South Western Railway (SWR) has ‘reworked’ its proposed timetable for the end of this year, following concerns raised during its public consultation.
The train operator launched a public consultation between September and December last year to gather feedback on its December 2018 timetable proposals.
The consultation focused on west of Southampton to Weymouth services, and involved passengers, councils, MPs, user groups and travel partners, with SWR planning to use the information to shape its final timetable proposals.
A new report published by SWR has revealed some of the key issues raised by respondents and how the train operator plans to address this.
There were concerns that direct trains between Weymouth and London Waterloo would be halved. In the report it says residents wanted to see more, not fewer direct services to London and that they felt journey time saving doesn’t warrant the loss of a whole direct train.
In response, SWR said: “We have reworked the timetable and will maintain two direct services at the loss of some, but not all, of the journey time saving. We estimate the journey time reduction to be an average of 10 minutes quicker for the faster train in each hour between Weymouth and London.”
There were also concerns that direct services to the capital from Upwey and Moreton would be discontinued altogether. This means passengers from these stations would have to get the new Portsmouth stopping train and change at Southampton.
However, the train operator says: “We proposed a second slower Weymouth service that will call at these stations to ensure a direct service to and from Waterloo all-day.”
The reports adds that these stations will be served by one service per hour in both the London and Weymouth directions.
SWR also proposes that one of the retained two direct services between London and Weymouth divides each hour at Southampton Central to allow ‘connectivity to be retained’ and to improve ‘end to end journey times.’
Councillor Colin Huckle, spokesman for transport at Weymouth and Portland Borough Council, (WPBC) said he is pleased with the result of the consultation.
He explained: “I am very pleased that South Western Railway has taken on board the comments which I as briefholder proposed to WPBC, which was agreed, and many local people supported.”
He added that ‘public opinion has provided a successful outcome’ and that ‘as far as Weymouth and this area are concerned’ the local economy will continue to ‘benefit’ from people visiting the town and using the train service.
The community has told of its delighted at the results of the timetable consultation.
Terry Putnam, a member of Friends of Upwey Station, said: “We are delighted because we are retaining one train to London every hour from Upwey and two trains from Weymouth.
“They are not continuing with the alterations they talked about with a train to Portsmouth, so things will stay the same with very little different.
“We are absolutely delighted because we thought it was a potty idea. I take my hat off to SWR because they did this huge consultation and had thousands of people send in comments.
“The people have spoken, and we are really surprised and delighted they have taken what people wanted on board.”
Article originally appeared on Dorset Echo
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