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A plan to revive Britain’s rural railways gathers steam
振兴英国农村铁路的计划正在酝酿中
In the silent ticket office, beneath the half-moon windows of the booths, a large green sign announces “Okehampton” to an empty room. On the platform, a faded poster reads “Devon—Travel by rail”. Those reading it have had little chance to do so. The last passenger train left Okehampton on June 3rd 1972. The town turned out to mourn: the mayor stood by, holding a wreath. On the line, between the sleepers, the grass started to grow.
在寂静的售票处半月形的窗户下，一个空荡荡的房间里有一块巨大的绿色标志，上面写着“奥克汉普顿”。站台上，一张褪色的海报上写着“德文郡—乘火车旅行”。（但是）那些读到它的人没有机会再乘坐了。最后一列客运列车于1972年6月3日离开奥克汉普顿。全镇的人都出来哀悼：市长站在旁边，手举花圈。在这条线上，在枕木之间，草木开始生长。
But Okehampton is changing. New steel tracks gleam beneath the platform; diggers toil in the car park. The station is being reopened as part of the government’s “Restoring Your Railway” fund, launched in January last year to keep a manifesto promise. The aim of the scheme is, as the transport secretary Grant Shapps explained, to “reverse catastrophic cuts to the rail network primarily led by the Beeching axe”. Some 141 bids have been made; 25 have been successful. Okehampton is the first to reopen. Eleven miles of track have been laid with Brunellian briskness in four weeks. The first train arrives on November 20th at 7.10am.
但奥克汉普顿正在改变。新的钢轨在平台下闪闪发光；工人们在停车场里辛苦地干活。作为政府“重建铁路”基金的一部分，该火车站将重新开放，该基金于去年1月启动，以履行宣言中的承诺。正如交通部长格兰特·沙普斯所解释的那样，该计划的目的是“逆转主要由比钦大斧引发的对铁路网的灾难性削减”。大约有141项投标产生；其中25项获得了成功。奥克汉普顿是第一个重新开放的城市。四周之内，布鲁内利人用迅捷的步伐铺设了11英里的铁轨。第一班火车将于11月20日上午7点10分到达。
In 1963 a report by Richard Beeching, chairman of the British Railways Board, earmarked 5,000 miles of track and 2,363 stations for closure. To this day, it is seen less as a piece of bureaucracy than as an act of “infamy”; its cuts “a wound that hasn’t healed”, according to Stewart Francis, a former chairman of the Rail Passengers’ Council.
1963年，英国铁路局主席理查德•比钦在一份报告中指出，要关闭5000英里铁轨和2363个车站。时至今日，人们对它的看法与其说是官僚主义，不如说是一种 "臭名昭著 "的行为；铁路乘客委员会前主席斯图尔特·弗朗西斯说，铁路的削减是“一个尚未愈合的伤口”。
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