Why doesn't Ripon have a train line towards Harrogate or York?

[SuspectUsual]

The biggest surprise to me is that North Yorkshire has a transport plan!

It's really simple. One page, "buy a car" in big letters

 

[RT4038]

It's really simple. One page, "buy a car" in big letters

i.e. what the vast majority of residents want.

 

[Killingworth]

It was sad to see the demise of branch line railways, something that was increasingly inevitable as the 20th Century progressed.

In 1900 most freight moved by rail, except round the coasts. Like hundreds of stations Ripon's heydays will have been before WW1 but largely unappreciated until after WW2. People like Beeching, Marples and Serpel are blamed for the losses but they were increasingly inevitable as we craved the independence and flexibility of our own cars. Alongside that army surplus trucks after WW1 and WW2, with many former services drivers to drive them took wagon load freight, far more flexible than shunting railway trucks around the country.

It's a miracle so much railway has survived. Very substantial parts of it are basically still as built in Victorian times and need large amounts of capital expenditure just to keep them running at all. Diverting multi millions, collectively billions, into reopening lines to places like Ripon make minimal business sense.

We can't electrify what tracks we still have to places like Swansea, Bristol, Sheffield, Nottingham and Hull. Old embankments, cuttings and tunnels need constant attention - and all that vegetation growing where it shouldn't!

The Beeching/Serpell era didn't just close branch lines. It lead to removal of surplus track mileage to reduce maintenance costs. No doubt most were good ideas at the time. I suspect many older readers will recall bits that were removed near them that would be useful to have replaced today - and more use to the modern network than little branch lines.

My favourite restoration would be to restore 4 tracks fom Dore into Sheffield. The original 2 were quadrupled in 1904 but by the 1970s they'd been reduced back to 2, those tracks slewed and bridge spans removed. Those 2 are now a bottleneck causing hold ups to services from Edinburgh to Penzance, Liverpool to Norwich and knock-on impacts across the nation. Will it happen? No. Even a bi-directional 3rd track with some effective 4 track sections for loops may not happen - or reconfiguring Sheffield station to increase capacity.

There isn't the money to provide enough rolling stock for the services we have now on the their current congested paths to justify building a a new line to Ripon. Certainly not with frequent services to compete with buses that get nearer to where more people want to go, albeit more slowly.

 

[yorksrob]

The closure programme in the 1960's was, and continues to be a national bane.

Up until the late 1960's there was no attempt to make economies. The only recognised justification for objecting to a closure in law was the rather woolly concept of "hardship" which could be overturned by the Minister at the drop of a hat.

Be ever vigilant. Sadly there's always a threat, even to today's moth-eaten network.

 

[yoyothehobo]

It was sad to see the demise of branch line railways, something that was increasingly inevitable as the 20th Century progressed.

In 1900 most freight moved by rail, except round the coasts. Like hundreds of stations Ripon's heydays will have been before WW1 but largely unappreciated until after WW2. People like Beeching, Marples and Serpel are blamed for the losses but they were increasingly inevitable as we craved the independence and flexibility of our own cars. Alongside that army surplus trucks after WW1 and WW2, with many former services drivers to drive them took wagon load freight, far more flexible than shunting railway trucks around the country.

It's a miracle so much railway has survived. Very substantial parts of it are basically still as built in Victorian times and need large amounts of capital expenditure just to keep them running at all. Diverting multi millions, collectively billions, into reopening lines to places like Ripon make minimal business sense.

We can't electrify what tracks we still have to places like Swansea, Bristol, Sheffield, Nottingham and Hull. Old embankments, cuttings and tunnels need constant attention - and all that vegetation growing where it shouldn't!

The Beeching/Serpell era didn't just close branch lines. It lead to removal of surplus track mileage to reduce maintenance costs. No doubt most were good ideas at the time. I suspect many older readers will recall bits that were removed near them that would be useful to have replaced today - and more use to the modern network than little branch lines.

My favourite restoration would be to restore 4 tracks fom Dore into Sheffield. The original 2 were quadrupled in 1904 but by the 1970s they'd been reduced back to 2, those tracks slewed and bridge spans removed. Those 2 are now a bottleneck causing hold ups to services from Edinburgh to Penzance, Liverpool to Norwich and knock-on impacts across the nation. Will it happen? No. Even a bi-directional 3rd track with some effective 4 track sections for loops may not happen - or reconfiguring Sheffield station to increase capacity.

