The Rugby-Leicester rail reopening campaign has reached Northampton!
Feel free to wade in and give support to rail reopenings more for modal shift to reduce, check and balance congestion in normal times.
I am generally supportive, whilst allowing those taking the driving seat to continue to lead and ensure their segment of interest is carried through to delivery hopefully.
We should all bear in mind that these are exciting times, Climate Emergency is real and time is running out. It starts small and works out from there. Modal Shift cannot happen unless we get tracks back. Happy to discuss further with anyone.
Principles and needs repeat elsewhere across the country and we can compare notes, learn from each other, but also incumbent on public and elected audiences to act to a. keep options open, b. gather and pool resources to study/make the case and c. for Government to sanction, speed up delivery and have clarity of focus in leadership and direction - not pluralism and plethora all things to all people. If re-railing is good for the environment and saving land, then that is the way to go and we should expect £27 billion for new roads to come down and £500 million for Rail Reopenings Fund to be raised up. We need a rolling programme with route protection, even wide enough for green corridors with integrated cycleways, footpaths, ecological features whilst the majority also benefit from fast, cleaner rail choice.
In short, Guildford-Horsham, March-Deeping St Nicholas, Gloucester-Ross area-Hereford and Woodhead (new) all starts with willing people to assist to advance these agendas. ERTA can coordinate, orchestrate and lobby, but cannot do it all and relies on members to rally and take some responsibility.
We need an on-going rolling programme of funded studies support, route and realignment protection to keep options open (formal, legal and binding) and speeding up delivery with a switch from £27 billion new roads to fully funded railways per se and raising significantly £500 million Reopenings Funding to parity with roads. Government needs lobbying for these (hello Railfuture?) and to give leadership and direction as a sign they take Climate Emergency seriously and signal accordingly. Currently we have pluralism and all things to all demands, which is neither principled nor green. Positively a trickle is happening, but no-where near a 'Reversing Beeching' on a scale anywhere near like. If we had line-born freight plans for every line existent and new as well tiered down to mandate Councils to be more creative and collaborative as well, that would bode better. Support via richard.erta@gmail.com or join via https://ertarail.co.uk/become-a-member/
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