Three Heroes Line up As Britain's Newest Station Opens
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AN INDEPENDENT VOICE £1.50 July 2016 FOR RAIL USERS No 148 Three heroes line up as Britain’s newest station opens SEE PAGE 2 PAGE ONE PICTURE THE CAMPAIGN FOR RAIL FREIGHT Long wait for a train Is it really There was a party atmosphere reopening. The original station in east London when Britain’s closed 31 years ago but virtually newest station was opened on 16 every part of it had to be rebuilt. RIP for Old May by rail minister Claire Perry. The station allows local people Many people were involved in to reach Stratford in just a few minutes by train. SHEPHERD Picture: DAVID campaigning for the reopening SCUDAMORE Picture: DAVE but none worked harder than the Northbound trains go along the King Coal? three in our front page picture. Lea Valley line to Tottenham Hale By Lee Davies They are also pictured, right, six and Bishops Stortford. The new station was funded by [email protected] years ago when the campaign for Through winter and into spring the new station was in full swing. Walthamstow Council and the Government but will be operated it seemed that an announcement Jennette Arnold, on the left, has by Abellio Greater Anglia. about a coal-fired power station been a doughty fighter on behalf closing was happening every “Lea Bridge station will really SIX YEARS AGO: Jennette, Peter and Stella on the site of the of London’s public transport help open Leyton up for growth,” month. users. She is the Greater London old (and new) station. Long grass was growing all over the said Chris Robbins, the leader of platforms in this picture published in Railwatch December 2010 Longannet in Fife and Ferry- Assembly member for north east Waltham Forest council, who said bridge C in Yorkshire closed at London. 3,000 homes are likely to be built the end of March, while Rugeley Railfuture member Peter nearby. in Staffordshire was expected to Woodrow is chairman of the Officials at the opening ceremony close by the time you read this in Chingford Line Users Association. paid tribute to the Chingford Line Win like the Smiths June or July. Stella Creasey, MP for Users Association which kept the Fiddlers Ferry in Cheshire was dream of reopening the station HAVING the surname £12, payable to Railfuture Walthamstow, pictured right, Smith may well be lucky . Lottery, to 24 Chedworth Place, given a stay of execution for said she became involved in the alive. three winners in our March Tattingstone, Suffolk IP9 2ND. 12 months and Eggborough in campaign before the primary One thing rail campaigners have Yorkshire, which was expected to learn is to have patience. Pro- Railfuture Lottery draw share Recent winners – February: school children who attended the that name! to close in March, was reprieved ceremony were born. gress is made – but very slowly. Peter Hillier-Palmer, Peter but “mothballed”. POWER TRAIN: A traditional coal train at West Burton power station on a rainy February day. It was a new station but also a Triumphant return: Page 18-19 But you could buck the trend R Lawrence, Fred Golding, There are two power stations at West Burton, the coal-fired one built in 1968, and a second – or add to it if you are a The impact on the rail freight combined cycle gas turbine station commissioned in 2011. Both are operated by EDF Energy Lianne Woodman, John operating companies has Smith– and help Railfuture Fancourt, Roger Blake. fundraising by joining in. It can resulted in redundancies at DB Immingham so coal is not quite The trial allows longer lorries to has been set. Railfuture believes cost as little as £1 per month. March: Paul Godfrey, Graham Cargo (formerly Schenker) and dead. operate on British roads within more long-distance rail freight Euro sleeper trains at risk Smith, Garth Smith, Roger Freightliner Heavy Haul. Half of the entry fees are Ash kept off the road the current 44-tonne weight should be using the tunnel and Goring, David Smith, Michael Europe’s largest coal-fired power Both Germany and France are cutting sleeper train services this year ploughed back as prizes with restriction. The trial is ongoing that rail freight operators should Breslin. station at Drax near Selby has A recent case study of Forterra and the “cheap” airlines are being blamed. The European Union has the other half going into our with a 10 year life. offer lorry piggyback services converted three of its six generat- plc (formerly Hanson), shows encouraged the airlines but has not yet created ideal conditions for funds and it is simple to join , April: Peter Geall, Michael However now we have the road over longer distances than Folke- ing units to biomass. the merits of using rail. the