There isn't the money to provide enough rolling stock for the services we have now on the their current congested paths to justify building a a new line to Ripon. Certainly not with frequent services to compete with buses that get nearer to where more people want to go, albeit more slowly.

This 100%, we would likely have a lot more railway, with marginally more income and a lot more cost.

If the network had limped past the 60s, would it make it beyond the 70s? the 80s? the 90s? Cars and trucks became a lot better in that time period as did roads. That was the way of the world, the same way people moved away from the canal to the railway. They dont expect there to be a need to go back. We are also at a point in the existence of a lot of the earthworks in that they are massively life expired. The railway has a finite budget to deal with a lot of problematic assets and the coming years will require hard decisions for routes to be made looking at the effect of climate change.

The closure programme in the 1960's was, and continues to be a national bane.

Up until the late 1960's there was no attempt to make economies. The only recognised justification for objecting to a closure in law was the rather woolly concept of "hardship" which could be overturned by the Minister at the drop of a hat.

Be ever vigilant. Sadly there's always a threat, even to today's moth-eaten network.

No, it is self flagellation for rail enthusiasts who refuse to acknowledge the real world and who think the railway of the 1960s was ever imperfect or inefficient or was ever going to change.

 

[yorksrob]

This 100%, we would likely have a lot more railway, with marginally more income and a lot more cost.

If the network had limped past the 60s, would it make it beyond the 70s? the 80s? the 90s? Cars and trucks became a lot better in that time period as did roads. That was the way of the world, the same way people moved away from the canal to the railway. They dont expect there to be a need to go back. We are also at a point in the existence of a lot of the earthworks in that they are massively life expired. The railway has a finite budget to deal with a lot of problematic assets and the coming years will require hard decisions for routes to be made looking at the effect of climate change.


No, it is self flagellation for rail enthusiasts who refuse to acknowledge the real world and who think the railway of the 1960s was ever imperfect or inefficient or was ever going to change.

Absolute nonsense.

A read of Beeching's own re-shaping report shows that routes such as York - Beverley could have been made to cover their costs through rationalisation.

That this wasn't considered was entirely a political choice by Beeching/Marples/Fraser etc.

 

[NCT]

This 100%, we would likely have a lot more railway, with marginally more income and a lot more cost.

If the network had limped past the 60s, would it make it beyond the 70s? the 80s? the 90s? Cars and trucks became a lot better in that time period as did roads. That was the way of the world, the same way people moved away from the canal to the railway. They dont expect there to be a need to go back. We are also at a point in the existence of a lot of the earthworks in that they are massively life expired. The railway has a finite budget to deal with a lot of problematic assets and the coming years will require hard decisions for routes to be made looking at the effect of climate change.


No, it is self flagellation for rail enthusiasts who refuse to acknowledge the real world and who think the railway of the 1960s was ever imperfect or inefficient or was ever going to change.

Absolutely correct.

Absolute nonsense.

A read of Beeching's own re-shaping report shows that routes such as York - Beverley could have been made to cover their costs through rationalisation.

That this wasn't considered was entirely a political choice by Beeching/Marples/Fraser etc.

All other European countries had Beeching equivalents. A cursory glance on Openrailwaymap will show Britain's experience was nothing out of the ordinary.

 

[yorksrob]

Absolutely correct.



All other European countries had Beeching equivalents. A cursory glance on Openrailwaymap will show Britain's experience was nothing out of the ordinary.

We're not beholden to foreign countries experiences.

There were many initiatives to rationalise secondary routes later on in the 1960's/70's - East Suffolk, Marshlink etc.

That these weren't tried earlier was a political choice. Remember, Dr Beeching was a more hawkish member of the Stedeford committee who was chosen by the dodgy Marples to reshape the railway to his requirements.

As I say, it was a political choice.

The labour Government in 1964 won on a manifesto on reviewing the Beeching cuts. It did this eventually, albeit far too little, too late.

 

[NCT]

We're not beholden to foreign countries experiences.

The UK doesn't exist in a vacuum.

 

[yorksrob]

The UK doesn't exist in a vacuum.

It doesn't, but we have (and had in the 1960's) the ability to decide our transport policy.

 

[NCT]

It doesn't, but we have (and had in the 1960's) the ability to decide our transport policy.

Every European country was subjected to the same macroeconomic changes. That everyone went through the same experience suggests either we were all right or we were all wrong.

 

[Dr Hoo]

Absolute nonsense.

