A NEW railway station to serve Grove and Wantage and a reopened branch line linking Witney and Oxford are on a list of rail network improvements proposed by the body representing train companies.

The Association of Train Operating Companies says the £4m Grove project would be good value for money, although residents remain pessimistic that the proposal will become a reality.

Atoc estimates that the benefits of building new platforms at the site of the former Wantage Road station, alongside the A338 just north of Grove, would far outweigh the cost of reinstating the station and running trains to serve it.

The report also says that the reopening of the branch line to Witney, at a cost of £95m, should be “evaluated” for Government assistance with the capital costs of rebuilding, because once reopened it could operate profitably, carrying commuters to Oxford.

The branch line, from the former Yarnton Junction station, on the Cotswold Line, closed to passengers in 1962 and freight in 1970.

Hugh Jaeger, a spokesman for the Thames Valley branch of campign group Railfuture, said: “Railfuture has long campaigned for the reopening of the former station at Grove and the railway to Witney.

“We welcome Atoc’s report as proof that there’s now a serious business case for considering both proposals.”

In October 2007, Oxfordshire County Council was granted outline planning permission for a new station at Grove. Wantage Road station closed during a cost-cutting drive in the `1960s.

However, little is expected to happen in the short term as the Department for Transport has said it will not make money available for major rail schemes until 2014.

Don Summers, a retired atomic energy worker from Hawthorne Crescent, Grove, said: “Previous inquiries into this indicate this is more of a wish and the train operators don’t seem very enthusiastic about it. My feeling is that if it made commercial sense, the train operator would have pursued it already.

“Although the local community would love to think we could have our own station and go to London from Grove, I think most commuters doing that journey already live the right side of town to get to Didcot.”

Geoff Chown, of Mayfield Avenue, said: “I don’t think it’s going to happen for some time, if it does at all.”

The county council’s rail development officer Adrian Saunders said: “We haven’t taken a view on the report as such. It only came out last week and we still need to know from Atoc the basis of their assumptions.”

Transport Minister Chris Mole said: “For the longer term, we will work with local authorities who want to improve links to the rail network.”