Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

This is the way forward with rail transport

We do have some "freight only" lines but they are mostly connecting power stations, ports and the like to the main network, or occasionally providing a link through from one bit of the network to the other. We don't have main lines dedicated to freight as such.
 
Not really. There are some minor lines that only carry freight, but intercity routes are shared by all trains.

They're going to have to do something to address the capacity issue in the next 20 years if things carry on growing like thye have been.
 
Right speaking as a former railwayman - 15 years on freight, here's my two pennyworth


the problem is that there is no longer sufficient capacity to carry all the traffic on offer and reasonably predicted for the next 25 years. It has to be on this time scale because any infrastructure project takes a long time to bring about.

IF the problem is lack of capacity - then the solution is to build more capacity and make best use of it.

Here lies a conundrum. High Speed lines sterilise massive amounts of 'paths' - that's why LGV is effectively reserved for such trains. HSLs are also massively expensive because of the kind of engineering that has to go into them - minimum radius curves and so on.

So any proposal for new build has to capable of carrying the maximum amount of mixed traffic. The Swiss railwayman is quite right - look at their network - roughly the size and density of the major conurbations in the UK - median journey lengths of between 90 and 150 miles. Their solution is a maximum speed of 100 mph but VERY intensively worked with mixed traffic - freight, stopping services and expresses, using a highly sophisticated signalling system and some very slick operating [single line working at short notice, bi-directional running] and so on.

I would have thought the majority of UK traffic more closely resembles the Swiss model and that is what we should aim for especially if funds for investment are tight.

125 mph [or possibly 140 within existing technology is fine for those clear sections north of Newcastle and Preston on ECML and WCML where traffic densities are not that great anyway and are not ever likely to be. Far better would be an ultra reliable medium speed [max 110 mph] system capable of carrying all the different traffic types on offer especially in those areas like the North West where I live, where the network is still dense and capable of being developed. Other areas similar are the Birmingham area and certainly round Bristol where a lot of lines closed but could be brought back into use for a fraction of the cost per mile of an HSL.

Sorry if that 'pisses on your particular chips' as we say in Liverpool

Gra
 
Although the massive hub of london makes a difference to the swiss model, yes?
 
PS

you'll get an idea of current thinking in Govt when the new line HS1 is sold off. It cannot pay for itself on Eurostar traffic alone, so it will have to carry fast suburbans [the new Hitachi javelins] and freight. No-one wants to admit this yet, but it is going to have to be faced - that expensive infrastructure needs to be much more intensively used if it is to justify itself - the same would be true of any other new build in this country.

gra
 
HS1 is not a fair comparison. Ebbsfleet is not exactly a major conurbation with an existing intercity route creeping close to capacity.
 
davgraham said:
So any proposal for new build has to capable of carrying the maximum amount of mixed traffic. The Swiss railwayman is quite right - look at their network - roughly the size and density of the major conurbations in the UK - median journey lengths of between 90 and 150 miles. Their solution is a maximum speed of 100 mph but VERY intensively worked with mixed traffic - freight, stopping services and expresses, using a highly sophisticated signalling system and some very slick operating [single line working at short notice, bi-directional running] and so on.

I would have thought the majority of UK traffic more closely resembles the Swiss model and that is what we should aim for especially if funds for investment are tight.

125 mph [or possibly 140 within existing technology is fine for those clear sections north of Newcastle and Preston on ECML and WCML where traffic densities are not that great anyway and are not ever likely to be. Far better would be an ultra reliable medium speed [max 110 mph] system capable of carrying all the different traffic types on offer especially in those areas like the North West where I live, where the network is still dense and capable of being developed. Other areas similar are the Birmingham area and certainly round Bristol where a lot of lines closed but could be brought back into use for a fraction of the cost per mile of an HSL.

Sorry if that 'pisses on your particular chips' as we say in Liverpool

Gra
Click to expand...

I have to say that I tend to agree with this to some extent. Given a limited pot of money, I think it would be more wisely spent as davgraham suggests.

Also, the case for high speed lines in the UK is a bit different compared to say France or Germany where they can link into a Europe-wide network. Geography means that nobody travels through the UK to get to somewhere else, except ourselves. So an HS line from Birmingham to London will only ever carry traffic from Birmingham and a small amount of traffic from north of there. That is not the same as, say, building the HS line from Brussels to Cologne where you have a whole lot more through traffic on offer.

