We've had a lot of talk about what type of route you would have but where would you send it? Would you have core routes with spurs to the major conurbations or a core route/s running through each?

Personally I'd first try and keep as many central termini as possible in order to keep competitive with regional air travel. In order to prevent the closure of many other rail routes I would make it limited stop with only ay 3/4 stops along the route and I would also make it prohibitively expensive to travel 1 or 2 stops in contrast to the other end of the line to ensure most usage is for long distance travel. I'd make as many of the tickets something internet only in order to keep it competitive.

My own route would go from Euston in London via the Euston line with a station at Watford as so to stop people in the northern home counties or west london travelling into town. From there I would have a route north of Watford going off to Bristol and then splitting again to go to Cardiff and possibly Swansea via a totally new alignment bar the cities it serves and Devon and then a new terminus at Cornwall running along upgraded current routes or the M5/A38.

Going north, I'd continue along the Euston route but with slightly changed gradients to avoid the Berkamsteds and Leighton Buzzards. past MK then follow the A5 then into Birmingham via the Water Orton route into New St or a new eastside station. Then going north again, bypassing Wolverhampton and then north following a rough M6 alignment via Stoke (high unemployment - a large conurbation that could hugely benefit from something like this) then a new alignment north into south Manchester and a station at the airport or nearby for the same reason as the station at Watford. Rail alignments and motorways exist whereby large parts of east manchester and Cheshire could benefit from this. Then over normal routes into Manchester then taking over the southern rail route through the city ( I appreciate a local rail replacement for this will be very expensive) and then on via existing rail to Liverpool.

For the other alignment I'd go further north from Rugby via the M1 to say Long Eaton and an East Midlands parkway for Derby/Nottingham/Leicester then via the M1 again to Sheffield Victoria then current rail and the Woodhead on to Liverpool and Manchester. Another toute would creep past Sheffield to Leeds then further north mostly via new alignment next to major roads to Teesside, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Glasgow with another possible new route going north to Dundee and Aberdeen with quick interchange to Aberdeen ferry services. At Birmingham I'd enable a link to the route bypassing Worcester to allow access to the south west and WAles making it more inclusive. Ditto a spur at the Pennines so Liverpool/Manchester trains could go north. Would try and manage the system so that timings to Liverpool and manchester were the same whichever route you took.

Eventually I would look at a route going off north of Watford down to Heathrow and the South Coast (brighton/solent) or the Channel Tunnel. Long term, I'd look at bringing Belfast and Dublin into it via a Stranraer or Holyhead tunnel when it might be viable ( pie in the sky for now I know).

Would not necessarily use it for freight as there would be greater capacity on the current network. Would make current services to many of thes eplaces multi stop so that there is a big difference in timings and these places became more accessible to others where they don't stop now.

There are probably many physical constraints on this that I don't know about but I think it stands up well as a good network on paper.

If I'm only 'allowed' one line:

Southampton
Portsmouth
London
Milton keynes
Birmingham
Manchester
Leeds / Bradford
Middlesbrough
Newcastle
Edinburgh
Glasgow

http://i1.tinypic.com/o52q8k.jpg

could you'r one line even travel through cardiff/bristol down to southampton Tubeman? Can't really be adding too much time could it? I just wouldnt wanna miss out ;)

If I'm only 'allowed' one line:

Southampton
Portsmouth
London
Milton keynes
Birmingham
Manchester
Leeds / Bradford
Middlesbrough
Newcastle
Edinburgh
Glasgow

http://i1.tinypic.com/o52q8k.jpg

That looks about right, maybe the Cardiff/Bristol-Southampton section could be added and maybe a second line branching off from Luton through Leicester, Nottingham and Sheffield before joing the mainline again at Leeds. There should be some way of connecting Liverpool too imo. Finally a link between Bristol and Brum would make sense as an extension once the network had proved to be popular.

Stations should be as close to the city centres as possible (preferably at existing mainline stations) and airports such as Heathrow, Brum and Manchester could have stops too.

Naturally the likelihood of even 1km is small, but hey - we can dream or propose ;)


Red: Definate line construction (maglev)
Yellow: Secondary line construction (maglev)
Green: Tertiary line construction (HSR)
Blue: Fantasy (maglev)


http://img104.imageshack.us/img104/7915/unitedkingdomrel874ni.jpg


Stations would be built either underneath, above or alongside main termini in stations. For the main 'red' London-Glasgow route, you could have 20 stations:
London Heathrow Airport - London Central (Tottenham Court Road) - Watford - Luton/London Luton Airport - Northampton - Coventry - Birmingham International Airport - Birmingham New Street - Wolverhampton - Stoke-on-Trent - Manchester International Airport - Manchester Piccadilly - Oldham - Bradford - Leeds - York - Middlesbrough - Sunderland - Newcastle - Edinburgh - Glasgow

Naturally you could have express services with local services using secondary platforms while express services overtake local services.

Ideally - It would go from my front door to my office. :colgate:

If I'm only 'allowed' one line:

Southampton
Portsmouth
London
Milton keynes
Birmingham
Manchester
Leeds / Bradford
Middlesbrough
Newcastle
Edinburgh
Glasgow

http://i1.tinypic.com/o52q8k.jpgI would agree 100% if you straightened out the curve between Birmingham and Manchester. I think the extension south of London is less important than the rest.

I would agree 100% if you straightened out the curve between Birmingham and Manchester.

but then you would miss out Crewe :horse:

If I'm only 'allowed' one line:


http://i1.tinypic.com/o52q8k.jpg

I would agree with most of it although I think it should start at Southampton then on to Portsmouth and then Brighton before heading northwards towards London and the north.

If it serves Southampton and Portsmouth then it should serve Brighton seeing as Brighton is larger in population than both of those cities in Hampshire.

I agree with tubeman's route. I think spurs to Liverpool and one to Brighton would be benefitial.

For the major cities I think we should follow Lille's example (which has been phenomonely successful) where there is a fairly straight alignment in tunnel with both through tracks and stopping tracks separated.

There should be parkway stations outside the cities so that people can drive to one of these from the suburbs rather than having to always commute to the city centre.

Keep praying, this might happen!

I agree with tubeman's route. I think spurs to Liverpool and one to Brighton would be benefitial.

For the major cities I think we should follow Lille's example (which has been phenomonely successful) where there is a fairly straight alignment in tunnel with both through tracks and stopping tracks separated.

There should be parkway stations outside the cities so that people can drive to one of these from the suburbs rather than having to always commute to the city centre.

Keep praying, this might happen!

Does anyone agree with a main line route going to London with a spur via heathrow running to the south coast or the continent? As most travellers heading south would be going to London, it makes most sense to me. You can get to Brighton or Southampton in an hour (ish) from London and services are already frequent so I don't think it requires a direct route.

I think only the largest conurbations should have suburban stations and even if you did it in Birmingham it would greatly reduce advantages of speed going north or south. I think any should be reasonably well integrated rather than reliant on cars. For example if you take Watford Junction as it could (in theory) connect with services from Nw London, west london, Bedfordshire (if you link the Abbey line to the Midland) and the Chilterns (via the spur north of Moor Park once/if the WJ Met extension is built) ther emight not be much need for anyone in the district to drive there.

Does anyone agree with a main line route going to London with a spur via heathrow running to the south coast or the continent? As most travellers heading south would be going to London, it makes most sense to me. You can get to Brighton or Southampton in an hour (ish) from London and services are already frequent so I don't think it requires a direct route.

I think only the largest conurbations should have suburban stations and even if you did it in Birmingham it would greatly reduce advantages of speed going north or south. I think any should be reasonably well integrated rather than reliant on cars. For example if you take Watford Junction as it could (in theory) connect with services from Nw London, west london, Bedfordshire (if you link the Abbey line to the Midland) and the Chilterns (via the spur north of Moor Park once/if the WJ Met extension is built) ther emight not be much need for anyone in the district to drive there.The Brighton and Southampton lines are both full and relatively slow, rarely going above 90mph.

Why would parkway stations slow down the line? There could be through tracks like those at Ashford, Ebsfleet on the CTRL. Adding these stations increases the number of potential users. Someone living on the outskirts of a city does not want to travel to the centre to travel to another city no matter how good the integrated transport. I think a lot more people would use the train if they could simply do car, city centre, rather than car, local station, city centre, city centre.

The Brighton and Southampton lines are both full and relatively slow, rarely going above 90mph.

Why would parkway stations slow down the line? There could be through tracks like those at Ashford, Ebsfleet on the CTRL. Adding these stations increases the number of potential users. Someone living on the outskirts of a city does not want to travel to the centre to travel to another city no matter how good the integrated transport. I think a lot more people would use the train if they could simply do car, city centre, rather than car, local station, city centre, city centre.

Well would you have 2 either side of Birmingham as well as London and say Manchester? I can't see there being much difference in time gains between what we have now and an all stopping route like that.

And a route through London would be madness as you would probably need 2 central stops and a 'prohibitively expensive' tunnel.

I wouldn't argue that south coast services need improving. A Pendolino type train to Brighton, Portsmouth, Southampton and Poole using the Eurostar platforms at Waterloo over over head electrics might acheive that.

A Pendolino type train to Brighton, Portsmouth, Southampton and Poole using the Eurostar platforms at Waterloo over over head electrics might acheive that.

Oh no please, I hate both the new voyagers and pendolino trains, they both have uncomfortable hard seats, and for the long journeys they serve just aren't up to the standard of the old HST's or loco hauled trains.

The new southern trains are much more comfy than those virgin trains, and I would rather sit on one of those for 3 or 4 hours than a voyager or pendolino.

Also the tilting pendolino's make me feel sick every time they tilt from side to side, making an already uncomfortable journey on the hard seats even more unbearable and when you need a nice cold drink to calm your throbbing headache you have the daunting task of walking along the train aisle whilst it's tilting - you get shoved from side to side and you end up bashing into almost everyone down the length of the train (terribly embrassing) just to get to the damn buffet, which isn't even called a buffet anymore it is called the 'shop' now isn't it.

Plus - try having a piss in one of the toilets whilst the super high tech tilt comes into play, I tell you now that it is a truly horrible experiance to go through, you will get bashed around from side to side trying to hang onto your dear life whilst also enjoying a terrible headache due to the tilting motion, then - if standing up wasn't already a tricky enough task you have the almost impossible mission of trying to aim correctly into the toilet bowl or you will end up peeing all over the floor only for it to run under the crack of the cubicle door and out into the open where there is generally a queue of people. :ohno:

Riding a Pendolino is like being on a waltzer ride.
I don't know how these things are legal, I would hate to put anyone through it.

Truly awful, evil trains.:rant:


http://static.flickr.com/28/102166234_f75bd4e428_o.jpg
If you value your life you will board the train to the right - not the train of doom.

Well would you have 2 either side of Birmingham as well as London and say Manchester? I can't see there being much difference in time gains between what we have now and an all stopping route like that.
Just because the station is there doesn't mean the train has to stop there. A train every 10 minutes (concievably less) would allow for a whole combination of stopping patters just like GNER operate or any other long distance operator. Look to the CTRL I say and they have 4 stations over 70 miles, all with additional through tracks.

And a route through London would be madness as you would probably need 2 central stops and a 'prohibitively expensive' tunnel.
Again the CTRL offers an example. This has tunnelled under London for about £3bn. They seemed to think it was worth it. Plus a through tunnel gets rid of the need for a terminus. Termini needs lots of space which is expensive in London. London gets in the way of so many journeys, a though service has massive gains for say a Brighton - Manchester journey. 5 hours becomes 2 hrs and thus taps into a enormous new market. We have to find new customers, not just improve the lot of existing ones. Only that way can we reduce road congestion.

^^ Indeed, not only is it more worthwhile to tunnel from one end of London to the other, it connects up both ends of the capital, allows for through connections (meaning more people will ride), doesn't create congestion at termini and interchanges for those who are basically going through London and you can have higher capacities, fewer depots (as essentially the lines are all joined up) and greater efficiency from having a through line.

A good line would be to possibly go Southampton-Portsmouth-Brighton-London Gatwick Airport-Croydon-Waterloo-London Central (Tottenham Court Road)-London Paddington-London Heathrow Airport, etc.....

Another thing is to have an identical Tokaido Shinkansen model of having three 'lines' running on the same tracks and the trains overtaking the others at the smaller stations. One intercity only:

Intercity (Nozomi): London-Birmingham-Manchester-Newcastle-Glasgow service
Transcity (Hikari): London-Milton Keynes-Birmingham-Stoke-Manchester-Leeds-York-Newcastle-Edinburgh-Glasgow
City (Kodama): London-Watford-London Luton Airport-Milton Keynes-Northampton-Coventry-Birmingham International Airport-Birmingham-Wolverhampton-Stoke-Manchester International Airport-Manchester - Huddersfield-Leeds-York-Middlesbrough-Newcastle-Edinburgh-Glasgow-Glasgow International Airport

Note, the names aren't Japanese translations but UK route names I just made up.

oh and one of the major stumbling blocks is finding a route into London anyway. The existing termini are full and redeveloping an open station and its approach is very very expensive and very slow. Paddington may have enough space if crossrail is built and then only when it's complete. A new tunnel has a lot going for it. I'd pitch (after a connection to CTRL just north of Euston), Euston - Clapham Junction (just north of). I think most Londoners could find their way to either of those stations and this avoids messy expensive interchanges right in the centre.

Southampton-Portsmouth-Brighton! Are you quite mad?

To put an alternative and less fantasist (for I am the worlds most pessimistic utopian), I'd suggest that the only possibility is a singular LGV style contrcution, leaving Euston and going North to Nottingham on the Great Central alignment then following the east coast up to Scotland via Sheffield, Leeds, Teeside and Newcastle. There would have to be branches to Brum, Manchester and Liverpool (through the Woodhead) and Hull. Not very imaginative or particularly forward thinking, but it's much more practical than a Solent Maglev and will fix a coming capacity deficiency rather than hoping to transform our national love of suburbia and the car into something different. I'd prefer the more radical solutions on offer above (presuming that they would work) but just don't think we could build something like that in our era of reactionary politics.

