On our petition, the number is steadily rising and at time of writing stands at 684 signatures. A massive thank you to all who’ve supported it so far!
Currently looking into opportunities for some Northumberland Coast Loop Merch – more news on this front soon!
A recent article in the Northumberland Gazette announced the welcome idea of new Tyne ferry services but also suggests that once again, the dualling of the A1 to the Scottish Border is proposed.
Dualling the A1 to the Scottish Border was previously put forward in a failed petition back in 2011/12 which only gained 624 signatures, the proposer, Anne-Marie Trevelyan being later elected as MP for Berwick-Upon-Tweed in 2015 and serving until 2024 when the seat was eliminated and replaced by the new North Northumberland seat.
In that time, multiple promises to dual the road have been made, with the previous one notably just days before the announcement of the 2024 General Election. The winning candidate for the new seat of North Northumberland was David Smith of Labour, who notably did not commit to dualling in his election campaign, while the previous incumbent Anne-Marie Trevelyan did.
The main opposition to dualling is the environmental cost of the scheme, with figures for just the 11 miles of dualling proposed between Morpeth and Ellingham forecast to release 1.44m tonnes of CO² over 60 years by figures from Transport Action Network
Interestingly, in another article in recent weeks, the former Berwick Upon Tweed MP Anne-Marie Trevelyan, has stated that the ‘Conservatives need to go green’ too. In the article, there is the contradiction that dualling of the A1 is obviously bad for the climate, but that it is ‘pragmatic’ to dual for ‘safety and economic reasons’.
These views are clearly contested by groups such as Space4Gosforth, which states that injuries and deaths on already dualled sections per mile are very similar to single carriageway sections, and that focussing road safety spend on only the A1 would not tackle wider road safety problems on other roads. Increased traffic potentially will add to problems already faced rather than relieving them.
Similarly, the economic case for dualling is also questionable, as the calculation of economic benefit is largely an assumption that faster travel will bring economic growth, but that may omit the fact that widened roads quickly fill to capacity again, undoing the benefit rapidly. The A19 and Tyne Tunnels are an example of this where road capacity has filled in the years since the second tunnel opened.
The failure of the above petition, plus the lack of commitment at the election for the winning candidate suggests that the political appetite to dual the route is actually quite low, and given the evidence to suggest that dualling the A1 is going to come at a high environmental and financial cost, while far from guaranteed to produce a return economically or be a safety improvement at all, then shouldn’t other options be more fully explored?
The petition for the Northumberland Coast Loop rail route, for example, has more signatories than the 624 that the ‘Dual the A1’ petition recieved, and is one just part of several wider local campaigns to improve rail services along the Northumberland Coast, so politically, investing into the East Coast Main Line (ECML) would likely gather much more support than dualling the A1.
Secondly, organisations such as East Coast Main Line Authorities (ECMA) have an Invest East Coast campaign, a consortium of cross-party local councils, combined authorities and Scottish Regional Transport Partnerships have, since 2013, stated the case for the ECML investment, as it is a rail route that connects a £800bn per year economy
Investment into the East Coast Mainline is likely to deliver a much more assured economic benefit, is based around one of the the cleanest, greenest and most sustainable modes of transport (an electrified mainline railway), with route such the Northumberland Coast Loop being potentially part of the ‘…linear network, with a wide range of services converging with, and diverging form it.’, as mentioned above.
As for branchlines, one obvious candidate for added support would be the Aln Valley Railway, which this publication, (a recent addition to the N.C.L. library after a visit to Barter Books), which aspires to connecting the very popular town of Alnwick, home to Alnwick Castle, The Alnwick Garden & Lilidorei as well as Barter Books and other small attractions to the ECML.
The Northumberland Coast Loop would be a new passenger route that would branch from the ECML between Pegswood and Morpeth by taking the Morpeth North Curve towards Bedlington, then sharing the Northumberland Line from Bedlington to Newcastle Upon Tyne, offering new, direct connections to/from SE Northumberland towns such as Blyth and Bedlington, as well as North Tyneside and major centres of business such as Cobalt Business Park (one of the largest business parks in Europe).
If you’d like to support the Northumberland Coast Loop, please add your signature to the petition here, or share this blog post via your social media.
Thanks, RH.
This recent article by the BBC talks about how a new 70 space car park behind the Ruskin Museum in Coniston could be the start of the ruination of the Lake District by paving it over; arguably destroying the picturesque landscape of the area by doing so.
