How can the Stranraer line be made more useful/less useless?

[AHBD]

For an answer to your question, just look at the volume of freight on the ..... A77, .... mainly single carriageway with sparse opportunities for overtaking. ...

....countenance to that might be if the Stranrer line was cut back as part of a comprehensive transport package that saw a substantial upgrade to the A77 south of Girvan along with ....

I wonder if the Scottish Gov/Parliament would view subsidising a Larne-Troon ROPAX ferry as cheaper than upgrading the A77? Would it be better or cheaper?

It could save driver hours / save fuel ?

 

[bramling]

There is already an all shacks bus that runs every 2 hours between Girvan and Stranraer, taking just over an hour including a tour of half of Girvan. For comparison, the train takes just under an hour.

The bus serves Stranraer itself, rather than just the end of the pier.

I fully expect the branch will be rationalised and limp along for many years yet, rather than one of the two nettles being grasped, those being either to somehow drive demand into the service (relocate the station, improved rolling stock, good connections to/from Glasgow) or decide that the priority is to provide an economic public transport service.

As an aside, the Scottish £2 bus fare cap applies in Ayrshire but not Dumfries & Galloway.

In the absence of the Irish traffic, which clearly isn’t going to come back, is there ever going to be a significant level of demand between Stranraer and Girvan?

Rail is never going to be quick, and it’s a long way to commute to Glasgow. If people have to drive then in many cases once the car is on the road then it would presumably be reasonably convenient just to drive to Girvan, Ayr or somewhere on the GSWR line?

It’s a *lot* of railway to have to maintain to serve two lightly used stations.

 

[The exile]

To be honest some of the vibes in this thread seem to be of not merely close the railway, but bulldoze places like Stranraer into the sea while you’re at it!

To be honest, in some cases (though I doubt Stranraer comes into that category) where that would be the logical option. That’s not a “Townie says we shouldn’t support the countryside” argument, because in most cases we’d be talking about settlements artificially plonked somewhere to serve an industry that has now ceased to exist (there are several examples scattered over the former East Germany, as well as a few in this country where it has already happened). However, as we are dealing with people’s lives, logic (and bald economics) is only part of the equation.

 

[Bletchleyite]

To be honest, in some cases (though I doubt Stranraer comes into that category) where that would be the logical option. That’s not a “Townie says we shouldn’t support the countryside” argument, because in most cases we’d be talking about settlements artificially plonked somewhere to serve an industry that has now ceased to exist (there are several examples scattered over the former East Germany, as well as a few in this country where it has already happened). However, as we are dealing with people’s lives, logic (and bald economics) is only part of the equation.

The one place where this is likely is Fairbourne, due to the high cost of maintaining sea defences. This is a challenge for the Cambrian Coast line which may need to be moved inland. I can't see it happening anywhere else, though there may be voluntary depopulation of car dependent places with low employment like Stranraer.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Yesterday at 09:33 ==

I've created a separate thread in General regarding the depopulation part of the discussion:

Voluntary or potentially compulsory depopulations in the UK?

In the Stranraer line thread it's discussed about the possibility of "shoving it into the sea" - i.e. compulsorily depopulating the settlement. One example of where this might happen is Fairbourne, where the cost of maintaining the sea defences is increasing as sea levels do and weather...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[NCT]

@NCT's argument would basically lead to a Serpell network, maybe leaving a few bits in place like Merseyrail which he was going to close* in favour of buses. Stranraer is a particular basket case of course but the view they express is very much the extreme end.

* Completely close the Southport line and most of the Wirral, the Ormskirk line would have lost its local stations and become intercity only, if I recall.

I think you are overinterpreting my point.

There's nothing wrong with redistribution, but it's also important to note the direction of redistribution, the relatively needs, alternatives, and affordability. Often, especially on these boards, the subsidisees overplay their hand.

It'd be an economic failure. New Towns only succeed where there is good employment. Compare how Milton Keynes/Peterborough/Stevenage have done better than Skem/Peterlee etc due to proximity to London.

