The next branch meeting will be held on 26th September 2009 at Chapel Field Methodist Chapel, Chapelfield Road, Norwich, NR2 1SD. Steven Ashling, who worked for Network Rail's East Anglia region and is a director of the North Norfolk Railway will be giving a personal talk about the local railway infrastructure, its strengths, weaknesses, problems and prospects. Mr Ashling will also discuss the North Norfolk Railway's project to reinstate the level crossing at Sheringham, which he has been closely involved with. For details of the venue see http://www.bertrams.freeserve.co.uk.

Branch chairman Peter Wakefield thanks Railfuture members for the offers of help to perform a station count at Downham Market on Thursday 17th September. A full schedule of counters has now been drawn up to cover all trains that day.

Susan van de Ven, who is the Liberal Democrat councillor for Meldreth on South Cambs District Council is in the process of setting up a user group for the stations between Cambridge and Royston, i.e. Foxton, Shepreth and Meldreth.

Virgin are offering customers who take part in the £15 weekend upgrade the chance to be entered into a competition to win a cab ride in Pendolino. This gives passengers extra impetus to upgrade by offering a very unique, money can't buy prize. The idea came from a driver at Preston, as part of the company's 'Getting more commercial' initiative.

STATIONS

New £45m station near Chelmsford is proposed

A public exhibition for a new 4,000 home development near to Chelmsford has been shown to nearby residents. After this consultation the proposals will be submitted to Chemmsford Borough Council. The proposals include a new £45m railway station to open by 2015. With 1,400 car parking spaces it should relieve pressure on road congesiton and car parking at Chelmsford station, along with two passing loops to allow passenger trains to overtake freight trains.

Downham Market station will have footbridge to replace barrow crossing

Network Rail intends to construct a £1.5m footbridge at Downham Market over the two electrified lines. The present ungated barrow crossing, which has red lights that are frequently ignored by passengers and is one of the highest risk crossings on the rail network, wlll be closed. The footbridge will be to the north of the level crossing (to avoid a high footbridgge becuase of the OHLE) but this will necessitate a longer walk. In addition a small garden are will be lost. A planning application has just been submitted and if passed the footbridge will be in use by summer 2011.

Waterbeach improvements continue

Brand new waiting shelters have been errected on both platforms in the last month, with the 'up' one replacing an inadequate bus shelter and the 'down' replacing a vandalised shelter of the type used at Cambridge station. There are now four benches on each platform (as there are on all Fen Line stations) and a replacement ticket machine on the 'down' platform is to be installed once the new CCTV system is working, which is planned for September.

ESTA analyses reponses from Lowestoft staton relocation survey

ESTA has started to analyse the results of its on-train survey during the week 10th - 16th August, when passengers travelling to or from Lowestoft were asked a number of questions to establish whether they would find it easier, or more difficult, if the station were moved 450 metres inland. 785 questionnaires were completed, which represents more than a thousand passengers, since many were couples or families. Not surprisingly in a peak holiday week, more people were travelling to, than from, Lowestoft. ESTA expects that the second part of its survey, which begins on 20th September 20th, is likely to cover more business, commuter and student traffic. ESTA plans to issue a report later this autumn. The survey has received financial support from Railfuture, to which ESTA is affiliated.

Proposal for "Cambridge Gateway Link" to Cambridge station avoiding Station Road

The proposed Cambridge Gateway Link road into Cambridge station would allow buses, pedestrians and cyclists to travel from the Hills Road/Brooklands Avenue junction to the railway station without using the congested Station Road. Whilst this will be good news for rail users, controversy has arisen because an application has been made to knock down 127 and 127a Hills Road, plus part of the garden of the Earl of Derby pub.

News item: http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/cn_news_home/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=448459.

