Plans for revived county rail link move forward

A plan to reopen a strategic Herefordshire railway line could take a big step forward if local representatives agree to get behind it.

Ross-on-Wye Liberal Democrat councillor Louis Stark raised the idea of reinstating the Hereford, Ross and Gloucester rail link during a debate on county transport policy in December.

He and LibDem colleague Coun Ed O’Driscoll are now formally proposing that Herefordshire Council work towards a feasibility study for the idea, “as a first step”.

With the county’s over-arching local transport plan up to the year 2041 now formally agreed on, work is now under way on more specific policy areas for the county, including rail.

This should include “a bold, ambitious and visionary commitment towards the reestablishment of the Hereford, Ross and Gloucester railway,” the councillors’ motion says.

This would serve as “a strategic rail corridor from the edge of England to the heart of London, Bristol and the South”, as well as “reestablishing the rail link between two of the oldest English cities and the birthplace of British tourism”.

It calls on officers to discuss with neighbouring Gloucestershire County Council the possibility of a joint feasibility study on the reestablishment of the rail link, and to write the Secretary of State for Transport to gauge “the likely support and possibility of funding” for this, while also “testing the market for any private finance interest” in the idea.

The motion will be put before county councillors when they meet on March 6.

The British Rail Transport Association (BRTA) has already backed reviving the service, which operated from 1855 until axed under the Beeching cuts in the mid-1960s.