There are sensible New Town sites nearer Glasgow e.g. the old IBM site, but not really Stranraer.

I was being facetious. Fundamentally there's little civilisation south of Girvan, and the line will remain a financial basket case. For as long as there's no political appetite for formal closure, all that can be done is to keep the size of that basket case to a manageable level. Anything better than SNCF's approach to rural branch lines is a win.

 

[HSTEd]

Rail services are only "guaranteed" on some level because an act of parliament requires it and for no other reason.

It would be quite feasible to obtain an act of parliament guaranteeing a bus service.

 

[NCT]

Taking a purest view - what does the Stranraer line do that the Stagecoach 358 (1bp2h Girvan - Stranraer) and 359 (3bpd Girven - Barrhill - Newton Stewart) don't?

 

[35B]

Taking a purest view - what does the Stranraer line do that the Stagecoach 358 (1bp2h Girvan - Stranraer) and 359 (3bpd Girven - Barrhill - Newton Stewart) don't?

Nothing. And even back in the 1930s, the lack of a direct connection from Ayr/Girvan towards Newton Stewart along what's now the A714 was costing the railway traffic - it features a key plot device in Dorothy Sayers' "Five Red Herrings"

 

[Bletchleyite]

Taking a purest view - what does the Stranraer line do that the Stagecoach 358 (1bp2h Girvan - Stranraer) and 359 (3bpd Girven - Barrhill - Newton Stewart) don't?

Be more likely that a car owner will choose to use it? But in all seriousness that bus service is probably plenty, and could be increased without the railway.

 

[HighlandStorm]

Taking a purest view - what does the Stranraer line do that the Stagecoach 358 (1bp2h Girvan - Stranraer) and 359 (3bpd Girven - Barrhill - Newton Stewart) don't?

Provides more space for one thing, there wouldn’t be many seats in a road coach with both a lift and an accessible toilet! So there is the accessibility aspect to it that a longer distance coach / bus can’t match.

Then there is the relatively level nature of a railway vs the A77 - whether for entertainment or work reasons you can do things on a train that’s just not practical on a coach.

If you took an ember type coach, fitted an accessible toilet and put in 2+1 seats with a mix of tables and airlines. Your going to have the capacity of a minibus!

If BEMUs and electrification to Girvan came about - realistically with a plain line to Stranraer and no token exchanges - how much time could be shaved off the rail journey?

As a here and now option - make the Highland Railcard valid on the line and include postcodes south of Girvan in the railcard zone.

 

[35B]

Provides more space for one thing, there wouldn’t be many seats in a road coach with both a lift and an accessible toilet! So there is the accessibility aspect to it that a longer distance coach / bus can’t match.

Then there is the relatively level nature of a railway vs the A77 - whether for entertainment or work reasons you can do things on a train that’s just not practical on a coach.

If you took an ember type coach, fitted an accessible toilet and put in 2+1 seats with a mix of tables and airlines. Your going to have the capacity of a minibus!

If BEMUs and electrification to Girvan came about - realistically with a plain line to Stranraer and no token exchanges - how much time could be shaved off the rail journey?

As a here and now option - make the Highland Railcard valid on the line and include postcodes south of Girvan in the railcard zone.

All true - but being brutal, what's the value of that relative to the cost of providing it? As @NCT sagely observes:

There's nothing wrong with redistribution, but it's also important to note the direction of redistribution, the relatively needs, alternatives, and affordability. Often, especially on these boards, the subsidisees overplay their hand.

 

[overthere 2]

A few questions around cutting Girvan-Stranraer and replacing it with an "express coach":

- Assuming the GLC-Ayr services extend to Girvan, what'd serve Troon-Kilmarnock?

- What guarantees are there of the bus service being retained long term? It wouldn't have the level of permanence and political support that a railway does.

- What frequencies would you run such a bus service at? Who'd run it - a coach operator on a contract, or a local bus operator? Quality and long-term viability would heavily vary based on what you pick.

- How do you ensure both reliable, predictable services to Stranraer and good ferry connections at Cairnryan (to Stena, but also possibly P&O)? If you can't do both, how'd you prevent excessive duplication of services?

