Development of Far North line would benefit local users and tourists alike

George Kerevan, in his article, "We cannot afford to let our manufacturing die" (Opinion, 25 August), says that we need to use local market opportunities, such as regeneration of Scotland's railways. I would like to state the case in favour of the development and expansion of an important part of the railway network, the Far North line, connecting Inverness to Wick and Thurso in Caithness.

Of particular concern is the train journey times (over four hours from Inverness to Wick, and 3hr 52min from Inverness to Thurso) to cover about 120 miles, compared to around 2hr 15min by road between the same locations. This is a serious handicap to the expansion of rail travel in the Far North, and does not encourage use by locals or tourists.

There has been an ongoing campaign to shorten train times substantially on this line, principally involving the construction of the Dornoch bridge rail link, in addition to upgrading of the line to 90mph and double- tracking part of the line as suggested in the Corus proposal in February. Forty-five minutes can be saved from the present timetable by the construction of this rail link short cut via Dornoch across Loch Fleet and the Dornoch Firth. Proposals also exist for the retention and development of the Lairg section of the line as well.

It has been asserted, by Richard Ardern, the previous chairman of the pressure group Friends of the Far North Line, and others, that the postulated time savings using the Dornoch rail link would need the trains to run at speeds of up to 150 mph to save 45 minutes on the timetable and would in reality save only 30 minutes, at most. I have done some calculations to test the veracity of his conclusions.

The best time for the 40 miles of the Far North section between Golspie and Tain via Lairg is one hour, giving the train an average speed of 40mph. This includes five stops and at least two crossings where the train has to slow to a crawl.

Assuming that the Dornoch link section is 15 miles long, as Mr Ardern states, then the time in which the train would cover that distance at 40 mph would be 15 x (60/40) More time could be saved if other sections of the Far North line are upgraded to 90 mph, and other improvements are made (eg the Thurso-Georgemas-Halkirk chord). This could shave off another 30 minutes, in addition to the 45-minute Dornoch time saving, giving a shortening of at least 1 hr 15 min in total. This would give a reduction, in the Thurso-Inverness times, from 3hr 45min to 2hr 30min.

This would encourage many more people to use the Far North line, and create an additional customer base in Dornoch and Embo, along with greatly expanding rail freight capacity. Is this not worth pursuing?

MARK W NORTON

Forsinard

Sutherland