VILLAGESHanborough
HANBOROUGH is very central to the
Village Travel Network. It's population is similar to Woodstock's
and it sits astride a busy main road, the A4095. And it has the
busy Hanborough railway station. Over the years the station has
grown in importance and not only because of Hanborough's increasing
population. The universal recognition that however much we love
our cars, we cannot simply keep building more and more, ever wider and
faster roads. When we do it just transfers the congestion along
down the road to somewhere else. So in the last few decades there
has been a growing emphasis on public transport. Buses have
received subsidy, bus lanes have been provided to give priority to
public transport and, for longer journeys "let the train take the
strain". The Cotswold Line Promotion Group was set up many years
ago to promote the line from Oxford to Worcester. Hanborough
Station is the first stop from Oxford and it's a busy commuter route to
Oxford and to London. Over the years the Cotswold Line has been
improved and double tracks have been replaced where they were previously
dismantled during the "Beeching cuts" of the fifties and sixties.
But it still has not been dual tracked throughout and it remains an
unfinished campaign.
Left: The narrow railway arch on Lower Road, Hanborough has long been a concern for cyclists and for Hanborough PC. The VTN hopes that the Eynsham Garden Village project will provide the funding stream to provide an alternative and safer way through this bottleneck
As the population of Hanborough and the villages rises and as the volume of traffic on the roads increases it becomes imperative to redress the balance and to ensure that active travel becomes a safe and sensible option. Active travel to Hanborough's neighbours in Combe, Stonesfield and Bladon, and through the park to Woodstock. And it's a two way street, good active travel infrastructure will ensure that we can all access Hanborough Station for those trips to work, or to the shops and entertainment of Oxford and beyond.
Hanborough VTN representatives have lots of good Active Travel ideas, some for leisure some for domestic or business. Take a look at them here