FRANCHISES

Richard Bowker speaks about National Express' withdrawal from the East Coast franchise

According to an article in the Daily Telepgraph, Richard Bowker claims that said he spent months trying to negotiate a deal Department for Transport to extricated National Express from its £1,400m East Coast contract (running a management contract before handing the franchise back), while allowing the group, for a fee, to retain its East Anglia and c2c services. He claims that on 1st May 2009 (when Geoff Hoon was still Transport Secretary) the two sides signed an agreement to work towards a deal by the end of that month. However, the DfT then took the deal off the table. Prior to succeeding Phil White as NX Chief Executive, Richard Bowker had run Partnerships for Schools, a government body overseen by then edication minister and now Transport Secretary Lord Adonis.

At the moment there is sitll no date for the government's company to take over running the ICEC service, although it is certain to occur before the end of the year. Meanwhile it is reported that Lord Adonis has now offered a deal to Stagecoach on c2c and East Anglia in return for about £100m.

Stagecoach issues response on takeover of NXEA and c2c franchises from National Express

Following the financial difficulties of the National Express group, primarily caused by the NXEC rail franchise and a Spanish acquisition, the group has been the subject of a takover bid by a consortium consistng of CVC Capital Partners and the Cosmen family. This would see the group broken up with the UK rail and bus (but not coach) businesses being sold off. Clearly this would affect the NXEA and c2c franchises, which the DfT has consided (but is probably not legally able) temrinating. On 3rd September Stagecoach has confifmed that it is in exclusive discussions with the consortium to take over the two franchises, though not the failing NXEC one.

If successful, and if its own shareholders agree to the takeover, Stagecoach will have to make a payment to the DfT, which can veto changes of ownership of TOCs. The DfT has not yet confirmed that the performance conditions that must be met for the '7+3' East Anglia rail franchise to be extended from 2011 to 2014 have been satisfied.

News item: http://www.stagecoachplc.com/scg/media/press/pr2009/2009-09-03a.

East Anglia train operators all fall into the bottom half of the performance league table

All four train operators serviing East Anglia have punctuality perofrmance (as measured by the Public Performance Measure) for peropod 5 (26th July to 22nd August) less than the average of 94.0% trains within 5 or 10 minutes (depending on service) of scheduled arrival time at their destination. The figures (for all services run by the operator) are:
* National Express East Anglia: 93.7%
* First Capital Connect: 93.2%
* East Midland Trains: 92.8%
* Arriva Cross Country: 91.0%

Good news for NXEA is that a recent mystery shopper exercise conducted at Norwich station awarded 100% for customer service, information provision and cleanliness.

RAIL FACILITIES

Whitemoor Yard expansion to create track material recycling centre

On Thursday 17th September Cambridgeshire County Council is expected to support phase two of Network Rail's Whitemoor project, the creation of a national track material recycling centre. The council would then write to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government recommending that permission be granted.

The £30 million scheme on 62 acres of land already owned by Network Rail will see 16 new sidings and two loco sidings in addition to the existing 18 kilometres of sidings created for train maintenance, and would turn Whitemoor Yard into a world-class depot, whci will be used to dismantle, clean and recycle sleepers, rails and fastenings for reuse. The majority of used sleepers and all contaminated track ballast are currently sent to landfill. There will also be a switch and crossings recycling shed which will store, process and weld useable parts.

RAIL FREIGHT

First GBRf moves highest-ever number of containers from Felixstowe

First GBRf moved a record 2,140 containers from at Felixstowe during the week of 22nd-28th August 2009, which broke its record of 2,091 set a week earlier. These figures are up a third on the 2008. The freight company has been operating at the port for seven years, and has just celebrated its tenth anniversary.

GUIDED BUSWAY

Relentless bad news dogs the Cambridgeshire Guided Busway

The lean news period of mid-July to mid-September, when Parliament is in recess, has seen as series of critical news reports in the Cambridge News and Hunts Post newspapers. These have focused on delays in the busway's opening, disruption caused, embarrassing incidents (a cow on the track causing a 'moosense'), questions about the quality of construction and broken promises from the public inquiry back in 2004.

