Good News & Bad News

First - the bad news

It’s all going off at Howden Station…

A couple of weeks ago it was revealed that Northern Rail are planning to introduce a £2 a day parking charge at Howden Station starting in the next few weeks.

I believe no one would be bothered about paying £2 a day to park at the station if the car park offered, as a minimum, new fangled innovations like a tarmac surface, marked bays and even perhaps lighting!

Northern’s rationale for this move is:

“To reduce short distance access by car, generating a modal shift to more sustainable modes, to generate revenue from car park operations and to invest into stations and car park improvements for the benefit of all rail users.”

In my view “generating a modal shift to more sustainable modes” is business speak for encouraging people to walk or cycle to the station - which makes perfect sense if the station is in the middle of the town, not nearly a mile away up a busy, unlit country road.

“Generating revenue from car park operations to invest into stations and car park improvements for the benefit of all rail users” is very laudable, but after prolonged conversations about this there seems little appetite for investing any of the revenue in Howden, and with the carpark at it’s present size it would take years to raise the money to make any substantive improvements from revenue alone.

I have been in meetings with other local ward councillors, council officers and Northern rail to explain the fact that simply starting a charging regime without any consultation and, more importantly, with no plans whatsoever to improve the parking situation at Howden Station is simply not good enough.

Then we entered the labyrinthine rabbit hole of UK rail privatisation.

• Network Rail (owned by the government) own the station and the carpark

• Northern Rail (owned by the government) are the tenant

• The other train operating companies (Hull Trains, LNER (owned by the government) and TransPennine Express ( owned by the government) pay Northern ( owned by the government) for use of the station.

Are you following?

Suffice to say finding someone to take responsibility and put up the money to give us the car parking facilities we need with our ever growing, commuting population is not just the work of one phone call!

I have to say that the council officers have been really proactive on this issue and we are offering various suggestions and schemes.

Be assured we are keeping up the pressure to get some sort of resolution to this problem, which has been going on for far too long.

The Good News

You may have spotted in The Goole Times the other week the announcement of a new bus service from Goole Station to Howden Station, named ‘The Goole - Howden Hopper’

This is what they have to say about it:

“Known as the Goole & Howden Hopper, the new shuttle bus service, together with the associated infrastructure, such as bus stop signage and shelters, aims to make people’s onward journeys from Goole’s Station Hub easier, as well as helping to connect local people with key employment sites, such as Siemens, the RaisE Business Centre, Croda, Tesco’s Distribution Centre and Guardian Industries.

It will also help to make the town centre easier to reach for workers and increase the town’s appeal to potential investors by making Goole more accessible to those travelling from major cities across the North of England and as far afield as London.

Many local employers, several of which are represented on the Goole Town Deal Board, believe that this new public transport provision will benefit the local workforce, including those who currently struggle to access employment opportunities due to a lack of transport or being unable to meet the cost of transport.

The bus service will operate as a pilot project for two years to gauge whether there is sufficient demand and, if there is, to determine whether additional provision might be needed in the future.

The bus service will run between Goole Station, Tom Pudding Way, Glews Garage, Airmyn, the War Memorial in Howden and Howden Station. It will operate between the hours of 6am and 11pm from Monday to Saturday to try to meet the transport needs of shift workers, as well as those who work typical office hours and people travelling into, and around, Goole for shopping and leisure.

Two Goole Town Deal-branded buses, each of which will seat 19 people, will be hired to provide the new service. A £1 flat rate ticket will be available to all users of the new service, regardless of how far they’re traveling and the time of day. There will also be a discounted weekly ticket option for regular users.”

Although this is primarily a Goole initiative the benefits for Howden could be significant.

Two buses an hour from the War Memorial to Howden Station will hopefully reduce the numbers of cars at the station carpark and the return journey will give us a half hourly bus service to Goole from 6am to 11pm every day, a massive improvement to the service we have at the moment.

(I’m in discussion an additional bus stop on the route to pick up on Station Road and this is going out to consultation with the relevant transport bodies (but won’t be part of the service at the beginning)

As they say, this is a pilot scheme for two years and will be adopted if there is the demand to make it financially viable - personally I think it will be very popular at this end of the route but may, being a small 19 seat bus, potentially be oversubscribed in the early morning and late afternoon commuter times.

On the whole good news for Howden - particularly as it should free up more parking spaces at the station and means we can get in and out of Goole earlier in the morning and in the evenings.

Discussions about the station carpark are on-going, the will to improve it is there and I believe a sensible solution is achievable, but with so many stakeholders involved it may take a lot longer than we’d all like.