Liberal Democrats call for ticket office to be saved

The Liberal Democrats are urging the public to have their say on the future of Gloucester railway station’s ticket office after it was threatened with closure.

Rail companies have announced plans to close hundreds of station ticket offices across England over the next three years.

Great Western Railway, which operates Gloucester railway station, has begun a consultation on the future of the ticket office with it forecast to close by June 2024.

Under the proposals staff would be redeployed to work in public facing roles at the station, to sell tickets, offer travel advice and help people with accessibility.

According to the GWR consultation document, 101,000 (14.4%) tickets were sold at Gloucester’s ticket office in the financial year 2022/23 and a further 21,000 bookings collected in person.

Another 32,000 (4.6%) tickets were purchased from an automatic ticket machine while almost 80,000 bookings were collected from a machine.

In total 569,000 (81%) journeys from Gloucester railway station were booked online.

A public consultation has been launched to collect passengers’ views, which ends on July 26.

Councillor Jeremy Hilton, who represents the area around the railway station, said: “Railway station ticket offices can be a lifeline to so many people, particularly those who are elderly, disabled or who are visitors.

“They rely on the ticket office for help and the ticket office is often the first port of call when they arrive at the station.

“Closing the ticket office will make it harder for them to travel. Not everyone has a smartphone these days or can buy a ticket online before they travel.

“I have deep concerns that were these changes to go ahead it would not result in a better service for passengers, if anything, it would get worse.”

Councillor Hilton has written to Great Western Railway urging them to keep Gloucester’s ticket office open.

“As a regular train traveller from Gloucester, I also have concerns about the complexity of fares,” he said.

“Our fares system needs to be much simpler and ticketing machines upgraded to provide all the services currently on offer at the counter.

“It will not just be the elderly and disabled who suffer, but everyone who values a friendly human face to assist them in planning their journey and buying tickets will lose out.”

Further information about the consultation and to comment can be found at: https://www.gwr.com/haveyoursay