Any news on proposals to build an alternative route between Exeter & Plymouth?

[Shaw S Hunter]

Good value compared to what though? That is the point; value is a tool for comparison. And when you want to spend £100m of someone else’s cash (and in my view it will be more than £100m), then you need to make some you have compared all reasonable options.

And that is the point so often forgotten by rail campaigners. It is not enough to simply assume that funders agree with you that rail is a superior method of travel!

 

[yorksrob]

Good value compared to what though? That is the point; value is a tool for comparison. And when you want to spend £100m of someone else’s cash (and in my view it will be more than £100m), then you need to make some you have compared all reasonable options.

Good value compared to only allowing transport solutions that neglect those who aren't motorists or who don't live in cities.

 

[Bald Rick]

And that is the point so often forgotten by rail campaigners. It is not enough to simply assume that funders agree with you that rail is a superior method of travel!

To be fair, it is often forgotten by campaigners of other modes of transport, or for that matter proponents of non-transport projects.

Good value compared to only allowing transport solutions that neglect those who aren't motorists or who don't live in cities.

But there would be alternatives that easily meet that criteria, but don’t involve spending £100m on a new railway.

Instead, for example, you could spend half of it, and buy a fleet of executive coaches to operate a ten minute frequency service from 0600 to midnight, 365 days a year, from Tavistock to central Plymouth, serving the station and other key city centre destinations. And let passengers use it for free, whilst providing all regular commuters with coffee in the morning and a glass of wine for the trip home every Friday night. For free. And you could do this for a decade, and still have change from that £50m to build a new primary school and a new primary healthcare facility in Tavistock. And you’d still be £50m up.

In comparison to a train service every 75mins, as proposed by Devon CC, would that not be better value in terms of transport provision and benefit to Tavistock and the surrounding area? Wouldn’t it be much better at reducing traffic on the A386?

Yes, I’m being deliberately provocative. But the people whom the country / county elects to spend our money for us have to consider all reasonable options to make sure we get the best value for society.

 

[Robertj21a]

To be fair, it is often forgotten by campaigners of other modes of transport, or for that matter proponents of non-transport projects.



But there would be alternatives that easily meet that criteria, but don’t involve spending £100m on a new railway.

Instead, for example, you could spend half of it, and buy a fleet of executive coaches to operate a ten minute frequency service from 0600 to midnight, 365 days a year, from Tavistock to central Plymouth, serving the station and other key city centre destinations. And let passengers use it for free, whilst providing all regular commuters with coffee in the morning and a glass of wine for the trip home every Friday night. For free. And you could do this for a decade, and still have change from that £50m to build a new primary school and a new primary healthcare facility in Tavistock. And you’d still be £50m up.

In comparison to a train service every 75mins, as proposed by Devon CC, would that not be better value in terms of transport provision and benefit to Tavistock and the surrounding area? Wouldn’t it be much better at reducing traffic on the A386?

Yes, I’m being deliberately provocative. But the people whom the country / county elects to spend our money for us have to consider all reasonable options to make sure we get the best value for society.

Some good points in there. I do get a bit fed up when people, with any vested interest, can't see any issue whatsoever in just splashing out £millions on 'their' project. I always feel that they'd quickly have a rethink if they had more personal accountability for the costs.

 

[yorksrob]

To be fair, it is often forgotten by campaigners of other modes of transport, or for that matter proponents of non-transport projects.



But there would be alternatives that easily meet that criteria, but don’t involve spending £100m on a new railway.

Instead, for example, you could spend half of it, and buy a fleet of executive coaches to operate a ten minute frequency service from 0600 to midnight, 365 days a year, from Tavistock to central Plymouth, serving the station and other key city centre destinations. And let passengers use it for free, whilst providing all regular commuters with coffee in the morning and a glass of wine for the trip home every Friday night. For free. And you could do this for a decade, and still have change from that £50m to build a new primary school and a new primary healthcare facility in Tavistock. And you’d still be £50m up.

In comparison to a train service every 75mins, as proposed by Devon CC, would that not be better value in terms of transport provision and benefit to Tavistock and the surrounding area? Wouldn’t it be much better at reducing traffic on the A386?

