In the summer of 2018, I got volunteered together with other local residents in helping to create a neighbourhood plan for our local area – Yateley, Darby Green and Frogmore, in Hampshire.
My specific area of interest is ‘Getting Around‘, whether that is transport in all its shapes and sizes, or provision for those of us on the pavements.
In the course of our deliberations, a number of people have looked longingly at places which have improved connectivity using light rail, trams or guided buses. We were going to look into the subject, hoping to include something of an aspirational nature in our plan, thinking the idea would be a bit ‘Alice in Wonderland‘.
Blackwater Station, on the North Downs Line, Hampshire.
Imagine our delight when we discovered that we had been beaten to it. There have already been studies in 1991 (about bringing local railway lines and a new interchange hub station with the London Waterloo mainline, as well as additional ‘community stations’ in the Blackwater Valley of which we are a part), and reports in 2002 & 2003 (which make reference to plans for a ‘Mass Transit System‘ for the Blackwater Valley), with the possibility of light rail, trams or guided buses connecting the likes of Aldershot, Farnborough, Camberley, and Bracknell – making the possibility of much better connections with places like Yateley, Fleet, and Farnham with new interchange stations.
You can keep up-to-date with the work we are doing on our neighbourhood plan here and the post which contains full details on all of those studies can be found by clicking here. I think it is well worth a read, although I would say that!
Tramway de Gand. Credit: Claude villetaneuse (CC BY-SA 3.0)
While these might seem like long term aspirations, hopefully considering the wider strategic context for transport planning of the ‘Blackwater Valley‘, and previous work that has been done in this area for improving connectivity should provide grounds for including aspirations, if not our own specific policies, in our own neighbourhood plan.
Common 