Transport chief slams rail company over Botley Road closure ‘failure’

Andrew Gant, cabinet member for transport management, has directed his dismay at Network Rail on the delays to reopen the key city road. The railway company has been working on a GBP161m revamp of Oxford station and Botley Road was closed at the rail bridge as a result in April 2023. It was supposed to reopen in October last year but remains closed as a result of numerous delays with the project.

READ MORE: Interim leader of Thames Valley Police is announced [1] Community leader Julian Le Vay has written a letter to all county councillors questioning the county council's actions and responsibilities regarding the road closure. This follows Mr Le Vay's publication of the booklet Network Hell!, in which numerous residents and businesses reveal the impact of the closure on their lives.

Mr Le Vay said in his letter: "As you know, the botched Network Rail project at Oxford station has resulted in the seemingly endless closure of Botley Road. (Image: Andy Ffrench) "As this is the only road connecting West Oxford to the rest of the city, the closure has had serious consequences for the community. "Originally, Network Rail said the closure would be only four days.

It has now been closed for over 600 days and there is still no date for its reopening. "For two years, no one's listened to us, and no one has helped us." Mr Le Vay goes onto outline "ways in which the council appears to have contributed to this disaster".

He added: "The main cause of the delay according to Network Rail is the difficulty of widening and deepening the road under the railway bridge. "This is not however being done for 'railway purposes', but for 'highway purposes', concerning the use of buses and improvements in pedestrian and cycling access, and connects with the county council's transport strategy. "Who then is really the customer for these changes?

Clearly not Network Rail, charged with railway infrastructure: it must be the county council as highways authority. "Yet the county council has always maintained that the project has 'nothing to do with them' and been content simply to point the finger at Network Rail. "Granted the contract is held by Network Rail, the county council should nevertheless have insisted on acting as the real customer of this element.

The lack of an effective customer has been a major element in the project's failure." (Image: Oxford Mail) Mr Gant has pointed out Network Rail's "repeated failure to meet its own deadlines". He said: "Local residents and businesses have every right to think that the redevelopment of Oxford Station and the closure of Botley Road has been badly handled.

"We share their frustration at Network Rail's repeated failure to meet its own deadlines, which it has blamed on problems with a Victorian brick arch underneath the road. Trying to put blame the way of the county council is a simple case of picking the wrong target." The county council said its role throughout the process has been focused on mitigating the impact of the road closure on the rest of the network.

It added: "We will continue to work with Network Rail, Thames Water, the bus companies, National Highways, and others to achieve this. When bus services were threatened as a result of the extended road closure, we used money from our bus improvement funding allocation to keep these hugely important routes operating." (Image: Oxford Mail) Mr Gant said the project, once completed, will deliver improved rail capacity for passengers and freight in Oxford and the region.

He added: "We remain supportive of the scheme's aims even if we join residents in being hugely annoyed about the way it has been managed. "We urge Network Rail and the Department for Transport to announce how they are planning to move forward to complete this project as soon as possible." Lord Hendy, the rail minister, is expected to visit Oxford next week to provide an update.

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About the author Andy is the Trade and Tourism reporter for the Oxford Mail and you can sign up to his newsletters for free here. [3] He joined the team more than 20 years ago and he covers community news across Oxfordshire.

His Trade and Tourism newsletter is released every Saturday morning.

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References

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