Not that I wouldn't like to see a high speed line linking to the Chunnel that would let you travel from Glasgow to Paris in four or five hours, but being realistic, I think there are much better ways we could spend the money, including investing heavily in freight capacity.
 
To be fair, the article doesn't state just how 'high speed' the proposed track would be. Given that they plan to concentrate on the existing major routes, adding extra rails to those routes may well be an option for consideration.
 
I'm another who would like to see the local lines reinstated, as there are large tracts of the country no longer served by rail.

The proposed mainlines are good to see but I cannot see them serving day to day travel that well for most folk.
 
Crispy said:
To be fair, the article doesn't state just how 'high speed' the proposed track would be. Given that they plan to concentrate on the existing major routes, adding extra rails to those routes may well be an option for consideration.
Click to expand...



Yes I agree with that . . . .

provided this additional build is 'future proofed' to some degree

that means

1 built to a higher loading gauge compatible with GB2 to at least as far as 'swap bodies' go.

2 compatible with ERTMS level 3 at least

3 compatible with heavier axle loadings / highly mechanised maintenance regime [so that even Network Rail can carry out a major change within a maximum of 4 hours posessions - standard on some EU railways]

4 tracks paired by direction of travel rather than UP SLOW, DOWN FAST, UP FAST, DOWN SLOW. The 'weave' of slow moving freight on the WCML would be eliminated by this simple layout

5 many more dynamic loops to allow trains to be overtaken at speed rather than whilst stopped

6 Minimum loops for holding trains of 1500 metres

. . . sorry if all this reveals my freight bias


So far as the comparison with London and the Swiss model is concerned - yes far better to route non London traffic out of the way altogether. To be fair Network Rail show some idea of this with the proposals at Reading and for an East West route re-opening between Oxford and Bedford - again tho' if this goes ahead it should not be on the minimal level of 2 trains an hour and minimal signalling but look forward to the points I made above and in the earlier post.


London needs a dedicated commuter network [as probably does Birmingham and probably the trans Pennine conurbation, and the Edinburgh - Glasgow axis] - all freight and long distance express traffic should be kept clear of commuter routes which then operate at much denser frequencies, especially if ERTMS ever really does work - fancy 110 mph 400 metres from a 16 coach train in front [90 sec headways] with a computer doing the driving - this was the dream of 'moving block' signalling that was going to free up so much capacity on the WCML according to Railtrack


gra
 
The capacity problems are a nightmare, it means they do not really want to encourage too many more people to use the trains at the moment.

If electric cars & similar do not take off in future, the railways will not be able to take the strain, and there will have to be big reductions in people travelling.

Significant amounts of money have been spent upgrading my local station, part of the west coast mainline, so that other lines did not interfere with the traffic on the fast west coast mainline service. More improvements are planned, to improve freight services which go between ports and various destinations around the UK, via the midlands.

I get the idea that the internet is supposed to do more to reduce the transport of goods and people, than is actually proving the case, its just nowhere near as much fun. Still downloadable music and movies are a start I suppose.
 
Of course RFF or DB Netz et al remain in public hands and require "subsidies".
It's public infrastrucutre. Like roads.
 
I think it'd help a lot if we took a big step back and did some real blue-sky thinking about the whole end-to-end transportation network.

Even though Britain is a small(ish) country, it has very diverse transport needs, and the current piecemeal approach doesn't begin to address them.

As far as freight goes, I think it's fair to say that a lot of it is bulk point-to-point stuff (or at least could be). To me, it's close to lunacy, for example, that a lorry should ever need to go anywhere near a seaport (I believe quite a lot of seaports think so, too - much of the capacity limitations in some of the busier ones is around fast access and turnaround by road). Then you only have to look at the amount of freight traffic heading up and down the M1 to see that there is lots of scope for concentration of that freight onto fixed links.

When we talk about the Beeching cuts, we often focus heavily on the effects on passenger traffic, but it's true of freight, too: because so many smaller towns no longer have rail connections, their essential goods are coming in on the back of large trucks which have probably driven a considerable distance to get there. Of course, you can't have a railway siding to the back of every TESCO (though, if that were given consideration when the locations are being planned, it's not inconceivable), but you can at least get the goods as near to their destination as possible before dropping a demountable wagon body onto the back of a (possibly electrically-powered?) truck for the last 10-15 miles.

We didn't have the logistical tools back in the 1950s to really run a kind of hierarchical freight network efficiently, but we do now: you could probably pretty well automate the entire train-marshalling business with current technology.

