No chance is it that sort of money! Building what is essentially a cut and cover tunnel below the water table, through the middle of a housing estate? I can‘t see any circumstances where it would be possible to build it.
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Is Stratford upon Avon destined to remain as poorly connected as it is currently?
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No chance is it that sort of money! Building what is essentially a cut and cover tunnel below the water table, through the middle of a housing estate? I can‘t see any circumstances where it would be possible to build it.
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RailUK Forums
Don't shoot the messenger!
Another ARUP report in 2012 has more detailed costs; Appendix E in the document details their cost estimate further.
Table 6.1 - Capital Costs
| Cost Item | £m (2012 prices) |
| Design | £4.0 |
| Preliminaries | £3.2 |
| Signalling | £5.0 |
| Electrification and plant | £2.0 |
| Track | £17.9 |
| Telecoms | £3.0 |
| Civils | £33.5 |
| Operational Property | £4.5 |
| Other Costs | £2.9 |
| TOTAL | £79.0 |
| TOTAL Including Optimism Bias | £96.9 |
Don't shoot the messenger!
Another ARUP report in 2012 has more detailed costs; Appendix E in the document details their cost estimate further.
Table 6.1 - Capital Costs
Cost Item £m (2012 prices) Design £4.0 Preliminaries £3.2 Signalling £5.0 Electrification and plant £2.0 Track £17.9 Telecoms £3.0 Civils £33.5 Operational Property £4.5 Other Costs £2.9 TOTAL £79.0 TOTAL Including Optimism Bias £96.9
Magic numbers. And there‘s no risk allowance.
(Note that optimisim bias back then should have been 66%, not 23%)
I suspect that an estimate now would see little change from half a billion. Building that line through the housing estate would be extremely difficult.
I'm not saying I believe the numbers either!
Which bit are you referring as through the housing estate?
Pretty much the whole way from the station to the roundabout where the greenway starts. In places theres less than 20 metres between homes, more typically 30-40m. Quite how you would get piling rigs in there let alone the impact (literally) of them working. Realisitically you‘d be buying every property that borders that stretch - about 100 of them. That‘s £50m before you‘ve even fired up a JCB. And compensating another few hundred residential properties within 150m (rather shorter compensation boundary than for HS2), that will be another £10m or so.
Perhaps an open-access operator may make a proposal if they believe its a moneymaker. Maybe they have access to coloured crayons and rose-tinted specs.
Chiltern I believe are sending a few additional services back in the Dec timetable, as they used to run. A regular (hourly or two-hourly) service to London via Banbury would easily cover this, and the majority of tourism demand. Worcester etc irrelevant.
Having a regular Oxford service might also be interesting. Possibly the Oxford - Banbury stopper could run there, alternating with the Marylebone? Or alternating with an Oxford-Moor St.
Having a regular Oxford service might also be interesting. Possibly the Oxford - Banbury stopper could run there, alternating with the Marylebone? Or alternating with an Oxford-Moor St.
swt_passenger
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It’s 19 public services per weekday, mostly Leamington Spa to Stratford and return short workings, with one from and two back to Marylebone. RTT has the details. Was previously mentioned in the main Dec 2026 timetable thread.
overthere 2
On Moderation
In the latest issue of Steam Railway magazine they have got the latest article of a series they have been doing about the history and past, present and future of the heritage railway movement particularly concerning extension's.
This article talks mainly about the Gloucestershire and Warwickshire Steam Railway (GWSR) and the prospect of rebuilding the line to Honeybourne. It talk's about that when the line was redoubled through Honeybourne additional works were done by Network Rail (NR) to accommodate GWSR trains and that Sustrans offered the track bed to the GWSR for a token amount but it was blocked by the department of Transport due to the state of the bridge's both now and future maintenance worries, even though as the article points out the GWSR have more than enough experience of repairing/looking after infrastructure: Work done on other bridges, the repairs to Stanway viaduct and the regular collapsing embankment at Chicken Curve just South of Winchcombe.
They interviewed the chairman and he said that while they would like to get to Honeybourne, it cost them £1 million to repair 5 bridges between Laverton and Broadway and a rough guesstimate at repairing/replacing the three bridge's between Broadway and Honeybourne would be about £10 million - which seems a bit steep to me considering I assume that the volunteers could do most of the general labouring work for example?.