Yes, I’m being deliberately provocative. But the people whom the country / county elects to spend our money for us have to consider all reasonable options to make sure we get the best value for society.

Then you'll agree with me that @coppercapped can call for active reopening groups as much as he likes, but nothing will happen until there is a change of policy.

And in the scenario quoted by yourself, there is considerable congestion between Plymouth and Tavistock, so that fleet of luxury coaches would be more or less useless without a substantial capital expenditure on road improvements.

The decision the Government needs to make is does it want to spend millions on road works, and end up back at square one in five years time, when the roads have just filled up again, or does it want to provide a genuine public transport alternative to the people of Tavistock by linking them in with the only genuine public transport network that serves the whole Nation.

The answer really is very simple, even though our overlords in London are too blind to see it.

 

[Bald Rick]

Then you'll agree with me that @coppercapped can call for active reopening groups as much as he likes, but nothing will happen until there is a change of policy.

And in the scenario quoted by yourself, there is considerable congestion between Plymouth and Tavistock, so that fleet of luxury coaches would be more or less useless without a substantial capital expenditure on road improvements.

The decision the Government needs to make is does it want to spend millions on road works, and end up back at square one in five years time, when the roads have just filled up again, or does it want to provide a genuine public transport alternative to the people of Tavistock by linking them in with the only genuine public transport network that serves the whole Nation.

The answer really is very simple, even though our overlords in London are too blind to see it.

But the answer isn’t simple, because there are several answers, and that’s why problems such as these need proper consideration to pick the right one.

I am not particularly familiar with the traffic on the A386 or Plymouth, however looking at the (usually accurate) traffic flows on google maps suggests it’s not that bad in comparison to many other cities for 0830 on a wet and horrible weekday morning. It currently suggests a road journey time fo 37 minutes between central Tavistock and Plymouth station. In any event, who in their right mind would drive to central Plymouth from Tavistock if there was a free bus every 10 minutes? That would surely take more traffic off the A386 than an hourly train you’d have to pay about £6 for?

 

[Ianno87]

Then you'll agree with me that @coppercapped can call for active reopening groups as much as he likes, but nothing will happen until there is a change of policy.

And in the scenario quoted by yourself, there is considerable congestion between Plymouth and Tavistock, so that fleet of luxury coaches would be more or less useless without a substantial capital expenditure on road improvements.

The decision the Government needs to make is does it want to spend millions on road works, and end up back at square one in five years time, when the roads have just filled up again, or does it want to provide a genuine public transport alternative to the people of Tavistock by linking them in with the only genuine public transport network that serves the whole Nation.

The answer really is very simple, even though our overlords in London are too blind to see it.

Whilst not suggesting that there aren't travel problems for those in Tavistock, is £100m best spent there, or best spent somewhere else? It may be, it may not be. This issue is that money is finite, unfortunately.

 

[yorksrob]

But the answer isn’t simple, because there are several answers, and that’s why problems such as these need proper consideration to pick the right one.

I am not particularly familiar with the traffic on the A386 or Plymouth, however looking at the (usually accurate) traffic flows on google maps suggests it’s not that bad in comparison to many other cities for 0830 on a wet and horrible weekday morning. It currently suggests a road journey time fo 37 minutes between central Tavistock and Plymouth station. In any event, who in their right mind would drive to central Plymouth from Tavistock if there was a free bus every 10 minutes? That would surely take more traffic off the A386 than an hourly train you’d have to pay about £6 for?

You're clutching at straws now. Who in their right mind is going to pay for a free ten minute interval bus service to Tavistock ? How would that even happen with bus deregulation ? The fact that this "solution" hasn't happenned anywhere else suggests that it is not a solution.

In reality there are only two answers in this case. Stick with the status quo and try and improve it, or join Tavistock to the national public transport network, which is the railway.

 

[yorksrob]

Whilst not suggesting that there aren't travel problems for those in Tavistock, is £100m best spent there, or best spent somewhere else? It may be, it may not be. This issue is that money is finite, unfortunately.

By that argument, you could end up spending everything in cities. I believe that polocy should enshrine, and part fund the following two objectives:

1) ensuring that some of the capital pot is set aside for improvements in the regions

2) some of the capital should be specifically set aside for 'connecting communities' back to the rail network, in the recognition that the railway is the only public transport system that has a truly national reach, and is segragated from the road network.