Oh no please, I hate both the new voyagers and pendolino trains, they both have uncomfortable hard seats, and for the long journeys they serve just aren't up to the standard of the old HST's or loco hauled trains.

The new southern trains are much more comfy than those virgin trains, and I would rather sit on one of those for 3 or 4 hours than a voyager or pendolino.

Also the tilting pendolino's make me feel sick every time they tilt from side to side, making an already uncomfortable journey on the hard seats even more unbearable and when you need a nice cold drink to calm your throbbing headache you have the daunting task of walking along the train aisle whilst it's tilting - you get shoved from side to side and you end up bashing into almost everyone down the length of the train (terribly embrassing) just to get to the damn buffet, which isn't even called a buffet anymore it is called the 'shop' now isn't it.

Plus - try having a piss in one of the toilets whilst the super high tech tilt comes into play, I tell you now that it is a truly horrible experiance to go through, you will get bashed around from side to side trying to hang onto your dear life whilst also enjoying a terrible headache due to the tilting motion, then - if standing up wasn't already a tricky enough task you have the almost impossible mission of trying to aim correctly into the toilet bowl or you will end up peeing all over the floor only for it to run under the crack of the cubicle door and out into the open where there is generally a queue of people. :ohno:

Riding a Pendolino is like being on a waltzer ride.
I don't know how these things are legal, I would hate to put anyone through it.

Truly awful, evil trains.:rant:


http://static.flickr.com/28/102166234_f75bd4e428_o.jpg
If you value your life you will board the train to the right - not the train of doom.


pendolinos, 20 hours manchester to london! the only problem i have with them is the size of the windows

Why is it mad to suggest the route could serve the south coast cities as well?

There is a large population along the coastal strip between Southampton and Brighton and would be a well used section of the route.

In fact 3.2 million people live in across the three counties of East Sussex, West Sussex and Hampshire which includes Brighton (248,000), Portsmouth (187,000) and Southampton (217,000). They are the three largest cities in the South East outside of London.

The idea of a station at Tottenham Court Road is madness. Its already a pinch point for London traffic and used by huge amounts of people on public transport. Euston would be perfect as a London terminus (provided it was rebuilt along the lines. Through trains would surely have 12/18 car trains leaving London going south 3/4 empty as the ratio of demand to travel to London or the south coast would be quite large in difference. Would be far better routed via Heathrow and gatwick to Brighton I feel to take advantage of all the domestic air connections where I reckon demand for both the airports and the south coast routes would be quite similar - 1 x120 for example. You'd probably need to run a service every half an hour to London.

Also I'm not sure how easy it would be to bring the centre of Portsmouth into something like this if you are then connecting it to Southampton.

Yes Portsmouth would probably need a parkway type station at Havant or somewhere round there.

I agree essex, if it was routed through Heathrow and Gatwick it would provide a fast direct link to those airports from all areas of the country and would attract many air travellers - this would make the south coast section of the route more viable.

oh and one of the major stumbling blocks is finding a route into London anyway. The existing termini are full and redeveloping an open station and its approach is very very expensive and very slow. Paddington may have enough space if crossrail is built and then only when it's complete. A new tunnel has a lot going for it. I'd pitch (after a connection to CTRL just north of Euston), Euston - Clapham Junction (just north of). I think most Londoners could find their way to either of those stations and this avoids messy expensive interchanges right in the centre.


If you read the department of transport report into a possible north south high speed line, they say the best route into London would be Paddington. When the Cenral line took over the suburban service towards Ruislip there is still a parallel rail line to which is lightly used. If cross rail was built then you coud sequeze in a new terminus there and run a high speed track all the way to the m25 without any major tunneling.

The idea of a station at Tottenham Court Road is madness. Its already a pinch point for London traffic and used by huge amounts of people on public transport. Euston would be perfect as a London terminus (provided it was rebuilt along the lines. Through trains would surely have 12/18 car trains leaving London going south 3/4 empty as the ratio of demand to travel to London or the south coast would be quite large in difference. Would be far better routed via Heathrow and gatwick to Brighton I feel to take advantage of all the domestic air connections where I reckon demand for both the airports and the south coast routes would be quite similar - 1 x120 for example. You'd probably need to run a service every half an hour to London.

Also I'm not sure how easy it would be to bring the centre of Portsmouth into something like this if you are then connecting it to Southampton.Its busy already, but with careful modelling you could re-build the area around Centre Point (ie that vast useless plaza) and some of those horrific buildings next door into a new large bus station and taxi rank without much worry. The central location would be pretty useful for routes to anywhere in London.

Through services would essentially be connecting the port cities (and some of the largest urban areas in Britain I might add) as well as allowing for more flexible rail usage. It could be possible to use a maglev/HSR London through service to pretty much puncture through London. You for example wouldn't have say 20 trains running Glasgow-London, but probably 20 trains London-Birmingham, 18 trains London-Birmingham-Manchester and then possibly 10 trains London-Birmingham-Manchester-Glasgow. In other words you would have terminating services along the line to ensure that you concentrate capacity where it is needed now and in the future. So while there might be 20 trains going each hour (hypothetically of course - that would be significantly large capacity far larger than the current motorway + intercity rail network) from Birmingham to London, there might only be 8 trains carrying on to Brighton, Portsmouth, Southampton, etc....

Essentially you'd have stations which have more than two platforms. Two more platforms to allow for fast express services to stop or for terminating services. A London Central station could have 6 platforms for instance - naturally underground.

If you were to construct a Southampton-Portsmouth-Brighton-London alignment it wouldn't have to be a parkway station. The north of Portsmouth is far more tricky to build along for one reason: as you have harbours on one side and cliffs on the other...you'd either build a parkway station above the M27 motorway just to the north of Portsea Island OR build a line that goes along down towards Gosport, into a 3km tunnel, then stopping at Portsmouth & Southsea (the central station), it would then ride alongside or on top of the current Portsmouth Direct Line and thus run along the A27 to Brighton once off the island.

An interesting idea about this is that you could essentially extend the Portsmouth Direct Line under the harbour mouth and up to Gosport, to Fareham and then along to Portsmouth. Build a 4 line 2 platform (ie Portsmouth Direct Line services would run along but stop at Gosport station allowing for HS trains to pass through) station in Gosport and you give back a railway connection that it has not had for many years. Gosport is the largest town in Britain without a railway station or connection: it has a population of 77,000.

My maglev lines would go:

London - Milton Keynes - Birmingham International - Manchester
(London - Milton Keynes) - Leicester - Nottingham - Sheffield - Leeds

My fantasy network:

http://img163.imageshack.us/img163/9696/map3cw.jpg

The idea of a station at Tottenham Court Road is madness. Its already a pinch point for London traffic and used by huge amounts of people on public transport. Euston would be perfect as a London terminus (provided it was rebuilt along the lines. Through trains would surely have 12/18 car trains leaving London going south 3/4 empty as the ratio of demand to travel to London or the south coast would be quite large in difference. Would be far better routed via Heathrow and gatwick to Brighton I feel to take advantage of all the domestic air connections where I reckon demand for both the airports and the south coast routes would be quite similar - 1 x120 for example. You'd probably need to run a service every half an hour to London.

Also I'm not sure how easy it would be to bring the centre of Portsmouth into something like this if you are then connecting it to Southampton.Frequencies and passenger demand for trains London to South Coast are very high (every 10minutes or so to Brighton, 15 minutes Southampton. I don't see why the trains would be 3/4 empty.

The way I see it there would be demand for these journeys.

1.South Coast - London (south)
2.South Coast - London (north)
3.South Coast - North of London
4.North of London - London (north)
5.North of London - London (south)

The numbers of passengers without the destination of either London stop (3) would be the minority, but a completely new group of travellers, additional revenue that would help pay for the line. The majority would be 1,2,4 & 5 roughly half of which would benefit from a tunnel under the city bringing them closer to their final destination and negating the need for tube travel.

A Heathrow spur from the north would be an option. From the south the proposed Airtrack brings in a large catchment area.

I agree about Tottenham Court Road and Portsmouth. I think upgrading (increasing the guage) the line from Clapham - Southampton, Clapham - Portsmouth and Clapham - Brighton might well be the best option.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v441/woodhousen/railroute.jpg

i know the routes aint exactly imaginative, but i cant help but think that curving a maglev line around everywhere to get as many towns in as possibl;e is really the best method....have one main route with HSR conecting to it

Why not go the other way and avoid as many Towns and Cities as possible and have giant park and ride areas as the stops. This would keep costs down and be a good link with the motorways.

I would also like to see our domestic trains carrying cars from such park and ride stops.

Frequencies and passenger demand for trains London to South Coast are very high (every 10minutes or so to Brighton, 15 minutes Southampton. I don't see why the trains would be 3/4 empty.

The way I see it there would be demand for these journeys.

1.South Coast - London (south)
2.South Coast - London (north)
3.South Coast - North of London
4.North of London - London (north)
5.North of London - London (south)

The numbers of passengers without the destination of either London stop (3) would be the minority, but a completely new group of travellers, additional revenue that would help pay for the line. The majority would be 1,2,4 & 5 roughly half of which would benefit from a tunnel under the city bringing them closer to their final destination and negating the need for tube travel.

A Heathrow spur from the north would be an option. From the south the proposed Airtrack brings in a large catchment area.

I agree about Tottenham Court Road and Portsmouth. I think upgrading (increasing the guage) the line from Clapham - Southampton, Clapham - Portsmouth and Clapham - Brighton might well be the best option.

I know there is high demand but I feel as this service would be more expensive than Victoria or London Bridge services, I don't think most people would switch. Services are fairly quick and fairly frequent As I've said I think there is a very good case for a separate high speedlink from say Waterloo Eurostar that would serve Brighton, Southampton and Portsmouth within an hour.

The airport hing just comes from the same idea as the TGV where Eurostar curves around paris to go to Eurodisney. As many domestic flights to London go via Gatwick too it makes sense to me to bring Gatwick into the scheme and then just extend to Brighton. Just south of the M25 there is a straight route through to Ashford so plausibly you could also run services between heathrow and central paris or Brussells for French?Belgian passengers to transfer.

I'm going to try and do map of my own route at some stage.

Why not go the other way and avoid as many Towns and Cities as possible and have giant park and ride areas as the stops. This would keep costs down and be a good link with the motorways.

I would also like to see our domestic trains carrying cars from such park and ride stops.But the majority of intercity and commuters need to go from their home or other city to the centre of towns and cities. If you avoid towns and cities you create a barrier for further connections and make journeys more fragmented. There is nowhere in the world where any HSR has been used to skip urban centres altogether.

Also we want to get traffic off the roads, not put more on them or cause congestion hotspots around stations. That said such stations would be beneficial in areas such as Watford where commuters down the M1 and M25 could park up and ride in to Central London, but if you have no-where to no-where connections....nobody will use it unless you run lengthy and slow bus services between city centres and outoftown centres or you have a car ready for you at the other end. Uneconomical, not practical and not environmentally right.




Essex: Building a central line that goes down to Heathrow, across to a Central London station, down to Gatwick, Brighton, Portsmouth, Southampton, etc...

well would it be possible to have the high speed lines (tho cant be maglev) around the cities with spurs going off to the main stations. this wat the high speed lines would be away from the cities whilst the existing stranstations wouldne need to be rebuilt in order to accomodate the trains.....

That would be very expensive, wouldn't shave much time over journies (platforms with express lines running through the station would be more economical) and you decrease capacity over a core route.

Current stations wouldn't necessarily have to be re-built, but current intercity platforms could be dedicated to these services or additional platforms could be built underneath, above or to the side of current platforms (depending on the situation and location).

FT wrote yesterday that London - Edinbourgh (30bil) is unaffordable.

Calais to Marseille was unaffordable in the late 70's, but that is what France has now. It shouldn't even be proposed to be built in one go, but should start London to Birmingham.

I'd do as the French do and have very separate lines, rather than a spider's web as above and our existing network/the tube/DLR of the future - too much potential for delay.

One initial line to Birmingham, potentially continuing much later to Chester and North Wales/Liverpool.

A main M1 aligned one which would stop East Mids Parkway, Sheffield, Leeds, Newcastle. This would have a branch to Manchester before Sheffield then on to Preston and Glasgow. Edinburgh could be accessed from both sides, so not dissimilar to today.

If one of the HS lines goes to Birmingham (which of course it should) there would be very little room within the existing city centre stations to accommodate the additional trains. The government should therefore safeguard as soon as possible the huge car park adjacent to Curzon Street station and Millennium Point just off the WCML, which is about to be sold for development. It would be criminal to allow a potential site for a new HSL terminus to be developed just as the government is starting to get its act together and take this whole issue seriously

http://i209.photobucket.com/albums/bb105/jaybuoy/maglev.jpg

The Red line indicates the maglev route.
The Blue lines indicate a high speed rail route.

Majority of the united kingdoms major cities would have one of these transports entering there city. So what do you think are the chances of this happening and if it did how much do you think it would cost?

In fact 3.2 million people live in across the three counties of East Sussex, West Sussex and Hampshire which includes Brighton (248,000), Portsmouth (187,000) and Southampton (217,000). They are the three largest cities in the South East outside of London.

only because reading is a town, not a city ;) reading is about the same size as brighton these days. that said it has amazing transport connections to london, probably the best in the country. im not sure why reading would need crossrail given its only 25 mins to paddington (and would be less if the electrified the line fully).

the above maps amuse me, they all somehow manage to ignore the fastest growing population areas of the country. so much for planning infrastructure thats good for 100 years.

And there's no chance in Hell you're gonna get a Maglev Line running down the entire length of the peak district.

im not sure why reading would need crossrail given its only 25 mins to paddington (and would be less if the electrified the line fully).reverse commuting? ie from Slough, Maidenhead and it's suburbs. Crossrail to Reading isn't about people from Reading getting to London, it's about people from Slough, etc getting to Reading easier, complete segregation of Crossrail from other passenger services - you won't need the Slough-Reading shuttle, nor the Paddington-Reading service. The Shuttle would get in the way of Crossrail, and the Paddington-Reading service just adds to so-called "performance pollution", as it would share infrastructure at both ends with other services. It makes the whole of Crossrail more reliable, and serves Reading commutes.