There is also the extra maintenance and logistics of running longer distance services though he did ponder that if they got to Honeybourne they could bypass Honeybourne station - which I found surprising - and link up with the branch to Long Marston and the Rail innovation Centre (RIC) and they could use the GWSR as a test track when the GWSR weren't running trains.
Meanwhile at the other end of the line you have got the long running campaign by The Shakespeare Line Rail User Group (SLRUG) to reopen the line between Stratford - Honeybourne, but looking at their arguments for reopening I think they are barking up the wrong tree because their main argument seems to be that trains can run through to Oxford and London making journey times quicker for passengers rather than having to go up, over, then down again or change trains.
The problem is that if you are a local politician you don't care about people driving away from Stratford, you care about people driving in/through and causing congestion and you getting the blame for it and if you are a nimby then you don't care about the the traffic causing problems for other people you just don't want it causing problems for you.
Now, I reckon if you asked all the people who use Honeybourne station where they have come from the the vast majority would say they have come from places South of Honeybourne as Honeybourne is there nearest station also it would not surprise me if you had people coming all the way from Winchcombe to catch a London train as for them Cheltenham station is on the wrong side of town so would be a nightmare to get to/from in rush hour.
Also if you live anywhere South of Stratford and you worked in the outskirts of or in central Birmingham then battling in and out of Stratford for the station each day and paying expensive parking charges would not be appealing and getting a train from Honeybourne and possibly having too change at Worcester for Birmingham would be a hassle as well, so most people would just drive the whole way even if it means driving through Stratford anyway.
And if you asked tourists in Stratford have they been to Broadway or vice versa by car or would like to but wont because they don't have a car and don't want to mess around with bus(s) even if there are any? I think the number's would be pretty high.
Therefore what the campaigner's should be pointing out and arguing for that this would be a local line solving the traffic problem's mentioned above which are only going to get worse with the new town being planned/built at Long Marston.
So this is what I propose:
The GWSR, The (SLRUG) and the RIC team up and instead of promoting/wishing there own schemes promote the following:
Stratford station - South Stratford (Seven Meadows road)
With the road be radical and do any of the following:
1 - While we have morning and evening rush hours, the morning is more condensed as people naturally wont to stay in bed as long as possible where as in the afternoon some people might knock of work early, some at normal times and some work late and while most would go straight home others might go on to other things also school kids might have after school clubs or just wander around town before being picked up so traffic is more spread out and with people working from home and only going in to work occasionally they can modify their travel to quieter times so simply single the road and make it a one way street going in to Stratford then forget about the tunnel/cutting thing and put a single track on the unused bit of road.
2 - Single the road and make it bi-directional, so from say 5am till 2.30pm it is for traffic going in to Stratford, then from 3pm (break for safety) till 4.30 am ( again break for safety) it is for traffic going out from Stratford
3 - looking at Google maps I can see what looks like tyre marks in the fields just to the West of Stratford racecourse, so I assume this is where the racegoer's park?. So what you do is when you rebuild the line you build a road running along side it from the roundabout at the Southern end of Meadow Way to Stannells bridge and then tarmac over the temporary parking and turn it in to Stratford South park and ride (P a R) with a station at stannells bridge. both for the P a R. and Stratford racecourse.
4 - If for whatever reason you cant do that then then there is plenty of open land in the square formed by the Stratford Greenway, Seven Meadows road and the river Avon that could be used for a P a R and while I am usually dead against concreting over our dwindling countryside this would be for once doing it for the right reason as it would be reinstating a railway. You then close Seven Meadows road permanently and then either lay two tracks or one with future provision for two.
As for the houses along Meadow Way
On the East side there is already a tree line and along most of it a local road before you get to the houses so I doubt you would have to do much to hide the railway weather it was single or double track.
On the West side the houses are built quite close to the road but with singling the road or getting rid of it all together you would have room to put in trees/bushes and noise cancelling fences which would hopefully placate the nimby's which could save some money on compensation or compulsory purchase but if you had to pay compensation/compulsory purchase you would have the cash you saved on not building the tunnel/cutting.