 

[Bald Rick]

You're clutching at straws now. Who in their right mind is going to pay for a free ten minute interval bus service to Tavistock ? How would that even happen with bus deregulation ? The fact that this "solution" hasn't happenned anywhere else suggests that it is not a solution.

In reality there are only two answers in this case. Stick with the status quo and try and improve it, or join Tavistock to the national public transport network, which is the railway.

I said I was being deliberately provocative.

But to answer the question “who in their right mind is going to pay for a free 10 minute interval bus service to Tavistock” ... the answer is the same as “who is going to pay £100m for a railway to Tavistock”.

The taxpayer. And that is the point. Which is best use of taxpayers’ money? Assuming the problem we are trying to answer is “how do you best improve social and economic mobility for people who live in Tavistock and want to get to central Plymouth and the rail network at Plymouth station”

 

[yorksrob]

I said I was being deliberately provocative.

But to answer the question “who in their right mind is going to pay for a free 10 minute interval bus service to Tavistock” ... the answer is the same as “who is going to pay £100m for a railway to Tavistock”.

The taxpayer. And that is the point. Which is best use of taxpayers’ money? Assuming the problem we are trying to answer is “how do you best improve social and economic mobility for people who live in Tavistock and want to get to central Plymouth and the rail network at Plymouth station”

And I would answer that connecting back to the railway network is the only solution that will provide enough of a step change to the status quo, to meet those objectives, for reasons which I have outlined in the above posts.

Plus you're forgetting that building a railway line is a capital investment, whereas running a free bus is revenue support. That alone, to me suggests that the railway reopening is a more likely outcome.

 

[Bald Rick]

And I would answer that connecting back to the railway network is the only solution that will provide enough of a step change to the status quo, to meet those objectives...

But it isn’t the only solution. That’s the point. I dreamt up another solution in half an hour last night. No doubt there are plenty of other solutions that I (or anyone else) could dream up in another half hour.

This is the reason why some reopening campaigns have such difficulty. They focus on a solution rather than the problem, and even when / if they recognise they have to identify a problem, they maintain that their solution is the only possible way to solve it. Mr Windsor Link has just learnt that the hard way, at considerable personal cost.

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

Is it not the case, however, in achieving a modal shift motorists can be persuaded to foresake their steering wheels for a train or tram, but under no circumstances will switch to a bus. 'Rail replacement bus' is one the most dreaded phrases in the English language. Devon and Cornwall are the amongst the most car-orientated counties in the country, yet there are very positive signs with the success of the Devon Metro (by the early 70s local rail traffic Exeter - Paignton had virtually collapsed) and the forthcoming half-hourly service on the Cornish Main Line.

Plymouth, Exeter and Truro all have chronic traffic congestion - even on a wet day in November - as employment and educational opportunities are increasingly concentrated in them. The problem with the A386 to Tavistock is that it is the only route north out of Plymouth, and the planners in their wisdom located the main hospital (for the city and region) at Derriford just off it. It is a significant generator of traffic from patients and staff alike from a wide area. As a frequent visitor to Tavistock , I have endured the misery of many bus journies in the peak taking 45mins to just crawl out to Roborough on the city limits - and the timetable falling apart as a result. Tavistock is also expanding rapidly, changing from 'God's waiting room' to a commuter town with young families and the inevitable increase in traffic congestion. If we really wanted to maintain this car culture the sensible thing would be to close the Gunnislake branch and replace the Tavy Rail Bridge with a road bridge, offering a second road route from Tavistock to Plymouth via the Bere Peninsula. Quite apart from the environmental damage in an AONB location, all experience shows that building new roads is self-defeating, rapidly filling up with newly generated traffic. That is why we must break the cycle and I am a firm advocate of re-opening the railway to Tavistock.

 

[J-Rod]

'Rail replacement bus' is one the most dreaded phrases in the English language.

All of the disadvantages of driving yourself, but none of the advantages (i.e., loud music, Greggs, that sort of thing)

 

[coppercapped]

Then you'll agree with me that @coppercapped can call for active reopening groups as much as he likes, but nothing will happen until there is a change of policy.
SNIP.

