FOUR decades since the last passengers boarded a train at Carnforth's main line platforms, MP David Morris is pushing for the redundant platforms to be reinstated.

During a debate at Westminster, the Morecambe and Lunesdale MP asked the Department of Transport to urge Lancashire County Council to pay for a feasibility study into restoring the platforms, which became unusable in the 1970s.

Peter Yates MBE, of Carnforth Railway Action Group, which campaigns for the platforms to be brought back into use, applauded the MP's "dogged and determined" campaigning.

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Mr Yates said the restoration would simplify and reduce return journey times between Carnforth and Kendal from three hours to 30 minutes - in turn attracting many more shoppers and visitors to Kendal and Windermere from Carnforth and the Lune Valley.

"It's a win, win, win situation for everybody," he told the Gazette. "I feel that it would be a massive boost and benefit to Cumbria, and especially to Kendal and Windermere.

"Putting Carnforth station platforms back creates connectivity. It links Barrow with Windermere; it links Leeds with Windermere; and it links Carnforth with Kendal and Windermere."

As Mr Yates explained, since the platforms were closed to passengers 40 years ago, people travelling from Carnforth to Kendal by train have had to travel south to Lancaster, leave the train, walk across the station bridge to board another train, then travel back through Carnforth up to Kendal - a round trip of three hours, when Carnforth and Kendal are only 15 minutes apart by direct train.

Mr Yates, who founded Carnforth Station Trust, believes there would be great economic benefits for Kendal and the Lakes if the platforms were restored.

"Think about Kendal station, how quiet and dead it is - however, we (Carnforth) have a catchment area of probably 20,000 people that could come to Carnforth, leave their car and then travel into Kendal. It's only 15 minutes from Carnforth to Kendal but at the moment it takes one-and-a-half hours to get to Kendal from Carnforth on a good day."

He also believes that many of the Japanese tourists who alight from trains at Windermere would love to visit Carnforth for its links with the classic 1945 movie Brief Encounter, if the journey was shorter and simpler.

Mr Yates said that when the West Coast Main Line was electrified, engineers were told to trim back the platforms but they did not have the technology to do that. Instead, they removed a section of platform and 'dumped' it in a local quarry, he said. Although the platforms were never officially closed, alterations made them unfit for purpose and they are now fenced off.

Mr Yates said that restoring the northbound and southbound platforms was put at £450,000 each in 2002, and he estimated that the cost would now have doubled.