Railwatch 087 - March 2001

East Midlands

By Anthony Kay A.Kay@lboro.ac.uk

Parkway station Rushcliffe Borough Council has approved the planning application from Midland Mainline to build the new East Midlands Parkway station adjacent to Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station, after some delay to finalise details of the road access. Final approval is still required from the Secretary of State, and local environmental groups are asking him for a public enquiry. While it is MML's intention to attract long-distance travellers away from the M1 and on to rail, Friends of the Earth are concerned this benefit will be cancelled out by greatly increased traffic on local roads from Nottingham and Derby to the station. They also doubt whether the proposed bus service from the station to East Midlands Airport, four miles away, will attract many customers, and are calling instead for a new rail link into the airport.

Double headed The branch has secured the services of the managing directors of both the train companies operating in its region as guest speakers at its AGM. Brian Burdsall of Midland Main Line and Andy Cooper of Central Trains will lead a discussion on The shape of rail services in the East Midlands for the 21st century, starting at 13.45 on Saturday 17 March in the City Rooms, Hotel Street, Leicester.

Ivanhoe Leicestershire County Council has decided that the Ivanhoe Line (Leicester to Burton-on-Trent) is not viable, but other local authorities are not giving up. A new consortium, consisting of most of the district councils along the route, together with a variety of other statutory and voluntary organisations including RDS, was set up at a meeting in January to promote the scheme. The county council declined even to take part in the meeting. David Macintosh of Railway Consultancy Ltd who has authored a report on the project, is advising the consortium. The SRA says that the scheme will be financially viable if the predicted patronage figures can be doubled.

Choices Sportsmatters, the company that wants to build a 2km rowing lake across the proposed route of the Bedford-Sandy section of the East-West link, is refusing to compromise on its plans, despite the fact that a 1.5km lake would satisfy the requirements of the Amateur Rowing Association for international competitions and would not encroach on the rail route. Even the Lottery Commission has rejected Sportsmatters' bid for funding on the grounds that it is too ambitious. Meanwhile, GB Railways has set up East-West Ltd as a company to apply for Transport Works Act authority to build the Bedford-Sandy line, and is shortlisting civil engineering companies to join as co-investors.

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