Stratford South - Long Marston
NR single or double track
Long Marston - Honeybourne
Depending on the needs of NR you either carry on with a double track to Honeybourne or a single track for NR and another track for the RIC
Honeybourne - Broadway
Here you have a couple of options:
1 - NR buys the track bed, repairs the bridges and lays a single track to their own station slightly North of the GWSRs Broadway station with a short footpath/cycle track linking the two. The NR station would be a railhead for the surrounding areas and would be a proper station open 365 days a year with regular services between - Broadway - Honeybourne - Long Marston (for the new town) - Stratford and stations to central Birmingham.
the GWSR lays a single track next door to the NR track (think Spa Valley railway, Eridge station) that runs to Honeybourne station and makes a contribution to the overall cost's, also you could look at extending morning/evening NR services over the GWSR tracks to Toddington and Winchcombe.
2 - As above but if NR only wants a single track between long Marston and Honeybourne then GWSR and the RIC work together to lay track connecting the RIC to the GWSR including a spur to Honeybourne station then when the GWSR is not running the RIC can use the line all the way to Cheltenham for test trains and pay rent to the GWSR.
3 - If NR want a double track between Long Marston and Honeybourne but don't want to go to Broadway the GWSR still lay a single track between Broadway and Honeybourne station which could be used by NR morning evening/commuter services again possibly extending to Toddington and Winchcombe - as I have proposed for Minehead - with the rest of the time it is used for heritage services, rail tours and for incoming and outgoing rolling stock movements.
then maybe at night or on Sundays test trains could leave the RIC run over NR tracks to Honeybourne/Broadway and on to the GWSR for how ever long they need and the RIC could establish a "Southern" base at maybe Toddington or Winchcombe.
Another thing to look at would be electrifying all the way from Birmingham to at least Honeybourne and maybe Broadway because if you are relaying track and replacing bridges then wiring the line would not add greatly to the cost but it would mean the trains would be quieter so hopefully less nimby complaints .
Now you may be wondering that even if the Stratford - Honeybourne line is reopened where do the GWSR find the money to either contribute to option 1 or find £10 million to do it themselves
The answer is very simple:
Rent from NR or cut of tickets for letting NR commuter services run on their tracks
Rent from the RIC
The GWSR would get more visitors because with having a network link at Broadway and/or Honeybourne it makes visits easier for people without cars, particularly if they have young children, are OAPs or disabled also for foreign tourists visiting Stratford they might find navigating buses to Broadway to get to the GWSR difficult/impossible but if they could step off a train at Honeybourne/Broadway and then step straight on to a GWSR train they are more likely to pay a visit.
If NR don't want to build there own station at Broadway then NR and GWSR could work together to offer through ticket's and connections.
Shakespeare express trains could extend from there current Birmingham - Stratford service to run to Broadway or possibly Winchcombe or Cheltenham.
General Rail tours
In newspapers I have occasionally seen adverts for rail tours either for shopping/sightseeing or for Christmas shopping/markets so a rail tour company could offer day trips to Cheltenham with luxury coaches doing the short hop between the recourse and Cheltenham itself.
I'm guessing to bring locos to a railway it's cheaper and easier if they can come by rail rather than a lorry so the money saved can go to the cost.
At Cheltenham recourse they have got a sort of arena thing called the Centour which hosts various concerts and events, for example I saw an advert a while for some snooker finals they were hosting. So if you have a lot pf people who might be coming from places like London or Manchester/Liverpool then a rail charter for the event should attract a lot of punters.
While the most famous event is the Cheltenham gold cup, Cheltenham also holds other race meetings and while for some events they do do bus shuttles between the station and racecourse, Cheltenham and the surrounding roads including the M5 do grind to a halt also the shops in the town centre complain there sales collapse because the locals tend to hide indoors till its all over also Cheltenham station and the lines to from it run at full capacity and I read somewhere that NR wont allow rail charter's for the Gold Cup because their is no spare capacity so if the GWSR was connected to the network then charters could use the racecourse station and be stabled at Winchcombe and Toddington which used to happen back in the day.
Also GWR run extra/special trains between London and Cheltenham so they could run them to Cheltenham race course instead and because there are driving cabs at each end they can
be in and out a lot quicker.
