Great Western

Work on the Great Western RUS started in March 2008. We published a Draft for Consultation was published in September 2009, consultation closed in November 2009 and we published the final RUS on 1st March 2010.

The Strategy covers services from London Paddington to Cardiff; to Penzance; the Cotswolds and the West of England with radial routes to Oxford, Gatwick Airport, the Midlands and the North, the South Coast and the South West. Branch lines into the London suburbs in the Thames Valley, to the Devon and Cornish coast and dedicated freight only lines complete the mix of routes within the Great Western RUS area.

The Strategy identifies a number of gaps, the most significant of which is on-train crowding on peak services into London Paddington, Reading and Bristol Temple Meads. Other gaps examined include journey times between regional centers, station capacity and performance pinch-points in the RUS area.

The Strategy identifies a range of options to address these gaps, comprising train lengthening and additional services, to increase capacity to accommodate the growth in passenger and freight services whilst maintaining performance.

In the longer term the RUS proposes a strategy to address the challenge of accommodating the projections for growth of passenger and freight services outlined in the Governments 2007 White Paper over the next 30 years in the RUS area.