Kim and Pip recce for a film at Stroud station

I joined Kim and Pip at the station art lunchtime to consider how to best film at the station. We want to focus on the difficulties with access that are a big problem for a l,ot of people at this particular place. The whole railway line and these station buildings, including the iron-framed footbridge were all designed by the famous Isambard Kingdom Brunel in the 1840s, when the trains were wider and ran on a wider gauge track. The track width was later reduced to its current standardised width.

The buildings and the footbridge are listed which present certain problems when the issue of accessibility are considered. The only way to cross the 
tracks is by this footbridge for those who can manage the tricky steps, or else it is a two hundred yard journey on various footpaths beside four roads which provides a tricky alternative even for wholly mobile people. The obvious solution is to add two lifts to provide access to the footbridge from each platform.

Pip has agreed to make a film to focus on and highlight these issues aiming to influence the various 'powers that be' in Network Rail, the land owners, and the franchise holder, Great Western Railway. Filming will begin in the last week of August and on a couple of days in September when I hope to help Pip. He has been a film editor for nearly thirty-five years much of it spent in the natural history department of the BBC in Bristol. I'm looking forward to working with him and watching how he tells a quite complicated story to produce changes on the ground that will help a lot of people. Apparently more than half a million people use this station each year!