ANYONE who travels with any frequency on East Lancashire's railways is likely to have strong opinions on the speed, comfort and reliability of the services.

But even the most convinced pessimist will be surprised to hear that despite a multiitude of advances in technology, journey times are no better than they were 50 years ago.

There are several reasons why it was just as quick to travel by steam train between Blackburn and Colne in 1955 as it is by a bone-shaking twin carriage diesel railbus today.

Fewer doors, meaning passengers have to queue up to get on board, is one.

But another more important one is speed limits of 40mph imposed because of the state of the track and the trains running on it.

The nub of the problem is quite simply a lack of investment in our railway system.

Commuter services in the South East and on the troubled West Coast main line have emptied the small pot of cash set aside for improvement.

But until a real commitment is made to spend on modernising our local train services, politicians should not complain about East Lancashire being clogged up by cars.

Airy-fairy ideas like supertram systems should also be forgotten about. We have a good basic rail infrastructure - let's bring it into the 21st century.