THE RIBBLE Valley already has strong credentials for the revival of railways in East Lancashire. Now, it has steam up for more - as it is announced that Castle Cement in Clitheroe is to take more lorries off the road as it switches shipments of iron oxide to its plant back to rail.

This comes on top of its return to rail for deliveries of coal to its works - a move that, when it began two years ago, promised to remove 80 trucks a week from the roads to and from Castle Cement. Now, this latest switch will mean at least 35 fewer trucks a month carrying iron oxide there.

The boost for the environment will be felt across the Ribble Valley and beyond.

And how much greater it would be if more companies assessed the benefits of using rail for freight - and the commercial advantages must be there if it pays companies like Castle to do so.

It was their charges that ran much rail freight into the buffers under British Rail.

Now it looks like there is at least one aspect of rail privatisation proving competitive - let's have more of it.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.