HAVE now read two letters sent from Eric Howells of Llanddewi Velfrey regarding transport in the west. While I fully support his comments might I draw attention a little further. He correctly states in both his letters that the line speed to Milford and Fishguard is 55 miles an hour. If he were unfortunate enough as to need to travel to Tenby or Pembroke as most holidaymakers staying in the west and using the railway probably will, he would find the line speed is 35 miles an hour, with according to the Arriva Trains Wales website no plans to improve it in the next 30 years!

Indeed according to my Bradshaw railway guide from 1910 (see Michael Portillo’s travels on TV) the journey time from Pembroke Dock to Whitland is just the same now as it was over 100 years ago.

In the light of the more pressing issues in the county with the continued downgrading of our healthcare and the need to travel east all the time on roads that are poor at best, especially from Pembroke and the villages west of there, a decent rail service would be a useful option.

Personally I have given up with the trains, having tried to be ‘green’ and use them it is simply not a viable option so I have got back in my car.

What would make a vast difference to business, commercial and private life in the county is an air service from Withybush to Cardiff, London, Birmingham, Manchester etc such as that enjoyed from say Newquay in Cornwall - similarly placed to us, but with the option of flying to these places in an hour or so for the price of half a tank of fuel.

This was recently pointed out by your correspondent Neil P who voiced exactly the same feelings as he travels in and out of Pembrokeshire.

Of course the reason why this cannot happen is that while we have an airfield that has, so I am told, all its certificates to enable commercial flights to use it but one, the one it lacks is 24/7 availability 365 days a year, and it can’t have that because the county show is held on it over five days in the summer.

In light of what it could mean for tourism and business, let alone for the residents of our county to be connected to the rest of the world, because don’t forget we get neither mobile phone signals nor broadband out here to connect in any other way, I am pretty sure that somewhere else in Pembrokeshire there is another former airfield that is central enough and has decent enough roads to it for the show to be held there - say Templeton or Carew off the top of my head.

The amount of money being spent to get to Birmingham and Manchester 15 minutes quicker, and indeed to get from London to Swansea 25 minutes quicker when that line is electrified is nonsense compared to the improvements that could be made out west for a tiny fraction of that outlay.

Don’t forget, when all the money is spent, and you’ve travelled by train from Manchester to London in no time, and then from London to Swansea in next to no time, it will still take you two and a half hours to get from Swansea to Pembroke!

TONY HICKLING

Tenby