By your logic, the service pattern on the GWML suburbans should be 4 Heathrow, 2 West Drayton, 2 Marlow, 2 Henley, 0 Reading, as Reading has the fast trains, so doesn't need the slow trains! Very London Centric - are there no commutes to somewhere of the size of 200k+?

I agree with all of the above - Reading has the highest counter-commuting flow in the country after Croydon. The majority of which will probably originate in western Greater London and this pattern is only likely to increase.

It's also an incredibly busy and important railway station - easily the most in the country in relation to its size. Connections are available to practically everywhere.

Not to mention Maidenhead being fairly unsuitable as a terminus - not many onward connections at all. And also Twyford and up to Henley would be incredibly marginalised, in terms of rail service. But I apologise, this should be in the Crossrail thread.

you will need the paddingtgon to reading service! it goes to bristol remember. reading needs a station upgrade it doesnt need crossrail

Also there's the slow services from Paddington that go west of Reading on to Didcot and Oxford etc. These can't share the fast lines with the HSTs. Although if Crossrail were extended to Reading, with a lesser frequency, say 4 tph to Reading, slow DMU services from further west could probably fit inbetween. Then a fuller service could start from Maidenhead bringin crossrail up to 8 tph.

England should have a coastal line; from the chunnel to Cornwall. Tourists can make up a big number of passengers!

It comes down to the question of "would you rather have the maglev as a tourist attraction offering stunning views of the country or use the maglev network as a fucking fast way of getting everywhere?"

you will need the paddingtgon to reading service! it goes to bristol remember. reading needs a station upgrade it doesnt need crossrailno the Paddington-Reading service ends at Reading. You are talking about the Paddington-Bristol service, which stops at Reading en-route.

Reading Station Upgrade has got the go ahead - it deliberately makes provision for Crossrail.

Crossrail to Reading is logical, unless you have London blinkers on. Maidenhead was an odd choice to begin with and now the Reading works have got the go ahead (thus ending the signalling and cost problems), complete idiocy - Slough would be better (and cheaper), likewise West Drayton, or just have Heathrow if Reading wasn't viable.

Various bodies, such as all Thames Valley Councils (Reading unanimously voting in favour, the only thing for rather a long time to have that), the CBI, the SERA, FGW and so on, all want Crossrail to Reading - how can you be said to be "serving the UK" when you ignore the wishes of the largest region's councils (they make up SERA), fail to serve the Cross Country intercity network and fail to account for people wanting to go to other places than London, such as a town of 200,000 people? Reading needs Crossrail for it's survival as much as London does, if not more.

is there any real possibility of this happening? just curious.

ahhh yeah sotonsi, i see where you mean, had my wires crossed. i reckon slough wuold be ideal, partly because itd take a huge amount of pressure off reading in development terms too and partly because then you just need regular trains to reading (which it has already).

First post, so Hello!

I would use conventional high speed rail with the following new lines.

http://i64.photobucket.com/albums/h166/rich_j_parker/united_kingdom_hsr3.jpg

RED High speed line
BLUE Conventional 100-125mph line

High Speed 1: Channel Tunnel - Ashford - Ebbsfleet - Stratford - Central London
High Speed 2: (As proposed by Greengauge21) Central London/Heathrow - Bicester - Central Birmingham/Birmingham International - WCML
High Speed 3: Central London - Stratford - Stanstead - Cambridge - ECML - Nottingham (Victoria) - Sheffield - Leeds (Parkway) - ECML

These would be built in conjunction with the following conventional speed lines:

East-West rail link: Oxford - Bicester - Bletchley - Bedford - Cambridge
"Northern Crossrail": Liverpool - Warrington - Manchester - Leeds - Leeds (Parkway) - York

High Speed 2 would be built to relieve the southern section of the WCML. It would carry domestic express trains from London and Heathrow to Birmingham, the North West and Scotland and international services to the channel tunnel from Birmingham, Manchester and Heathrow. It would also carry "Javelin" commuter trains to Oxford (to relieve the GWML) and Milton Keynes using the East-West rail link.

Phase 1 of High Speed 3 would relieve congestion on the southern end of the ECML by bypassing the Welwyn viaduct and other bottlenecks with a junction south of Peterborough. ECML express trains would use this route leaving more space for commuter traffic on the existing line. "Javelin" commuter services would run to Cambridge via Stanstead airport.

Phase 2 of High Speed 3 would run on to Nottingham through a rebuilt Victoria station, with links to Nottingham Midland and Derby, and then on to Sheffield Midland. These connections would relieve the MML. The line would then continue north with a connection to the existing ECML line to Leeds, a parkway station east of Leeds for interchanges with the "Northern Crossrail" line, and finally connecting to the ECML north of York.

Over time HS2 and HS3 would be extended all the way to Scotland.

Here's my Maglev idea, the main spine would connect most major cities with London, would provide a Heathrow-Gatwick link and terminate at Ashford Int. where passengers from the midlands/North/Scotland could transfer across a platfrom to catch onward HSR services to the continent.

The 'add-ons' would link all the remaining major cities to the network.

I should probably add a South coast route linking Bournemouth, Southampton, Portsmouth and Brighton to Gatwick and into London from the South and maybe linking that route to Bristol/Cardiff/SW/Midlands in the West.

The Scots can pay themselves if they want to link Perth, Dundee and Aberdeen to the network :)

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a20/jonesy55/0_map_britain_1987_enlarged.jpg

MAGLEV is a wonderful technology but it doesn't integrate very well with existing infrastructure. If HS1 the channel tunnel and LGV Nord were MAGLEV lines then I think MAGLEV would have a chance, but they aren't.

Building a conventional network means that through services from regional cities such as Birmingham, Manchester, Nottingham and Leeds can run direct to the continent without passengers needing to change trains in London. Conventional high speed trains can also use the existing rail network to access a wide range of destinations without the need to build new infrastructure to each and every one of them, which is common practice on the French TGV network. For example Greengauge21's HS2 concept brings Glasgow within about 3 hours of London even though the dedicated high speed line would finish in the Trent valley, the trains would continue on the WCML.

Also, following the TGV's speed record set on LGV Est last year I think it's safe to say that there's a heck of a lot of use left in conventional high speed rail.

Mine is quite basic.

The red line shows a possible Northern maglev route, joining Glasgow and Liverpool by a curving line that stops by at Edinburgh, Newcastle, Leeds and Manchester enroute.

The blue line shows a Southern maglev route, joining Liverpool with Brighton. Stops include Derby, Birmingham, Luton, and London.

A third pink line is a straight route joining Cardiff to Dover, calling at Bristol, reading and London. This would include the building of a third bridge over the Severn in between cardiff and Bristol.

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y281/gherkin007/maglevmap.jpg

First post, so Hello!

I would use conventional high speed rail with the following new lines.

[snip]

RED High speed line
BLUE Conventional 100-125mph line

High Speed 1: Channel Tunnel - Ashford - Ebbsfleet - Stratford - Central London
High Speed 2: (As proposed by Greengauge21) Central London/Heathrow - Bicester - Central Birmingham/Birmingham International - WCML
High Speed 3: Central London - Stratford - Stanstead - Cambridge - ECML - Nottingham (Victoria) - Sheffield - Leeds (Parkway) - ECML

These would be built in conjunction with the following conventional speed lines:

East-West rail link: Oxford - Bicester - Bletchley - Bedford - Cambridge
"Northern Crossrail": Liverpool - Warrington - Manchester - Leeds - Leeds (Parkway) - York

High Speed 2 would be built to relieve the southern section of the WCML. It would carry domestic express trains from London and Heathrow to Birmingham, the North West and Scotland and international services to the channel tunnel from Birmingham, Manchester and Heathrow. It would also carry "Javelin" commuter trains to Oxford (to relieve the GWML) and Milton Keynes using the East-West rail link.

Phase 1 of High Speed 3 would relieve congestion on the southern end of the ECML by bypassing the Welwyn viaduct and other bottlenecks with a junction south of Peterborough. ECML express trains would use this route leaving more space for commuter traffic on the existing line. "Javelin" commuter services would run to Cambridge via Stanstead airport.

Phase 2 of High Speed 3 would run on to Nottingham through a rebuilt Victoria station, with links to Nottingham Midland and Derby, and then on to Sheffield Midland. These connections would relieve the MML. The line would then continue north with a connection to the existing ECML line to Leeds, a parkway station east of Leeds for interchanges with the "Northern Crossrail" line, and finally connecting to the ECML north of York.

Over time HS2 and HS3 would be extended all the way to Scotland.

:applause: This is the best I've seen so far. My only comment is that HS2 extensions to Manchester/Liverpool would seem to be more pressing than the HS3 to York. And an extension of one of them south to Gatwick would be the icing on the cake! :)

:applause: This is the best I've seen so far. My only comment is that HS2 extensions to Manchester/Liverpool would seem to be more pressing than the HS3 to York. And an extension of one of them south to Gatwick would be the icing on the cake! :)

I suspect you may be right about the order of construction. I've only shown phase 1 of HS2 here as proposed by Greengauge21, but yes the next stage would be extensions to Manchester/Liverpool. In my view the western corridor is certainly the immediate priority, but the next priority is a HSL to the north east, and then all the way to Scotland. This would be more easily achieved with an east coast route as the terrain is more accommodating that way. Fast trains to Scotland from Liverpool and Manchester could run via Leeds.

I suspect a fast link to Gatwick could be provided by extending the HS2 Heathrow spur southward. Remember though that Gatwick will be served well from St Pancras once the Thameslink upgrades are complete.

It comes down to the question of "would you rather have the maglev as a tourist attraction offering stunning views of the country or use the maglev network as a fucking fast way of getting everywhere?"

Both of course.

Parkey, I agree yours is the best so far. It's inspired me to do mine.


http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q30/elfabyanos/myUKmap.jpg

I've used a similar key.

RED High speed line
BLUE Conventional 100-125mph line
YELLOW Current line adding electrification (overhead 25kV) and other upgrades.
GREEN Upgrades of current electrified infrastructure.

The Yellow for GWR I envisage speeds of 150mph with resignalling from Heathrow to Chippenham/Bristol (not through Bath though), and to Oxford. Exeter to Birmingham, Swindon to Gloucester - 125 mph. All the other Yellow lines I just see as being electrified, with possible marginal improvements in speeds etc. I've added lots of little spurts from the HSLs aswell to Blackpool, Shrewsbury, Hull, Middlesborough, around the East Mids etc. As far as I know Dawlish prevents lekky down to Penzance? Would like it to go all they way so possible route diversion or something.

The green ECML south of Leeds again with resignalling, and some minor iimprovements bottleneck-wise should be 150mph. The Lincolnshire routes need adding with electrification and/or new lines, but I don't know s~@t about that area and Goth would be my deputy in charge of designing that bit :) . The green north of Newcastle would have alignment upgrades to try to get up to 125 mph over most of the route (with tilt maybe, depending on cost and availability of tilting units). I haven't given the ECML as much love as perhaps it deserves, but I wanted to make sure 200mph trains got at least as far as Newcastle. Whilst Newcastle/NE to Scotland is an important market, a second spanking HSL to Scotland for this is OTT IMO. On top of this electrification to Aberdeen is imperitive.

Overall I've tried to give a good spread so that HSL benefits London - WCML - Scotland, London - East Midlands - NE, XCountry - SW - NE and SW NW, XCountry South to NE & NW, and give lots of extra options like Heathrow (with a freight loop around it - hence 25kV Redhill - Ashford though it has 750vDC what the hell!) Gatwick and Brighton (mainly just for me :) )

Here's the network I proposed showing all the new routes made available using HSLs.

http://i64.photobucket.com/albums/h166/rich_j_parker/united_kingdom_hsr4.jpg

North-South
London/Heathrow - Birmingham
London/Heathrow - Birmingham Intl - Liverpool/Manchester/Glasgow/Edinburgh
London/Heathrow - Nottingham Victoria - Sheffield - Leeds
London/Heathrow - Nottingham Victoria/Sheffield - Newcastle - Edinburgh
London - Cambridge - Nottingham Midland - Derby Midland

International
London - Paris/Brussels
Heathrow - Paris/Brussels
Nottingham Victoria - Paris/Brussels
Leeds - Paris/Brussels
Birmingham - Paris/Brussels
Manchester - Birmingham Intl - Paris/Brussels

East-West
Swansea - Cardiff - Newport - Bristol Parkway - Oxford - Bedford - Cambridge - Norwich
Bournemouth - Southampton - Reading - Oxford - Bedford - Cambridge - King's Lynn
Bristol Temple Meads - Oxford - Heathrow

Transpennine
Liverpool - Warrington - Manchester - Leeds - York - Scarborough
Liverpool - Warrington - Manchester - Leeds - Hull
Liverpool - Warrington - Manchester - Leeds - Darlington - Newcastle - Berwick-upon-Tweed - Edinburgh

Javelin
Canterbury/Dover - Asford - Ebbsfleet - Stratford - London
Medway towns - Ebbsfleet - Stratford - London
Peterborough/King's Lynn/Norwich - Cambridge - Stanstead - Stratford - London
Milton Keynes - Aylesbury - London
Oxford - Bicester - London

I think it's all about doing as much as possible with as little as possible.

Maglev train system could re-balance UK economy
Nov 7 2007 by Bill Gleeson, Liverpool Daily Post

http://www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/business/business-columns/2007/11/07/maglev-train-system-could-re-balance-uk-economy-64375-20071781/

A NETWORK of Maglev rail connections linking the north of England with the nation’s capital and northern cities with each other could transform the balance of the UK economy.

That is the claim made by those promoting the scheme.

The network would cost billions to build but would, it is claimed, hugely shorten travel times between cities, making business much easier to do.

Such investment would also help the region and the nation keep pace with places like China and Germany, where Maglev schemes have either already been implemented or are in the throes of being approved.

One of the leading advocates of the Maglev system is Jack Stopforth, chairman of Liverpool Chamber of Commerce. He is currently trying to raise £250,000 towards the cost of a research project to study the viability of the project.

