An alternative route from London to Oxford had been opened, by way of Maidenhead, High Wycombe, Princes Risborough and Thame, but this had been engineered as a rural branch line and was incapable of providing trunk route facilities. The GWR obtained Parliamentary powers in 1897 for the Wycombe and Acton line: this was to provide a much more direct route to High Wycombe and on to Thame; but this was nevertheless designed as a rural branch rather than a future trunk railway route.