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Calls for North Devon rail lines to reopen

Could the Tarka Trail be a rail line once more? (image courtesy: Derek Harper/Creative Commons)

Alongside the Tarka Trail

A train campaign group has called for the re-opening of the Barnstaple to Bideford along what is now the Tarka Trail.

The English Regional Transport Association (ERTA)also want the Barnstaple to Ilfracombe line back in use.

The group says that since the first of these passenger services was cut in 1965, North Devon's population has grown dramatically and continues to do so, with constant building of new homes.

They say "traffic tailbacks in to Barnstaple...are increasing and it is time for us to add better and reliable access to a public transport network for the area before it becomes gridlocked with traffic congestion."

The nine-mile route is now the Tarka Trail, a cycle and walking path owned by Devon County Council.

A survey in 1999 claimed the line could be reinstated with enough room for the cycle path too.

For the Barnstaple to Ilfracombe line, an organisation called Combe Rail is proposing a modern, light railway between Barnstaple and Braunton.  The former railway route is 98 per cent intact, with sufficient width to accommodate a new single-track railway line alongside the Tarka Trail cycle path.

The old railway is now occupied by the Tarka Trail and South West Coast Path, but ERTA says "there is ample width for the new railway to share the formation alongside the leisure path, and the railway’s low-impact construction will be sympathetic to the successful leisure trail (a shallow kerb will separate TawLink from the leisure path.)

"The formation between Pottington and Velator is also used by concrete flood defences and by a transatlantic data cable. In the not-too-distant future, these will both be due for renewal, at which point the new railway can be accommodated. At certain points (most recently at Wrafton) the old railway formation has been built upon. For a light railway, a short deviation from the original course is not a problem. A new TawLink bridge will be built over the river Yeo, alongside the existing cycle/pedestrian bridge.

Starting from Caen Street in Braunton, it will run tramway-style along Station Road, and then use the old railway formation all the way to the Civic Centre car park in Barnstaple. There are two options for crossing the river Taw – either to street-run along Long Bridge, or to share the proposed reinstated (former railway) bridge. it will use lightweight, battery-electric vehicles – like traditional trams, but without the overhead wires – capable of running safely on-road, and quickly off-road. These vehicles are environmentally-friendly, and very quiet. Visually, and in terms of infrastructure, the railway will be low-impact."

Last year, the Exeter to Okehampton line was reopened after a gap of more than 50 years. Its original two-hourly service has since increased to hourly.

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