As usual you are completely misinterpreting what I wrote to justify your position. Your position is, as Bald Rick stated in post No. 672 that the solution you want - to re-open railways - is the only solution possible to the issue that you have identified.

If this is accepted then you think that all that needs to change is Government policy. You think that when that happens everything will be hunky-dory.

I have news for you, it won't happen. Not with this Government, not with the next Government and not with the one after that.

You will be permanently disappointed.

The reason is that there are many calls on Government to spend money. At least as many as there are people in the country - if fact many more as most people touch Government in many different ways - in one day you may need assistance from a doctor, or your child goes to school, or you drive on a motorway or you need the police or a friend has been washed out to sea and the RAF's Search and Rescue helicopters are needed or you take a bus which operates on a subsidised route. Other possibilities are available.

The Government has to pay for much of this. It has one source of income - taxes. It can, of course, borrow money - but the interest payable comes out of taxes which stores up problems for the future. It can devalue the currency - but this simply makes many things, especially imported stuff such as food, more expensive. Taxes can only be raised to a level which is socially acceptable. If the level is too high then social unrest is pre-programmed and people and companies will start to move to lower taxed countries. This already happened in the 1970s - high inflation peaking at over 25% per year seriously weakened the social structure, companies' finances were badly hit and the job market deteriorated. I don't ever want to live through such miserable times again.

I would point out that last year the Government spend more on debt interest payments, some £39 billion, than on all transport, £29 billion. Borrowing is not a solution.

The Government's income is, broadly, fixed so it has to judge where best to spend the money it does have. Firstly it decides the split between ongoing expenditure on welfare payments, pensions, wages and salaries of the doctors, nurses, police, school teachers, soldiers, sailors, its own administration, etc. and buying stuff such as defence kit or roads and other transport infrastructure.

Which leads me to what I wrote in

I include myself among these, I would be delighted if the link between Exeter and Plymouth via Okehampton (among others) were to be reinstated. But one has has to realise that the money has to come from somewhere - and for most infrastructure projects this means from the Government. In some cases there might be some reusable alignment, but as far as the Law and raising money goes, one is building a new railway.

He who pays the piper calls the tune - which means that one has to play by the Government's rules. These are quite clearly set out here. To stand any chance of success this process must be followed.

If you a serious about getting railways re-opened, get stuck in! I am trying to do something similar with a conservation area in my town - just bitching butters no parsnips. You have to roll your sleeves up.

and

What is necessary is find out why he/she was against re-opening. Were they afraid that they would lose money intended for some other project? Did they expect their district would have to contribute? And any one of many such reasons or fears.

You, or the action group(s) promoting the reopening, will have demonstrate that there is a benefit to this person if the line reopens. This could be financial; it could be that it assists the local Council in meeting its planning objectives and policies; or one of many other reasons. You have to demolish each of the arguments raised against re-opening - in detail, with figures that are based on facts not wishful thinking.

You will need to identify sources of money, work with the Local Enterprise Partnerships, local councils, politicians, businesses, local community associations, local rail action groups. Look at the way that the East-West Rail Consortium has campaigned for years to get the Cambridge - Bedford - Bletchley - Oxford line reopened. Finally, it's happening.

What will NOT work is to simply say that village or town XYZ deserves a rail service because it used to have one. If you say that NOBODY will open the door for you again. You'll be classified as a railway enthusiast and be discounted as a nutcase.

I stated quite clearly that pressure groups have to operate within the framework of the DfT's Webtag, I pointed you at it. It's found HERE. Did you even look at it? Any rail re-openings will have to follow the methods given there.

Either that, or keep bitching in on-line forms.

 

[yorksrob]

But it isn’t the only solution. That’s the point. I dreamt up another solution in half an hour last night. No doubt there are plenty of other solutions that I (or anyone else) could dream up in another half hour.

This is the reason why some reopening campaigns have such difficulty. They focus on a solution rather than the problem, and even when / if they recognise they have to identify a problem, they maintain that their solution is the only possible way to solve it. Mr Windsor Link has just learnt that the hard way, at considerable personal cost.

I think that too often we jump through hoops trying to reinvent the wheel.

