NEWBURGH TRAIN STATION CAMPAIGN  JUNE 2012

The campaign to reopen the station at Newburgh is moving along well. A thousand pounds were raised at a coffee morning in the Tayside Institute and a grant from Fife Council’s areas budget has also swelled the campaign fund. Links with the Campaign to Reopen Blackford Railway Station Again (COBRA) were strengthened by attendance at their recent AGM. The Scottish Government has also recently an- nounced that a dedicated fund will be available for local communities to access to re-open or open anew railway stations. This in terms of the political atmosphere is a step in the right direction and it’s now very much up to Newburgh and area to make a case strong enough to become eligible for this financial support and take advantage of it accordingly.

Whilst this goes to press the door to door Household Survey of Newburgh and its rural hinterland has begun to establish how many folks want the station to reopen, how they might use it as well as providing their support by signing the survey questionnaire form, all actions that would provide the campaign with useful data and supporting material for anything from the inevitable and necessary local transport appraisals to a public petition.

The door step approach of this survey is also a great opportunity to raise public awareness and engage- ment directly on a face to face level with the commu- nity. The Newburgh Train Station Campaign would also like to extend this exercise to Abernethy and calls on any Abernethy residents interested in this to make contact.

Meanwhile candidates up for the May elections as councillors to the Tay Coast and Howe of Fife ward of Fife Council where there are three seats, were invited to the Tayside Institute by Newburgh Community Council to take questions from the floor. The Newburgh Train Station Campaign asked all pro- spective candidates on the platform “If you support the reopening of the station at Newburgh, what would you do if elected as a councillor to actively promote and further this within the council given that there is a significant amount of involvement that Fife Council would be called on to contribute in partnership with the Scottish Government and all the various rail au- thorities during the feasibility, design and implementa- tion stages?” Or words to that effect. This elicited the universal response on a cross party basis that gave a promise of support and willingness to be engaged in the nitty gritty efforts required to realise the project. These encouraging words said in public before local towns folk will in the future if necessary be quoted back to whoever is elected to remind them where they stood and what they said at the hustings.

As the man in the Network Rail office in Glasgow responsible for planning more or less said to the cam- paign recently “We would have no problems seeing Newburgh station reopen. The problems might arise in convincing the Scottish Government and Transport Scotland, essentially a political issue.” So Newburgh Train Station Campaign will continue to press on and press hard.

If you are interested in supporting the campaign by helping with a door-to-door survey of Abernethy then please feel free to contact the Newburgh Train Station Campaign at the following:

Newburgh Train Station Campaign c/o Nigel Mullan, 151A High Street, Newburgh, KY14 6DY - 01337 840415
email: nigel.mullan@btinternet.com, or email: ntsc@btinternet.com