THE second ministerial visit to West Devon in a matter of weeks has brought renewed hope of a rail line for Tavistock.

The Secretary of State for Transport, the Rt Hon Patrick McLoughlin MP, visited Okehampton last Wednesday to meet with councillors and campaigners behind efforts to see the Okehampton and Tavistock line linking Plymouth to Exeter reinstated.

Later that day, the transport minister stated during a visit to Paignton that while the Government was intending to retain the Dawlish line as the main rail route for the region, the case to re-open the Okehampton line was being looked at. The issue has come into sharp focus over the last year after the winter's horrendous storms that destroyed part of the main line into the region at Dawlish.

Cllr Christine Marsh, Mayor of West Devon, said: 'West Devon Borough Council has written in support of the return of the railway to Okehampton and Tavistock. It is extremely important for the economy of West Devon and Devon as a whole that the railway returns.

'This has been a very important meeting. Now we need to be positive, press the issue and not give in.'

During the meeting in Okehampton, Mr McLoughlin MP visited Okehampton Station, rode on a train out to Meldon Viaduct and had a look at the rail infrastructure already in place along the proposed route.

The visit came days after a delegation representing Tavistock and Okehampton visited Westminster to meet with Mr McLoughlin to discuss the re-opening of the line.

It is the second such ministerial visit to Okehampton in just a number of weeks. In August Claire Perry MP, parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Transport, visited the town to meet with town council group Destination Okehampton, which has been working hard over the past few months on a strategy to boost the chances of ensuring a rail service returns to West Devon.

Tavistock Town Council recently pledged to support Destination Okehampton's efforts by offering £1,800 of funding.

Richard Searight, the chairman of the Peninsula Rail Group, who was at both meetings with the Minister, told the Times that their outcome was 'extremely productive' and that he was 'guardedly optimistic' that the re-opening of the Exeter-Okehampton-Tavistock-Plymouth railway line could become a reality.

He said: 'From a government viewpoint the key words are jobs and economic growth. The re-opening of the northern route would do just that and it is a known fact that when a railway line re-opens in an area, jobs and growth increase by at least 20 percent.'

Mr Searight, who lives in Tavistock, said the biggest danger to persuading the Government to back the line was that the various councils and railgroups in Devon did not speak with one voice and that all it would take for the northern route option to collapse could be 'just one or two influential voices in Plymouth to bring down the project'.

David Cameron, following the flooding of the rail track at Dawlish, pledged that the Government would upgrade transport links to the South West. But there are concerns in the South West that any public funding could be diverted to finance proposed High Speed Rail links 2 and 3 in the north of England.

Mr Searight also observed at the Okehampton meeting that: 'It was as if the civil servants there were looking for a division among us and if they spot that division they could find a way to persuade the Government not to spend the money.'

Both the northern and southern route would offer passengers faster times than at present between Plymouth and Exeter — roughly 49 minutes and 53 minutes, with two minute stops at stations.

Mr Searight added:?'We have to have a line to get us to London fast. It's no good building the northern route just to provide a local service.'

Also present at the meeting was Chris Bligh, the technical advisor to the Peninsula Rail Group.

He said:?'The two meetings with the Minister were highly constructive and we are definitely making progress.'