3/10/2008The planned Borders railway line

What should we make of the recent statement by a key Scottish government economic adviser that the planned Borders railway line is not good value for money and would produce "unimpressive" benefits?

Prof John Kay, a member of First Minister Alex Salmond's Council of Economic Advisers (CEA), recently told The Scotsman: "I do not think it (the Borders line) is a particularly good use of Scottish taxpayers' money. Its costs seem disproportionate to any likely benefit."

He said the planned 31-mile Edinburgh-Tweedbank link would be poor value for money because of its escalating cost and "unimpressive cost-benefit analysis".

What does the future hold for this close to £300 million scheme, which has suffered from delays and soaring costs?
Border Campainer says:
The problem with the Borders Railway are all down to the Scottish Office, if they would get their fingers out and get the Borders Railway line started instead of pussyfooting around then the costs would stop spiralling so high, also if the people who are always complaining about the line and how much of a waste of tax payers' money it is, most of whom don't even belong to the Borders and should keep their thought to themselves instead of putting the line down all the time, things might get better.

If they think that the money that has been pledged for the re-introduction of the line would be spent on a new road link down here they must be more stupid than I think they are, because if this line doesn't go ahead the money will NOT be relocated to another project in the Borders, it will be spent in the central belt or in Edinburgh instead. It will be money we have lost because the chances of us getting a new road link to the Borders are nil, just have a look at the problems the campaigners are having with upgrading the A1.

The people who are trying to stop us getting the railway line down here are more interested in getting stuff done in the major cities than in the Borders if there is a bigger waste of Scottish Tax Payers' money it is the trams in Edinburgh which are costing a lot more than a railway all the way to Carlisle would cost, and all that we get back in the Borders for the taxes we pay, a poorer public transport system, poorer road infrastructure and a local council who cannot carry out vital work needed in the Borders because of the restraints of money from government.

If anyone can come up with a major project that the Scottish Office has given to benefit the Borders then please do as I can't think of anything in the past few years, we don't even get the same gritting and snow clearing during the winter from the Scottish Office as they give in the major cities and in the central belt, they give us the minimum amount of cover they can get away with and hopefully keep us quiet.

Like the famous so called land slip south of Hawick on the A7 which has been there now for almost four years at an enormous cost of approx £37450 already in traffic lights alone, not to mention the consultants' reports and ground reports etc. Why can't they just get on with the job, which I think you would find could have been sorted by now instead of talking about it.

Then there is the so called new street lighting on the Melrose by-pass which was started by Amy and has now been taken over by Bear after a lot of ranging as the Scottish Office could not make up their minds who they had paid for the work to be done and is still in progress and I bet you anything extra expenses after 3 years. And they call that value for money, I don't think so, the time and money wasted with consultant reports and other stupid reports that do no good, we could have had a railway line all the way to Carlisle, so the Scottish Office should just come out and say that they are excluding the Borders from anything as that's what they appear to want.
frank bradford says:
I don't think the railway is the way to go, spending the money on a road bypass to Edinburgh would be a better way to go, it would cut travelling time in half without the hassle of going to a train station which would probably mean we would have to use the car to get to the station in the first place. Frank, Galashiels.
Maxine Sakkas says:
If I'm not mistaken the old railway line now sits on the Asda Supermarket site along with other properties etc. To lay the line around these buildings doesn't seem to me to be cost effective.
Ditto with Frank above.
Maxine, Galashiels
Ian Stephen says:
Why don't people check out FACTS before making vague uninformed comments! I have walked along the Galashiels part of the new railway (old 'Black Path') It doesn't need to go 'round' Asda (a simple look will show this!). Also where does Frank Galashiels suggest a Road Bypass to Edinburgh go? (The cost of this would be far in excess of the railway line!)

It was economic arguments (Dr. Beeching) that took away the railway line in the first place. Arguments from economics are not always best for the community. There WILL be benefits which cannot be measured simply in money terms. Sometimes it takes FAITH to take on such projects - which I believe will not be misplaced!
Heather Momo says:
The railway would only be a single track branch line. Who is going to use it? If built it would be well used by the residents of Eskbank and Gorebridge but who is going to come all the way down to Gala by train? Spend the money dualling the A7 or at least straightening it out a bit.
frank bradford says:
Just a reply to Ian, even if a bypass cost more to build than the railway which it wouldn't, you would still get at least 50 times more people using the road than the railway line, the only way to get more people using the railway would to be by building the train station in Galashiels.

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