The Future
Since 1995 the Abbey Flyer Users Group (ABFLY) has been campaigning to secure the future of the line and encourage its growth. The Abbey Line was designated by the Strategic Rail Authority as a community rail line in July 2005, one of seven pilots under the Community Rail Development Strategy.
In 2004 a proposal was made by Transport for London for a London Regional Rail Authority to take control over some rail services which extended out of Greater London, including the St Albans branch line.
On 30 October 2009 Secretary of State for Transport, Lord Adonis, announced a plan to increase frequency on the line by allowing Hertfordshire County Council to lease the line from Network Rail and converting it to operation using light rail vehicles from 2011. This should be made possible for the same amount of subsidy the line currently receives, as the new infrastructure required, such as a passing loop is cheaper for light rail than heavy rail. Longer-term proposals envisage the extension of the light rail service into both Watford town centre via Clarendon Road and High Street, and into St Albans city centre, possibly as far as St Albans City railway station, as well as the possible re-instatement of the line to Hatfield.
Read more about this topic: Abbey Line
Famous quotes containing the word future:
“It is marvelous indeed to watch on television the rings of Saturn close; and to speculate on what we may yet find at galaxy’s edge. But in the process, we have lost the human element; not to mention the high hope of those quaint days when flight would create “one world.” Instead of one world, we have “star wars,” and a future in which dumb dented human toys will drift mindlessly about the cosmos long after our small planet’s dead.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
“the future is simply nothing at all. Nothing has happened to the present by becoming past except that fresh slices of existence have been added to the total history of the world. The past is thus as real as the present.”
—Charlie Dunbar Broad (1887–1971)