Northumberland, with a less developed but growing tourism industry could fare better, if the existing public transport network was used better (i.e. more stopping services between Berwick and Newcastle as argued for by Railfuture) as well as being enhanced by new connections to allow tourism visits without cars, which means avoiding the need for car parking to be provided in the first place.
There is very much the risk that in a rush to accomodate tourism, Northumberland could lose it’s very appeal by being paved over for parking, when realistic alternatives are very much available.
The Invest East Coast group of cross-party local authorities sets out the case for continued investment in this route, with 1/3 of the UK population within 20 minutes of an ECML station, and the route corridor accounting for 47% of the UK’S economic output.
Some of the plans are already in place, for example the connecting bus to Chathill station announced recently is a very welcome step forward, but two trains a day is still a fairly poor service when an hourly service was proven possible.
New stations at Belford, to serve major attractions such as Bamburgh, voted the Best Seaside Destination in the UK for four years running, and Beal, again with this station serving a potential market of 800,000 who visit Lindisfarne (Holy Island) each year, could all help to drive car-free or even cae-light tourism on the beautiful Northumberland Coast.
Reconnecting the Aln Valley Railway to Alnmouth (for Alnwick) station would similarly give the town of Alnwick, home to Alnwick Castle (350,000 visitors a year), The Alnwick Garden & Lilidorei (working towards 8 million visitors with the Garden passing 7 million in 2022), the highly popular Barter Books and many more smaller attractions improved access, which could be boosted in the shorter term by a dedicated bus link similar to the Northumberland Line. The Arriva X15 is touted as part of the existing ‘Bus Meets Train’ branding, but this could be made even better for such a popular tourist town in Northumberland?
The Northumberland Coast Loop could very much play a part in this: the Port of Tyne recently announced the 25th anniversary of the cruise terminal, with a record of 61 ships bringing 164,000 visitors to the port for onward destinations; why not use rail to get tourists to their destinations quickly and comfortably?
The soon to be completed Northumberland Park station would be the nearest mainline station to the dock, and could offer direct connections to destinations in Northumberland to both the north and the west along the East Coast Main Line (ECML) and Tyne Valley Line respectively, as well as allowing travel from populated urban centres like SE Northumberland and North Tyneside to directly travel to North Northumberland too.
If you’d like to support the Northumberland Coast Loop, please do so via the petition here, already signed by 681 at the time of writing.
Let Northumberland not mirror the mistakes made in the Lake District and make better use of the public transport network.
This BBC article about the vicar of Holy Island (Lindisfarne) being on a mission to turn the tide raises a few interesting issues.
Firstly, the annual visitor figures are up to an astounding 800,000 per year, with most presumably arriving by car at present, and causing issues as the island is so small, as the article says, you cannot really drive around on it.
One proposed solution to this is a park and ride facility being built on the mainland, but surely this would also work hand-in-hand with the long suggested reopening of Beal Station (Railfuture), which could allow both arrivals by car and by rail to feed into bus services to and from Lindisfarne?
The reopening of the station, alongside the building of a park and ride could be potentially combined with replacing Beal level crossing following an incident on 21st August 2024 (ITV News), where the tailback of traffic became stuck on the causeway.
With visitor numbers as high as this, reopening Beal station could have a potentially strong case, and would feed into the wider case for better local rail services on the northern section of East Coast Mainline between Newcastle and Berwick to serve these increasingly busy tourism areas (as the recent blog post about Chathill mentioned).
Richard Bowker, one of the podcast hosts was joined by John Smith, CEO of GBRf on part of the route in Scotland, discussing a broad picture of this particular service, as well as the broader picture of railfreight in Scotland and wider UK, well worth a watch (as ever of this interesting and informative podcast).
For the Northumberland Coast Loop proposal, this freight run is of particular interest as it uses the vast majority of the route, by ‘starting’ at Bedlington Sidings (where it has run around after coming from North Blyth), passing along the Hepscott Line, then heading towards Fort William by taking the Morpeth North Curve and joining the East Coast Main Line (ECML) near Pegswood on it’s way north.
For passenger services, the intention of the Northumberland Coast Loop would be for these services to begin at Newcastle Central, take the soon to open Northumberland Line as far as Bedlington, and then following this currently freight only route along the Hepscott Line, join the ECML near Pegswood and run north.