- How would you guarantee rail-bus connections at Girvan or Ayr? Reliability is one risk (particularly with A77 traffic), but also I doubt Girvan's small bus-only loop with a little shelter would fit a coach, and even if it did, it wouldn't be a particularly comfortable/convenient transfer compared to a direct train.

- How would you serve Barrhill? I'd suggest a Girvan-Newton Stewart coach service (departing alongside a Stranraer coach) but this is another route where managing capacity, frequency and long-term viability would be difficult, and subsidising a tendered coach route would be a risk regarding quality and reliability.

All these would have to be addressed properly for bus replacement to work. There's no cheap option other than abandoning Stranraer altogether and waiting for it to depopulate, a good bus on an obscure route still requires subsidy. Ignoring any of these issues runs the risk of replacing a decent train service with a crappy bus service, which is something we should leave in the last century.

Its a pity nobody put these questions to Beeching and all the other bright sparks who over the years think closing railway's or not re - opening them and putting on buses is the answer .

We then might still have 20000 miles of network to use .


Here's a couple of ideas that could be looked at:


1 - How much would it cost to put in a triangle junction East of Stranraer and then a single track to Cairnryan so trains could run Glasgow - Stranraer then reverse to Cairnryan and vice versa?

Because I know you would not get thousands of passengers but if there was some working together between Scotrail, the Irish railway's, the ferry company's, various Government/local authorities both in Scotland and Northern Ireland/Ireland and tourism body's on a targeted advertising campaign could there be some scope in offering foot passenger's some sort of daytrip/holiday package which would be: Tickets from Scottish/Northern England stations - Stranraer, ferry, then train from Larne - Belfast/rest of Northern Ireland/Ireland?


2 - When the cars and lorries get off the ferry obviously the are not all going to exactly the same place and that to offer a shuttle type train to take every car or lorry to where they want to go in the UK that was on the network is not practical but could there be enough of a demand and the expense justified for raising bridges etc to offer a piggy back/motorail service between Cairnryan - Glasgow/Kilmarnock for the M74?


3 - If Stranraer station is relocated to the centre of Stranraer then you are left with a decent bit of track, a station building and a large bit of land to store stuff.

If the the SVR trial is a success and other railway's follow suit the logical next step would be for a heritage railway to come back on to the network full time, or as is regularly discussed a lot heritage of railways are looking "creaky" and potentially it is only a matter of time before one fails.

Either way there is potentially a full inventory of locomotives coaches, wagons, signalling equipment, buildings etc up for grabs, also most councils seem to be very supportive of heritage railways as a way to bring in tourists and while I don't know where the nearest heritage railway to Stranraer is I'm guessing its a very long drive there and back or doable by public transport but only as a overnight visit?

So, what could happen is the council encourages a heritage railway group to start up, the council, the group or together they buy the assets of a defunct railway and move them to the old Stranraer port site and set up a Heritage Transport Museum, get hold of some old cars, buses and trucks. Maybe get some local classic vehicles owners clubs to set up there as their base and perhaps offer to let people have a go at driving them, see here far an example: www.drivedadscar.com

Monday to Friday it would be a Didcot type of set up where the heritage trains run between the old Stranraer station and the new one and on weekends the trains would run all the way to Ayr or maybe even Glasgow (think NYMR/Whitby).

At the moment I cant think of any reason why I would want to visit Stranraer but offer me a ride on a heritage train from Glasgow/Ayr to Stranraer, a look around a transport museum/drive the exhibits and then a ride home again I would be first in the queue.

 

[Killingworth]

The end of the line! A ferry at Cairnryan is just visible in the distance beyond the end of the pier.



I suggest there'd be more need for cycle provision on a substitute bus service than for wheelchairs. Elizabeth Line users manage without toilets between Shenfield and Heathrow!



If residents of western Galloway want an outside rail connection the passenger numbers don't seem to offer strong support. Perhaps those living in that area can explain why the bounce back since Covid has been so weak.


