Don’t build over rail tracks
LAST month Màiri Mcallan, Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, started a chain of events by announcing that the interim net zero target could not be met. She had just recognised the reality. What has been achieved is mainly a result of exporting our heavy industry so its emissions are not counted in Britain.
Scotland’s biggest source of emissions is transport and Ms Mcallan also recognised, quite rightly, that the Westminster Government is mainly responsible for controls on transport emissions. What can Scotland do? Net zero cannot be achieved without a more comprehensive railway network. While railway construction is expensive it would be much cheaper if the trackbeds were not built over with housing.
Older readers may remember the Glasgow Herald in January 1983 publishing the sad photo of the last train to leave Kilmacolm. The rails were ripped up and the trackbed sold off for a nominal sum to a supposed environment group which had pre-arranged a lucrative housebuilding deal, blocking the track for ever. The old Strathclyde Passenger Transport stepped in and stopped it but time has gone by and recent reports suggest the Scottish Government has overruled the local council and is allowing housebuilding to block the route at Bridge of Weir. Our Cabinet Secretary should now step in and protect the trackbed so it can be reinstated as a railway and part of a modern, environmental transport system.
Perhaps also there should be a government warning to developers, house buyers and their solicitors that railways can reopen as well as close?
Ralph Barker,
Crawford.