N.C L. local service: Calling at all stations en-route between Berwick-Upon-Tweed and Newcastle-Upon Tyne via Bedlington, providing stronger ‘within Northumberland’ connectivity, and building upon recent bus improvements announced to places like Chathill and the proposal to also reopen Belford Station to drive modal shift of people away from cars and onto rail to access North Northumberland, which is a popular day-out destination from South East Northumberland and North Tyneside, which the N.C.L. route could help serve.
N.C.L. Semi-fast service: A longer distance service (i.e. Edinburgh – Newcastle or points beyond) could also run via this route, but calling at only two stations, which would be Northumberland Park in North Tyneside, and Blyth Bebside in Northumberland.
This service could serve a much wider market of travel to, from, and within Northumberland by making rapid, direct links possible to many areas of the UK.
Taking Blyth Bebside station as an example, it is very well located to serve not only the town of Blyth (largest in Northumberland), but is arguably also well located to also serve Cramlington, Bedlington, and also Ashington by onward connections by both bus and rail to these towns, as well as a location just off the A189 Spine Road.
Compared to using Morpeth Railway station, which isn’t always easy to reach via public transport, is too distant for reasonable active travel access and constrained for car parking; Blyth Bebside is closer to reach by walking/cycling, is situated very close to the Cowpen Road route into Blyth which is already a major bus route, and the A189 plus large car park make it more suited to those that need to travel by car to reach the station.
A wider range of rail services could be a massive economic boost to Blyth, which would be a good fit with the £90m ‘Energising Blyth’ programme, which seeks to ‘Create 7,500 jobs, 5,000 learning opportunities, and attract over 100,000 extra visitors to Blyth each year.‘, and ‘Improve walking and cycling routes and connections to public transport networks, making it easier to travel to and from Blyth.’
Both of the above aims would be supported by the Northumberland Coast Loop route for both local and long distance services, which could help Blyth (and surrounding areas achieve becoming a ‘…thriving UK and international centre of renewable energy and advanced manufacturing growth and innovation, providing new jobs, better skills, more homes, and a clean environment for people in the town and the wider North East region.‘.
The N.C.L petition continues to perform well too, with 662 signatures to date, and if you haven’t signed already, please do so!
The picture below shows Class 66 (66301) hauling the regular North Blyth to Fort William ‘Alcan’ tanks (filled with Alumina at Port of Blyth and taken to the Alvance smelter near Fort William) along the Morpeth North Curve which links the Hepscott Line between Bedlington and Morpeth to the East Coast Main Line.
This freight starts from the Port of Blyth, reverses in the sidings at Bedlington, then takes the Hepscott Line towards Morpeth, but then diverges onto the Morpeth North Curve to take a direct path towards Pegswood and the north, passing through stations such as Alnmouth, Berwick Upon Tweed, Reston, Dunbar and on to Edinburgh and beyond.
The Northumberland Coast Loop proposes that passenger services could follow a similar route, starting at Newcastle and taking the soon to open Northumberland Line route as far as Bedlington, the services could then take the branch westwards at Bedlington (the Hepscott Line), and following this freight path, access the ECML facing northwards toward Berwick Upon Tweed, which means a direct link between Berwick and Blyth by rail could be realised.
As my constituency MP, I have already proposed this connection to David Smith, newly elected MP for North Northumberland, as well as this ongoing petition to Glen Sanderson, leader of Northumberland County Council which at time of writing has 658 signatures.
If you’d like to see this route as one of the next expansions of the Northumberland Line, please contact your local MP, County Councillors and Town/Parish Councils to offer your support, as well as signing the petition above.
Thanks, RH.
Station Updates (Northumberland Line project)
A new ‘fly through’ video of Bedlington has just been released by NorthumberlandTV (YouTube Channel) which shows the final plans for Bedlington Station, and the complexity of the site between a junction at the northern end and a level crossing on the southern end.
There is also an update on the Northumberland Line website about the recent Bedlington Station drop-in event, with some of the Q&A on the evening quoted to give added info.
Northumberland Coast Loop proposals
With the forthcoming ‘Railway 200’ celebrations for the 200th anniversary of the Stockton and Darlington Railway (one of the railways seen as the beginning of the ‘modern era’ of rail technology, with railways themselves dating back to at least Ancient Greece), hopefully Bedlington Station will be completed fairly early in 2025 to showcase its important role 200 years ago.
