The RT has met twice since it was set up by Cabinet Secretary Fergus Ewing last December. Regular readers will remember that its remit was two-fold: first to look at what can be done using existing funds to improve the timetable "immediately"; secondly to look at what infrastructure and other things can be done "in the medium to long term". I interpret these as being, first, in the remaining 22 months of CP5 (up to March 2019), and secondly stuff to be done in CP6 (April 2019 to March 2024).

There are quite a few things going on on the Level Crossing front which will allow trains to go more quickly. As these have not been completed in time for the May timetable change there will be no immediate benefit, but the December timetable should be several minutes faster than the current one. I'm hopeful that in the slightly longer term a way will be found to allow faster travel into, along, and out of the many loops on the line.

One of the recommendations made in Tony Glazebrook's Consultation last year was that some more efficient way should be devised of alerting the driver at a request stop. At present the train has to slow down so that it can stop if an intending passenger waves it down (a bit like a bus stop). Network Rail has picked up on this idea and is looking to see whether some kind of advance warning can be given, allowing the driver to know whether there is a passenger before the train would otherwise start to slow down. As the line-speed through many request stops is at a good lick this ought to shave another few minutes off the end-to-end timings. The next RT meeting on 12 May should see how this might be done.

The biggie, of course, is the "medium to long term" matter of double track at Lentran. Progress towards achieving this is still being made, I believe, and we await the HLOS announcement in June or July.