This might not be practical as there might not be enough time for a NR train to get all the way to Cheltenham in the morning/evening particularly if a arrangement can't be done to run at say at least 40mph and a Train Operating Company (TOC) may not want a unit standing idle most of the day at say Winchcombe or Toddington but there is a P a R at Cheltenham Racecourse that gets very busy so while my proposal is generally aimed at people going North you could get people who live North of Cheltenham - Possibly include re-opening Bishops Cleeve - who could use the train to get to the racecourse and then the bus to Cheltenham.
What's the plan for the roundabouts? The other direction of traffic?
They aren't cranes or crane operators, which is one major expense.
It sounds unusual for NR to not want full ownership.
If there were a station in south Stratford, it might be called Stratford Racecourse. Would people be heading towards Cheltenham Racecourse? Charters don't really come into the calculation as they're so rare, it's the daily commuter and tourism traffic that matters. This connection would allow those Heathrow-London-Oxford-Stratford-Heathrow tourists to get to Evesham without a change, or to Bristol in one change as currently, but quicker.
AlastairFraser
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I like your enthusiasm, but your Stratford road narrowing idea is not feasible sadly.
No highways department would agree to running an active railway that close to a main road, let alone converting a road to timed single track one way operation.
Approximately 0.75-1 mile of tunnel out of Stratford is the only way to get the railway through towards Honeybourne, after the tunnel the trackbed is pretty much intact to the Cotswold line and that would allow services to provide a wide range of important connections at Honeybourne station.
I can't see mainline services on the GWSR being a viable way of paying the bills tbh, but with a Midlands connection at Honeybourne, I can't see any reason why the GWSR wouldn't be able to gradually raise the money needed to reach Honeybourne.
Gareth1990
Member
I don’t believe this nonsense about foreign tourists preferring a coach tour. Maybe 30 years ago but both domestic and foreign tourists are nowadays much more independent, I think at least a 2 hourly Marylebone-Stratford service is definitely wanted, doesn’t the Leamington Spa shuttle only run every two hours?
HSTEd
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Is the video a tunnel or some sort of open topped trench in the style of the Alameda corridor?
It looks opened topped in the video.
I can just imagine how well such a thing would go down with the people of stratford.
Either eay, it’s just impractical
ox_chap
Member
I've often wondered if an hourly Sunday and Bank Holiday tourist service could work, which is something like Marylebone, Bicester Village, Oxford (reverse), local stops for canal walks to Banbury, then Leamington and Stratford.
OK, it would take an exceptionally long time end-to-end. But there could be some sort of hop on, hop off ticket specifically for the train. Could be a great day out, doing Stratford, Oxford and a bit of shopping at Bicester, all in one day.
OK, it would take an exceptionally long time end-to-end. But there could be some sort of hop on, hop off ticket specifically for the train. Could be a great day out, doing Stratford, Oxford and a bit of shopping at Bicester, all in one day.
Severnia333
Member
Stratford is not a big place, if you built a South Station on the edge of town it would still be only a 15-20 min walk to the centre, not good but not particularly bad, especially for a secondary station.
Would still need the money to link to Honeybourne (and much more for Cheltenham), but saves the very expensive work in the town itself that was proposed.
GWSR might be feasible with only stops at Cheltenham Racecourse, Bishops Cleeve, Winchcombe and Broadway. A chord connecting Cheltenham Racecourse to the mainline would let you do direct raceway specials from London, Bristol and Cardiff that might be decent money spinners.
Obviously only so much money to go around and a mostly rural line in what is seen as an already prosperous area probably isn't going to be a political priority.
Stratford Parkway station has around 100000 passengers a year. It’s difficult to see how this would be much different.
AlastairFraser
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Problem with your South Station plan is that it wouldn't enable through trains from Birmingham, which limits those interchange options at Honeybourne.
GWSR may be feasible as a heritage railway, but I can't ever see mainline services working through. Maybe a shuttle from Cheltenham Spa at best, but building a spur from the mainline to Cheltenham Racecourse would cost a pretty penny if done to full mainline standards.
Severnia333
Member
I don't disagree.
