CBR has worked closely with the Waverley Route Trust, which was founded in 2002 as a registered company with charitable status to promote the case for a 'community railway' to and through the Borders, and to facilitate innovative rail solutions nationally.

In 2004, the Trust commissioned Corus Rail Infrastructure Services consultancy to undertake a study of ‘Delivering an Innovative Borders Railway’. The Corus report recommended that the ownership of the railway infrastructure be vested in a local company or trust rather than Network Rail. Corus proposed that the operational control and maintenance of infrastructure (and marketing of rail services to and from Edinburgh) be focused on a rail operations centre in the Borders, providing a strong base for the future expansion of the railway to Hawick.

Together with other voluntary organisations (including CBR and Stow Community Council) the Trust has since played a valuable role in helping to secure a number of significant improvements to the specification of the railway, including:

  • reduction of Tweedbank-Edinburgh journey times to 55 minutes
  • incorporation of a well-located Stow station in the railway specification
  • an innovative (non Network Rail) approach to the construction, operation and maintenance of the line infrastructure.

The Trust commissioned further work from Corus in late 2010 to assess the scope for a number of affordable enhancement measures to facilitate passenger charter and freight traffic – plus the use of trains to lay track and ballast for the new railway as it is built through Midlothian to the Borders. The Corus report concluded that with eight extra signals and some track alterations at Tweedbank, the new railway could accommodate both passenger charter and freight traffic, and that a new chord line at Millerhill – to facilitate these traffics, plus engineering trains – is feasible. This analysis has now been passed on to Transport Scotland and the two line bidders.

For more information on the Waverley Route Trust, please contact David Spaven on 0131-221-9019.

Melrose station – next stop for the railway?
Trains can bring in ballast and track for the new Borders Railway