So far, he has raised £100,000 from the Northwest Development Agency and another £50,000 from Maglev designer Siemens.

Mr Stopforth said: “This is not just a transport thing. It has the potential to re-balance the UK economy.

“Nor is it just Liverpool to London. Just imagine if Leeds and Manchester were just 15 minutes apart. What a difference that would make to connectivity in the North.

“But I think a connection between Liverpool and Manchester should be first.”

Such a link could connect Liverpool city centre, the city’s airport, the Trafford Centre, Manchester city centre and include a spur to Manchester Airport.

Much of the line could be built on Peel Holding’s Manchester Ship Canal estate, making the process easier to implement, suggests Mr Stopforth.

He says the Government has agreed to listen to the case for a Maglev network, even though it currently believes the scale of investment would make it uneconomic.

The Mersey Partnership has backed Liverpool Chamber’s ambition to conduct a study. It is now trying to persuade the region’s local authorities to chip in to the cost.

UK Ultraspeed gave a presentation at TMP’s offices recently to outline the benefits of the connection. UK Ultraspeed owns the sole rights to promote Maglevs in the UK from its German designers, engineering groups Siemens and ThyssenKrupp.

Maglev trains can travel at speeds in excess of 300mph and require little maintenance due to their lack of parts. The cars float above their tracks and are propelled by electromagnetic force.

UK Ultraspeed believes a line would be viable using private sector investment only.

Such a train could get from Liverpool to Manchester in 10 minutes, and from Liverpool to London in just under an hour.

The proposed routes would use eight times less land and half the vehicle fleet than conventional high-speed trains, it is claimed.

Although Maglev vehicles cannot use the existing infrastructure of the British railways, the track can be built up to 20 metres above ground, thus needing no major engineering structures such as bridges.

There is an existing route in Shanghai and a test route in Germany. The Shanghai service has been in operation for three years, and the city’s authorities are now planning to extend it. The current service links the city’s principal airport with the city centre.

A Maglev has run in England before, from Birmingham International station to its airport between 1984 and 1995, but was shut down as its electronic system eventually became unreliable.

The proposed north-south link between London and Glasgow via the Midlands, Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle and Edinburgh, would cost an estimated £16bn.

Here's the network I proposed showing all the new routes made available using HSLs.

http://i64.photobucket.com/albums/h166/rich_j_parker/united_kingdom_hsr4.jpg


Why has poor old Leicester been deliberately avoided by your eastern route??

Why has poor old Leicester been deliberately avoided by your eastern route??

Because Leicester Sucks. :lol:

Seriously though, a HSL can't go everywhere at once. Nottingham is the largest population centre in the East Midlands with the best local connections, but it suffers in respect of a fast rail link to London. That's why my HSL goes there (honest!). Leicester currently has much better connectivity to London and also has good links to Birmingham and Nottingham.

One option suggested by government and independent studies is that rather than starting at London HS3 could be a branch off HS2 near Rugby, and such a plan would indeed allow easy connections to Leicester. The disadvantage is the limited capacity of the southern section of HS2 before the branch. The main argument behind high speed rail for the UK is to increase capacity on congested corridors, in particular the WCML and ECML. Starting HS3 from London does this much more effectively, and so I've drawn my HS3 to benefit not just the ECML but most of East Anglia too.

My Maglev plan would also relieve the WCML and ECML but would also serve Leicester (with phase 2), so there! :baeh3::banana:

i hate to say it guys but the best route in terms of cost benefit hasnt even been shown here. its basically the ecml as it is now but rerouted slightly going through lincoln and middlesborough *grins*. an HSR going through the west coast route is actually worse in terms of cost benefit (less passenger miles you see) and the midland mainline one is even worse still.

this route is london > cambridge > peterborough > lincoln > doncaster > york > middlesborough > durham > newcastle > berwick > edinburgh. from doncaster it has a spur going west to wakefield > leeds and going east to hull.

So Lincoln, Middlesbrough, Durham and Peterborough will generate more passenger miles than Birmingham/West Mids, Greater Manchester and Merseyside? ;)

My Maglev system would serve the West Mids, NW and Yorkshire/Scotland with one single line, hurray!!

All these systems with multiple HSLs going up the East and West coast don't do anything for people travelling from Yorkshire to Birmingham.

Building an extra transpennine HSL would improve links between Yorkshire and NW but a single Maglev line would make so many more origin-destination combinations available both quickly and directly than multiple HSLs

The proposed routes would use eight times less land and half the vehicle fleet than conventional high-speed trains, it is claimed.

Although Maglev vehicles cannot use the existing infrastructure of the British railways, the track can be built up to 20 metres above ground, thus needing no major engineering structures such as bridges.

The proposed north-south link between London and Glasgow via the Midlands, Manchester, Liverpool, Newcastle and Edinburgh, would cost an estimated £16bn.


Intersting-ish article up to this point, when it becomes absolute poppycock. Eight time less land? That's just crap. An HSL would use just as much land, with the benefit being it can use existing city centre stations and the approaches to them without eating up any more land (that's also the most expensive land).

Then comes the biggest contradictory sentence ever:

"the track can be built up to 20 metres above ground" so thats a 20 m high viaduct spanning the entire width of the country...."thus needing no major engineering structures such as bridges." Implying a 20m viaduct is not a major structure comparable to a bridge.


And the last bit, £16bn, even HSL would probably be more than that.

Maglev can go up steeper inclines though can't it so that would be an advantage over the pennines and elsewhere, more direct routes could be taken.

If Maglev can be built 20m above ground, would it in any way be possible to build it above existing railways or motorways thus lessening the amount of land needed or is that just ridiculous?

So Lincoln, Middlesbrough, Durham and Peterborough will generate more passenger miles than Birmingham/West Mids, Greater Manchester and Merseyside?
no, but leeds will as will edinburgh. the ecml already does... roughly 1.5 times what the wcml does per passenger. cambridge doesnt even have a decent connection with london and is the most over congested line on the entire network - it should be more like reading. cost benefits are also assessed on the basis of the population growth of the area over the operating time and most of the population growth is going on in the eastern half of the country which means every year it becomes more not less important. it might suck to admit it but there's a squillion reports comparing the two and the wcml is basically a blackhole as it is whilst the ecml is fabulously profitable. in terms of cost benefit youd build one line up the east coast and then a second line to bristol!

Greengauge21's High Speed 2 proposal highlights to me the disadvantages of MAGLEV.

A London-Birmingham MAGLEV line would only provide a service from London-Birmingham. Onward connections would involve changing train.

A London-Bimringham HSL would likely cost about the same, but in addition to London-Birmingham services it would offer enhanced timings on London-Manchester, London-Scotland services that continued on the WCML. It would allow through trains to Europe from those destinations using HS1. It could carry commuter trains to Oxford and Milton Keynes. Even though the trains to Birmingham might take 10mins longer than a MAGLEV, HSL is still much better value for money.

As brilliant a system as MAGLEV is, it just can't use existing infrastructure. That makes it much less flexible.

Greengauge21's High Speed 2 proposal highlights to me the disadvantages of MAGLEV.

A London-Birmingham MAGLEV line would only provide a service from London-Birmingham. Onward connections would involve changing train.

So build the Maglev line further than Birmingham. If you extended it to Manchester, Leeds, York, NE and Scotland you would serve pretty much every major city in the country.

The current WCML can't take much more traffic I think so even with an extra HSL south of Brimingham, you would still need more capacity to the north of Brum, especially if improved journey times attracted more people.

With HSR you can build in stages with trains continuing on existing tracks until new sections have been completed - as with HS1. This is estimated to reduce costs by as much as 20%.

Trains using HSLs can also fan out to a wide range of destinations to which building new dedicated infrastructure simply isn't economical. This is a practice the TGV network uses well, and will be used by the commuter trains on HS1.

With HSR you can build in stages with trains continuing on existing tracks until new sections have been completed - as with HS1. This is estimated to reduce costs by as much as 20%.

which is also why you build the most profitable lines first which is what the french did. im not sure if its still the case as they have so many lines but the early tgv lines paid for themselves in pure profit in ten years and helped bankroll the next set of extensions! this is part of the sheer importance of london to leeds, edinburgh and bristol as these are the profitable routes.

With HSR you can build in stages with trains continuing on existing tracks until new sections have been completed - as with HS1. This is estimated to reduce costs by as much as 20%.

Trains using HSLs can also fan out to a wide range of destinations to which building new dedicated infrastructure simply isn't economical. This is a practice the TGV network uses well, and will be used by the commuter trains on HS1.

So if compatibility with existing infrastructure is the key factor, that means that we are tied into conventional rail forever.

yes, and the good news is conventional rail is getting ever faster :) lets face it, the maglev speed record is only a fraction above HSR.

So if compatibility with existing infrastructure is the key factor, that means that we are tied into conventional rail forever.

There's still a heck of a lot of performance left in conventional rail. The french showed this recently by running a TGV up to 357mph. To my knowledge that's much faster than the Transrapid has ever gone, and only about 5mph slower than the Japanese MLX01.

200mph line speeds, which are becoming the international standard for conventional high speed rail, are easily enough to bring all major UK cities within 3 hours of London, and at 3 hours trains are theoretically able to get 80% market share of passenger travel.

I'm sorry I'm just being pragmatic. MAGLEV is a very nice system and I'm sure its day will come eventually.

i dont think it necessarily will because both maglev and conventional trains will be limited by the aero dynamics and inability to break the sound barrier.

Maglev trains could reach enormous speeds if they were run in vacuumed tubes underground. That's far future stuff though.

We could build a sort of cage in space surrounding the earth and suspend the maglev tracks from that, the track could then be lowered when approaching a station but raised to several miles above the earth when cruising so that aerodynamics could be improved.

That's getting into space elevator (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_elevator) territory.

Maglev launch tracks for suborbital aircraft and spacecraft have also been suggested over the years, but these work better in the absence of an atmosphere, such as the lunar surface.

Needless to say all of these concepts are far from being built. Conventional high speed rail as a mode of transport has evolved and has herritage. Risk levels are much lower than newer technologies, and politicians like low risk.

Lowest risk of all is to not build anything, by the time people notice that most of our transport infrastructure dates back half a century or more, the politicians will have retired anyway.

Lowest risk of all is to not build anything...

Now you're talkin' ;)

Ever thought of a career in politics?

Lowest risk of all is to not build anything, by the time people notice that most of our transport infrastructure dates back half a century or more, the politicians will have retired anyway.

The West Coast Main line is over a century old. It basically consists of a number of different railways built in the 1800s that were all connected up and put through quite parts of the country that missed major towns. It was also built on the cheap so they have all these bends in because they didn't want to spent loads and making the line straight. Apart from afew changes here and there, new track and electrification its really a line designed for pleasing the locals and keeping the costs down than speed but sadly that hasn't been the case. Something that a number of people did in the 1800s is biting us right in the arse.

no, but leeds will as will edinburgh. the ecml already does... roughly 1.5 times what the wcml does per passenger. cambridge doesnt even have a decent connection with london and is the most over congested line on the entire network - it should be more like reading. cost benefits are also assessed on the basis of the population growth of the area over the operating time and most of the population growth is going on in the eastern half of the country which means every year it becomes more not less important. it might suck to admit it but there's a squillion reports comparing the two and the wcml is basically a blackhole as it is whilst the ecml is fabulously profitable. in terms of cost benefit youd build one line up the east coast and then a second line to bristol!

The west coast conurbations would be higher yielding with better links I'd wager.

The glaring difference in passenger revenue is due to the fact that the WC has the M1/M6 all the way whereas the EC only has the pitiful A1(M) and the M1 only as far as Leeds.

Leeds, Newcastle and Edinburgh are very important markets, but arguably only Newcastle wouldn't be best served by a route roughly following the WCML with a branch off at Sheffield for Leeds.

Edinburgh is actually west of Carlisle, a route heading straight north from there would be more efficient than via Northumberland.

The west coast conurbations would be higher yielding with better links I'd wager.

they have better links already actually. the actual difference in passenger revenue comes from the fact that edinburgh is so damn important but the most profitable line in the uk is actually london to leeds.

they have better links already actually. the actual difference in passenger revenue comes from the fact that edinburgh is so damn important but the most profitable line in the uk is actually london to leeds.

With each other and in terms of diversion options, yes.

But even with Pendos, the 200 or so miles to York can be done in 1hr 50 compared to the 180 to Manchester at 2hr 5.

I think the North West corridor is certainly the one that is most in need of capacity enhancements at present and it does have a larger population than the east until one draws level with Manchester. I think Greengauge21 is right to identify this route as the current priority for HS2.

In terms of building a line all the way to Scotland I think this would be most easily achieved using an eastern corridor alignment as the terrain is much flatter.

I believe that the order of building should be to get HS2 as far as Birmingham and Manchester first. This would allow trains running onward to Edinburgh and Glasgow using the uncongested northern end of the WCML. Then you start work on an eastern corridor HS3 to relieve congested southern end of the ECML and the GEML. This line would then be built in stages all the way to Scotland incrementally allowing journey time increases with each new section.

Phase 1. HS2 London/Heathrow-Birmingham-Manchester
Phase 2. HS3 London - Stanstead - Cambridge - ECML (Peterborough)
Phase 3. HS3 ECML (Peterborough) - Nottingham - Sheffield - ECML (Doncaster)
Phase 4. HS3 Sheffield - Leeds Parkway - Newcastle - ECML
Phase 5. HS3 Newcastle - Edinburgh

That said, by the time the line reached Sheffield the argument for starting a HS4 to the south west instead of continuing HS3 northward might have taken priority.

I would build the first highspeed line
London-Birmingham-Manchester-Leeds-Newcastle-Edinburgh-Glasgow.

The second would split just before Birmingham going;
Leicester-Nottingham-Sheffield
before rejoining the first line at Leeds.

The third stage would be to build link avoiding London joining to the current link to the Channel Tunnel, allowing trains to travel fast and direct from the regions to the Continent.

The fourth stage would be to connect Cardiff and Bristol to London.

I think that going via Stansted and Cambridge routes on the main line would probably mean getting to Peterborough would be slower than today's 45 mins!