Most towns of any size want the same things:

1) A decent road network
2) Some sort of local public transport, usually a bus
3) A station on the national rail network.

Most of these wierd and wonderful alternatives are just supposedly cheap ways of trying to recreate the above, when we should be providing those things wherever practical.

 

[yorksrob]

As usual you are completely misinterpreting what I wrote to justify your position. Your position is, as Bald Rick stated in post No. 672 that the solution you want - to re-open railways - is the only solution possible to the issue that you have identified.

If this is accepted then you think that all that needs to change is Government policy. You think that when that happens everything will be hunky-dory.

I have news for you, it won't happen. Not with this Government, not with the next Government and not with the one after that.

You will be permanently disappointed.

The reason is that there are many calls on Government to spend money. At least as many as there are people in the country - if fact many more as most people touch Government in many different ways - in one day you may need assistance from a doctor, or your child goes to school, or you drive on a motorway or you need the police or a friend has been washed out to sea and the RAF's Search and Rescue helicopters are needed or you take a bus which operates on a subsidised route. Other possibilities are available.

The Government has to pay for much of this. It has one source of income - taxes. It can, of course, borrow money - but the interest payable comes out of taxes which stores up problems for the future. It can devalue the currency - but this simply makes many things, especially imported stuff such as food, more expensive. Taxes can only be raised to a level which is socially acceptable. If the level is too high then social unrest is pre-programmed and people and companies will start to move to lower taxed countries. This already happened in the 1970s - high inflation peaking at over 25% per year seriously weakened the social structure, companies' finances were badly hit and the job market deteriorated. I don't ever want to live through such miserable times again.

I would point out that last year the Government spend more on debt interest payments, some £39 billion, than on all transport, £29 billion. Borrowing is not a solution.

The Government's income is, broadly, fixed so it has to judge where best to spend the money it does have. Firstly it decides the split between ongoing expenditure on welfare payments, pensions, wages and salaries of the doctors, nurses, police, school teachers, soldiers, sailors, its own administration, etc. and buying stuff such as defence kit or roads and other transport infrastructure.

Which leads me to what I wrote in

and


I stated quite clearly that pressure groups have to operate within the framework of the DfT's Webtag, I pointed you at it. It's found HERE. Did you even look at it? Any rail re-openings will have to follow the methods given there.

Either that, or keep bitching in on-line forms.

I've explained my position. There will be no change until there is a change in policy. Everything you've said about funding constraints is true, yet we have a Government which is happy to spend taxpayers money, propping up TOC's during strikes, just to prove who's in charge.

If the DfT used that money instead towards schemes such as linking Tavistock to the rail network, we would all be better off.

 

[Brush 4]

How can relaying 5.5 miles of plain track out of 2 originally, signalling and 1 station platform cost £100 million? Is there a cost breakdown anywhere online? Does that figure include non rail aspects, such as the cycle paths and trails? The rail and non rail costs should be kept separate, if they are not already that is.

 

[Bald Rick]

The rail and non rail costs should be kept separate, if they are not already that is.

Out of interest, why?

 

[AndrewE]

Out of interest, why?

Because you shouldn't really charge the railway for moving and reinstating bike and footpaths that have borrowed the formation since the track was lifted.

 

[deltic08]

To be fair, it is often forgotten by campaigners of other modes of transport, or for that matter proponents of non-transport projects.



But there would be alternatives that easily meet that criteria, but don’t involve spending £100m on a new railway.

Instead, for example, you could spend half of it, and buy a fleet of executive coaches to operate a ten minute frequency service from 0600 to midnight, 365 days a year, from Tavistock to central Plymouth, serving the station and other key city centre destinations. And let passengers use it for free, whilst providing all regular commuters with coffee in the morning and a glass of wine for the trip home every Friday night. For free. And you could do this for a decade, and still have change from that £50m to build a new primary school and a new primary healthcare facility in Tavistock. And you’d still be £50m up.

In comparison to a train service every 75mins, as proposed by Devon CC, would that not be better value in terms of transport provision and benefit to Tavistock and the surrounding area? Wouldn’t it be much better at reducing traffic on the A386?

