A tribute to Adrian Shooter the man responsible for Leamington and Warwick to London Marylebone rail service

A community group has paid tribute to the man responsible for the founding of the rail service between Leamington and Warwick and Marylebone Station in London.

The Friends of Leamington station will hold an event in the town in April to remember Adrian Shooter, who died in December aged 74.

The rail executive founded - and was the driving force behind the privatisation of - Chiltern Railways in the 1990s.

He had the failing and faltering Marylebone Station in London turned into Chiltern Railways’ terminus and HQ.

He also had Warwick Parkway Station built on the line – the first new station in the county for perhaps a century - enabling easy rail travel to and from Warwickshire with nearly 1,000 parking spaces.

A retired manager wrote of Leamington Station: “When I was young I visited occasionally and saw the steady decline in both train service and buildings and assumed that this would continue.

"I suppose, had I been asked in the mid-sixties to predict what the station site would look like in 2023 I would probably have said 'mostly disappeared under housing' or something similar.

“So what we see today is really quite amazing, the train service which we know on the Chiltern route is the result of the foresight of Adrian Shooter and the cross-country route, which has developed partly as a result of this, while the station itself has been preserved and yet discreetly modernised.”

The Friends of Leamington Station have arranged for the group’s president Ian Baxter to pay tribute to Adrian – who was his close friend - at the Royal Pump Rooms on Thursday April 13 at 7.30pm.

There will be an admission fee of £5 to cover expenses.

The Friends of Leamington Station have said: “Any profits will be sent to the Motor Neurone Disease Association, to research the disease which robbed Adrian of his retirement and all of us of a good man.

"In his 40 plus years working for the railways Adrian was a star and is acknowledged as such by his colleagues and most railway experts.

"His obituaries in the national press list his many and various national achievements.

"We are in his debt.”