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DEAL WOULD KEEP RAIL LINK BID ALIVE
10:40 - 31 January 2008
A three-mile section of defunct train track between Portishead and
Portbury could be bought by North Somerset Council - to safeguard its future use
as a possible rail link for the town.
The section of railway, which runs
between the former station at Portbury and Portishead, is owned by the British
Railways Board (Residuary) Ltd, set up to manage British Rail's remaining assets
when it was sold off in the 1990s.
After a consultation and review in
2006, a recommendation was made that the land be sold and North Somerset Council
was given first option.
The authority will then seek to establish what funding sources could be available to them should the sale be agreed.
North Somerset Council chiefs have already agreed a long-term objective to re-open the Portishead to Bristol railway line to passengers, following concerns about the A369 commuter bottlenecks.
North Somerset Council executive member for strategic planning, highways and economic development, Elfan Ap Rees, said: "We are looking at buying this land to protect the future of the railway.
"From our point of view this would be a real step towards developing a high-speed link between Portishead and Bristol.
"The British Railways Board has agreed to sell the land and has given us first option on it."
Mr Ap Rees said that if the council was not to buy the land, developers could snap it up instead - putting the re-opening of the railway at risk.
Both the Portishead Railway Group and the Gordano Valley Local Councils Transport Group have been campaigning for years for the final section of the track to be re-opened.
Chairman of the Gordano Valley Local Councils Transport Group, Peter Burden, said: "I am extremely pleased that the district council is taking the issue of re-opening the Portishead line seriously.
"By purchasing this section of the track it would protect it from inappropriate development and secure its future as a railway line.
"The re-opening of this line is key to the future of Portishead."
The news comes just weeks after the Department of Transport said that it would not earmark the millions needed to re-open the line.
The line was closed to passenger traffic in September 1964 and freight in 1981 and lay unused apart from the occasional steam specials.
In 2002 the track between the former Portbury station and the docks, which is owned by Network Rail, was opened for freight use at a cost of £21 million.
But the last three miles from Portbury to Portishead remained closed.
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