As for the passenger thing. Well, high-speed lines are sexy and look good when you're showing off to other countries, but I agree with what quite a lot of other people have already said on here: is it really what we need most of all? I still think we'd be better off reinstating a lot of our local feeder networks - perhaps as light rail, but for freight and passenger use - and, ideally, electrifying it, because almost all our renewable energy is going to be electricity. Maybe running it on tram-standard 750VDC would make the infrastructure cheaper? So, "downgrade" lots of the more distant parts of the network to light rail, but expand it. In my little corner of paradise (West Wales), we really do need something better than the three east-west links, but we're probably a special case. Obviously, you can't mix heavy and light rail traffic on the same tracks, so it would mean more interchanges. But, providing you were offering decent guaranteed connections, a reliable service to start with, and really good headways between trains even at the branch level, would that be too much to expect people to tolerate?

I'd be interested to hear from those who clearly know about such things what the implications (benefits and drawbacks) are for moving over to light rail for branch lines...

In rural areas, stations should be provided with more-than-adequate car parking, provided free of charge to rail users - perhaps with discounts for, eg, electric vehicles? - and/or really good, comprehensive bus/minibus/taxi linkups, since there will obviously still be quite large distances which aren't economic to cover by rail.

Once all this is done, you can start whacking motorists with all kinds of punitive taxes, road pricing, all that stuff, because you're offering them a credible alternative which should get them where they're going at less (or, at worst, the same) cost, just as fast, and hopefully just as painlessly.

Time for a paradigm shift, I think.
 
agnesdavies said:
When we talk about the Beeching cuts, we often focus heavily on the effects on passenger traffic, but it's true of freight, too: because so many smaller towns no longer have rail connections, their essential goods are coming in on the back of large trucks which have probably driven a considerable distance to get there. Of course, you can't have a railway siding to the back of every TESCO (though, if that were given consideration when the locations are being planned, it's not inconceivable), but you can at least get the goods as near to their destination as possible before dropping a demountable wagon body onto the back of a (possibly electrically-powered?) truck for the last 10-15 miles.
Click to expand...

Tesco is already doing this, to some extent, although not quite to the level of getting it 10-15 miles from stores. For the past year or two it's been running a regular train between its distribution centres in the midlands and central Scotland.

They have just announced that they are to start a second service, this time running from central Scotland to Inverness, where the goods will be transferred to various stores in the area by lorry.

http://www.strathspey-herald.co.uk/.../Tesco_lets_the_trains_take_their_strain.html

You mention about the possibility of a railway siding by every supermarket. A bit optimistic perhaps but it's worth noting that many supermarkets are built on sites which were previously railway sidings. On the approach to many train stations you pass by the back of a supermarket and this is why.
 
And the Rail, Maritime and Transport union says that the economy needs trains, not planes.

RMT general secretary Bob Crow said: "Paris remains Heathrow's top destination and there are as many flights leaving for Edinburgh as for New York.
"If we provide a viable, fast and sustainable alternative to short-haul flights, the case for Heathrow expansion would evaporate."
Click to expand...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7470907.stm
 
elbows said:
And the Rail, Maritime and Transport union says that the economy needs trains, not planes.
Click to expand...

It doesn't matter a toss what they think - it's not as if they'd actually do something useful like dip their mitts into their pockets and come up with some funding is it?
 
teuchter said:
Blimey indeed. Is that in operation anywhere already?
Click to expand...

That's the whole point ERTMS Level 3 is decades away from being a working system. Railtrack really thought that 'moving block signalling was ready to use 'out of the box' - it simply isn't so.

There is a similar kind of mindset in the Dept of Transport where they seriously believe that they will not have to electrify the main lines because 'fuel cell locomotives' [hydrogen power] will mean that it is just not necessary . . .

. . . . and the price of oil will fall to around $50 to $70 a barrel. [this is a planning assumption used in costing all future rail investment]

You have to wonder what planet some of these people live on.

Gra
 
Cobbles said:
It doesn't matter a toss what they think - it's not as if they'd actually do something useful like dip their mitts into their pockets and come up with some funding is it?
Click to expand...
Given your well-documented attitudes to public transport, I'm trying to figure out what the point of your bothering to post on a thread like this is...?
 
Cobbles said:
It doesn't matter a toss what they think - it's not as if they'd actually do something useful like dip their mitts into their pockets and come up with some funding is it?
Click to expand...
I should imagine what they think counts about a hundred million times more than what the aviation lobby has to say on the matter.

