MP seeks new rail safeguard (From Tewkesbury Admag)

MP seeks new rail safeguard

AN angry letter has been fired off by Peter Luff, MP for Mid Worcestershire, to the chairman of the Strategic Rail Authority, Richard Bowker, about fears of a reduced service level for the Cotswold Line.

In his letter Mr Luff says: "I am dismayed to learn that from December, when First Great Western assumes responsibility for all trains between Worcestershire and London, services along the Cotswold Line may get worse, not better. This appears to be because the SRA has opted for a lower specification for services than we had been led to expect. I am writing to seek your reassurance that this is not the case and that the SRA will use the opportunity provided by the merging of the operators to improve services."

Mr Luff says he has heard that the early morning peak HST 125 trains to London will leave earlier and take longer, that there will be two hour gaps in services in both directions and that there will be an actual reduction in through services with three trains again involving changes at Oxford.

Although, he says, most services will be operated by the greatly superior Adelante sets, there will still be more of the inadequate Turbo services than imagined.

Mr Luff is telling the chairman: "Regularity and frequency of service is essential if we are to build custom on the line. Changes at Oxford have proved notoriously unreliable and a great deterrent to rail travel in the past. The advantage of the Adelantes will be squandered if they operate to a second-rate timetable."

"If we are to lure people out of their cars we need a better service than this."