It runs to Cogload Junction (east of Taunton) where it joins the Bristol to Exeter and Penzance line.

The section from Reading to Westbury is sometimes called the Berks and Hants Line, despite never entering the county of Hampshire.

[3][page needed] The Great Western Main Line is on the right and between the two routes is the former Reading TMD, now an engineering depot.

Just beyond the depot lies Reading West, a local station that is elevated above a road at one end but is in a deep cutting at the other.

A third line used to curve to the left to a goods depot but this is long closed and the trackbed blocked by a footpath.

There was never a station at Burbage but the siding served a wharf which allowed transhipment of goods between the canal and railway.

The next junction on the right is at Witham, where the old East Somerset Railway carries stone trains from Merehead Quarry and continues to Cranmore.

The main line is now on the Langport and Castle Cary Railway that opened on 2 July 1906 to shorten the so-called "Great Way Round" via Bristol.

[4][page needed] Passenger services on the route are operated by Great Western Railway (GWR).

[7] GWR also provide local services along parts of the line, between Reading and Bedwyn,[8] and between Westbury and Castle Cary.

The main pinch-point is between Reading West and Southcote Junction where the route is shared with trains to and from Basingstoke and south-coast ports.

It was forecast in the report that demand for journeys towards London can be met up to 2016 by increased service levels; three trains each hour will be needed to the west of England.

[11] Plans for the route included making the down loop at Newbury Racecourse reversible to improve train handling on race days; the extension of the turnback siding at Bedwyn to accommodate six-car DMUs; increase line speed as far as Cogload Junction; a third track from there and direct access to the northern bay platform at Taunton.

A 2009 DfT white paper called for electric services beyond Reading to be operated by cascaded and completely modernised Class 387 commuter trains from the end of 2018.

This would allow the existing DMUs that operate on this section to be cascaded to the Bristol area, the South West and Northern England.

[16][17] The improved station was officially opened by the Queen in July 2014, and railway upgrades in the area were completed in the summer of 2015.