Dawlish rail link to re-open April 4th.

This is a story that pleases me no end.

It will be exactly 2 months between the line getting damaged by storms, and the line re-opening, and that is great news.

Network Rail has been working around the clock to make the repairs that are needed to restore the line to working order.  They deserve our thanks and our appreciation.

Also, First Great Western deserve a lot of credit, for how they have handled the entire situation.  They have worked very hard to make sure that, as much as physically possible, some kind of service remained in place, even if it wasn't the one they had wanted to run, as based on their published timetable.

However, the whole situation has shown up issues that need to be tackled without delay.

The first one I'm going to bring up, is the continuing debate over whether there should be an airport in Plymouth.

I'm going to make no bones about this.  THERE MUST BE AN AIRPORT IN PLYMOUTH.

Why?  You even need to ask why?  The old Plymouth City Airport to London service could transport people there in less than an hour, whjilst the train still takes 3 hours at quickest.

It was also linked to Newquay Airport, in fact the route started there.  The whole route from Newquay to London via Plymouth took no more than 90 minutes, and was run up to 5 times a day.  And if you think that is the only route that Plymouth had, think again.  There were many others to other UK domestic airports, which made for a speedy connection to many places.

Such services could be provided again.  Flights to the Channel Islands, Bristol, Bournemouth, Cardiff, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Belfast, Derry, Birmingham, St Mary's in the Isles of Scilly (via Newquay and Lands End[if they can tarmac it]), Leeds, Southhampton, Manchester, Liverpool and many more places are all possible, helping to create an air network that would be speedier than the train, and enable cross country travel between the South West and the rest of the country in no more than 3 hours.  Heck, even some limited international flights to places like Dublin or Paris would help no end.

Sadly, the airport's owners, Sutton Harbour Holdings, have shown no real interest in re-opening the airport, claiming it wouldn't be viable.  Yet it seems to be the case that the airport was viable when Plymouth City Council operated it.  And maybe a consortium could run Newquay and Plymouth airports together, making sure both remained viable and operational.

Because in many ways, when Plymouth City Airport closed, the routes that ran from Newquay became a problem, as the customers that were picked up at Plymouth made those routes viable.  Now the airport at Newquay needs subsidy to run.  If Newquay closes, then Exeter becomes the only major airport in the South West, and as we've seen with the railways since February 4th, getting to Exeter would be problematic.

So what to do about the railway itself?  Well, the favourite idea for creating a second route, has been the re-opening of the old LSWR line that ran from Exeter to Plymouth via Okehampton and Tavistock.  The route from Plymouth to Tavistock has already be committed to prior to this, and it does seem to make sense to re-open that old stretch of track.  The line was closed in 1968, and it was a shame that this happened.  The process of concentrating traffic on one line, the one that got damaged on February 4th, meant that old LSWR line was deemed surplus to requirements.  It doesn't seem surplus to requirements now.

There is also an old Teign Valley route which is being considered, and in my view, reviving this, AS WELL AS, the Plymouth, Tavistock, Okehampton, Exeter route, would be an ideal double solution to the problem.  The northern line needs to be revived anyway, and run as a regular service all the time.  The Teign Valley line would work as a back up should the line at Dawlish get damaged again.

There is one other point that I would like to make in regards to the railways around Cornwall and Devon.  The fact that some areas, especially around North Cornwall, have been cut off from the railway network and could do with being revived in order to create a second Great Western route.  The line between Newquay and Perranporth should be re-opened, as should the lines that connected Padstow, Bude and Launceston to the rail network.  Indeed, connections should be made between Penzance and Perranporth, possibly via St Ives, and between Newquay and Padstow, which would have the effect of creating a nice mini network of lines that since 1963 have only been served by bus services, and that has meant that the bus companies, First Western National and Western Greyhound, have something of a public transport monopoly in those areas, and it would bring competition back. 

At the moment, the lack of transport connections is reinforcing the old image of those of us in Cornwall and Devon as being in the sticks and cut off from the rest of the country.  We need to counteract that immediately.  Restore the lines that should never have been cut, the connections that are in danger need to be protected, and even enhanced as much as possible.  We must not rely entirely on roads, especially roads like the A38 where there are accidents every day, which close the road for hours at a time.

Newquay Airport must remain open.  Plymouth City Airport must be re-opened.  Lands End Airport must be tarmaced.  The old railway lines that were closed must be re-opened.  We must do whatever it takes, pay any price, to make sure our links with not just the rest of the country, but also the rest of the world, are not cut off.