DAVID Randon's letter cites the Beeching Report (September 19).

Beeching admitted each York-Hull train carried roughly 57 passengers. The fare "take" was £90,400 a year against £84,400 costs - a £6,000 profit.

Before Beeching, planned modernisation schemes would have paid for themselves in seven years.

Mr Randon speculates on passenger levels, pre-empting the outcome of the "demand study".

This will look beyond likely fares and at the route's wider potential to promote economic growth and cut road congestion and accidents.

Single vehicle occupancy is the rule on the A1079. Each rail passenger will usually mean one less car.

The A1079 has been "de-trunked" and will see 50 per cent more traffic in the next 20 years.

Making it dual carriageway would cost £200-£300 million.

One hundred people have been killed and 1,000 seriously injured in the past 24 years. Each road death costs the state £1 million.

York is daily invaded by traffic queuing from the East Riding so £5,000 towards a "demand study" hardly reflects the route's potential benefits to York.

The Countryside Agency is contributing three times that amount.

Rail from York to Hull/Beverley misses the fast-growing areas of the central East Riding and goes out of the way.

You travel to Copmanthorpe and then miles south before heading east towards Selby and Hull.

Links to Beverley are such that it may be quicker to leave the train at Howden and take a taxi.

Philip Taylor,

Minsters' Rail Campaign,

Strother Close,

Pocklington.

Updated: 09:46 Friday, September 26, 2003