A read of Beeching's own re-shaping report shows that routes such as York - Beverley could have been made to cover their costs through rationalisation.

That this wasn't considered was entirely a political choice by Beeching/Marples/Fraser etc.

Please ‘show your workings’ in relation to York-Beverley. Bear in mind that it had loads of level crossings that hadn’t been modernised.

In fairness to Ernest Marples and Dr B it’s worth noting that Automatic Half Barriers were rolled out during their tenure (but largely on lines that had better prospects).

 

[yorksrob]

Please ‘show your workings’ in relation to York-Beverley. Bear in mind that it had loads of level crossings that hadn’t been modernised.

In fairness to Ernest Marples and Dr B it’s worth noting that Automatic Half Barriers were rolled out during their tenure (but largely on lines that had better prospects).

I did that about fifteen years ago on this forum. The workings are there to see in the report.

Automatic crossings were apparently rolled out to York - Beverly aswell, but they were never installed due to Beeching.

 

[HSTEd]

I agree that some routes could have been saved by resort to early rationalisation. As an example, probably big chunks of the GCML could have been saved by two car Derby lightweights and paytrain.

Even leaving aside whether the unions will wear such rationalisation before the trauma of Beeching showed them the alternative...... given that incomes were still falling at the time of the Beeching report, it seems unlikely that very much more would have survived into the modern era.

Income kept bottoming out well into the 1980s, just because it could cover its costs in 1964 does not mean it will do so in 1974 or 1984. A sprawling mass of tracks haemorrhaging money into the 1980s is just going to get a Serpell report that looks like Beeching at best. The sacrifices of the Beeching report saved a hard core of the railway that was better able to navigate the political-economic challenges of the 1970s and 1980s.

 

[yorksrob]

I agree that some routes could have been saved by resort to early rationalisation. As an example, probably big chunks of the GCML could have been saved by two car Derby lightweights and paytrain.

But given that incomes were still falling at the time of the Beeching report, it seems unlikely that very much more would have survived into the modern era.

Income kept bottoming out well into the 1990s, just because it could cover its costs in 1964 does not mean it will do so in 1974 or 1984. A sprawling mass of tracks haemorrhaging money into the 1980s is just going to get a Serpell report that looks like Beeching at best. The sacrifices of the Beeching report saved a hard core of the railway that was better able to navigate the political-economic challenges of the 1970s and 1980s.

Or it could be said that politically cuts to 1980's network were due to political and transport necessities during the 1980's.

Had a larger network made it through to the 1980's, those same political and transport necessities would have had the same proportional effect on the larger network, leading to a larger overall network than that left from the disastrous Beeching programme.

 

[Killingworth]

But we are now in 2026, heading towards the 2030s. Whatever the riights and wrongs of the 1950-90s period that's gone, as has 2000-25.

Nostalgia is only constructive if it channels past experience in conjunction with realistic examination of where we are going now, and how.

The Elizabeth line is a success but it cost a lot. Will the TRU be seen in a similar light once complete? But I digress. Ripon is a diversion of effort and attention from more boring and mundane projects with greater benefits for the future railway network.

 

[Dr Hoo]

I did that about fifteen years ago on this forum. The workings are there to see in the report.

Automatic crossings were apparently rolled out to York - Beverly aswell, but they were never installed due to Beeching.

The Reshaping Report analysis concluded that the ‘financial improvement’ was ‘over half of the total direct expenses’ (Page 99)! Worth bearing in mind that the irregular York-Hull service tied up no fewer than than four units+crews during the morning shift. Meanwhile the increase in car ownership and changes in holidaying habits were continuing to leech away at the revenue base.

Although the route had at one stage been seen as a pilot scheme for Centralised Traffic Control I’ve never seen any serious evidence that the project was actually being implemented (apart from delivery of generic components such as cable troughing).

I have never heard that there was a ‘rollout’ of automatic crossings. Source, please.

Meanwhile, back at Ripon, this was another case where a superficially attractive peak service but an appalling off-peak one also tied up multiple sets of resources at some times of day.

 

[Bahnopa]

I did that about fifteen years ago on this forum. The workings are there to see in the report.

Automatic crossings were apparently rolled out to York - Beverly aswell, but they were never installed due to Beeching.

The only crossing on the York-Beverley route that was actually modernised was at Warthill (aka Stockton on the Forest) which received lifting barriers and traffic lights worked from the signal box. Photo from the book 'Hudson's Way' by Stephen Chapman.