Reopening Ironbridge to Birmingham line 'a golden opportunity'
Reopening a railway linking Ironbridge and Birmingham is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to improve transport links to an internationally-renowned destination, a councillor has said.
Nicola Lowery, borough councillor for the Ironbridge Gorge, says she intends to discuss the proposal with the development company Harworth Group, which recently bought the Ironbridge power station site for an undisclosed sum.
She says she is working with Telford's MP Lucy Allan, who has also put her weight behind the campaign to reopen the railway as part of the work on the power station site.
Ms Allan says it will help preserve the area's heritage through regeneration and support tourism.
She is also writing to the Harworth Group and Network Rail to express her support for the initiative and offer her help.
Councillor Lowery said: "Initial conversations with those interested in utilising the existing rail infrastructure have been received positively by the new buyer Harworth and we understand a strategic meeting regarding the rail is being established to discuss the proposals for the site.
"The reintroduction of rail into the site is also an area I will be discussing with Harworth at our forthcoming meeting later this month.
"The regeneration of the former Ironbridge power station presents a golden opportunity to unlock the full potential of this unique site and to ensure an innovative mixed-use regeneration scheme that will hopefully provide an opportunity to expand our tourism destination and sustainably expand our physical and social infrastructure.
"The support received from our MP for Telford, Lucy Allan, has been greatly welcomed as it is important as local representatives we champion this once in a lifetime opportunity to improve our sustainable transport links to our destination that is internationally renowned."
Harworth spokesman Iain Thomson said: "We’ll only be determining what the masterplan for the site could look like once we’ve undertaken further due diligence this summer and once we’ve undertaken the first round of stakeholder consultation workshops in the autumn."
The developer plans to build “several hundred” homes on the 350-acre site, and will utilise parts of the area for commercial and leisure uses.
Councillor Eric Carter, who is chairman of the Marches Strategic Rail Group and borough councillor for Newport South and East, also made a call for the move last month, saying it would be “foolish” to ignore the chance to reconnect the line.
He said it would be a "massive boost" to the Gorge.
He said the line could link to a park and ride facility into Ironbridge itself, cutting down on the amount of people driving into the area.
The line has been used for passengers from Birmingham to Ironbridge in the past.
On May 27, 1979 the first train to Coalbrookdale from Birmingham ran as part of the Ironbridge bicentenary programme.
It was the first time there had been a scheduled passenger train along the line since 1962.
