Inland Railway Train at Mara

turnaround in its fortunes, with spectacular passenger growth. Services connect smoothly into local bus and long-distance rail services, and an over staffed and unproductive operation has been slimmed down by measures such as one-person operation of the trains. A new fleet of lightweight diesel railbuses has just been delivered from Siemens-Duewag which offer much improved standards of comfort, accessibility, and speed.
   In Sweden, county passenger transport authorities are now responsible for franchising local bus and rail passenger services. This has achieved substantial savings by creating a competitive market for the provision of rail service; these savings have been ploughed back into new and improved service. Whilst most of the Swedish rail infrastructure is owned by the state track authority, Banverket, one very long rural line known as the Inland Railway (inlandsbanan) is now owned by a consortium of local authorities along its route. They have encouraged additional freight and passenger service onto the line, including much-increased tourist traffic.

Plans are afoot to re-open dis-used rural lines, including this on in the north-west.

   Some of the most radical restructuring of railways is currently taking place in Britain. The 1993 Railways Act has allowed for the franchising of the British Rail-owned passenger train operating companies. At the same time, an association of existing and potential operators has come together to form Community Railways (CR). The aim of CR is to provide high quality local passenger service, using innovative operating service, using innovative operating and marketing methods. Some of CR's members are existing railways which want to run service for the local communities as well as intercity service. Other CR members want to take over existing British Rail (BR) branch lines and develop them along similar lines to the Dürener Kreisbahn. In several cases, companies want to start entirely new service, either along currently dis-used branch lines or between towns and cities which currently have no direct passenger service.
   In several parts of the UK, rail partnerships are being set up to promote and develop existing BR local railways.  They are

October 1995