The latest revelation, which was discovered by the opposition Liberal Democrats who have always opposed the busway, is the inability to provide inter-available ticketing from day one, supposedbly because the smart-card technology is not yet in place. Section 4.67 of the Transport Assessment submitted to the public inquiry stated "An inter-operator ticketing system is proposed which will enable passengers to **catch the first CGB service that arrives** irrespective of operator. This will be a major benefit over existing services where passengers are restricted to a single operator." However, passengers have to buy tickets from machine at the busway stops as on-board payment is not possible and this maans that passengers may wait at the stop as a bus passes them because their ticket is not valid. It is underrstood that both the bus operators have been ordered to paint their buses the same colour so passengers will not even have time to purcahse a ticket for the correct bus before it arrives.

Whilst passengers may be able to use the northern section, built on the former Cambridge-St.Ives railway line, from November 2009, there is still no planned opening date for the link from Cambridge railway station to Addenbrooke's Hospital whilst work on the Trumpington cutting, leading to Trumpington park and ride, is making slow progress owing to issues with drainage and a major gas main running under it. Work has started on the route south of Hobson's Brook with a ditch being dug for a few hundred metres southwards for drainage. Meanwhile, track has been laid from just south of Cambridge station to well beyond Long Road bridge to the start of the spur to Addenbrooke's Hospital, and the tracklaying machine is now making its way up the new busway bridge ove the mainline.

Ticketing: http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/transport/thebusway/tickets.

PRESERVED RAILWAYS

Mid-Norfolk Railway takes a steam train to Hoe to promote the extension and encourage sleeper sponsorship

Sunday 30th August was an important date in the Mid-Norfolk Railway's history as it saw the first steam train reach Hoe Level Crossing since the early 1960s. After a day pulling passenger trains between Dereham and Wymondham Abbey, the steam locomotive was used to push a train of goods wagons to Hoe where a small welcoming committee was waiting at the level crossing gates. This was just a one-off and has led to useful publicity in local newspaper. The MNR hopes that reaching this latest milestone will encourage its supports to consider sponsoring a sleeper - see http://www.mnr.org.uk/help/sleeper.

Uses with a Yahoo login can see photos of the steam train at Hoe on the following: http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/mnr-workingmembers/photos/album/1675638860/pic/list

The MNR's current project, which will open well before the link to Hoe, is the passing loop at Thuxton station. This will allow an hourly service to be run. There is now a dedicated web-site, run by volunters, to inform both MNR members and the public about what is going on in Thuxton - see http://www.thuxtonloop.org.uk. One of the most recent activities occured on 9th August when Norwich Crown Court judge Peter Jacobs ceremonially laid first brick on Thuxton signal box, which was recovered from East Winch.

The MNR has recently opened an Online Shop at http://www.mnr.org.uk/shop where DVDs, souvenirs, clothing, books and pamphlets can be bought. Enquiries can be sent to 'shop(AT)mnr.org.uk'.

WEB-SITES

More enhancements to the Accessible UK Train Times web-site

Users of the http://www.traintimes.org.uk Accessible UK Train Times web-site will know that it is possible to bookmark a URL for speicfic jounrneys. Now it has been enhanced to specify it not to ignore overtaken trains. Just add "/overtake=1" to the end, for example: http://www.traintimes.org.uk/stevenage/kgx/overtake=1.

Rail Management magazine is no more, whilst Keeping Track becomes the Rail Hub

Following a lighting strike that affected the office in Dunstable where the Rail Management online magazine was written, it has been decided evaluate what the magazine was achieving along with the 'keepingtrack.co.uk' web-site. It has now been relaunched as http://www.railhub.co.uk.

Web-site for the Ireland's National Rail Users Organisation

The Rail Users Ireland web-site http://www.railusers.ie is a valuable resource for anyone interested in the railways of the Itish Republc. Ireland's National Rail Users Organisation is the equivalent of Britain's Railfuure, and is also an EPF member. Their well-designed web-site has sections on Passenger Issues, Passenger Information, Newsletter and Campaigns.