Re-opening Britain’s Railways (Part 3): Dumfries – Stranraer and Glastonbury

Sadly, various recent announcements have left Britain’s rail network in a worse state than it was before. But, if things were to be better, (which they will be one day) what lines would make the most strategic sense to re-open?

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Good afternoon unfortunately it hasn’t been a great past few weeks for the railway but it is important not to lose hope there’s still plenty of stuff we can do and plenty of stuff that needs doing even if we’ll be pushed back quite away before that happens so let’s zone

Out for a few minutes and think of the lines that we’d most like to reopen if we had the chance of course this is going to be highly subjective if there are any lines that I’ve missed out that you think would be prime for reopening please do let me know there are some

Parts of the country I’m not too familiar with and therefore I might be missing out something Obvious the first line I to reopen would be in the southwest of Scotland Dum free to Str ra via Castle Douglas to be precise this line closed in 1965 but I think it will be incredibly useful today there are several sizable towns along its route particularly Castle Douglas

And Del bitty unfortunately the area has fallen on hard times with for example many closed shops dominating the high streets however enhanced rail connections May well change this and dum free would stand to gain as well from potential commuters and Shoppers from the surrounding Villages furthermore the route the line took was incredibly

Scenic and much of the bridges and infrastructure remains it would be an ideal route for ail tours close to various Northern cities but also beautiful and remote that said though the right of way isn’t perfect the line has been built on in several places and

It’s so bad in Del betti that I sadly think the line will have to be rerooted to the north of the Town rather than through it as it did originally in Castle Douglas the only real option I can see is saying goodbye to the Tesco Superstore but that’s a win for me

Speaking of the Two Towns I think it would be a good idea if the funds were available of course to avoid the awkward curve that the line used to take between the two and instead build a new tunnel directly under the Hills this would increase the price of the reopening

Significantly though so it would have to be assessed properly but I’ve not mentioned the main reason why you’d want to reopen this line the fairies the southwestern corner of Scotland is geographically speaking very close to Northern Ireland as as a result it’s one of the busiest Ferry corridors in the UK

With 11 Crossings a day in each Direction sadly though the transport links to Ken Ryan Port are quite poor in particular the rail links are D the closest station to Ken Ryan is stran Harbor when stenine moved the fering services from stran up the lock to Ken

Ryan in order to take advantage of the deeper waters and use larger ships the railway station didn’t move if you want to go to stram town you have to walk through an abandoned Ferry Terminal which goes on for quite some way and isn’t very pleasant but if you want to

Go to can Ryan port and catch a ferry well you’re miles away to solve this I would actually close the section of track that runs through stran ra town instead I would reopen the section of track that runs north and continue it on to K Ryan stran ra station will be moved

To the new curve this would be quite away from the Town Center however there is plenty of space for new development creating almost a hub of its own up at Ken Ryan I would rebuild the port to allow for better connections between trains and feries this wouldn’t just be

For passengers too coupled with the Redevelopment of the Belfast Harbor area freight trains could be reinstated to Northern Ireland strengthening the economy and reducing Emissions on the subject of emissions the line might as well be electrified from the get-go this would allow say four or five trains a

Day to or from London to to operate up the West Coast Mainline with no need for diesel haage as for the more regular stopping Services I’d run an hourly extension of the Newcastle to carile trains which would run through to Ken Ryan I hope I’ve made the case for Dum

Free to strand ra well but unfortunately it seems as if the government has other ideas by sheer coincidence whilst I was writing this video the Prime Minister rishu sunak announced that some of the money saved from the cancellation of hs2 north of Birmingham will be spent on upgrading in presumably that means

Widening the a75 a road that runs between dumre and strand ra the choice to accommodate extra traffic from Great Britain to Northern Ireland by Road feels a shortsighted one that runs contrary to our aims as a society with huge growth of the route that doesn’t currently have many connections we have

Been presented with an opportunity to design a corridor almost from scratch and making rail a large part of it would be enormously beneficial I highly doubt that anyone is listening but if any government advisers do happen to be watching this video then I strongly urge you to rethink your decision more roads

Is not the direction we want to be going in the second new line would be one that serves Glaston Brian Street in the southwest of England the two towns are sizable enough to have a railway Connection in their own right but what makes their lack of one particularly

Ridiculous is the positioning of the glastenbury festival this is one of the largest music festivals in the world but at the moment the closest railway station is Castle kry requiring bus transfers to and from the festival a direct rail connection therefore would both improve the experience of Festival goers and boost our International

Credibility indeed there originally was a railway that ran directly through the Festival site its track bed remains and I have no doubt it could be reinstated if anything it would become an attraction in its own right another reason for this reopening would be to increase the housing stock of Bristol

I’ll explain this this in more detail later but it would include various infrastructure improvements to existing lines and it would hopefully help to solve Bristol’s crippling housing crisis as for the line’s right of way I’ll present you with two options which vary massively in costs but also in Returns

The first and by far most beneficial will be an entirely new almost High Speed Line running from FR and rejoining the mainline down at taon this will provide a faster and more direct route for trains running from London to Penzance and Plymouth if electrified to improve acceleration two you could

Almost certainly add a stop at glastenbury and still reduce Journey times overall whilst I think it would be worth it it would be extremely expensive so the second option provides a cheaper alternative this would see the section of the famous Somerset and Dorset joint Railway reopen from the branch just

South of brutin up to a new station at Glen ban Street it would be able to follow the original trajectory of the line in most places though a few slight diversions or compulsory purchases would be needed where it has been built on sadly though so many buildings have been

Constructed on the site of the line in glastenbury itself that I just couldn’t justify running it along its original path instead I would divert the Line south so that it stopped at a new station in between glastenbury and Street to make up for this there must be very high quality cycling and walking

Routes into the respective towns and there should be a decent bus connection as well the branch would terminate here so it wouldn’t be very long at all being a stub you also wouldn’t get any sped up Journeys to the Southwest services along the branch will be half hourly one train

Per hour will be an extension of the existing services that run from Bristol and terminate at westbr the second service would be an extremely long extension of the current filter Bristol trains all of this would coincided with an electrification of most local lines around Bristol creating an almost metro

Style service unlike the current Metro West which is just two diesel trains an hour these upgrades would also happen if we were to take the first option of an entirely new line to Taunton but anyway why are we doing this well Bristol has a very severe housing shortage it’s a city

That has grown a lot recently but its lack of housing Supply is holding it back if combined with sensible high density development around stations of course then improved rail links to more places can see the radius in which people can comfortably Liv Broan increased potentially relieving the city of some of its

Problems so those are the two railway lines I’d reopen first if I had the power hopefully I didn’t sound too ridiculous and you’re able to enjoy it even if you don’t know the areas anyway that’s all from me goodbye thank you for watching GW villager please like subscribe and share

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