T.N. Bone from St Andrews says the Starlink campaign ‘would have his whole-hearted and active support’ if it were pressing for the East Coast Main Line to be re-routed via St Andrews, but he sees ‘no purpose whatsoever’ in a light railway shuttle between Leuchars and St Andrews. And J.M. Anderson of Crail is concerned about the cost and the fact that the Old Course Hotel and Petheram Bridge car-park sit on the old alignment. The alternative, he says, is for a station on the North Haugh which would, he claims, be ‘vastly inconvenient for passengers from St Andrews’. Furthermore, he avers, passengers would ‘have’ to change trains at Leuchars and there would be no room for sufficient car-parking at St Andrews, whereas the car-park at Leuchars is large. He concludes by disbelieving that customers of Rusacks and Rufflets Hotels ‘find any great difficulty in travelling to Leuchars and taking a 10-minute taxi ride to their hotel’.

With all respect for the two correspondents, and it is good that they took the trouble to reply, they do seem to have read into the article much more in the way of detail than was actually there. It is far too early for questions of alignment, rolling-stock and stations, or the type of service to be run to have been decided; these matters are for transport experts to determine in a full feasibility study, which so far has not been carried out. Neither can realistic claims be made about car-parking or lack thereof and one could point out that Leuchars car-park fills up very quickly, often forcing St Andreans to park outwith the proper spaces or overflow onto the grass verge. The present situation with St Andrews nearest railway station being 6 miles away is not satisfactory and it is unwise to pretend that it is.