Save the Woodhead Tunnel protest 12th Jan 2008

After a long walk from Hadfield I arrived at the Woodhead tunnel entrance well before the scheduled 1pm start of the protest. I was a bit disappointed by the relatively small turnout, but I thought this was due to the fact it was only 12.15. Sadly, by 1pm the crowd had not swelled to the numbers I was expecting. I would estimate about eighty people in total turned up. I would guess that about 30 of the total were Green/environmental campaigners, about 20 seemed to be railway enthusiasts, and the remainder seemed to be a mix of supportive well wishers and journalists. Shortly after 1pm, the gentleman in the photograph above, wearing the orange trousers opened proceedings. He gave a brief introduction as to the reason why we were all gathered and introduced the first speaker, who was, Chris Davies M.E.P. Mr Davies talked about how he was on the final train through the Woodhead Tunnel in 1970, he echoed the sentiments of most there when he said the line should be reopened.

A number of other speakers followed ranging from Green Party spokesmen to railway enthusiasts. One railway enthusiast had a large pair of horns that apparently were taken from one of the locomotives that used to work the Woodhead route. All in all it was an excellent event and credit must go to the organisers. The turnout was small, but the atmosphere was great. I got to speak to some very interesting people, some of them at the complete opposite end of the political spectrum from I. The only downside to the whole event was the Stazi, sorry, police surveillance. Why on earth they feel the need to come to such an event and start intimidating people by filming them is beyond me.

My only regret is that I did not bring my video camera to film so I could share it with Tameside Citizen Viewers. There were plenty of video cameras there and undoubtedly some of the footage taken will make it to Youtube, and when it does I will post the clips here.