Chiltern gets go-ahead for second Oxford-London rail link (From Witney Gazette)
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Chiltern gets go-ahead for second Oxford-London rail link
2:03pm Thursday 18th October 2012 in News By William Crossley
A Chiltern Railways Clubman train
Chiltern Railways this afternoon finally won permission from the Government to create a £130m railway route between Oxford and London, via Bicester.
Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin has approved a Transport and Works Act order allowing the project to proceed after accepting proposed measures to protect bats which use Wolvercote Tunnel in Oxford as a roost.
The line will be the first new Rail link between London and a major British city for 100 years, with the first trains running between Oxford and London Marylebone in 2015, via a new connecting curve from Bicester Town station to the Chiltern main line.
The project includes a new railway station next to the Water Eaton park-and-ride centre, south of Kidlington, and a new Bicester Town station.
Graham Cross, business development director of Chiltern Railways said: “We're pleased to have been granted the power to proceed with this significant railway investment, which will benefit thousands of commuters and businesses in Oxfordshire.”
The recently announced East West Rail project, to link Oxford and Bicester with Milton Keynes and Bedford, will also benefit from Chiltern’s project, with both routes using the line between Oxford and Bicester.
Today's decision to approve Chiltern's scheme follows a public inquiry into the project held in Oxford in 2010-11. It was reopened earlier this year to hear further evidence on measures to protect the bats and other wildlife near the line.
Comments(12)
EMBOX1
says...
4:08pm Thu 18 Oct 12
Get out there and start work!
Robie
says...
4:53pm Thu 18 Oct 12
JohnHenRailfuture
says...
7:03pm Thu 18 Oct 12
uk/ox-cam
Myron Blatz
says...
9:54pm Thu 18 Oct 12
Ox4Eva
says...
1:12pm Fri 19 Oct 12
King Joke
says...
1:37pm Fri 19 Oct 12
I'm not sure what the stopping pattern for the Oxford trains will be, but it will be at least Marylebone-Wycombe-B
icester Town-(Islip on some trains)-Water Eaton-Oxford. There may be other calls at places like Risborough and Beaconsfield.
70 min on a comfy 168 will feel like less than 55 min on a crappy FGW HST...
Andrew:Oxford
says...
5:27pm Fri 19 Oct 12
Myron Blatz wrote:Sadly £2M wouldn't be enough to build a new railway station. Nor would it be enough to build the two new through platforms required at the current rail station to serve a city-line service. Looking at the map, a new station would be very useful though.
So this isn't being diverted through Blackbird Leys as part of the £2million investment plan to try to breathe life into one of Oxford's mainly Council-owned social housing estates, or did Chiltern refuse to operate trains every four minutes?
A single station built at the Kassam Stadium would serve several thousand people working at the Science Park, along with thousands of residents of both Littlemore and Westen Blackbird & Greater Leys.
A futher station built at Tesco would serve the 5000 staff working at the business park, the further 4000 working between BMW, Unipart and other major sites nearby along with the residents of Eastern Blackbird Leys.
I know that you have a great deal of anxiety over the profitable, non-subsidised, and regular bus services that the Blackbird Leys, Cowley Centre, Cowley Road enjoys into central Oxford. If these 1000+ seats, that are available every hour, were banned as you demand then the only option would be to build new multi-storey carparks in central Oxford with a similar tariff to the former bus service. So, given that you'd have to treat all the bus routes in an equal fashion, that would need a new 12,000 space car park built in Central Oxford...
bodchris
says...
7:21pm Fri 19 Oct 12
Forget the trains and invest in roads!!!!
bodchris
says...
7:23pm Fri 19 Oct 12
bodchris
says...
7:34pm Fri 19 Oct 12
King Joke
says...
12:11pm Sun 21 Oct 12
The new Chiltern service will virtually double capacity between Oxford and London, a flow which is overstretched in the peak on the current service.
Building more roads only creates more traffic and more congestion in the long run, as well as encouraging more sprawing land-hungry development. THis would in no way contribute to our tech sector.
What we need is office space close to transport hubs in central Oxford and other town centres. Central Oxford is especially important as it's only here where there is a chance of proper high-capacity links to Heathrow airport for global links, HS1 for links to Europe and HS2/the existing rail network for links to the major UK cities.
Sophia says...
3:47pm Thu 18 Oct 12