RK/SJA/Cons/CV

29 September 2004

Priscilla L. Mackay
Chairman CVPS
Nunton Cottage
Nunton
Salisbury
SP5 4HW

Thank you for your letter of 22nd September about parking at Salisbury railway station.

I am as perplexed as you – and members of the Chalke Valley Preservation Society at the extraordinary policy annunciated by Mr P L Tilley of Wiltshire County Council.

I have been arguing with the District Council and with Railtrack (now Network Rail) as well as South West Trains about the urgent need for more parking at Salisbury. As we all know, there is virtually no attempt to restrict parking to users of railway trains – and this is a major cause of congestion in the car park especially on Tuesdays.

Last Friday I met the Leader of Salisbury District Council together with a group of Councillors and I took the opportunity of raising your letter. Every single Councillor present denied ownership of or agreement with the contents of the letter from Mr Tilley of Wiltshire County Council. The Leader, Councillor Kevin Wren, asked for a copy of the letter – and this he will shortly have.

For many years South West Trains has sought to increase parking capacity at Salisbury railway station - which is in its own interests as well as in the interests of the travelling public as well as being in accord with declared Government policy of encouraging people to use trains.

As you will recall, when the incoming Labour Government cancelled the Salisbury bypass they initiated the Salisbury Transport Plan (STP) which was agreed by all the political parties under the District and County Councils together with a spending profile for action. Last year, inexplicably, the Government froze all spending on the Salisbury Transport Plan. Nine months later they reinstated it. All the Salisbury Transport Programmes have slipped. Worse, new uncertainties have crept in. In the particular case of parking at Salisbury railway station, it appears from your letter from Mr Tilley that not only does the left hand not know what the right hand is doing, somewhere somebody has lost the plot.

I will copy this correspondence to Councillor Fleur de Rhé-Philipe, to Councillors Kevin Wren, Dennis Brown and John Noeken at Salisbury District Council and to the Managing Director of South West Trains.

I am very grateful to you and to the Chalke Valley Preservation Society, for giving me the opportunity to pursue this issue which is of such importance to our community.