I grew up with family tales of visits to relatives in Belfast using 'boat' trains from Newcastle. My grandfather would travel on business to Ireland that way. By the 1950/60s they first took a car by plane rather than on the ferry. The railway had lost its primary markets by then, that of the boats was going too. The line from Ayr has been living on borrowed time for decades. The move of the ferries to Cairnryan makes the current station almost as out of place as that on the line previously running to the earlier ferry port at Portpatrick.

 

[daodao]

The Stranraer line is surely not top of the list of expensive to maintain remote Scottish lines serving only a limited population, and thus possible candidates for closure. The populations of Stranraer and the wider Wigtownshire area are about 10,000 and 30,000 respectively.

By contrast, far fewer people are served by either the West Highland extension to Mallaig or the Kyle of Lochalsh line, and as in Stranraer's case, the connecting ferry services that were the rationale for building these 2 lines have largely been diverted to other ports; the Kyle line's patronage will have also been affected by the opening of the Skye bridge, enabling through vehicle (including bus) travel to Portree and Uig.

Relocating the terminus to Stranraer town would surely reduce running costs, possibly increase patronage and not be particularly expensive, as would running the line as a single track siding from Barrhill to Stranraer.

 

[35B]

The Stranraer line is surely not top of the list of expensive to maintain remote Scottish lines serving only a limited population, and thus possible candidates for closure. The populations of Stranraer and the wider Wigtownshire area are about 10,000 and 30,000 respectively.

By contrast, far fewer people are served by either the West Highland extension to Mallaig or the Kyle of Lochalsh line, and as in Stranraer's case, the connecting ferry services that were the rationale for building these 2 lines have largely been diverted to other ports; the Kyle line's patronage will have also been affected by the opening of the Skye bridge, enabling through vehicle (including bus) travel to Portree and Uig.

Relocating the terminus to Stranraer town would surely reduce running costs, possibly increase patronage and not be particularly expensive, as would running the line as a single track siding from Barrhill to Stranraer.

If a "not particularly expensive" relocation came in at £1m (probably optimistically low), how long would it take to recover that expenditure through increased traffic and/or cost reductions from the harbour station? And what might that money do if available for something else?

In this discussion, I'm reminded of discussions of pre-Beeching closures, where people bemoan the failure to invest in new DMUs before closure, forgetting that those DMUs had to be paid for and the examples (e.g. the Banbury branch) where early success with DMUs wasn't sustained, and declining demand continued.

 

[zwk500]

If a "not particularly expensive" relocation came in at £1m (probably optimistically low), how long would it take to recover that expenditure through increased traffic and/or cost reductions from the harbour station? And what might that money do if available for something else?

Does the railway have any liabilities with regard to maintenance of the pier itself, and if so are they possible to sell off?

 

[35B]

Does the railway have any liabilities with regard to maintenance of the pier itself, and if so are they possible to sell off?

A very good question - to which I have no answer!

 

[Bill57p9]

Perhaps those living in that area can explain why the bounce back since Covid has been so weak.

Ayr Station Hotel fire (2023) and resulting withdrawal of all services south of Ayr for nearly a year will not have helped.

 

[HighlandStorm]

I suggest there'd be more need for cycle provision on a substitute bus service than for wheelchairs. Elizabeth Line users manage without toilets between Shenfield and Heathrow!

This should get an award for absurd comparisons. Where exactly between Girvan and Stranraer do you propose someone hops of the service, finds a toilet and a coffee and boards the next service in a few minutes time ?

As for not providing accessible access, is it not a requirement for all new coaches / buses?

 

[Bletchleyite]

As for not providing accessible access, is it not a requirement for all new coaches / buses?

Accessible toilets are not. With a bus being roughly half the length of a rail vehicle it's just not feasible.

 

[HighlandStorm]

Accessible toilets are not. With a bus being roughly half the length of a rail vehicle it's just not feasible.

I was referencing the comment about there being more need to carry bikes than wheelchairs.

 

[Killingworth]

I was referencing the comment about there being more need to carry bikes than wheelchairs.

I illustrated a bike that had actually come off a train at Stranraer.