Yes, I’m being deliberately provocative. But the people whom the country / county elects to spend our money for us have to consider all reasonable options to make sure we get the best value for society.

But you are assuming buses don't pollute( all road vehicles pollute, even electric ones, and buses and lorries pollute more than cars due to their weight. Treads of 50m tyres need replacing every year and where does it end up? In our lungs as carcinogenic rubber dust particulates) and the roads of Plymouth are free of gridlock in the peaks which they aren't.

 

[The Ham]

Because you shouldn't really charge the railway for moving and reinstating bike and footpaths that have borrowed the formation since the track was lifted.

If the railways are proposing changing the cycleway then they should be the ones paying for it to be altered.

If it is a nice to have feature which doesn't already exist then they probably shouldn't (although by providing good access it could mean that more people use the railways and/or less car parking is required which could reduce costs if providing parking is problematic - read costly).

 

[Pigeon]

How can relaying 5.5 miles of plain track out of 2 originally, signalling and 1 station platform cost £100 million?

Because we've got really really good at flannel.

And because people so determinedly refuse to see that it is flannel, and won't acknowledge that it's just as possible to remove it as it was to instantiate it.

You get whacked in the face with this all the flipping time when reading about railway history. There's an account of the Victorians building, say, a tunnel, which cost them such-and-such an amount, "equivalent to this-much in today's money". The equivalence factor does tend to vary a lot, but that doesn't really matter, because it doesn't change that "this-much in today's money" is only a fraction of what it is said in the next paragraph to have cost to stuff a few yards of the now-disused tunnel with concrete to stop it falling in and causing subsidence.

It never seems to occur to anyone that if the Victorians could manage to build the tunnel by digging it all out by hand, or rather by thousands of hands, with crappy tools and materials, and no powered machinery whatsoever apart from a few steam-powered water pumps, while with modern machinery and materials we can build a better tunnel with only a comparative handful of hands, then the modern tunnel ought to be ten times cheaper - otherwise wtf were all the technological advancements for? - and if instead it's twenty times more expensive then we must be doing something wrong, in a pretty massive way.

 

[yorksrob]

Particularly when one considers that Shillamill tunnel and viaduct, and Tavistock viaduct are both in pretty good nick anyway,.

 

[Bald Rick]

Because you shouldn't really charge the railway for moving and reinstating bike and footpaths that have borrowed the formation since the track was lifted.

But it’s not borrowed. It’s theirs. They have the same rights as any other property owner (or lessee). That’s the law.

But you are assuming buses don't pollute( all road vehicles pollute, even electric ones, and buses and lorries pollute more than cars due to their weight.

I’m not assuming that at all. Incidentally a 2 car DMU uses about as much diesel per mile as 10 road coaches on a similar working. The tyres thing - yes it’s an issue, but in the scheme of things, rather marginal. Most of the stuff that comes off tyres ends up in the drains or on the road surface.

Because we've got really really good at flannel.

And because people so determinedly refuse to see that it is flannel, and won't acknowledge that it's just as possible to remove it as it was to instantiate it.

You get whacked in the face with this all the flipping time when reading about railway history. There's an account of the Victorians building, say, a tunnel, which cost them such-and-such an amount, "equivalent to this-much in today's money". The equivalence factor does tend to vary a lot, but that doesn't really matter, because it doesn't change that "this-much in today's money" is only a fraction of what it is said in the next paragraph to have cost to stuff a few yards of the now-disused tunnel with concrete to stop it falling in and causing subsidence.

It never seems to occur to anyone that if the Victorians could manage to build the tunnel by digging it all out by hand, or rather by thousands of hands, with crappy tools and materials, and no powered machinery whatsoever apart from a few steam-powered water pumps, while with modern machinery and materials we can build a better tunnel with only a comparative handful of hands, then the modern tunnel ought to be ten times cheaper - otherwise wtf were all the technological advancements for? - and if instead it's twenty times more expensive then we must be doing something wrong, in a pretty massive way.

Shall we all go back to Victorian ways of building infrastructure then? If you compare Victorian costs to now, then we should also convert Victorian wages to current prices . I’m sure we could build things a lot more cheaply if we only paid people £30 for a 60-70 hour week, and didn’t pay them if they were sick, didn’t provide protective gear, or any site welfare to speak of, and treated them as an expendable resource who wouldn’t mind finishing the job with a few scars or body parts or their friends missing.