I think just the spur to Cheltenham racecourse on it's own could happen though, I think it would do a pretty good trade on race days and might see decent use as a Parkway for the nearby villages and northern fringe of Cheltenham.
AlastairFraser
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Maybe it could work, but I think you'd need some support from the racecourse if you wanted to build it to permit intercity services to run through.
I think an hourly service from Stratford to Oxford, in lieu of the Leamington shuttle, would be of most benefit. It connects to Leamington and Banbury for onward Chiltern fasts (quickest way to London) - but then also in lieu of any Oxford-Banbury stoppers - and delivers Oxford as the other major regional market for commuting/jobs, onward connections. It gives a regular hourly to those stations (KS/Heyford/Tackley) too.
In removing two shuttles (different TOCs for now, granted), and giving a lot more connections to the various spots en route, it has multiple purposes and is also more efficienct.
And in the process, it provides the tourist connection between Stratford and Oxford, which might be anecdotally useful and keep a few coaches and buses off the roads.
Could be run by Chiltern into the bays - or into a permissive country-end P4, if that ever happens! 3-4 cars would be fine.
In removing two shuttles (different TOCs for now, granted), and giving a lot more connections to the various spots en route, it has multiple purposes and is also more efficienct.
And in the process, it provides the tourist connection between Stratford and Oxford, which might be anecdotally useful and keep a few coaches and buses off the roads.
Could be run by Chiltern into the bays - or into a permissive country-end P4, if that ever happens! 3-4 cars would be fine.
AlastairFraser
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Does Chiltern have the stock for it?
It will do after the BEMU order (!) - but yes I think it would do, as the MK5s have given some capacity back, and the timetable isn't fully reinstated. Frankly, it could operate with 2 car units if it had to. Or use 197s and optionally, interwork with EWR!
Might be a good service to add to the Cowley branch too, given it would be a lot of 'local' places who I think are more likely to commute into the Biz/Science Park than Londoners. Although that service will really be about inbound Bicester folks
Might be a good service to add to the Cowley branch too, given it would be a lot of 'local' places who I think are more likely to commute into the Biz/Science Park than Londoners. Although that service will really be about inbound Bicester folks
AlastairFraser
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Tbh a 2 car 165 isn't the worst idea - the Banbury to Leam Spa section might be a bit crowded, but the rest should be fine with a 2 car. Banbury to Leam Spa is only 20 mins anyway, not long to stand if you had to.
Maybe I'm misremembering, but I think the old TOC Thames Trains used to operate that Oxford to Stratford upon Avon service with a 2 car Turbo before it was merged with First Great Western.
I think EWR is better for the Cowley branch extension - as you say, a lot of the people working round there will live in Bicester and it has better strategic connections to the WCML + eventually the MML, Universal Stewartby and Cambridge (plus 1 quick change away from Luton Airport).
Might still be a useful place to 'lose' such a Stratford train to avoid a long turnback layover in platform capacity-constrained Oxford station. Additional capacity on the Cowley branch (likely an extra platform at the terminus), specifically to cater for Stratford trains in addition to some EWRs could be plausible.
Yeah I considered Cowley as a turnback for services due to platform capacity, even after p5 is done. If it can only ever handle 2tph - I would think they need to be even (EWR MKC is more clockface and uniform stops than the Marylebones) - but it would be great in time if it could cope with 'turning' 3-4tph. Or Marylebone becomes more uniform. But this Stratford service would be a good fit due to the local employment opps.
It's a bigger crossing move but a few Cowley services from the Cotswolds line for Oxford workers might also be quite useful for local journeys.
It's a bigger crossing move but a few Cowley services from the Cotswolds line for Oxford workers might also be quite useful for local journeys.
The Planner
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Remember it will be built with the absolute minimum infrastructure for the service spec. Bumping up to 4tph would need something extra than whats being provided.
Yes, and I know it has some narrow, curvy single track sections (and bridges) - so it's not simple. Even if the urban parts and stations are double tracked (isn't the plan two tracks but one is basically one long freight track/loop).
Might be an enhancement for the future. Might also be better to invest in quadding all the way to Didcot, instead.
The current Cowley Branch is essentially single track from just after the junction until the BMW factory. I've not seen anything in the coverage to suggest any double track apart from to allow a freight train past the Cowley station.