At the end of the day, it's the latter that speaks from a very biased position, completely departed from reality and which has a record of lying and distorting facts to support their cause.
 
Cobbles' post is not a particularly useful contribution to what up till now has been an unusually civilised and interesting thread. It is true, though - almost to the same extent that it is true that it doesn't matter a toss what Cobbles thinks.

I imagine the RMT are saying this because they have a vested interest in that their members are more likely to be working in the rail sector than the aviation sector, and therefore will benefit from any growth in rail travel.

Of course, they also have a vested interest in preventing changes to the way in which the railways are run, which could make them more efficient, but would not be in the interests of their members.
 
Cobbles said:
Wrong - they'd prefer to spend £60-130 return on a nice no frills air journey that only takes an hour. Why not just give £15Bn to the airlines and let them use it to slash fares?
Click to expand...

The £130 quoted was for a walk on fair. Do you know what that means? It means arriving at the station shortly before you want to travel, and buying a ticket. Have you ever done this at an airport? Are you aware that it typically costs over £150 one-way for a short-haul airline ticket bought at the time of travel?
 
slowjoe said:
The £130 quoted was for a walk on fair. Do you know what that means? It means arriving at the station shortly before you want to travel, and buying a ticket. Have you ever done this at an airport? Are you aware that it typically costs over £150 one-way for a short-haul airline ticket bought at the time of travel?
Click to expand...

Don't waste your energy on Cobbles. We've been through the exact same argument with him ad nauseum and it doesn't stop him from posting up nonsense eg. here, here, etc. etc.
 
slowjoe said:
The £130 quoted was for a walk on fair. Do you know what that means? It means arriving at the station shortly before you want to travel, and buying a ticket. Have you ever done this at an airport? Are you aware that it typically costs over £150 one-way for a short-haul airline ticket bought at the time of travel?
Click to expand...

Frequently - I usually maintain a full fare booking (100% refundable if not used) and then see if there's any cheapo seats by phone just before I get to the airport.

There are spectacular deals available both with air and rail if you have the ability to book well in advance and don't need to be flexible (e.g. stick with exactly the train/flight that you've booked). Sure, as seats are limited, there's always a risk of not getting the plane/train that you want. It works both ways but at least with planes, you actually get a seat, as opposed to just the right to get onto the train and stand for an hour or three.

NB I've only twice been "bumped" from an overbooked flight in the last 20 years (averaging 3 one way short haul flights/week) but have frequently had the joy of standing on a "Virgin Voyager" from Leeds to York where I could transfer onto a real train.
 
Cobbles said:
NB I've only twice been "bumped" from an overbooked flight in the last 20 years (averaging 3 one way short haul flights/week) but have frequently had the joy of standing on a "Virgin Voyager" from Leeds to York where I could transfer onto a real train.
Click to expand...

Invalid comparison as usual.

"Bumping" on an airline means not getting your seat when you have booked and paid for one. Different to standing on a train when you haven't reserved a seat. If standing troubles you, make a reservation (free) when you buy your ticket. If there are no seats available you will have to wait for the next one, exactly the same as if you walked into an airport on a whim. The difference is that if you really need to get somewhere you have the right to take your chances and get on the train anyway, and there may or not be a seat for you.
 
teuchter said:
"Bumping" on an airline means not getting your seat when you have booked and paid for one.
Click to expand...


Indeed - the airline is penalised if it sells more tickets than it has seats available. Not so with the train companies.

agnesdavies said:
Given your well-documented attitudes to public transport.
Click to expand...

I'm quite happy with public transport so long as I'm not expected to subsidise things that I have no intention of using. I just wish that Taxis and Airlines got the same handouts that trains and buses attract. If high speed rail links make such "economic" sense then why hasn't anyone felt like investing in them privately? let's not forget that the rail network was developed by shareholders until such time as other means of travel offered a better rate of return.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

hash tag
Rail holidays
Replies
20
Views
630
mauvais
mauvais
N
Rail sale!
Replies
3
Views
197
Maggot
Maggot
Callie
15ch ?? Rail bridge?
Replies
17
Views
461
Dogsauce
Dogsauce
editor
The London Transport Covent Museum and Museum Depot in Acton
Replies
0
Views
129
editor
editor
editor
Wallingford town and the Cholsey and Wallingford railway in Oxfordshire
Replies
5
Views
424
editor
editor
Back
Top Bottom