High speed train not for Pendle

There has been much talk in recent years about the possibility of the Colne-Skipton railway line being reopened.
Mr Pendle doesn't think we'll be seeing a high speed rail link anytime soonMr Pendle doesn't think we'll be seeing a high speed rail link anytime soon
Mr Pendle doesn't think we'll be seeing a high speed rail link anytime soon

Indeed, the Skipton-East Lancashire Rail Action Partnership campaign group has battled long and hard to have the link re-established.

Now Mr Pendle thinks that while they have a chance of reaching their goal, he believes the odds are not in their favour.

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But at least they stand more chance of achieving success than does the Labour Party’s candidate in Pendle at the next General Election, Azhar Ali, who has suggested the proposed east-west high speed rail link, which appeared out of nowhere in a speech by Chancellor George Osborne last month, should run from Liverpool via Preston and the East Lancashire line through Pendle and on to Leeds and Hull.

Now Mr Pendle has agreed with Azhar on many things over the years.

He fully supported his calls for land at Gib Hill between Nelson and Colne to be kept as a “green lung” between the two towns and left undeveloped.

And when a threat hung over Pendle Community Hospital in Nelson several years ago and Azhar was at the forefront of the fight to keep it open,and Mr Pendle backed him all the way.

But he cannot do so in this case.

Nice as it would be to see a high speed electrified railway line running through Pendle and into Yorkshire, even a whiff of the coffee beans is enough to tell Mr Pendle it is not going to happen.