All Things Yorkshire!
Our Member Mr Chris Hyomes, gives us the load-down on
all he’s been doing for rail causes in ‘God’s Own Country’!
Queensbury Tunnel - 2021 Round up
It's been another tumultuous year.
National Highways spent £2.8M erecting a plug below
No.3 Shaft, rather than agreeing to the dewatering arrangement offered by the
landowner which would have allowed RamArch/sprayed concrete strengthening to be
installed at a fraction of the cost. The rent on the pumping station has still
not been paid almost six years after the first instalment became due.
The work at No.3 Shaft was probably the most expensive
and high-risk single project ever undertaken by the Historical Railways Estate,
yet no formal progress reports were produced and practically no emails
exchanged about it amongst their team. They have adopted a scorched-earth
approach to record-keeping, demonstrating again just how disreputable the
company is.
National Highways' technical report into options for
reuse of the tunnel - no doubt contrived to blow repair out of the water - and
Sustrans' draft study into the benefits of a cycle network connecting
Bradford/Keighley to Halifax via the tunnel are being reviewed by Bradford
Council.
"We are now starting work on understanding the
inter-relationship between the technical report into the tunnel repair and the
economic assessment by Sustrans in order that a holistic picture of the initial
costs and benefits of a cycleway through the tunnel can be fully understood, as
well as the on-going liabilities which could arise", says the Council.
There are pots of Government money for levelling-up
and transforming cities which could provide funding for a cycle path through
the tunnel. A route from Bradford city centre to Thornton - providing access to
the existing Great Northern Railway Trail - is going ahead and Calderdale
Council is looking to develop an active travel scheme from Halifax to Trinity
Academy at Holmfield. A two-mile link through Queensbury Tunnel would connect
these emerging networks either side of the hill.
The planning application for the tunnel's partial
infilling still sits dormant on Bradford Council's planning portal; the
objections currently stand at 7,772 - a huge number. With £7.8M of taxpayers'
money frittered away on work that mostly wasn't necessary and serious
reputational damage incurred as a result of its incompetence over the unpaid
rent, we suspect National Highways will not be keen to return any time soon,
but they are nothing if not full of surprises.
We'll let you know when there are developments to
report. In the meantime, have a fabulous Christmas - as best as you can in the
prevailing circumstances - and let's hope for a much better 2022.
Queensbury Tunnel extends for 1.4 miles beneath a ridge in
the Pennine foothills of West Yorkshire. Halifax lies at its south end (2.5
miles), whilst Keighley is located to the north (7 miles) and Bradford to the
east (4 miles).
The tunnel could help to establish a strategically important link within the emerging network of shared paths across the region, allowing a connecting route to be formed between the Aire and Calder valleys where paths are already under development, as well as a link into Bradford. The existing Great Northern Railway Trail would form part of that route.
Minsters Rail Campaign
Reinstating the Beverley to York line
Hull and Beverley are linked with Market Weighton,
Pocklington, Stamford Bridge and York by the increasingly congested A1079. The
Minsters Rail Campaign believes that the former 32-mile Beverley to York
“Minsters” rail line (closed in 1965), which branched off the existing
Hull-Scarborough line at Beverley and served these places, should be
reinstated. This will contribute substantially to the long-term economic and
social future of the East Riding, improving public transport, reducing car
dependency and encouraging sustainable development. It will also be an
alternative link from Hull and the East Riding to the rest of the rail network,
needed because the existing rail infrastructure serving Hull lacks resilience.
Regionally, the line will contribute to the Government’s “Northern Powerhouse”
initiative, improving east-west connectivity between East and North Yorkshire.
Following their successful bid to the Restoring Your
Railways Fund earlier in the year, The Minsters Rail Campaign are working
towards a Strategic Outline Business Case for submission to the Department of
Transport in February 2022. Assistance
is being given by infrastructure consultants Aecom and the East Riding of
Yorkshire Council in compiling the case for reinstatement, with cross-party
support from Members of Parliament in York and Hull. The Campaign is confident
that the line will meet all the criteria required for reinstatement and the
benefits for the region will be significant and far-ranging.
SELRAP
(Skipton-East Lancashire Rail Action Partnership)
Update on
the Current Situation with Our Campaign
The Airedale line is a
modern and fast train service running from Leeds and terminating at Skipton.
SELRAP's proposal is to
extend this by reopening the closed railway line from Skipton to Colne, this
will allow passengers from East Lancashire to travel directly into Leeds in
less than 60 minutes.
This proposal is supported
by Arriva Northern Trains and Skipton Building Society, who both recognise that
it will open up employment, educational and leisure opportunities throughout
Lancashire and Yorkshire.
It also allows the
possibility of a direct link to Manchester airport from points from Shipley to
Skipton.
The aim at present is to
progress the project which is within the ‘Develop’ phase of the Rail Network
Enhancement Pipeline (RNEP).
A critical engineering study
was endorsed by DfT ministers 6 months ago but has apparently being ‘blocked’
from going ahead on the grounds that the Skipton to Colne rail reopening
proposals are now deemed to be too expensive. They have done this without the
evidence to back it up.
This assumption has been
made in advance of this critical engineering study that would have determined
on the ground the practicalities for the scheme and its final cost to be built.
SELRAP are contacting local
MPs, the rail and transport ministers plus other supporters to try to get this
study carried out.
The reopening of this line
is essential in helping to ‘level up’ East Lancashire which has some of the
most deprived communities in the UK. It would bring social and economic
regenerative benefits to them.
Boris Johnson himself stated that ‘we’re going to unite and level up
across the country’ whilst also talking about ‘building back better’!
Please visit our website for
further information www.selrap.org.uk
You can also view there a
promotional video made last year about the benefits of reopening the line. For
any further information, questions or comments, please send to chris.hyomes@hotmail.co.uk
ED. We thank Mr Chris Hyomes
for these articles and very much hope we will have more news from ‘up north’ in
coming editions of our newsletter. Suffice to say “Woodhead… bring-it-on!!
To make common cause, enquiries or give support, please contact ERTA Northern/Yorkshire Area Rep:
