RAILWAY chiefs celebrated the 10th anniversary of the re-opening an East Lancashire railway line and admitted: "It couldn't happen now".

The Blackburn-Clitheroe line opened for regular passenger services again in May 1994 - 32 years after it was axed as part of a national closure programme - when it became the only rural line in the country to regain services following Dr Beeching's cuts.

Yesterday, civic dignitaries joined railway campaigners on a special service from Clitheroe to Carlisle to mark the anniversary.

Campaigning for the re-opening of the line to regular passenger services began in 1986 when rail enthusiasts were fighting to keep the Settle to Carlisle line - which the Blackburn to Clitheroe line goes on to join at Hellifield on the Yorkshire border.

Richard Watts, now a public transport officer at Lancashire County Council, was responsible for setting up the campaign, which is called Ribble Valley Rail.

He said: "I think we were lucky in some ways about the timing of it all. I don't think it could happen now because costs have escalated so much in the rail industry since privatisation.

"We received a lot of support from the then Regional Railways who bent over backwards to help us, and the case the county council put together estimated 200,000 passenger journeys would be made on the line between Blackburn and Clitheroe every year. We were also fortunate in the sense that the line hadn't been ripped up after Beeching's cuts."

Initially, Ribble Valley Rail ran several 'Saturday shopper' services from Clitheroe to Preston to raise interest in the line, while the county council operated its summer Sunday Dalesrail services from Preston to Clitheroe and on to Hellifield and then Carlisle.

The county council spent nearly £1million re-opening and improving stations at Whalley and Langho, rebuilding Ramsgreave and Wilpshire Station from scratch and investing heavily in Clitheroe.

Ribble Valley Rail still exists, promoting the benefits of the line, and also operates a 'Friends of Stations' scheme which sees local people maintaining stops along the route.

Up to 18 trains a day run along the line now, with an average of 300,000 people travelling the route every year.

Ribble Valley Rail member Ron Birch said: "Our next aim is to get a service running north of Clitheroe too, and we think there is a serious case for that, especially for tourism, in the future."