Although railway passenger traffic remains high, negative aspects of rail continue to make the news, including serious concerns over cost acceleration, cutbacks in proposed investment and preceptions of poor quality. Many medium and smaller stations are also seeing facilities upgraded and links with the locality improved. In all cases this helps place the station more visibly at the heart of the community, thus increasing the profile of rail as a good quality travel mode, creating new potential demands. Such schemes benefit from partnerships between rail interests, local authorities and developers, indicating the wide spectrum of benefits which such schemes can offer.

Speakers include: Stephen Clark, Director of Planning, SRA; Andreas Markides, Director, Colin Buchanan & Partners; Nicholas Waterson, Associate, Rail Division, Mott MacDonald; Peter Hine, Associate Director, Symonds Group and Chair, RTPI Transport Panel; David Brown, Passenger Services Director, South Yorkshire PTE; Stephen Pauling, Senior Public Transport Officer - Rail, Nottingham City Council; Paul Salveson, Director, Association of Community Rail Partnerships; Andy Harmer, Business Development Director, Laing Rail; Peter Kelly, Corporate Strategy Manager, Merseytravel; Stephen Turner, Managing Director, Meteor; John Yunnie, Disability Adviser, Association of Train Operating Companies; Dr Paul Cozens, Research Fellow, University of Glamorgan & Jeremy Whitaker, Commercial Director, Wales & Borders Railways