East Cambridgeshire District Council

With the Government confirming funding for the doubling of the track between Ely and Soham – the prospect of a station in the town is a step closer.

The Department of Transport (DfT) has made available £55m for the Strategic Rail Freight Network which aims to help deliver schemes to remove bottlenecks and help smooth transport of freight from ports to bases of manufacturing.

In East Cambridgeshire, the Ely – Soham doubling scheme will remove the blockage on the Felixstowe to Nuneaton freight route and would create the possibility of a double platform railway station at Soham.

At a recent meeting between East Cambridgeshire District Council, Cambridgeshire County Council and the DfT, Government officials heard feedback on an engineering feasibility report and research into whether the station would be commercially viable.

The next step is to develop a full business case for the introduction of an hourly train service between Peterborough and Ipswich which could stop at Soham if the station was rebuilt.

Cllr James Palmer, Deputy Leader at East Cambridgeshire District Council, said: “It has long been an aspiration of everyone connected with Soham to restore the railway station which was closed in 1965. With the recent funding and positive feedback from the Government we are edging closer to this goal but there is still work to be done. We must put together a business case to show how any service stopping in Soham would be used and whether it would attractive a franchise operator. If this can be achieved and we secure funding through developer contributions and further Government support to build the station we could be seeing trains stopping in Soham in the not to distant future.”

Councillor Ian Bates, Cabinet member for Growth and Planning at Cambridgeshire County Council, said: "Any project which can increase the use of the railway is very much to be welcomed.  We all know how congested some of our main roads are in the county as they link the ports in the East to industry in the Midlands. The possibility of rebuilding a station at Soham therefore taking cars off busy roads such as the A14 is something which we are working closely with our partners to achieve.”