Save the Melksham Train
Archived Save the Train forum articles - 2005 to 2010. See below
Comparing Rail Growth in other South West counties. - 7987/12930
Written by admin (Graham Ellis) on Sunday, 29th March 2009

I have been looking at passenger count growth (based on ticket sales) for counties around the South West - looking at an average for the stations in particular areas, using DfT figures for the year to March 07 and for the year to March 08. 

For a Wiltshire station averaged 5% for the year ...
For a Hampshire station averaged 6%
For a Cornish station averaged 7%
For a Devon station averaged 8%
For a Dorset station averaged 8%
For a Somerset station averaged 9%
(in each case, a station geographically in the middle of the county was chosen, together with stations nearby)

You may feel that there's not much difference between 5% and 9% ... but year on year, it compounds.  Five years of growth at 5% gives an overall traffic increase of 28%, whereas a 9% growth over five years gives a 54% increase in traffic over a similar period - and those are (IMHO) significant extra traffic levels.  I expect FGW have done similar sums  ;)

P.S. Cardiff = +9%, Slough + 9%, Swindon +5%, Evesham & Cotswold line + 2%... West Sussex + 7%, Surrey + 9%,



 
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Save the Train was the campaign to bring an approriate train service back to and through Melksham.

Most big contributors are still around writing at the Coffee shop forum where new members are very welcome.

The train has been saved - sort of - we have stepped back up from an unusable service to a poorish one but it's doing very well. We did that through setting up the TransWilts Community Rail Partnership. That fulfilled its early objectives; it has been taken over by local and regional government types who are now doing medium and long term work. The team from this forun can also be found at the Melksham Rail User Group (which was the Melksham Rail Development Group at the time these articles were written and we had no users.

We mustn't loose sight, though, that the train service remains poor and needs our community support in marketing and campaigning to keep it going in a positive direction ... and all the more so when we're expecting to find a different normallity once we get out of the Coronavirus Pandemic and head for zero carbon via the climate crisis. Yes, it's saved ... it's now a key community facility ... the need for enhancement and the strong and near-universal local support remain, and the rail industry and goverment remain slow to move and provide the enhancements even to level us up with other towns. Please support the Melksham Rail User Group - now very much in partnership rather than protest with the rail industry and local government, including GWR, TransWilts and unitary and town councils. And please use the trains and buses, and cycle and walk when you can.

-- Graham Ellis, (webmaster), February 2021


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