The City of Durham Parish Council has requested an urgent meeting with the Rail Minister Huw Merriman MP in a final bid to save the Ticket Office at Durham Railway station.
Ministers recently announced a plan to “modernise” the railway by closing all of England’s ticket offices and opened an evidence-taking process which was due to last 21 days. However, on Wednesday, the Government announced that the consultation would be extended until 1st September leading to hopes that the ticket offices may be saved and the controversial plans to close all but a few ticket offices may be scrapped.
The consultation has already received 170,000 comments, according to watchdog Transport Focus and the Rail Delivery Group said operators are “keen to give more people a chance to give their views on the proposals”.
At its recent Business Committee meeting, the Parish Council heard concerns from a number of different stakeholder groups – particularly those representing people with mobility and other issues.
The Parish Council has already objected strongly to these proposals, which it describes as “abhorrent” and “in total contravention with Equality and Disability Discrimination Laws.”
The Parish Council says that passengers would no longer have widespread and easy access to the purchase of rail products and best value fares if the ticket offices closures went ahead as planned. The Council argues that Durham has the highest number of passengers from among the stations where LNER propose to close the ticket office and demand for the ticket office in Durham remains high, with an estimated 14,000 tickets purchased each year at Durham Station alone.
Durham station welcomes around 2.8 million travellers each year and this number has been on an upward trend with 1.2 million travellers using Durham Station in 2000/01.
The Parish Council has argued that the Ticket office closures would cause a significant worsening of the facilities and support offered to disabled, deaf and older residents. Already, disabled people face numerous barriers in accessing the rail network and are three times less likely to travel by rail than non-disabled people.
There has been overwhelming opposition to ticket office closures from disabled people’s organisations, including our own local Durham Access for All Group, Disability Rights UK, National Federation of the Blind UK, Transport for All, RNIB, RNID, Guide Dogs, Scope, Thomas Pocklington Trust, Winvisble, Greater Manchester Coalition of Disabled People and the MS Society.
Speaking at the Council’s recent Full Council meeting, Coun. Richard Ormerod (pictured) said “Rail users in Durham really value the exceptional service provided by the ticket office staff and proposals to close this service are clearly going to impact on disabled and elderly users the hardest. We are requesting an urgent meeting with the Rail Minister to ask that he and his Government re-think these plans which essentially boil down to staff cuts in all but name.”
He added: “The Parish Council is wholly opposed to any cuts to station staffing and believe any supposed cost savings cannot be used to justify a policy that will worsen passenger service, accessibility, safety, security, and access to rail products. It is deeply concerning that the Government and train operators have given no commitment that staffing numbers will not reduce as a result of ticket office closures.”
Councillor Ormerod, who represents the Elvet and Gilesgate division on both the Parish Council and County Council, has also gained the Leader of the County Council’s support in lobbying the Government to re-think these plans
Only the Customer Information Centres will sell the full range of tickets and the one nearest to Durham is in Newcastle. A passenger needing to make a journey at short notice will not be able to buy or renew a railcard unless they have a smartphone, which many older people do not possess.
The Parish Council is liaising with the Local MP’s office in order to facilitate this meeting however Ministers are understood to be reluctant to meeting with groups on these proposals.
Residents wishing to respond to this consultation are encouraged to do so by emailing: TicketOffice.LNER@transportfocus.org.uk
A full copy of the Parish Council’s response to this consultation can be found here.