DETAILS have just emerged to reopen Pontrilas railway station and rename it the Golden Valley Parkway.

The plan for the station emerged as part of Herefordshire Council’s plan for coming year ahead.

Cllr Phillip Price, cabinet member for transport andinfrastructure and Ross Cook the authority’s director of economy and environment explained that the council will spend £50,000 developing a ‘strategic outline business case’ for the new station in partnership with rail industry figures.

“We are currently developing a project brief for this work and, once the individual members of the task force are confirmed, we expect consultants to be appointed and the study to start,” they said.

But they pointed out that the plans are still at a very early stage and with new station plans typically taking several years, it is currently ‘not possible to commit to a timescale for station opening’.

The Golden Valley Railway ran from Pontrilas through to the Midland Railway line at Hay on Wye.

However, the station closed in 1958, but the line itself still remains in use today with an operating signal box and sidings and relevant infrastructure that is occasionally used as a freight loop.

The railway station building itself has been converted into a bed and breakfast and self-catering cottage. Ewyas Harold Parish Council believes the new railway station at Pontrilas would serve up to 500 passengers a day.