Closing Down Reading West Suggestion

[Wokingham]

With all the talk of cuts needing to be made instead of spending millions on the antisocial hotspot that is Reading West, would closing it as is served by well over 10 buses a hour allow new paths for freight and better performance?, in the past electrification studies it was suggested that this area may have been 4 tracked something that is obviously of the cards now.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

With all the talk of cuts needing to be made instead of spending millions on the antisocial hotspot that is Reading West, would closing it as is served by well over 10 buses a hour allow new paths for freight and better performance?, in the past electrification studies it was suggested that this area may have been 4 tracked something that is obviously of the cards now.

Surely it is too well served for that? An average of just under half a million use it per year, according to ORR statistics, and indeed trains that call at the station often see a good amount of passengers board and alight there whenever I pass through, which is often.

 

[JonathanH]

Better than that, money is being spent in making the station more secure with ticket gates, which should reduce the amount of ticketless travel.

 

[coppercapped]

With all the talk of cuts needing to be made instead of spending millions on the antisocial hotspot that is Reading West, would closing it as is served by well over 10 buses a hour allow new paths for freight and better performance?, in the past electrification studies it was suggested that this area may have been 4 tracked something that is obviously of the cards now.

By freight I assume you mean the container trains to and from Southampton and the the Mendip stone trains?

The Mendip trains are huge, so there are not many of them. Pathing for them is mainly limited by the intensity of operation on the Reliefs between Reading and Acton so whether or not there is a station at Reading West is well down in the list of constraints.

Similarly for the container trains. Paths are constrained through the two track tunnel at Southampton, gaining and leaving the Berks & Hants at Basingstoke, Southcote Junction, Didcot East Junction and the section through to Wolvercote Junction north of Oxford.

It is necessary to look at a wider area than just one station to see if the gains (more income, less maintenance) are greater than the loss of fare income for those journeys not made.