Six-year wait for station access works 'ludicrous'

A six-year wait for planned improvements to a railway station to make it more accessible have been called "totally ludicrous" by a campaigner.

In 2019, the Wellington station in Shropshire was chosen as one of 73 across the country to benefit from Department for Transport Access For All funding.

A new accessible route was planned including a lift but a spokesperson for Network Rail said it would be autumn 2026 "at the earliest" before work began.

"It's totally ludicrous. It's a heck of a long way round [otherwise]," said Ian Roberts.

"I can't understand, they've got the funding, why haven't they done something about it?"

Mr Roberts, who is part of the Telford Macular Society support group, said he regularly had to plan his journeys ahead with several hours of time to spare in case some station's did not have the necessary accessible facilities.

He said it was "baffling" the lift still had not been built, six years after the funding was granted.

"With the number of disabilities I've got, the easiest thing to me would be to stay at home and not go out at all." he said.

"But I don't want to do that, I want to go out, keep some independence as do a lot of other people so this just makes it difficult to do things which other people do quite easily."

"I would probably have to get a taxi to go the other side [of the station]."

His wife, Paula, said it was hard to see how many issues her husband had with access issues.

"I can see he struggles to walk so to have to walk all the way around will be really difficult, take ages. It would just be really hard for him," she added.

Plans for people not to need to use steps to get to trains at the Wellington station through the accessibility improvements remained "firmly in place", the spokesperson for Network Rail said.

Final timescales and designs were still being worked on but a contractor was appointed earlier in January to help with those, they added.

"These are challenging financial times and we must spend every pound as efficiently as possible, so we have looked at all aspects of the scheme - including the bridge deck and lifts - so they are the best value for money," they said.

"This has meant a redesign of the scheme was needed but the long-term benefits will remain and outweigh the short-term delay."