Templecombe Station
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| Templecombe on the Salisbury - Exeter line
was the link with the S&D with the latter's trains arriving at a bay platform behind the signalbox. Salisbury
- Exeter was originally double track throughout with a variety of steam hauled through and local services. Gerard
Fiennes, the General Manager who sought to rationalise this line rather than close it, recalled the situation in
his memoirs, see below. Here are two 'then & now' comparisons of Templecombe from 1980 & 2006 respectively. The 1980 photos were prompted by a suggestion that the remains of the station were to be demolished for redevelopment, though in reality the reverse happened with the station reopening in 1983. |
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Gerard Fiennes, Western Region General Manager
from 1963-66, put much effort into improving long distance services on the Cornish main line from Penzance and
proposed heavily rationalising the Salisbury - Exeter line in lieu of closure. However, Dr. Beeching's trunk routes report, published in 1965 on a much lower key basis than the original 1963 Reshaping report, indicated that both Plymouth - Penzance and Salisbury - Exeter, along with Taunton - Westbury - Reading would be considered for closure. In his memoirs (left), published in 1967, Fiennes's tone when referring to, 'the Great and Good Doctor' [Beeching] is usually friendly, but when the subject of the services above arises, he makes a brutal attack on Beeching. Clearly, Fiennes was at the end of his tether, to use a phrase. With other forthright statements in the book, the Chairman who succeeded Beeching, Stanley Raymond, made Fiennes retire somewhat prematurely. Ironically, Raymond himself left his post in December 1967 due to disagreements on policy with Transport Minister Barbara Castle. |
