Draft text - to be emailed this week as I get the opportunity

Thank you for coming along to last Monday's "Save the Train" meeting in
Melksham.  I'm writing to enclose brief minutes of the meeting.

OR

Please find enclosed a copy of the minutes of the "Save the Train" meeting
held last Monday evening, for which your apologies for absence were noted.

Then:

The meeting concluded that the current train service offered from Swindon
and Chippenham south to West Wilts, Somerset, Dorset, Salisbury and
Southampton is NOT appropriate for the current or future public transport
needs of the corridor, and called for all practical measures to be taken
for the return of such a service from December 2007.

Please:

a) Attend / lobby at the meeting at West Wilts District Council on 20th
        March at 7 p.m. (Council Chamber, Bradley Road, Trowbridge)
b) Contact the County Council Cabinet Member for Transport, calling for
        her action, via fleurderhephilipe@wiltshire.gov.uk
c) Contact your own local elected representetives / MPs and enlist their
        help.

Thank you

Graham Ellis
"Save the Train"

*** MINUTES OF MEETING
**********************

1. Meeting held at Well House Manor, Spa Road, Melksham from 19:30 on
Monday 5th March 2007.  55 people were present, and apologies were
received from a further 50.

2. The meeting was chaired by Graham Ellis who presented a brief outline
of the train services from Swindon and Chippenham south through Melksham
to Trowbridge, Westbury, Frome and beyond in Somerset and Dorset, and to
Warminster, Salisbury and Southampton.  He described how traffic had grown
at between 8% and 35% per annum in the last five years, but despite that
growth the service was cut back to just 2 trains a day each way (a 60%
cut) last December, and how the new trains were not timed to meet passenger
needs and traffic has dropped by an estimated 90%.

The new minimum service is specified by the Department for Transport and
implemented by First Great Western, who have some limited freedom in how
they time the trains.  As a commercial company, they have chosen to use this
freedom to time the trains such that they meet the specification which was
intended to provide a peak hour commuter service to / from Swindon, but in
reallity the train runs offpeak releasing the same train for peak use on the
Swindon to Gloucester service.  Although the "Swindon via Melksham" service
is included in Wiltshire County Council's Local Transport Plan as a strategic
service, and they are the local transport Authority, they do not provide any
support funding.

3. Graham then recommended to the meeting that they work towards a more
appropriate service on the route to run from the next major timetable revision
from December 2007. No voices of dissent were raised.  Discussions included
an ideal frequency (an hourly service as recommended by the Parkman report),
but accepted that a single train operating back and forth from Swindon at
least as far as Westbury was a realistic target at this stage. Whether the
service would be extended to Frome and / or Salisbury was discussed, with a
note made that good connections at Westbury are in any case important, and
that an extended service with a a single train would reduce the overall best
frequency it could achieve.

It became apparent during the meeting that the service effects not only users
from West Wiltshire but also over a much wider area, that the curtailment in
December has cause some real hardships and difficulties, and that the service
should be improved as it links communities that will rapidly grow over the
next 20 years and which are otherwise linked only by roads which are getting
steadily more conjested while the railway corridor has spare capacity and makes
for shorter journeys.

4. The meeting discussed the mechanisms through which the service improvements
should be achieved, and set up two groups to take the matter further:

a) An official / officers group, comprising representatives of the County and
District Councils, First Great Western, Department for Transport, Network Rail
and other such bodies.   Sarah Content, Leader of West Wilts District Council
to ask Councillor Jeff Osborn, who had sent his apologies, to chair that group.

b) A campaiging group to raise local and press awareness of the issue, and to
push for more appropriate services and better marketing thereof. This group will run under the "Save the Train" name and the committee volunteered as follows:
Chair - Graham Ellis
Vice - Peter Blackburn
Secretary - Nick Field
Treasurer - Gordon Dodge
Committee - Sion Bretton, Sarah Content, Ruth Grundy,
        Phil McMullen, Jenny Raggett

It is noted that railway timetables are planned well in advance, and that
time is of the essence if an approriate service is to be run from December
2007.

5. Further discussions took place concerning making both the political and
the business case.  In particular, the campaign group encourages ALL its
members to:

a) Attend the extraordinary meeting called by West Wilts Distric Council on
20th March (19:00, Council Chamber, Bradley Road, Trowbridge)

b) Contact their County or Unitary Authority, and other local, elected
representatives to encourage them to work for an appropriate service.

c) Contact Fleur de Rhe-Philipe, Wiltshire County Council cabinet member for
transport, and request that she works for the provision of an appropriate service. 
        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fleur_de_Rhé-Philipe
        http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/councillors-general-information/councillor-by-division/div-westbury-laverton-shearwater.htm

The meeting was reminded that there are local elections in May and councillors
should be responsive.

6. The meeting closed at 21:30.