Don't forget, these heavy, powerful, long trains don't have great acceleration.

..

Don't forget, these heavy, powerful, long trains don't have great acceleration.

unlike MAGLEV :yes:

HS2 Stage 1: as per Greengauge's idea with a few differences.

Branch to Derby and East Midlands Airport added and line extended up to Stoke. Also a link is built from just North East of Birmingham into New Street/Grand Central providing a giant tri-angle junction. This will be used for future HSL XC trains.

Stage 2: Stoke avoiding line with a branch breaking away to cross the Mersey and reach a new terminal alongside Lime Street.

Core route continues with a branch breaking off to follow the Warrington-Manchester line past Old Trafford and then via a viaduct crossing over the proposed Ordsall curve into Salford Central where it will join a six track formation into a redeveloped Victoria station.

The rest of the line to continue up to Scotland and split to serve Glasgow and Edinburgh Airport-Edinburgh Waverly/North Scotland.

HS3:

From East Midlands Airport to Sheffield Victoria to Leeds and York.

I would also propose a series of what I'd call Inter City Express lines, these will be a mix of new and upgraded lines for speeds of 200-250km/h also using continental loading gauges.

ICE 1: London-Reading-Swindon-Bristol/Newport-Cardiff-Swansea

ICE 2: Southampton-Reading-Oxford-Coventry-Birmingham

ICE 3: London-High Wycombe-Birmingham-Wolverhampton-Crewe/Stoke-Manchester/Liverpool/Preston

ICE 4: Preston/Liverpool-Manchester-Huddersfield-Bradford-Leeds-York/Hull

ICE 5: Channel Tunnel/London-Stansted-Cambridge-Peterborough-Lincoln-Hull/Doncaster-York-Darlington-Durham-Newcastle-Edinburgh-Glasgow/Aberdeen

ICE 6: Oxford-Milton Keynes-Cambridge

ICE 7: Manchester-Sheffield-Nottingham-Peterborough

ICE 8: London-Southampton-Bournemouth-Exeter-Plymouth-Penzance

I think that going via Stansted and Cambridge routes on the main line would probably mean getting to Peterborough would be slower than today's 45 mins!

Don't forget, these heavy, powerful, long trains don't have great acceleration.

Not all trains would stop at Stanstead or Cambridge. In fact the long distance high speed trains probably wouldn't stop before they reached Nottingham, which at 200mph could probably be achieved in 45 minutes.

I selected that alignment because it would allow fast commuter trains, like the Hitachi 375s for HS1, to run in from King's Lynn and Norwich and join the line at Cambridge and then call at Stanstead and Stratford on the way into London. These trains DO have good acceleration, indeed they were designed for such a role.

Following the ECML might save a few minutes but the benefits of such a line to the network would be considerably less.

Not all trains would stop at Stanstead or Cambridge. In fact the long distance high speed trains probably wouldn't stop before they reached Nottingham, which at 200mph could probably be achieved in 45 minutes.

If that were the case why bother going that route? Why not go;
London-Leicester-Nottingham-Sheffield etc

Would the benefits of connecting Norwich and Kingslynn outweigh the negatives of avoiding Leicester?

If I remember rightly from the Greenguage report, the idea was to split around the M40/M42 juction, so the one part of HS2 would finish in Birmingham, at Snow Hill or Moor Street, with the second part going to Birmingham Int and then heading north. New Street is out of the equation anyway due to how packed it already is, the other two station could take extra capacity, they just need money to be spent on them.

It seems Greengauge21 have just posted their answer to the question posed by this thread. :)

Report Here (http://www.greengauge21.net/assets/GG21_TheNextSteps_1107.pdf) [PDF]

Cheers for that Parkey, am digesting it now :cheers:

Just to sum it up for those who haven't read the PDF, Greengauge21 are proposing five more HSL corridors. I say corridors as it's unclear whether they are suggesting completley new HSL's for each one or a mix of upgraded track aswell.

The five corridors are:

1. London-Birmingham-Manchester
2. London-Cambridge-North East
3. London-Bristol/Cardiff
4. Trans-Pennine
5. Anglo-Scottish

Looking at the greengauge report, it seems to suggest to me that plans are afoot to develop HS along the routes that have been discussed in this thread previously.
Without getting all excited no route map has been published yet, my concerns at the moment are:

1.How do they intend to link HS1 into this future network? Do they plan on digging yet another tunnel through Central London??

2. They stated that costing for the cross Pennine route would be higher, would this be passed on once the service starts? Also are they proposing to create branch routes to all these places as this seems to defeat the purpose of HIGH SPEED RAILWAYS?
” But in the longer term, with the potential of high-speed lines on both the eastern and western sides of the Pennines, a new east-west connection could offer many benefits. It would not only offer capacity and speed advantages to journeys between, on the one hand, Liverpool, Manchester, Preston and Chester and on the other Sheffield, Leeds, Bradford, York, Hull, Middlesbrough and Newcastle. It would also offer the opportunity to exploit the new north-south high-speed routes to connect (for example) Manchester with Cambridge, and Liverpool with Newcastle, with fast direct services. Such considerations again point to the advantage of thinking about high speed rail in Corridors 2 and 3 with a long-term network perspective, not as isolated schemes. While the terrain is likely to make per mile construction costs relatively high, distances across the Pennines are short: just 39 miles from Manchester to Sheffield, for instance, yet this is a journey that takes over an hour on average by road. The scope for better efficiency through time saving is immense.” Since the costs for this are going to be staggering shouldn’t we start to plan for the costs now so to stop any unforeseen break in construction due to lack of funding whether it be government backed or PFI?

3. Any Glasgow-Edinburgh routing should include connections to any Anglo-Scottish Routing whether ECML or WCML.

4. If this turns into a long term plan for rail travel in this country, shouldn’t we start protecting possible sites and routes to stop any developments on them, as we all know there seems to be a bit of building frenzy at the moment?

1.How do they intend to link HS1 into this future network? Do they plan on digging yet another tunnel through Central London??

HS2 to connect to HS1 at St Pancras.

HS3 to connect to HS1 (and subsequently HS2) near Stratford.

HS4 (Great Western) would connect with HS2 at Willesden Junction.

I think that going via Stansted and Cambridge routes on the main line would probably mean getting to Peterborough would be slower than today's 45 mins!

youre assuming the train stops at every station. if you have more services they dont need to stop at every station, infact the ECML already works like this. when i take it to london some trains skip grantham, some skip peterborough, some skip stevenage but all stop at at least one of those. there's also the express from london to york that doesnt stop anywhere in between (hence its silly average speed of about 105mph)

Hi,

This is my first post and I have a hell of a lot of free time. Thought I'd post my contribution to the thread.

Basically my design would have three lines, all of which would begin at London. I chose St Pancras for the sake of accessibility to the Eurostar link. Whether or not that is feasible, I don't know, but it'd be fantastic if it could because then there would be a no-hassle changeover for all other services.

I also included a high speed spur to Heathrow, to try and make Heathrow more accessible for people from the regions without having to rely on a domestic flight or car.

http://img67.imageshack.us/img67/418/ukhsronlynetworkhypothekw8.th.jpg (http://img67.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ukhsronlynetworkhypothekw8.jpg)http://img77.imageshack.us/img77/2752/highspeed1guidevk7.th.jpg (http://img77.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highspeed1guidevk7.jpg)
http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/9358/highspeed2guidesy2.th.jpg (http://img225.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highspeed2guidesy2.jpg)http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/4306/highspeed3guideyq9.th.jpg (http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highspeed3guideyq9.jpg)

Also I thought of adding extra feeding lines between regional "hubs" so that areas around the region can be in easy reach of the High Speed Line. There may already be existing lines, but I don't know and I'm a bit too lazy to want to check. :)

http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/4306/highspeed3guideyq9.th.jpg (http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=highspeed3guideyq9.jpg)

Its basically got to be a west coast route out of heathrow through to birmingham/birmingham international then up to manchester airport with a branch off to Liverpool and one to Leeds/York (York for ECML connections). From Manchester airport to Preston, Carlisle with a branch to Newcastle somewhere around carlisle. North from Carlisle to Edinburgh with a branch off to Glasgow. I reckon we should rail the west cost route and maglev it from Liverpool to Newcastle via Manchester and Leeds.

FORGET MAGLEV - not ever ever ever going to happen (not that HSR is mind), the lack of integration of services will block it from ever taking off anywhere in Europe on a large scale.

FORGET MAGLEV - not ever ever ever going to happen (not that HSR is mind), the lack of integration of services will block it from ever taking off anywhere in Europe on a large scale.

I second this. Maglev is 100 years too late to compete - now it can't get into the city centres without massive cost. Trains can get there already for free.

I would have to agree in that although I would love to see maglev lines zipping up and down the United Kingdom, the sheer cost of buying up land to lay the lines would make it impractical. I mean, look at the furore being raised at the 6th Terminal and 3rd Runway at Heathrow. A maglev line would need to be relatively straight and thus would mean it would cut through certain residential areas and thus homes would need to be demolished.

I think, realistically, all we'll see in the UK in terms of High Speed Rail is something akin to ICE in Germany or the LGV in France. Either of them would be an improvement, but maglev is a bit late now to make much of a difference! I would however lover to see a vacuum maglev line zipping through the Atlantic from the UK to Ireland and then from Ireland to the Eastern Seaboard of the United States! Could be faster than travelling by plane. It'd certainly appeal to business travellers who don't have a lot of time to spare.

Back on topic though, the only way maglev could be installed is if a completely separate infrastructure was made for it and it's stations would have to be built out of the city centre, which would make it less appealing. Looking at Shanghai, they had to build the maglev outside of the main city centre and it has lessened it's appeal and as a result, ridership of it is lower than what was originally hoped.

FORGET MAGLEV - not ever ever ever going to happen (not that HSR is mind), the lack of integration of services will block it from ever taking off anywhere in Europe on a large scale.

Oh come on! I conceded more in that post to the HSR camp than I ever have before - give me some credit for that! I'm not giving up on maglev because it is better but I don't think its going to be implemented en-masse because people have no vision.

I'm not giving up on maglev because it is better
That depends a lot on what your subjective view of what "better" means.

If you're looking purely at performance (speed, acceleration, etc) then yes MAGLEV is slightly better than conventional high speed rail. That said, I would point out that the record speed for HSR (357.18mph) is less than 4mph short of the record speed for MAGLEV (361.01mph).

If you're looking at the feasibility of a transport system in terms of benefits versus costs, and how it integrates with the existing transport system, you'll find most experts are behind a conventional system. It's important to step back and look at the big picture, not just go for the top trump card that has the largest number in the "speed" category.

There's also the issue that MAGLEV is currently an immature technology when compared to steel wheel-on-rail which has about a 200 year heritage. No politician will agree to fund a multi billion pound project if the risks involved aren't minimal.

Though heavy rail has matured whereas Maglev technology hasn't - so I'd expect to see Maglev hitting the sound barrier at some point.

But Prestonian - it is not through lack of vision that Maglev is not going to happen. To bring a Maglev route into the centre of London, Coventry, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Nottingham, sheffield, York, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Glasgow and have a station would alone cost over £50bn (going by the cost of building a new route and station for HS1 through half of London), because they cannot use the existing tracks. And that's before any interconnecting lines have been created, so we're talking £100bn for a network that'll achieve much. A network that'll start in spurts because it'll take 30 years to build and remain completely unprofitable until 10 years after the entire route is complete, for the first ten years people will get as far as Birmingham say and then have to change anyway, whereas an HS2 would already be profitable after the first 10 years coz the same trains would use the old tracks on uncompleted sections.

It's not a lack of vision, it's an ability to see clearly that shows Maglev to be unrealistic.

Exactly.

A MAGLEV route is an "all or nothing" project that needs to be committed to and built in its entirety to be viable. HSR can be funded and delivered incrementally and use existing infrastructure to spread its benefits to more destinations.

I'm a bit concerned at the latest plans for the North London line as it seems the space for four tracks between St Pancras and Camden will be entirely used by London Overground services. Therefore seemingly leaving no room for a couple of tracks to connect HS1 and HS2.

Transrapid, the German-Dutch conglomerate continues to flog a dead horse. The technique is OK yet it can hardly be implemented in urban areas for commuting purposes.

Imagine speeding up to over 200 miles p/h, slowing down, speeding up and imagine living close to a track where vehicles travel at such speeds.

People on the Maglev trains will throw up and the areas next to the track must become secured areas.

Mens scrotums would probably retract at those speeds.

Exactly.

A MAGLEV route is an "all or nothing" project that needs to be committed to and built in its entirety to be viable. HSR can be funded and delivered incrementally and use existing infrastructure to spread its benefits to more destinations.

Incremental = lack of vision, no? ;)

Anyway to move away from the whole maglev thing and back to rail... given that the west coast route is likely to be the first route, how viable do you think a spur from Carlisle to Newcastle would be.

I suggest this link for a number of reasons. First because a fast link on this route is currently missing and I think its creation could create some great routes from Newcastle to north west destinations and perhaps an alternative (and perhaps quicker) route to Glasgow. The second reason is that the other route to Newcastle would duplicate the ECML which is still OK - if we going to prioritise investment then it seems sensible to look at routes that aren't anywhere near up to scratch yet, it would fine for services to use the ECML to connect to the Leeds-Manchester spur. Third I think it woud be a relatively easy route to build, certainly less of a challenge than a spur accross from Manchester to Leeds.

I'm not exactly sure how useful it would be - and would like to hear your thoughts - but I think it would tie Newcastle to near neighbour Carlisle in an economicly beneficial way for both cities and it would be a great route for Lancaster/Preston too.

It's an interesting idea - kind of similar to the plugging effect the LGV rhin-rhone has. Would it have northwards and southwards spurs at each end? I agree that the ECML is probably not the best route for hs2 - with the next gen of signalling installed it should be easy to get the ECML up to 150mph anyway for long stretches. Still not HSR, but things do have to be prioritised.

