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Branch lines in the South West are very well marketed through the 'great scenic lines' campaign. It is reasonable to use other local branch lines as examples of well promoted lines when looking at numbers. If there is a market to extend services from the Salisbury line west to Plymouth, they...

Impressively brave of EMR having the first run as a midweek peak time trip on their longest route! They were obviously (correctly) confident that it would have a smooth trip.

Is there indecision? Or has a decision been made that the line is not viable at the current time, that many on here disagree with.

A slow, single track line to a small town could hardly be described as 'London Style public transport connectivity'. As my spin-off thread on the best way to spend £1bn in the south west has indicated, there are plenty of very worthy and realistic options to deliver projects that would deliver...

If passenger figures are 'just guessing' then new railways don't deserve to get any taxpayers money, that could be better spent on hospitals, schools or tax cuts. If there is a proper scientific study, based on current travel patterns, house building, places of employment etc, then they can...

A bus transfer from Newton Abbot to Tiverton Parkway takes the same time as the train via Dawlish, so really doesn't slow journeys, certainly much less than a train via Okehampton. If you've walked along the sea wall at Dawlish, you've seen that the amount of concrete poured is truly...

I was answering a comment that was specifically about journeys between Exeter and Plymouth, so not about new journey opportunities.

There is almost no likelihood that the number of railway journeys would ever break even on operating costs, so it would never even begin to pay back the build cost on ticket revenue. (that's not to say there aren't other benefits, but the question was specifically about ticket revenue) If you...

As per the original rules: You need to pay for all capital costs out of your £1Bn, but you don't need to pay for running costs, or get any of the profit back to reinvest!

I like that alternative history. As someone else suggested, I think there could be the option of recreating some of that network now. Street running from North Road down Armarda Way to a station on Royal Parade, then heading east to a Barbican station at the north end of Sutton Harbour, before...

Which could be why Waterloo has 4 underground lines connecting it to the right side of the river!

I quite like this one. Stations in Bovey and a Parkway Station in Heathfield by the A38. I agree that it could be a useful park and ride for Torbay, especially from the Plymouth direction, to avoid the congestion of Totnes. Cost-wise: 6km of upgraded mothballed track, +2.5km of new to take it...

If Teignmouth - Dawlish Warren was abandoned (and as has already been mentioned, the upgrade has already happened to make that extremely unlikely, and further line height increases have been judged to be practical as sea levels rise), then Teignmouth could easily be served as a branch line from...

A reasonable proposal. They wouldn't be top of my list of priorities personally, but I'd include both Padstow and Tavistock somewhere on my list. I had a similar train of thought for a Marsh Mills Parkway station. I could actually see it becoming a stop on intercity trains as well, as it would...

I agree that services to North Devon need improvement. Unfortunately you are well over budget - a 36km single track line on a new alignment following the A361 then going across county to Eggesford is £1.1Bn by itself! Extending the existing Barnstaple line to both Bideford and Ilfracombe is...

Done: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-would-you-spend-%C2%A31bn-to-improve-rail-transport-in-the-sw-peninsular.295207

Sparked from the various discussions on Tavistock, which for me seems to get all of the discussion, despite it being an expensive way to connect a fairly small town to the rail network. In my opinion, there are lots of more worthy ways to upgrade the railway network in the south-west...

For the North Downs line in particular, contactless travel to Gatwick would be a big improvement, especially as I'm sure many people are already using it, unaware that while the stations at each end of the line have readers it shouldn't be used on that route.

I think it was a sub-debate, leading from my post where I questioned whether Tavistock needed this investment, given that it is a prosperous town with relatively wealthy people. Others pointed out that Plymouth has high levels of deprevation, so it seemed an appropriate discussion on what the...

There are already plenty of very attractive settlements a short train ride away from Plymouth. In my opinion places like Totnes, Teignmouth, Dawlish, Exeter, Topsham, Exmouth, Calstock, Looe, Truro, Falmouth and St Ives are all more attractive days out from Plymouth, so I don't see that adding...