Letter: Railway bridge re-build is needed
The plans to carry out refurbishment work on Castle Foregate railway bridge have come as a bit of a surprise.
However, it is pleasing to note that Railtrack consider Shrewsbury to be an important rail centre with an assured future.
What a pity that they cannot go further and demolish this creaking Victorian eyesore, which makes the approach to the town one of the worst and most off-putting in the country and replace both structures with pleasing open arches and traffic circulating below.
A few licks of paint on rusting steelwork and scrubbing the toilet-like tiling together with the council’s proposal to spend £1.6m on ‘improving’ the Chester Street gyratory solves nothing and only pushes the problem further into town.
With the demise of the NWRR, this constant sticking plaster approach won’t cure the patient and drastic surgery is the only remedy.
Visitors to Jersey will have been struck by the linking of the two halves of the island capital by an audacious road tunnel blasted through the solid rock below the citadel.
Economists say that the heavy construction industry needs big projects to create jobs and get us out of recession. What better place to start? If only Shrewsbury could be at the head of the queue.
Christopher Barff
Shrewsbury
Comments for: "Letter: Railway bridge re-build is needed"
BrianG
Perhaps you are mistaken, Railtrack was disolved in 2002 after the Hatfield crash. I think you are referring to Network Rail.
Matt
I question your authority on this matter when you mention Railtrack, a company that has been defunct since 2002!
Network Rail run this country's railways now and work on a limited budget. Why replace a structurally sound bridge at immense cost for purely cosmetic reasons? And people complain that rail fares are going up!
evaland
And why are Network Rail, formally Railtrack on such a limited budget when getting people from one place to another efficiently and as sustainably as possible is or should be a massive priority in this small but self important island?
It is not difficult to see why we have the richer getting richer when those in a position to made a killing on the sell off of such a vital part of our transport infrastructure did so leaving behind a legacy of public reliance on the now failing original Victorian investment.
Driver
I hope you will have all noted the photo of Chester st that the Star published a couple of weeks ago, it showed Chester St as it was with two way traffic.
We now have a councillor who is installing wider pavements, cycle tracks and even trees so as to ensure a complete foul up of traffic in this area.
It is quite obvious that Chester st should be two way, and this would stop many cars having to go under the bridges just to get to Smithfield road.
The whole project is an appalling waste of our money.
Town Walls
'Our money'? It is entirely funded from grants, with a large chunk from the Lottery. Shropshire taxpayers have had nothing to do with it.
My mistake, I should have tried to appeal to this newspaper's readers. Right then - I think we should remove all the pavements in this area and turn them into extra lanes with a minimum speed of 80mph. Moreover, snipers should be placed on Castle Foregate to shoot dead anyone who dares to try to walk or cycle into the town centre. Maybe that way Britain will be Great once more.
Robin Hood
Totally agree with you Driver. The utter lunacy in sending traffic from Coton Hill under the narrow railway bridge instead of going straight ahead to Smithfield road has long been a puzzle and a complete time waster for me. The bridge is so low that buses have to hog both lanes. HGV's perpetually get stuck and traffic coming from opposite directions have to cross in front of each other. At times it's complete chaos and just another factor that makes shopping in Shrewsbury a No-Go situation.
Bill
Yes, a re-build would be great, but would Network Rail and the train companies want to close the lines for the time required to do it? Or can the Council help to foot a £50m+ bill?
If anybody wants to see what's involved, go to The Network Rail website and have a look at an admittedly slightly wider bridge being installed at Reading. And at least the tracks cross at 90 degrees - at Shrewsbury it's more like 60 degrees
http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/6339.aspx#/Custom/Templates/DownloadPage.aspx?id=30064773109