Anyway to move away from the whole maglev thing and back to rail... given that the west coast route is likely to be the first route, how viable do you think a spur from Carlisle to Newcastle would be.


how many times do i have to say that the most profitable route is NOT the wcml. the ecml also carries more intercity passengers and for longer average distances than the wcml.

with the next gen of signalling installed it should be easy to get the ECML up to 150mph anyway for long stretches. Still not HSR, but things do have to be prioritised.

only south of york

In terms of journey times, the ECML has been ahead of the WCML for decades. Since the late 70s, the journey time from York to London has been around two hours whereas Liverpool / Manchester to London (a shorter distance) has still to catch up.

There are a number of factors that have influenced that. One is undoubtably the terrain, which is much flatter on the East Coast than the West Coast and allows straighter alignments. Another is the effect of a continual programme of speed improvements that has seen speed limits at Peterborough, Doncaster and York reduced and curves straightened to enhance linespeed.

The geography of the two routes is different as well. The East Coast serves all of the main towns and cities along its route (Stevenage, Peterborough, Doncaster, York, Darlington, Newcastle and Edinburgh) directly whereas the West Coast serves the cities of Birmingham, Liverpool and Manchester by means of loops and branches.

All the same, I am sure that a future HSR will follow the line of the WCML rather than the ECML as there is a greater concentration of population west of the Pennines than East.

another is that york to london has an express service which stops nowhere. compare london to newcastle to see its not far ahead at all.

I am sure that a future HSR will follow the line of the WCML rather than the ECML as there is a greater concentration of population west of the Pennines than East.

wrong too. population transfer is moving from west to east. fastest population growth in england is in the east midlands and east anglia. population growth in the east midlands alone between 2001 and 2006 was 200,000 people. the northwest by comparison, despite having a much larger population managed only 110,000 people and the west midlands 50,000. east of england added almost as much as the east midlands did.

northwest and west midlands vs north east, yorkshire and humberside, east midlands, east anglia. thats 11.99 million vs 12.86 million in 2001 or 48.3% to 51.7%. in 2006 it was to 47.3% to 52.7%. the difference is greater now still in the favour of the east and is set to continue to grow for the forseeable future but lets not let that get in the way of truthiness.

The reason if any HSR would be built along the London, Brum Manchester route is very very simple, they are the three largest economies and populations in the country.

There may be more people in the east as a whole, but they all live in piddly small towns and cities splattered along the entire route of the ECML.

Given the whole benifit / idea of a HSR is to move fast they have very very few stops.

I'd imagine the initial HSR routes would be...

Manchester - London - Europe
Birmingham - London - Europe

That's it.

To start adding further stops would defeat the object of the excercise, and would mean any investment would be totally wasted.

Out of interest, how far apart are the average station on the TGV network? The only experience of HSR I have are direct routes from Turin to Milan - about 100miles, with no stops, and the Channel Tunnel which had no stops between Lille and London Waterloo - well over 100miles.


EDIT - Ooops, forgot Ashford, but even so, still a long way.

Goth - out of interest, where would you have this HSR along the East Coast stopping?

I can only think of Leeds as being a sensible destination tbh.

HS2 needs to go along the WCML corridor, most of our biggest cities are all connected on that route.

The East Coast can be served by HS3.

Paddington would be a good HS2 terminal?

Would need a somewhat costly annex but would have good connections to crossrail and Heathrow Express.

well guys atkins keep saying and i keep saying this over and over, that the feasibility disagrees with your "west coast". people seem unable to grasp the concept that there are less passengers on the WCML than the ECML and that there are more passenger miles done on the ECML and more money made with a greater number of flights from london to edinburgh than anywhere else.



There may be more people in the east as a whole, but they all live in piddly small towns and cities splattered along the entire route of the ECML.


like in france? in france towns actually compete to have the route going through them offering more money to the railway builders than their neighbours! such metropoli are macon as happily served.

So which towns and cities would you have with stations on this ECML route?

Simple enough question.

Bit of help for you, of the 24 stations currently serverd (compared to the 16 on WCML) which of these would you use to make a HSR down the ECML route, remembering that too many stops will mean any speed savings are lost, and you need to server more than Manchester and Brum combined.

Aberdeen
Alnmouth
Berwick upon Tweed
Darlington
Doncaster
Dunbar
Dundee
Durham
Edinburgh
Glasgow
Grantham
Hull
Inverness
Leeds
London KC
Morpeth
Newark
Newcastle
Northallerton
Peterborough
Retford
Stevenage
Wakefield
York

The only possible route on that as far as I can see would be Newcastle - Leeds - London, but I bet that'd serve fewer people, and cost more than linking Manc and Brum to London on a HSR.

well guys atkins keep saying and i keep saying this over and over, that the feasibility disagrees with your "west coast".

Where does it say that the feasibility study disagrees with a west coast route?

A high speed line is going to be about connecting our major cities not the smaller ones.

Btw where would your east coast HS2 London terminal go?

well guys atkins keep saying and i keep saying this over and over, that the feasibility disagrees with your "west coast". people seem unable to grasp the concept that there are less passengers on the WCML than the ECML and that there are more passenger miles done on the ECML and more money made with a greater number of flights from london to edinburgh than anywhere else.


The ecml is a very good railway, in UK terms. Whilst it does have large passenger numbers that's partly down to it being historically very quick and reliable. I don't see that the East Coast could support the doubling of paggensgers any time soon that would need a high speed line on that route as well as a perfectly good fast and straight 125mph (at least) classic route. That's what I would call duplication of resources and not pointing the money where it's most needed.

I think the WCML will get to the pinch point sooner than the ECML. Ultimately both need to be superseeded. My approach would be to start a HS2 along the WCML corridor from the south, whilst starting the HS3 along the ECML from Newcastle southwards - at least to Northallerton. A lot of the ECML can be upgraded to silly speeds the way Germany has done with it's classic lines. I would prefer a program to re-shape the existing ecml - removing flat junctions, level crossings, adding loops at bottlenecks, and having new alignment in certain section such as Northallerton to Edinburgh. With new signalling we could see 250kph+ on the classic ecml. 300kph Northallerton to York too.

I would also like to see HS2 splitting at about Rugby, going northwards to serve Leicester, Nottingham, Derby, Sheffield and Leeds, but then linking up with the upgraded ECML. This would then give high speed XC aswell.

If we are simply talking about HS2, then the inital route will surely be London to Brum, close and two large populations.

Then, I'd imagine it could be extended up to Manchester, therefore linking the three largest conurbations, possibly later extending to Glasgow and a spur off to Liverpool.

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/5160/hsr1xj3.jpg

There is simply not an equivilent along the east that links such large populations so easily.

it says that the west coast route is NOT feasible without an east coast one. one of the main reasons is the east coast route would have the passenger numbers and turnover to help subsidise the west.

So where are your stations then?

It's not very obvious where you'd get the required populations from a couple of stops on the ECML.

oh, can you you provide a link to this report, and show me the part that states a west coast line would require subsidising by an east coast line?

Because the limiting factor of a single trunk is the capacity into London, and because the driving factor behind high speed rail in the UK is providing more capacity on such routes this is what I would do:

http://www.geocities.com/rich_j_parker/HSR.JPG

Two high speed lines built in parallel to relieve the southern ends of the WCML, MML and ECML.

This offers much better value for money than a single line all the way to Scotland.

More importantly, where would you put the stations.

All very good having lines, but it's where you put the stations that is important.

Paddington would be a good HS2 terminal?

Would need a somewhat costly annex but would have good connections to crossrail and Heathrow Express.why would it need an annex? You have 14 mainline platforms - you can put the commuter lines (I guess about 8tph) and GW intercities (5.5tph) in about half of the platforms, leaving the other half for HS2, which can also terminate at Heathrow/go to Europe. However Paddington would be not as good as Euston - 18 platforms, reduced service for WCML intercities (as HS2 will replace them) - you could move London Midland out into Paddington. You've probably got room for the West Country/South Wales intercities to fit in a couple of platforms (3 will do - gives half an hour dwell time). Basically you can have 10 platforms for HS2 and a much easier journey to St Pancras without too much work (no costly annex). It would however involve quite a bit of playing around near Willesden Junction.

If HS2 is ever built it MUST be directly connected to HS1, giving direct access to the continent from the provences should the demand ever be there.

the report clearly says that one line up the west coast is not financially feasible without a second line up the east! parkey also touches on the capacity issue.

Bit of help for you, of the 24 stations currently serverd (compared to the 16 on WCML) which of these would you use to make a HSR down the ECML route, remembering that too many stops will mean any speed savings are lost

not true either. it depends how many trains stop at which stations. what matters most is not how many people live in a place but who lives where. there are more trips from london to edinburgh than london to glasgow for example and with these being more passenger miles they are more profitable than london to manchester. the fact of the matter is there's more demand from leeds to london than manchester to london and more demand from edinburgh than from glasgow. you might not like this, but thats the actual reality. youre not trying to move population per se, youre trying to move population that wants to be moved. the ecml serves tourist meccas like durham and york and edinburgh and business centres like edinburgh and leeds. people are assuming that a passenger from manchester is as valuable as a passenger from edinburgh both to the train company and the general economy.

oh and the east coast mainline finishes at edinburgh waverly. some trains might go on through to aberdeen or inverness but they are NOT using the east coast mainline. there are actually 19 stops on the ECML.

the route of the line is more or less fine right now but it needs a few changes. it needs to run through lincoln not newark (this increases the population you serve by 350,000 and adds less than a mile to the line) and it needs to run through middlesborough too instead of north allerton (another 200,000). it doesnt need to stop at retford at all which it currently does. this is because retford is supposed to be a server station for lincoln, except of course its not a valid route anymore thanks to the moronic ticketing agreements we have but they still stop there anyway! if you were really smart youd also drop stevenage for cambridge which happens to be the most overloaded route on the entire network. cambridge operates half hourly express services to london, the average service of which has over 100% passenger capacity.

Because the limiting factor of a single trunk is the capacity into London, and because the driving factor behind high speed rail in the UK is providing more capacity on such routes this is what I would do:

http://www.geocities.com/rich_j_parker/HSR.JPG

Two high speed lines built in parallel to relieve the southern ends of the WCML, MML and ECML.

This offers much better value for money than a single line all the way to Scotland.

Have you seen Arup's proposal to take HS2 via Heathrow? Operationally it would probably be much better to have the airport on the main trunk rather than a branch - this would reinforce the connections from Heathrow to the rest of the country as well. The diversion is relatively small in terms of distance, although it would need some hefty tunnelling under west London!

oh, can you you provide a link to this report, and show me the part that states a west coast line would require subsidising by an east coast line?

Metrolink, I wouldn't hold your breath. From my experience Gothic is very good at reading official reports on a subject area he appears to know very little about and twisting the facts within to suit his own agenda!

http://http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/researchtech/research/highspeedlinestudysummaryreport

The original study was based upon the upgrade of the ECML being progressed. The following was concluded:

westerly routes serving Birmingham and Manchester
(Options 1 and 3) perform better than easterly routes
that serve Leeds (Option 16). It should be noted that
if the ECML were only upgraded to the “1C” level,
then the benefit-cost ratio of Option 16 would
improve from 1.23 to 1.31;

When the route were re-appraised without the intital upgrade of the ECML the eastern routes performed better than the Western routes (both showed BCR's >2:1)

A HSL in the UK is all about capacity. According to the Atkins study (which is getting a little dated now but the facts remain the same) the WCML will be at or over capacity much sooner than the ECML.

That is why the case exists for HS2, to relieve the West Midlands and the North West. Gothic's insistance that the ECML should take absolute prioirity is in my view based upon nothing more than personal preference and a detest of Virgin!

Revenue per passenger on the WCML and ECML are very similar, with ECML slightly higher due to greater populations further north (i.e Newcastle compared to Carlisle) and Edinburgh being a stronger market than Glasgow (although the gap is closing).

Gothic is very good at reading official reports on a subject area he appears to know very little about and twisting the facts within to suit his own agenda!

oooookkkk

the ECML the eastern routes performed better than the Western routes

yeah and....

(both showed BCR's >2:1)

so the east was higher.

the WCML will be at or over capacity much sooner than the ECML.


except they are supposed to be increasing the pendos to 11 cars in 2008 so the reality is the reports findings actually have to take into account the WCML having an upgrade and the ECML not.

Gothic's insistance that the ECML should take absolute prioirity is in my view based upon nothing more than personal preference and a detest of Virgin!

i detest virgin???

ECML slightly higher due to greater populations further north

latest figures i have show ECML almost 30% ahead. so basically your post says im wrong but the ECML routes perform better than the western routes, that the WCML will be over capacity but only if not including phase 3, and that revenue per passenger IS higher on the east than west.

Edinburgh would be best served by a west coast HSR as it would be more direct.

the report clearly says that one line up the west coast is not financially feasible without a second line up the east! parkey also touches on the capacity issue.

Good, if it is so clear you'll have no trouble finding me the quotes from said report so I am left in no doubt to the validity of your claims then.

If you'd do me the pleasure of posting those quotes we'll all be able to agree, so fire away, otherwise, I'm sure you'll understand if I take you're claims with a pinch of salt since it seems ridiculous.

Couple of things about comparing the Manchester to Leeds markets. At present over 30 flights a day ferry airline passengers to London from Manchester, I've no idea what the Leeds figure is but it's much less. These are potential new passengers that could be won onto HSR - an added benifit for the WCML that doesn't exist on ECML.

Goth - your still haven't given me your stations.

For example, I suggested HS2 would be along the lines of...

Manchester - London - Europe
Brum - London - Europe

both with no stops.

All your suggestions to date have involved dozens of tiny places, all being linked by HSR.

FWIW - when trying to find this mythical quote that HS2 up the west coast would need to be susidised by an east coast line, I found something in one of the articles that stated the only places that would be considered for stations are the 8 English core cities, i.e. London, Manchester, Birmingham, Newcastle, Leeds, Sheffield, Nottingham and Bristol alon with Glasgow and Edinburgh in Scotland and Cardiff in Wales.

Sure, some of the smaller places on the existing WCML and ECML could potentially have trains run to those locations, but they wouldn't be actually served by the line, rather classical line would join them onto HSR.

