SENRUG – The South East Northumberland Rail User Group – is a voluntary organisation that promotes rail travel and campaigns for better rail services in, within, to, from and through South East and East Northumberland, representing the interests of both existing and potential rail travellers in the area.
By ‘potential’, SENRUG means those who would use rail services if only the trains went where they want to go, at the time they want to go, at a price they can afford, and in a clean, safe, secure, accessible and easy to understand manner.
Please look through our website to find out more about our current campaigns and how we pursue them. Use the Contact button below to let us know if you agree or advise us of ideas of your own.
The more people we speak for, the louder our voice is heard. If you support our objectives, we invite you to add your voice to ours and join SENRUG, to help us achieve our campaigns and develop new ones.
SENRUG has been campaigning for the re-opening of the Ashington Blyth & Tyne Line, now known as The Northumberland Line, linking Newcastle to Ashington, since March 2005. Go to our Ashington Blyth and Tyne Campaign Page to find out details of what we propose, and the scheme now being delivered by Northumberland County Council, or visit our AB&T Campaign History Page which gives key milestones throughout the campaign’s 17 year history. But SENRUG is not a single issue campaign group, and you can check out our other campaigns and the progress we are making on our Campaigns Index page here.
LATEST NEWS
Northumberland Line Opening Put Back to December: An announcement from the Northumberland Line Project Team on 2nd August 2024 finally conceded the line will not open this “summer”. Many had suspected this, since despite there only being a few weeks of summer left (admittedly the council had previously indicated they were counting September as “summer”), there had still been no formal date set, and tickets are not yet on sale. Whilst SENRUG is of course disappointed at the length of delay – hoping it would only be a month or so, we are encouraged that a number of key milestones have been achieved this week, such as the Newsham Road Bridge and Palmersville underpass opened, and the Blyth-Bebside cycle and footbridge over the A189 Spine Road going in this weekend. So completion is definitely moving closer, and we note the Project Team’s Press Release gives just a hint that it might just be possible to pull the opening date forward a bit from the new December target. Just for clarity the date being discussed here is for the first phase of the opening, excluding Bedlington, Blyth-Bebside and Northumberland Park stations that will follow later. SENRUG’s own Press Release commenting on the delay is here.
