The budget of the Wiltshire Council has been decided for the year 2009/2010 but the public meeting of the West Wiltshire Rail Users Group, on 22nd April in Trowbridge gave the opportunity for the public to question the attitudes to sustainable transport of councillors standing in the June elections for the four main parties.

It was encouraging to hear Fleur de Rhe Philipe, Conservative Party, advise that £25,000 was in the budget for the preparation of a business case for the Trans Wilts line from Salisbury to Swindon through Melksham. Officers are writing a brief for the consultants who will work in conjunction with First Great Western. The business case will examine the potential patronage, believed to be at least 300 passengers each day with a two hourly service. The current track will take a two hourly service but to be more frequent, would require substantial infrastructure improvements at a cost. Currently First Great Western do not have any spare rolling stock with which the service could operate but there is a possibility that from December 2009 there may be some suitable rolling stock available.

Wiltshire is a rural county and the Council has a responsibility to ensure that most villages have at least a bus service as few villages are served by trains. The public continually demand improved highways as their top priority and so priority is given to expenditure to achieve this demand but an improved rail service could improve the economy of the County. Unfortunately with this year receiving an increase of just 1.6% from the Government, it means that Wiltshire is one of the worst funded counties in the country. Recently two services have been the subject of an announcement by First Bus that they are no longer economic to operate and the County has had to find unbudgeted funds to support these services with operators to ensure that the villages concerned continue to receive a bus service.

The Westbury By-pass is a thorny issue but the West Wiltshire Trading Estate and the business community require the by-pass to improve the reliability of road transport and to provide a huge benefit to the economy of the district. The existing road network discourages companies from investing in west Wiltshire.

The Green Party approach was completely different in that Ellie Crouch, a car-less person, said that her party would improve the facilities for cyclists with a network of cycle paths linking all of the west Wiltshire towns and areas of employment, schools and shopping. Cyclists should have to not battle with lorries, cars and other road traffic. Maps in booklets such as resident’s guides should show cycle and footpaths where currently little is shown other than roads. The Wiltshire Council should take a lead in promoting cycling as an alternative to gridlock on expensive roads. Buses are expensive but trains are cheaper and public transport at reasonable cost is essential for social inclusion as those without their own car require public transport. Nationally the Green Party stands for nationalisation of the railways including the rolling stock companies as their charges for the hire of rolling stock are too high. Local rail services should be supported with funding and there should be a greater tie up of buses and trains connecting at railway stations.

The Wiltshire Council should protect rail lines where there is a low patronage, commit funding for three years after which, if successful, the Department for Transport will take over the service and force the train operating company to continue its operation but within its franchise.

Sean Semple for the Labour Party understood that there was a demand for an improved rail service from Melksham to Swindon for shopping trips and also his party nationally would like to nationalise the railways. Public transport should be affordable to the user and reliable if people are to make use of it. Many parts of Wiltshire are only accessible by private car and whilst it was ideal to have a ten minute public transport frequency on all routes, the practical approach meant that it was not possible for everyone in the County to have access to public transport to travel to everywhere they may wish to go. The Westbury By-pass had been discussed for thirty or forty years. He liked the resident parking arrangement in Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight where between 1pm and 2pm resident only parking is permitted which makes it easier for parking restriction enforcement.

The last speaker was Jeff Osborn of the Liberal Democrat Party who said that the £25,000 in the budget for the creation of a business case for the Melksham line was very welcome but it should have been implemented years ago. He gave a resume of the Melksham train frequency since 2001 when it had been hoped to increase the frequency from five trains a day whereas it was cut to two. The Heart of Wessex markets that line but First Great Western have not marketed the Melksham line. Wiltshire supports highways and has a reasonable relationship with the bus operators, but found that it was impossible to penetrate the train companies and Network Rail. The County should appoint an Officer with rail knowledge and expertise so that the County can better understand as to how the railway industry works. New stations had been proposed for Wilton as a Park & Ride and alongside the White Horse Business Park but nothing had come to fruition.

The real time bus project Salisbury to Bath, for which the County had £2M of Government funding, had floundered due to no monitoring of the scheme having been implemented. The County was now employing an IT specialist to turn round this potentially useful scheme to encourage people to travel by bus.

A lively question and answer session covered subjects as bus subsidies, the Westbury By-pass, residential parking, the air pollution of Bradford on Avon. A question asking for the three wish list projects were answered by Fleur with the Westbury By-pass, Yarnbrook By-pass and dualling of the Chippenham By-pass, by Ellie by more trains to Melksham integration of buses and trains and an integrated cycle network, by Sean with resident parking schemes, resolving the Bradford air pollution problem and integration of public transport and Jeff in favour of Westbury By-pass, Yarnbrook By-pass (not in favour of the Chippenham duelling) and an improved rail service to Melksham. The successful evening ended on the sombre note of is it cheaper to subsidise public transport now or face the future cost to meet climate change obligations.

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