Police patrol Inverness railway line

no trespass sign beside the railway track

POLICE are stepping up patrols on a ‘hotspot’ stretch of railway line running through an Inverness residential area following the latest in a series of potentially dangerous incidents.

A disaster was potentially averted after a member of the public contacted police to report three children on the line and throwing stones on the track at Smithton, near the back of Murray Terrace.

A "large object" was also left on the line under the bridge over Tower Road.

The 1843 train travelling from Inverness to Edinburgh was delayed for around 10 minutes as a result of the incident after British Transport Police (BTP) issued a "caution" to train drivers, while it investigated.

Two boys, aged 12 and 11, and a girl, aged 11, later received a warning from BTP after the incident on Monday evening.

"We would regard this as a hotspot — it has been a magnet for children for a number of years," explained a BTP spokesman.

"Incidents of this type are not unique, it is a place where we have had incidents before. We will be increasing our presence there."

Several boulders were placed on the line last August, creating potential for a devastating derailment.

Catastrophe was only averted when the driver spotted the debris and managed to stop in time.

Patrols were also increased last spring when a missile was thrown at the windscreen of a train travelling through Cradlehall.

The object, believed to be a bottle, smashed through the outer pane of the double-glazed windscreen when the train crossed Caulfield Road North. No-one on board the train was injured.

Inverness councillor Bob Wynd, who lives in nearby Woodside, thinks housing development has played a part in the increase in incidents, with more people living in close proximity to the track.

"Parents are obviously not warning children about the dangers and the risks of their actions," he said.

"Putting things on the line is an extremely dangerous thing to do, it can derail a train, all sorts of thing could happen.

"Parents have got to get the message through to their children — for their own safety and for the safety of other people, stay away from the railway line."

He thinks improvements to fencing could help, a view shared by Smithton and Culloden community councillor David McGrath, who lives in nearby Culloden.

"There has been ongoing issues," he said. "Apart from spending a lot of money, putting up high fences, with barbed wire, and putting up a fence on the bridge over the railway line at Tower Road, I cannot see anything that is going to do much about it."

Inverness councillor Thomas Prag has written to Network Rail to get a disused bridge over the line, between Tower Road and Tower Brae North, reopened.

He thinks it would provide a natural route between housing in the Tower Road area and Smithton Primary School and could be incorporated as a Safer Routes to School.

"I think one of the issues is, like any other railway line that run through a residential area, it is a natural magnet for youngsters, particularly young boys who will want to see what happens if you put something on the line and a train goes over it," Councillor Prag continued. "They simply don’t understand that risk."

He also thinks improving the strength and height of the fencing around the line could help.

Network Rail has written to Highland Council about re-opening the bridge and says it would be supportive if the council came forward with an appropriate proposal.

"Parents have got to get the message through to their children — for their own safety and for the safety of other people, stay away from the railway line" — Inverness councillor Bob Wynd.