CALL TO RE-OPEN NEWTONHILL STATION
NEWTONHILL, Muchalls and Cammachmore Community Council wants Newtonhill railway station to be earmarked as next in line for re-opening under the Aberdeen Crossrail project.
Members reiterated their support for the project at last week's meeting and said that following the re-opening of Laurencekirk and the prospective re-opening of Kintore railway station, Newtonhill should be next in line.
Their comments followed the publication of a draft copy of the Aberdeenshire Council's Local Community Plan, which states a "rail action plan" is to be drawn up this year which "takes into consideration the community aspiration to re-open Newtonhill railway station".
The re-opening of Newtonhill Station was classed as one of the priorities to come out of the Planning for Real exercise held by the community council in May 2009.
In addition, Nestrans, the transport partner for Aberdeen City and Shire, has just published a draft copy of its rail action plan for 2010 - 2021, in which it aims to build a new railway station every three years, bringing the current eight stations in Aberdeen City and Shire up to 12.
The draft Aberdeen City and Shire Structure Plan has designated the Laurencekirk-Huntly corridor a Strategic Growth Area for development, with a minimum of 6000 new homes to be built in the Portlethen and Stonehaven area over the next 22 years.
Local Aberdeenshire councillor Carl Nelson said: "Re-opening the station would be a very, very big job. On one hand there is the community council who want Newtonhill station to re-open, which makes a lot of sense, but then you have the Scottish Government who want to make links between the major cities quicker, and who do not want trains stopping at more and more stations along the route."
He added: "It is possibly more hopeful now than it was several years ago. The Portlethen corridor is the area where we are meant to get thousands of houses and if we do, then we want to get cars off the road and onto bus and rail transport, so on that basis it would make a lot of sense. There would need to be integrated transport."
Vice-chairman of the community council, Michael Morgan said: "All we want to find out is if this is going to be feasible, first of all. There needs to be joined up thinking."
Nestrans draft rail action plan looked at some of the problems which need to be resolved at Portlethen and Stonehaven railway stations.
It stated: "The main issue at Portlethen is the infrequent service of trains stopping at the station. Although the December 2009 timetable added one additional evening peak stop, there are currently just six trains stopping in each direction Monday-Saturday and three trains on a Sunday. A more frequent service, along with local marketing and other improvements could see this station better used.
"The Access for All funding application for Portlethen identified the need for identifying a space for disabled parking, dropped kerbs, tactile bands, Help Points, audio and visual alerts when trains are approaching and improvements to remove a hinged gate."
It continued: "Key issues for Stonehaven relate to the occasional trains which do not stop. Adding this stop could significantly improve journey options, particularly to/from Glasgow and journey times between Aberdeen and Dundee are not substantially different between trains with/without this stop.
"Car parking constraints should be a priority to improve use of Stonehaven station. Additional capacity on peak hour trains and better stopping patterns would be necessary to complement additional parking. The station also lacks a suitable waiting room and modern, accessible toilet facilities."
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Weather for Stonehaven
Thursday 24 May 2012
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