There is simply fair many more people living in large urban areas in the west than in the east of the country, and if we were to move to a system that stopped a lot less than the existing main lines i.e. HSR then this would become more and more of an issue.

Goth - your still haven't given me your stations.

thats because i am not a planner. im not stupid enough to think i am.

Goth - here is the report.

http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/researchtech/research/highspeedlinestudysummaryreport

Please be helpful and direct me to the part that says the west coast line is not viable without the east coast line.

thats because i am not a planner. im not stupid enough to think i am.

and therein lies the problem.

There is NOT a feasible route along the east of the country that comes even close to serving the same population and economy that a simple line to Birmingham, and then Manchester would offer.

# routes to the north west and north east are both attractive and both could support onward services to Scotland over existing routes;
# however, easterly options are potentially more viable than westerly ones judged against committed investments on the existing rail network;

ooops. lol.

oooookkkk



yeah and....



so the east was higher.



except they are supposed to be increasing the pendos to 11 cars in 2008.



i detest virgin???



latest figures i have show ECML almost 30% ahead. so basically your post says im wrong but the ECML routes perform better than the western routes, that the WCML will be over capacity but only if not including phase 3, and that revenue per passenger IS higher on the east than west.

I'm personally in favour for an EC and WC HSL. My post says that the need is greater on the West Coast as it will be over-capacity way before the EC. That holds true even with 11 car Pendo's. I'm curious to know where you get your revenue figures from? As far as I'm aware you don't work in the industry?

youre also forgetting the 2008 improvements on the WCML wont be the last ones. ECML is getting nothing at all. when you chuck it in with the population growths of the area its not so much in the WCML favour. the population differential between east and west is growing in favour of the east by 2% a decade.

im a journalist. you know those 2000 word pieces posters like to publish from various high end magazines and national newspapers, i write some of them. amuses me to see posters post my stuff in this forum and then argue with me later not realising who i am and who i have talked to.

ill look for the actual figures of passenger miles, revenue and so on later. youll be surprised i think. also however it depends what you mean by capacity, if youre talking about track capacity the ECML is already over 100% thanks to those damn choke points like welwyn viaduct and newark crossing.

# routes to the north west and north east are both attractive and both could support onward services to Scotland over existing routes;
# however, easterly options are potentially more viable than westerly ones judged against committed investments on the existing rail network;

Indeed oops.

So, where was this about the West Coast not being able to manage without the east coast sibsidy?

Was it in the same report or were you twisting what it said?

Post 136 - Goth says...

the report clearly says that one line up the west coast is not financially feasible without a second line up the east! parkey also touches on the capacity issue.


Care to retract that?

I think you'll understand if I take what you say on this matter with a large pinch of salt given you track record?

youre also forgetting the 2008 improvements on the WCML wont be the last ones.

im a journalist. you know those 2000 word pieces posters like to publish from various high end magazines and national newspapers, i write some of them. amuses me to see posters post my stuff in this forum and then argue with me later not realising who i am and who i have talked to.

I'm not forgetting anything! That's fine and dandy, in fact it doesn't suprise me given your excellent ability to selectively quote from reports you don't fully understand! I work in the rail industry and I'm still curious as to where you have got your figures from??

I'm also very curious given I don't work in the rail industry, and finding any hard facts about anything commercially sensitvie is nigh on impossible.

thats because the better cost benefits come from both lines. go read the public accounts committee report on the west coast mainline and on future rail options. im not the one who called it "a financial black hole". then when youve finished go read the national audit office report.

WCML hsr would NOT make profit. ECML hsr would. simple as that. reason the ECML would is mostly due to the massive amount of london to edinburgh air business traffic which would switch to rail. that said, if you route the WCML to edinburgh as salif says the rules of the game change, but atkins never looked at that one.

its important to remember when i speak of a west coast line, i go on about it going from london to glasgow. at that it is unfeasible, indeed atkins agree saying that it should only go as far as stoke at first, then a full east coast route, then they finish the west coast one. there you go ! west coast is built as far as it can be profitably then they switch to the east and do a fully profitable one then build north of stoke subsidising it with whats been built before.

I'm also very curious given I don't work in the rail industry, and finding any hard facts about anything commercially sensitvie is nigh on impossible.

not really if you know the right people. just you cant say who you got it from, and in some cases cant publish the figures directly.

No, when you make two train lines the cost benifit tends to rise due to economies of scale and through traffic.

Just because when you build line A on it's own the cost / benifit is only 1.5 and when you add line B it goes up to 2.0 it doesn't mean line B is more valuable than line A, rather that is the combined cost benifit.

Now given you stated...

the report clearly says that one line up the west coast is not financially feasible without a second line up the east! parkey also touches on the capacity issue.

Which section (the bullet point numbering will do thanks) clearly states this to be the case?

thats because the better cost benefits come from both lines. go read the public accounts committee report on the west coast mainline and on future rail options. im not the one who called it "a financial black hole". then when youve finished go read the national audit office report.


We've been through this before in another thread. http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=539155&page=2

The financial black hole remark concerns the WEST COAST UPGRADE. It has nothing to do with the revenue streams on Virgin West Coast which are as good as East Coast and will get greater still post Dec08.

Indeed, and was that report not about how badly National Rail managed the WCML upgrade?

It has nothing to do with the potential for profits for a western HSR.

Section 6.23 through 6.27 does suggest west is more viable than east, and certainly able to stand alone.

Specifically 6.27...



6.27 In economic terms, it is clear that there is a case for the
construction of HSL as long as economic growth
continues to drive the demand for rail travel over the
long term. The characteristics that improve the HSL
case are:
♦ a passenger-only line, without provision for dedicated
freight lines;
♦ either a single line into London or two single lines,
rather than a core southern section with two
branches east and west;
♦ a westerly orientation (although easterly options can
also be viable, particularly if the full 2+ upgrade is not
implemented on ECML);
♦ more than one London terminus, particularly if these
provide connections for international travel;
♦ faster journey times;
♦ a perception of premium service.

just the small fact that building north of stoke is not feasible on the WCML until the rest has been done because it would not generate enough money! as the report dates from years ago and an upgrade has NOT been done on the ECML you can safely say that what you're citing is wrong. your argument is simple - oh the west is more efficient but only if this report six years old allows for an upgrade that we since know hasnt been built and wont be. ummm, ok.

building what until the rest of what has been done?

oh, and could you please state your source given your lack of credence on this subject?

Thanks

read the bloody report. do you not understand that option 1 is now an anarchronism??? is this really too much for you to grasp? do you not understand that option 8 involves building the WCML only as far north as stoke, doing the full ECML and then subsidising the rest of the WCML with the profits from what has been built before? last time i checked stoke was actually south of manchester. is this too much for you to grasp?

the report clearly says that one line up the west coast is not financially feasible without a second line up the east! parkey also touches on the capacity issue.

Still waiting for this CLEAR statement that the west coast option is NOT viable when section 6.27 states that the west coast orientation boosts the case for the route.

what is not fucking clear except that they dont want to build the route north of stoke until AFTER. is this not clear. but no, your argument consists of -
in option 1 they say that it is more feasible if the ECML gets an upgrade.

this is however from a report six years old that was written when taking into account that the ECML could still have been upgraded. it hasnt been, and all things considered wont be.as a result of that we can completely discount option 1 because the actual reality of what has happened since has made it out of date. because of this the only option in the report that is still not out of date is option 8!

You say you're a journalist?

Until AFTER what?

I cannot read your mind.

after they build the sodding ECML HSR. what else would it be. after they import 1000 fucking elephants from africa? you can see why if you look at figure 2.5. see how few trips there are on the WCML north of crewe after 2031 compared to the ECML. thats a lot of extra line to build for so few passengers. thats WHY the WCML is not feasible until an east coast line has been built. hard to believe to believe manchester gets less passengers on it than york isnt it? the only reason the line is so congested north of crewe that despite the low passenger levels is because it dosent have the capacity the ECML has. you have congestion vs passenger levels. the smart thing would be to simply have the WCML HSR stop at manchester and route the ECML from edinburgh to glasgow because between manchester and glasgow there isnt really the demand except for glasgow so youd have the WCML terminating at liverpool and manchester though id probably run it as far as preston.

To me it seems pretty simple. London Paddington - Heathrow Airport - Birmingham New Street - Manchester Piccadilly - Glasgow Central. And those are the only stops I'd consider building along the high speed line. Apart from that, though, trains could continue to Liverpool from Manchester, to Stoke and Derby from Birmingham etc. using existing (and possibly upgraded) railway tracks. If this is successful extensions should be considered. Depending on how busy Paddington would be (Crossrail should free up some capacity, and Heathrow Express services would not be needed anymore), I would consider a branch from Manchester to Newcastle and Edinburgh from there. Otherwise a new HS3 from London King's Cross to Leeds, Newcastle and Edinburgh.

The latter would be faster, but the former would be better when it comes to connectivity between UK cities.

Manchester Piccadilly (21 million p/a) + Birmingham New Street (17 million) + Glasgow (29 million) is a lot more than Leeds (16 million) + Newcastle (6 million) + Edinburgh Waverley (15 million).

check out the report sweek, you can see the passenger figures. surprisingly few use the manchester > glasgow line, a LOT less than on the east coast. thats where the west coast falls down.

Which is why I can't see a WC HSL north of Manchester. It doesn't mean that a WC HSL won't be built first though or that it would be economically less viable than an EC HSL to Leeds, Newcastle and Edinburgh.

Hardly anyone uses the Manchester - Glasgow route because it is and has always been shit. Building HSRs is not only about adding capacity but encouraging change in trends. How many take the plane between these two cities?

Whenever I travel to Glasgow on business I fly, the trains are only every couple of hours, think you have to change at Preston most of the time and take ovr 4hrs.

I bet the flights to Edinburgh and Glasgow from Manc are (miles) higher than from any of the cities airports (bar London) on the ECML, showing huge potential for new passengers.

The DfT needs to be convinced that taking forward High Speed rail as a concept is the no-brainer that we know it is.

If nobody does that they'll try to solve transport congestion through other means, such as changing the font on road signs, adding £1 to the cost of car tyres, using both carriageways of motorways for both directions at once or something else equally stupid.

Knowing the way UK government works if the whole rail industry doesn't get behind one concept (I'd argue for a western corridor HS2 first) the debate will take about a decade before planning can even begin. No, prove the concept, get the ball rolling on a London - Brummingham - Manchester line first, and then start pushing for HS3.

The DfT needs to be convinced that taking forward High Speed rail as a concept is the no-brainer that we know it is.

If nobody does that they'll try to solve transport congestion through other means, such as changing the font on road signs, adding £1 to the cost of car tyres, using both carriageways of motorways for both directions at once or something else equally stupid.

Knowing the way UK government works if the whole rail industry doesn't get behind one concept (I'd argue for a western corridor HS2 first) the debate will take about a decade before planning can even begin. No, prove the concept, get the ball rolling on a London - Brummingham - Manchester line first, and then start pushing for HS3.

Precisely. That's why we see Greengauge21 and now Arup promoting what is essentially the same proposal. Ok, they're self-promoting SDG and Arup's services and looking to get a foot in the door, but anything that can can keep HSR in the public eye and give it momentum is a good thing.

check out the report sweek, you can see the passenger figures. surprisingly few use the manchester > glasgow line, a LOT less than on the east coast. thats where the west coast falls down.

To be honest, I would like to serve both cities in the end. Both Glasgow and Edinburgh are pretty much equally important, and both have 30+ flights a day to London and around 10 flights to Manchester and Birmingham each which this high speed line is supposed to get rid of.

The first goal, however, would still be London - Birmingham - Manchester. Whether it's Newcastle and Edinburgh or Glasgow then, doesn't matter that much to me. I am convinced both of them will be connected in the end. I just don't see as much potential for cities within England along the East Coast.

I think Sweek is going along the right lines here.

HIGH SPEED 2

For HS2 I would start the line from somewhere near Acton with a link onto the WCML to connect with HS1. The main HS2 terminal being Paddington (or perhaps a new station somewhere past Paddington).

If you look at the high speed line which goes from Frankfurt city centre to the airport and then up North to Koln I would have HS2 do something like that to serve Heathrow and then run alongside the GW line towards Birmingham.

Have a line run into a new station at Birmingham International with the city centre being accessed by a branch breaking off just south of there. From Birmingham International the line would then connect with the Trent Valley line.

HIGH SPEED 3

I would use Kings Cross because you simply cannot fit the full length high speed trains in there and St Pancras should not be overloaded. Can see Liverpool Street having similar problems so would rule that out aswell. So a new station would be needed, not sure if anyone can suggest some well placed wasteland?

The line itself can go up to Cambridge and onto Leeds and York with branches to Nottingham, Sheffield, Lincoln and Hull. North of York the line could then go up to Stockton before joining a re-opened Leamside line to reach Newcastle.

To be honest, I would like to serve both cities in the end. Both Glasgow and Edinburgh are pretty much equally important, and both have 30+ flights a day to London and around 10 flights to Manchester and Birmingham each which this high speed line is supposed to get rid of.

the thing is edinburgh is half the size of glasgow and thats being generous to edinburgh and the economic contribution per passenger from edinburgh is greater than from glasgow.

But you can't look at that fact on it's own. How many potential WCML passengers are being lost to the air? How many potential ECML passengers are being lost to the air? What is the maximum potential passengers for any route? Once we know this we can work out why the current loads are what they are. Once we know that we can formulate a decent plan. Otherwise, as somebody noted somewhere else on the forum, we are looking at the problem backwards and illogically, if, by induction we deduce that seeing as historically the ECML has better patronage and higher profitability therefore this will always be so.

I agree with Sweek and Salif that HS2 should go from London to Birmingham, if the various options need to be prioritised this is the first one.

you can actually see from the atkins map that shows the traffic flow that the traffic on the east coast is higher further north than on the west. this is due in part to the geographical fact that there's pretty much nothing north of preston and south of glasgow. the main urban centre is carlisle for gods sake!

the WCML needs an upgrade not in terms of passenger flow but simply because it will get congested with trains as it has less tracks.
if you wanted to be really smart, and the latest studies do this, then you have the wcml hsr stop at manchester and then route the ecml on through edinburgh to glasgow (which also provides those two cities with the fast shuttle service they need). like routing any east coast line through cambridge you immediately add several million passengers a year. passenger loads on that end of the line will also be less than further south to the glasgow to edinburgh route can carry lots of local custom as it would have the spare passenger capacity. you dont get this utilisation with two separate lines to scotland :)

historically the ECML has better patronage and higher profitability therefore this will always be so.

except the population the east coast is greater than the west coast and the difference between the two is increasing every year.

