THE CHAIRMAN of a supporters group has vowed not to give up the fight if Government officials do not come up with the cash for the restoration of one of Tavistock’s rail links.

Richard Searight, chairman of the Peninsula Rail Group said the campaign to reconnect Tavistock to Plymouth rail link would go on even if Devon County Council’s latest bid to get Government support for the project did not succeed.

The county council won £50,000 from the Government towards a business case for the former Southern Railway main line, closed in 1968. Tavistock’s other station, on the ex Great Western Railway branch line, had shut four years earlier.

Council officials expect their business case to go before the Government in September in a bid to attract further funding.

Mr Searight, who said he expected the ‘moment of truth’ for the latest bid to be in October or November, told the latest meeting of the rail group that at present they were ‘purely a supporters’ group.’

But he added: ‘This has got to go through (the restored rail link). If we don’t get the bid, we are going to structure ourselves as a campaigning organisation.’

Mr Searight said the group could learn from the success of Okerail, the Okehampton pressure group which successfully campaigned for the restoration of their section of the line to Exeter.

He said when Tavistock had been completed, they would ‘blow through’ to get the town’s link across Dartmoor restored, but the present focus was on getting the rail link to Plymouth via Bere Alston back.

Hopes are high that the Tavistock to Plymouth line, which is expected to help regenerate areas of the city, will be open for business in around five years after full funding is granted.

Work has already started on signalling at Bere Alston to ensure the restored Tavistock line does not clash with the present branch to Gunnislake, which already runs trains through to Plymouth.