 

[deltic08]

I’m not assuming that at all. Incidentally a 2 car DMU uses about as much diesel per mile as 10 road coaches on a similar working. The tyres thing - yes it’s an issue, but in the scheme of things, rather marginal. Most of the stuff that comes off tyres ends up in the drains or on the road surface.

Absolutely incorrect. Only 23% of vehicle pollution comes from exhaust emissions. Nearly 80% comes from tyre and brake wear and no it doesn't end up in drains or on the road. Most particulates are less than 20 microns and light enough to stay airborne for days on the vortices of passing traffic and weather, but it is the particulates of under 10 microns that end up in us or inhaled into lungs to be precise. Rubber dust is carcinogenic and mutatogenic and can be worryingly serious to our health in an accumulative way. 440,000 tons of this particulate matter is produced every year.

Steel wheel on steel rail does not cause this so your 10 buses are much more polluting than a 10-coach diesel.

 

[Bald Rick]

Absolutely incorrect. Only 23% of vehicle pollution comes from exhaust emissions. Nearly 80% comes from tyre and brake wear and no it doesn't end up in drains or on the road. Most particulates are less than 20 microns and light enough to stay airborne for days on the vortices of passing traffic and weather, but it is the particulates of under 10 microns that end up in us or inhaled into lungs to be precise. Rubber dust is carcinogenic and mutatogenic and can be serious to our health in an accumulative way. 440,000 tons of this particulate matter is produced every year.

Steel wheel on steel rail does not cause this so your 10 buses are much more polluting than a 10-coach diesel.

I think we might need some evidence for the statement that only 23% of vehicle pollution comes from exhaust emissions. What is defined as pollution?

But if it is correct, given that the rubber dust is carcinogenic, and that it ends up in the lungs, and also given the that road traffic has been on an increasing trend for over a century (with a couple of dips), then lung cancer rates would similarly be increasing?

 

[Shaw S Hunter]

Absolutely incorrect. Only 23% of vehicle pollution comes from exhaust emissions. Nearly 80% comes from tyre and brake wear and no it doesn't end up in drains or on the road. Most particulates are less than 20 microns and light enough to stay airborne for days on the vortices of passing traffic and weather, but it is the particulates of under 10 microns that end up in us or inhaled into lungs to be precise. Rubber dust is carcinogenic and mutatogenic and can be worryingly serious to our health in an accumulative way. 440,000 tons of this particulate matter is produced every year.

Steel wheel on steel rail does not cause this so your 10 buses are much more polluting than a 10-coach diesel.

Perhaps you'd like to provide a link to any studies that confirm your assertion (though on past performance I'm not holding my breath). In the meantime forum members could try reading this short article: http://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2012/07/31/3554997.htm as an introduction to the subject. While this article also provides no links to any studies it does appear reasonably trustworthy. In particular I note that it claims that tyre and brake wear cause only 3% to 7% of harmful particulate pollution attributable to road transport. If true that suggests that while the issue is certainly worthy of further research the most pressing issue arising from road vehicle pollution is indeed exhaust emissions. It also says the quantity of such materials produced annually in Europe is just 40,000 tonnes; what does the number of 440,000 tons refer to?

 

[Brush 4]

Google satellite indicates no cycle paths on the Bere Alston to Tavistock A390 bridge section, where the line will end (for the time being). There is a farm track and unofficial paths. Shillamill viaduct is fenced off at one end. Google maps show dotted lines for cycle paths, there are none on this section.

The small plan (zoom page to 250%) on the Kilbride Group development page shows a cycle route on the line at the Tavistock end. This should be funded separately from the railway to reduce the rail plan costs, to avoid dragging it down. www.kilbridegroup.com/home/railprojects/tavistock/

 

[a_c_skinner]

We've devised clever ways of rail accounting (BCR) that, like all rail planning techniques are inadvertently good at stopping change. We are going to be forced either to accept a lot of disruption to rail in the SW or spend a staggering amount of money. Okehampton and Tavistock seems the only scheme that has the advantage of bringing rail services to large areas not currently served.