News from the East Anglian Branch of Railfuture, Edited by Martin Thorne and Jerry Alderson.
Railfuture News Snippets 364 - 30/07/2023
Transport for London announced in July 2023 that it had decided to go ahead with the abolition of the TravelCard add-on from 2024, which it believes will bring more desperately-needed money to TfL (caused by its failure to reach agreement with government). Railfuture has strongly campaigned against this (as had other gorups), and its press release was picked up by Rail Business Daily on 19th May 2023 in an article.
On Friday 14th July 2023 LNER ran a successful 'verification' run between Finsbury Park and Liverpool Street, which is part of wider aspirations to get passengers ot and from London (as opposed to 'dumping' them at Peterbrough, St Neots or Stevneage) if Network Rail has closed the line.and doing the right thing for the passenger. This is the kind of flexibility that Railfuture has long been calling for, not least after an occaison when Finsbury Park station was in chaos and was the lead time on the TV news programmes, all because it could not cope with so many passengers terminating there.
England's Economic Heartland (EEH) will be staging its free-to-attend annual conference at Cambridge Guildhall on Wednesday 1st November 2023. Register at https://www.englandseconomicheartland.com/eeh-conference-2023/.
At Whitwell & Reepham Station in Mid-Norfolk on Saturday 5th and Sunday 6th August 2023 there wil be a Summer Fayre, which promises a fun-filled weekend of family entertainment. There will be stalls selling a variety of goods, traction engines, a Beer & Gin Festival, children's entertainment, and train rides. Entry is free and there will be food and refreshments available on site. Gates open at 10am both days, and the Fayre will be open until late on Saturday night.
On Saturday 9th September 2023 UK Railtours will run its 'Anglian Angel' train which will venture onto the trackwork at Potter group in Ely. The train will start from Peterborough, calling at Stevenage, Potters Bar, Finsbury Park and Liverpool Street &mbash; the train will take the same route from Finsbury Park to Liverpool Street as mentioned in the LNER 'verification' run above.
RAIL FREIGHT
New rail freight flow of aggregates from Port of Lowestoft to Whitemoor
Keywords: [LowestoftPort]
On Thursday 27th July 2023 GB Railfreight ran a train from Whitemoor Yard, in March, to Lowestoft, with a a rake of empty wagons. Within minutes work started to fill the wagons with aggregates for its return journey. This was the first run of a new railfreight flow from the Port of Lowestoft of aggregates brought in by sea from Norway, thanks to the efforts of Intermodality UK to help facilitate it. The freight sidings were laid back in February 2019.
TRAIN OPERATORS
Greater Anglia's holds 'Environmental Awareness Event' at Cambridge station
Keywords: [GreaterAnglia]
On 14th July 2023 Greater Anglia (GA) held an 'Environmental Awareness Event' at Cambridge station to showcase its efforts towards sending any waste to landfill and to recycle more, with the assistance of its waste contractor, Veolia, which manages the routes its skip lorries take to ensure they travel the shortest possible distance when collecting the waste.
Every six months over 820 tonnes of waste (e.g. food waste, paper cups, newspapers and even metal, wood and rubber) are collected from Greater Anglia's trains, stations, depots, and offices. Greater Anglia has its own segregation centre, based in Essex, where waste is sorted and almost 60% of waste is recycled with the rest being used for 'energy conversion' where the waste is incinerated to generate electricity. GA says that its recycling figures are as high as 96.7% at Norwich, whilst no waste from Cambridge station has been sent to landfill for the last two years as food waste is composted or used in energy recovery
GUIDED BUSWAY
Two people injured after car and bus crash at Cambridgeshre Guided Busway junction
When the history books cover the Cambridgeshre Guided Busway they wlll have no shortage of incidents to include. The latest occurred on the afternoon of Monday 31st July 2023 when a car and bus crashed at the guided busway junction with Gatehouse Lane in Histon. Two people were injured but not seriously. The bus had to be recovered after the crash.
News: https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/two-people-injured-after-car-27438019.
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Railfuture East Anglia Branch News Snippets 364 - 30/07/2023
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