environmentally friendly international train service which they using PayPal at www.railfuture. Breslin, Mark Edgell, Michael hauliers calling for the weight to stone-Calais. High-quality, low-carbon ash should. But maybe there is a way to revive the night train. org.uk/lottery or by sending Hanson, P J Rowland, Robert Rail freight is transporting the be increased to 48 tonnes. The used to create Thermalite blocks However in Britain, rail freight A future for night trains: See Pages 10 and 11 a cheque for a multiple of Burrows. biomass to Drax from Port of increase to 44 tonnes from 38 is transported nearly 200 miles operators have to provide their Tyne, Hull docks, Humber tonnes was originally allowed own terminals, whereas in France (Immingham), Liverpool and from Drax to Appleford-on- on the basis of running into rail the state or the local authority Portbury, near Bristol. With at Thames, Oxfordshire, three times depots. provides the facilities. Army veteran Steve put Railfuture on the right track least 20 years life left in it Drax a week using InBulk Technolo- gies’ ISO-Veyor containers. Steve Wilkinson, chairman of the will be a big player for rail freight FREIGHT NEWS IN BRIEF That is one reason why a new chairman. Steve was born in Cambridge in the north of England. Each train can carry up to 1,200 intermodal flow from southern Railway Development Society for 10 and was happiest in his home county but tonnes of fly ash to Forterra’s n n France to Britain goes only as far years until 2000, died on 3 April after a was proud to be member of the Wiltshire One of the arguments for burn- Inefficient long illness borne with great fortitude ing biomass is that it is far more railhead, before being trans- as Calais, with lorries delivering Regiment for his National Service and ported by road to the Aircrete The transport industry is “inef- to destinations in Britain. and good humour. served at Suez in 1956. environmentally friendly than coal. Some of the environmen- plant in nearby Newbury where ficient, expensive, polluting and n n Rail potential unrealised He showed courage and resilience as he Later he drove lorries from Britain to the fly ash is mixed with cement living in a pre-internet age”. Lor- faced operation after operation and one tal advantage is lost when it is There is considerable suppressed defence establishments in the Middle imported from the USA and Can- to make Thermalite blocks. ries are empty up to 25% of the hospital appointment after another. East, including Badar Abbas and Abu Using rail is expected to reduce time and have been for the past demand for rail freight con- ada, and requires shipping over sumer services, especially out of He visited Addenbrooke’s Hospital as a Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. He the Atlantic with a rail journey at the firm’s carbon footprint by 10 years. the ports, according to Philippa patient in 1976 but did not retire because had a respect for Islam and regularly both ends. 1,700 tonnes of carbon dioxide. Source: Freight Transport Associa- of ill health until 2001. Edmunds of Freight on Rail, the quoted from the Bible and the Koran. A couple of by-products from the The fly ash is loaded at the power tion 2015 Logistics Report. n n Pollution group which facilitates the shift He joined RDS in 1976, serving on the For a time, he worked for the British burning of coal have been pul- station in just a few minutes with from road to rail. East Anglian committee and was the Nursing Association as a carer for the verised fly ash and, with lime- the containers being sealed for Transport accounts for 20% of She said: “Every new path out of founding chair of the freight committee elderly and mentally ill. He found it stone used in flue gas desulphu- the entire journey, the first stage total emissions and uniquely is for more than 20 years, building up many personally fulfilling but he was forced to risation, gypsum. by rail, and the second stage by Felixstowe port which comes on the only industry whose carbon stream can be used by rail imme- invaluable contacts for the society. retire because of his health problems. road. footprint is still increasing . The ash is used to make breeze diately and thus reduce road He campaigned for the reopening of Over the years, he rescued many “waif blocks for the building trade The total round trip is 415 miles. Source: European Union Commis- congestion and collisions on the the St Ives-Cambridge line until 1993 and stray” animals, including ducks, while the gypsum is used in The intermodal route using rail sion Transport Pocketbook. A14 corridor. when transport minister Roger Freeman geese, rabbits, chickens, guinea pigs, rats, making plaster board.