That's no way to run a railroad… (From Bournemouth Echo)

That's no way to run a railroad…

First of all there was furore over the Wareham to Carey crossing being closed, with residents saying that doing so would cut the town in two, and there would be no easy way to get into the town itself from the Carey side.

RUNNING THE GAUNTLET: A mother with a baby buggy ignores warning lights to race over the level crossing at Wareham in CCTV footage released by Network Rail

Then security tapes were released with idiots playing hop-scotch with trains, all of which made the pages of The Echo.

Next Fred Dinenage is reporting it on Meridian Tonight, then it moves on to the national news.

And now (Daily Echo, October 29) it’s going to Parliament so that they can waste taxpayers’ money chewing the fat of the matter; which they’ll probably turn into something of a Parliamentary ‘works outing’ to come and have a look.

In the ‘good old days’ before Beeching axed so many railways, every crossing had pedestrian wicket-gates which the crossing keeper locked when he closed the gates for a train to go through. So this case in Wareham now beggars belief with not only the whole of the UK, but probably the whole world by now, wondering why was this crossing installed in the first instance with no security gates whatsoever?

Whatever the outcome, and I hope it’s not with someone being killed or injured, it shouldn’t be a news item at all, because if the railway authorities had done the right thing at the outset, the problem would not exist, as it would either be gated, or closed off.

Alan Burridge, Blandford Road, Upton

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