As stated in a previous post for a ‘Railway Quarter’ in Bedlington, the town, and particularly the ironworks/engineworks in Blyth Valley was where a pivotal development in rail technology took place; with the malleable iron rail by John Birkinshaw being patented.
This new rail was vastly superior to the cast iron ‘fishbellied’ rails that had gone before, and George Stephenson recognised this and against his own investment and interests in in cast iron rail making, adopted the malleable iron rail for the S&D, being used for about 2/3rds of the whole length of the line (sourced from the Friends of the S&D).
Building of locomotives in the Blyth Valley was also a major enterprise, with the first locomotives in the Netherlands (‘De Arend‘) and Italy (‘Vesuvio’ and ‘Bayard‘) all Bedlington built locomotives, and perhaps R.B. Longridge could claim the title of the most northerly loco builder in England?
There is also the Gooch family, most notably Sir Daniel Gooch who was locomotive engineer to Sir Isambard Kingdom Brunel, and is recorded as selecting Swindon as the location of the works for the Great Western Railway, but many members of his family were heavily involved in railway history.
Could bi-mode GWR 800004 ‘Sir Daniel Gooch’ possibly traverse the route on a special service, or would LNER consider also naming one of their bi-mode units ‘Sir Daniel Gooch’ too?
With the Northumberland Line due to fully complete in 2025, co-inciding with this major anniversary, could there be scope to offer regular services from further afield (esp at weekends, bank holidays etc) to showcase this often overlooked but important place in railway history?
The Northumberland Coast Loop could allow for a Newcastle – Edinburgh service to pass directly over the Blyth Valley where the works was located, and if stopping trains were enabled at either Blyth Bebside or Bedlington, they could offer a tourism gain for the area with visiting fans of industrial heritage, and fittingly, bring them in via a newly reopened railway?
Please click here to view the Bedlington Station Fly Through video from NorthumberlandTV.
Bedlington is due to open in 2025, after Northumberland Line services begin in December 2024.
Hopefully Bedlington will open before September 2025, as Bedlington Ironworks played an important role in the fledgling Stockton and Darlington Railway by providing about two-thirds of the rails used for the line, so should be an important part of the overall celebration of the S&D in my view, and the Northumberland Coast Loop could allow for railtours and other special trains to pass very close to the site of the Ironworks, and help provide a tourism boost to the area too as part of this widely recognised ‘Railway 200‘?
On the last day of my family holiday, a short trip was made to Marshall Meadows to visit the border crossing sign (a long-time personal intention finally crossed off), and also a visit to Berwick Station for the first time in many years.
The photos were taken across both the Sunday and Monday at Berwick, as an early morning Sunday walk meant the station wasn’t actually open to access the platforms.
The primary reason for visiting was to capture a new video, which you can view here, and features the front end of this HST-shaped planter on the northbound platform at Berwick…
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…which has a nice sense of circularity to it, as the ‘Craigentinny 100’ branding on the real HST, hauling the ‘Bound for Craigy’ railtour back in 2017 was a big part of the inspiration for the Northumberland Coast Loop in the first place.
With the petition now at 650 signatures, lets hope that the Northumberland Coast Loop can soon become a reality!
As of 11th August 2024, the Northumberland Coast Loop petition has just reached 650 signatures since starting in October 2023.
The aim of this petition is to use the Hepscott Line as one of the next expansions of the Northumberland Line beyond the soon to open Newcastle – Ashington route.
This route is advantageous by track already being in place, and used regularly for freight; and offering a direct potential connection from South East Northumberland, and North Tyneside to North Northumberland (Alnmouth (for Alnwick), Berwick-Upon-Tweed and more), and into Scotland.
The route wouldn’t require any additional stations to be built, just to utilise the existing link between the Northumberland Line at Bedlington, and the East Coast Main Line at Pegswood.
This short link should be a relatively simple, fast to implement, and cost-effective route to make use of, providing much better connectivity both within Northumberland and to/from wider UK.
A recent stay in Berwick-Upon-Tweed confirmed the underlying movement of people along the route, with the owner of a neighbouring caravan travelling regularly from their home on the coast in North Tyneside to their caravan in Berwick, probably a trip made mostly by road at present, but a more direct rail service (i.e. Northumberland Park to Berwick-Upon-Tweed) could make modal shift much more easy and convenient, the same being true for other major parks such as Haggerston Castle, a VERY common destination for families from South East Northumberland.
If you support this route, please give the above petition your signature and hopefully make it a reality in the very near future.
The Northumberland Coast Loop