcastle-Ashington line to passengers.
Could this be because re-opening lines in the most (road) congested urban and suburban areas is an appropriate place to spend the available funds.
So clearly the bus is doing what its designed to do, moving people short distances within urban areas. That sounds like a very long winded, congested journey for people wanting to get from Tavistock to further afield.
People from the South East with very extesive public transport provision, don't often realise that just because rural areas of necessity have high levels of car ownership, people might not always have access to it. Another member of the household might be the primary user for example, and even rural residents have to visit outside of their towns more than once every ten years.
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