I would do something like this
http://i16.tinypic.com/6ovk1gh.jpg

Anthony: Your map makes sense to me, although I would extend the Bristol Line to Cardiff (the Severn Tunnel already serves 125mph HSTs) and I would Branch from Manchester to a new station in the new Liverpool Waters development.

Also perhaps to aid in the rejuvenation of Blackpool, make a very short extension from Liverpool Waters to Blacpool, perhaps via Preston.

that is almost exactly what i would do too antony except i too would branch to liverpool (on the west coast there isnt the patronage north of preston but south of it there's a very good argument of going up to preston).

How about we start at the birthplace of the passenger railway?

Supertrain will get you from Liverpool to Manchester in 10 minutes
Feb 27 2008 by Neil Hodgson, Liverpool Echo

A REVOLUTIONARY transport system that would connect Liverpool and Manchester in less than 10 minutes has moved a step closer.

Backers of the 311mph maglev are setting up a £220,000 feasibility study, which could be completed by early May.

UK Ultraspeed is proposing the route and is working with The Mersey Partnership to find public and private backers to help foot the bill.

The announcement was being made today at the EuroRail 2008 conference in Milan by UK Ultraspeed chief executive Dr Alan James.

It is based on the transrapid magnetic levitation (maglev) system which floats carriages carrying more than 1,000 passengers over a single path, propelled by electro- magnets.

Dr James described the high-speed technology as “the inter city travel system of the future.”

And he said the Liverpool-Manchester link could prove the case for a £16bn line connecting London with major British cities, including Liverpool.

Dr James told his international audience of senior railway executives about the study into stage one of the network.

He said: “I am delighted we have made this breakthrough on the route section linking Liverpool and Manchester.

“In 1830, George Stephenson built the world’s first inter-city transport link between these two great cities.

“His 30mph Liverpool and Manchester railway took journeys that could take a day and turned them into a matter of hours.

“Our 300mph maglev takes those hours and turns them into minutes.”

Liverpool Chamber of Commerce chief executive Jack Stopforth is a keen maglev supporter after riding a test system in Germany.

Dr James said: “I salute the vision of The Mersey Partnership. I also applaud the drive of Liverpool Chamber of Commerce in putting maglev so forcefully on the north west agenda and their tenacity in keeping it there.”

Mr Stopforth, a non-executive member of The Mersey Partnership board, said: “We are delighted that the north west is leading the UK.

“It is so important because it is not just a transport system, but could be the catalyst in producing a change in the economic development of the whole of the north of Britain.”

Maglev would connect London-Birmingham-Manchester in 50 minutes and Glasgow to Edinburgh in under 15 minutes. A Transrapid system already runs between Liverpool’s twin city of Shanghai and its remote airport, taking seven minutes 23 seconds for a journey that can take an hour by road.

UK Ultraspeed has so far invested more than £2m in developing the case for a UK maglev network.

The next step is a more detailed study of stage one routes, and the first is the Liverpool link.

Dr James said it could follow the Manchester Ship Canal route to link the two airports, before crossing the Pennines to Leeds.

He said: “Liverpool to Manchester and Leeds is a great first step.

“It’s a privilege to be treading the same ground as Stephenson.”

neilhodgson@liverpoolecho.co.uk

Ultraspeed's biggest flaw is that they don't seem to consider integrating their line concepts with the rest of the UK public transport system, except possibly airports.

No. Conventional HSR is the way forward for a whole host of practical reasons. Boring reasons maybe, when compared with the excitement of a shiny and futuristic looking MAGLEV, but still practical.

Anthony: Your map makes sense to me, although I would extend the Bristol Line to Cardiff (the Severn Tunnel already serves 125mph HSTs) and I would Branch from Manchester to a new station in the new Liverpool Waters development.



Or, avoiding the Severn Tunnel by running the line through South Bristol, past Bristol Airport to Weston where it would cross over the Severn on the new Severn Barrage (due to enter service in 2020) to Penarth Point in South Wales, past Cardiff Airport into Cardiff Central.

If we're dreaming, we may as well dream big-style :)

High Speed Trains, given the proper infrastructure, can go nearly as fast as a Maglev, so I don't see why major new infrastructure (or improvements- although this usually encourages the government to cut corners) isn't being considered.

A start should be made on upgrading the ECML - 4 tracks at Welwyn, new lines from Peterborough to Doncaster and at Morpeth, 140mph on existing lines and 155mph on new lines.

I'd like to see the South Wales line at least restored to the speeds it once had when InterCity 125s were first introduced. In the early days it too 2 hours 40 min to get to London from Swansea. Now it's a crappy 3 hours.

spot on chafford. and reroute the ecml to take in the small fact of where its customers are... run it through spalding to lincoln and then on from there to newark. avoid grantham.

National Express are planning to run a direct 2 hourly Lincoln to Kings Cross service from 2010.

And the East Coast Main Line Route Utilisation Strategy, just published, identifies the need to upgrade the Peterborough to Doncaster via Lincoln Route to increase capacity.

http://www.networkrail.co.uk/

I quote: "Similarly, on the busy, predominantly two-track section between Peterborough and Doncaster, improvements to the parallel route via Spalding and Lincoln will create effectively four tracks over this section."

Network Rail are also considering increasing linespeeds:

"Significant infrastructure investment would be required to enable services to run at 140mph. However speeds between the current 125mph maximum and this figure may be worth considering, as may increasing some lower speed restrictions"

"If implemented before 2014, this option would contribute to increased passenger kilometre targets."

"Network Rail’s analysis indicates that there would be a large economic benefit from improving linespeeds on the ECML"

They conclude:

"It is recommended that further work is undertaken on this option, in conjunction with improvements to infrastructure capacity and the IEP" (Intercity Express Programme).

The aim should be a regular London Scotland service taking just under 4 hours (on both West and East Coast routes), in order to attract more people from air services.

the service will take longer going direct from lincoln to london than the current service that involves changing at newark having waited for a train!

four tracks between spalding and doncaster via lincoln are one of the most needed transport improvements in the whole country. they cannot come soon enough.

London-Birmingham-Manchester-Leeds-Newcastle-Edinburgh-Glasgow-Dundee-Aberdeen

The only reasonable route.

I doubt there would be demand going North of Glasgow somehow

Same, and it would be silly to run it from Edinburgh-Glasgow then back on itself to Dundee; it'd be faster to get a normal train to Edinburgh and change onto the HSR at Edinburgh if you had to go via Glasgow.

Same, and it would be silly to run it from Edinburgh-Glasgow then back on itself to Dundee; it'd be faster to get a normal train to Edinburgh and change onto the HSR at Edinburgh if you had to go via Glasgow.

Considering almost 80 percent of the populations lives in the central belt, i would concur with your above statement!

All that is needed north of Glasgow / Edinburgh, is a completely electrified line, to Aberdeen and Inverness.

Due to the polulation density in the north of Scotland and the distances covered I would assume it will be a cold day in hell before getting a train from either Inverness or Aberdeen to London is a more economically attractive option than flying.

I doubt there would be demand going North of Glasgow somehowThere would be demand from Glasgow to continue on to Ireland though. Provided high-speed really meant high-speed that is.

I don't think there would. If a line was ever to be built to Ireland, it would do best to go from Manchester-Liverpool-Holyhead-Dublin and not from Glasgow to Northern Ireland.

Due to the polulation density in the north of Scotland and the distances covered I would assume it will be a cold day in hell before getting a train from either Inverness or Aberdeen to London is a more economically attractive option than flying.

i hate to say this because i lived up there but i agree, you might as well serve penzance if you're going to serve places like inverness. shall i post the top ten most journeys destinations on the ECML according to network rail? people might be interested to know newark to london is worth more than twice that of hull to london and almost as much as cardiff to london is on the GWML! the results are quite surprising though... on the GWML the most valuable route is actually london to reading.

The most valuable routes, I assume, are the London Commuters.

not exactly, for example grantham is worth more than stevenage. anyway... most valuble journeys on the ecml (phase 1) all of which are from london to these destinations...

1) peterborough
2) leeds
3) huntingdon
4) newcastle
5) york
6) darlington
7) doncaster
8) edinburgh
9) wakefield
10) newark

these are just the most valuable journeys by the way. edinburgh may seem low down but
16th is edinburgh to newcastle and 18th is edinburgh to york, newcastle might seem lower down too but newcastle to york is 17th. these three are the only ones in the top 20 not involving london. hull by the way is worth only 40% of newark's business!

in reality people in edinburgh, newcastle and york travel to places other than just london on the line in substantial numbers and york appears to be more commercially valuable than leeds!

GWML (phase 1) again is all from london
1) reading
2) maidenhead
3) didcot parkway
4) oxford
5) bath spa
6) swindon
7) bristol temple meads
8) bristol parkway
9) cardiff
10) charlbury

all major business on the GWML is from london to wherever unlike the ECML, the line commercially speaking seems to simply ferry people to and from london whereas the ECML has major destinations on it that generate additional business between themselves without london having anything to do with them.

A tunnel to Ireland will never happen. It's pie in the sky and the demand is not there. Ireland has 5 odd million people, compared to the 60 in France alone.

I hate to break it to the various Celts, Picts, families etc... but the greatest demand would be Dublin - London, not Manc/Liverpool/Glasgow. Again, it's business travellers, not visiting Auntie Siobhan, which will stimulate investment.

And London is very far from Holyhead/Fishguard or any other suitable tunnel portal - with high speed rail it would be 3 hours, whereas it's not far from Folkestone. Which is why the Chunnel is more viable.


And regarding Scotland, it would not need to go above Glasgow/Edinburgh. If the Aberdeen line was electrified, trains could continue on improved track at decent conventional speeds, but these would be intra-Scotland journeys, or Newcastle possibly. People will mostly still fly from London to Aberdeen, especially the higher yielding folk who make things profitable.

not exactly, for example grantham is worth more than stevenage. anyway... most valuble routes on the ecml (phase 1) all of which are from london to these destinations...

1) peterborough
2) leeds
3) huntingdon
4) newcastle
5) york
6) darlington
7) doncaster
8) edinburgh
9) wakefield
10) newark

these are just the most valuable journeys by the way. edinburgh may seem low down but
16th is edinburgh to newcastle and 18th is edinburgh to york, newcastle might seem lower down too but newcastle to york is 17th. hull by the way is worth only 40% of newark's business!

in reality people in edinburgh, newcastle and york travel to places other than just london on the line in substantial numbers and york appears to be more commercially valuable than leeds!

GWML (phase 1) again is all from london
1) reading
2) maidenhead
3) didcot parkway
4) oxford
5) bath spa
6) swindon
7) bristol temple meads
8) bristol parkway
9) cardiff
10) charlbury

Where are these stats from please? I can't believe Charlbury (???) is above places not mentioned such as Newbury and Slough. Or Newport, Ealing Broadway, Twyford...

the stats are from the intercity express programme showing the cost benefits for high speed trains on various journeys. those are the ones with the highest cost benefit per minute saved :) the more valuable the journey the more you save per minute...

isn't charlbury very rich? perhaps the economic value of every passenger is worth more than those of slough which compensates for the lesser number of people it carries. remember this is the value of the passenger flows on various journeys... not the value of an entire route. still, it does rather shit on everything everyone has said through this thread.

not exactly, for example grantham is worth more than stevenage. anyway... most valuble journeys on the ecml (phase 1) all of which are from london to these destinations...

1) peterborough
2) leeds
3) huntingdon


I didn't even realise Huntingdon was on the ECML - I can't ever remember hearing it on a train or station announcement, but then again I'm always focused on the Leeds services. How many trains per day serve Huntingdon?

many of the stops on the line do not get 225s, they have a different operator to the services to leeds. no idea how many trains but the station handles about 1.5 million passengers a year.

Stevenage would be FCC territory I assume?

I also am sat in disbelief at Charlbury.

yeah. i think perhaps for charlbury there are quite a few millionaires there using the first class service? that's how i'd explain it. their time is worth rather more than ours. the reason i posted the figures anyway is because it goes to show that the actual cost benefits have nothing to do with population, charlbury being one place above newport. perhaps a comparison between the average earnings of those in newport and those in charlbury will reveal why.

besides, remember thats for journeys. you cuold have 1 million people travelling from newport to cardiff, 0.1 million from newport to london and 0.2 million from charlbury to london. then you also have to take into account the value of those passengers too and let's face it, newport is quite poor. one reason hull is so far down is because it's poorer than other places, lincoln for example (which is what newark's figure basically is) was for the last figures i saw 15% richer per capita than hull so you could carry 10% less passengers and it could be more valuable from that alone.

Forget Newport. Newbury has money

the stats are from the intercity express programme showing the cost benefits for high speed trains on various journeys. those are the ones with the highest cost benefit per minute saved :) the more valuable the journey the more you save per minute....

I'm a little confused as to exactly what the statistics are meant to be showing, do you have a link?

the value of passenger flows by per minute saved on each of the journeys!

saving 1 minute on the journey time from london to peterborough will save 21.3 million pounds. newark will be 5.7 million pounds for a minute saved. hull will be 2.3 million pounds for a minute saved. i have listed the top ten journeys for each of those two lines.

newbury does indeed have money, it's one place under newport and again, a fraction of the size.

people might be interested to know by the way that should there be in cab signalling part of the ECML is capable already of running at 155mph speeds. 22 miles from shaftholme junction and 38 miles from skelton junction both going north are already capable of those speeds.

out of the 268.7 miles from kings x to darlington 22.7% of the line can already run at 155mph and that the current average speeds the line could do with in cab signalling right now from london to newcastle would be 135.3 miles per hour if the trains could cruise at 155mph. that's also taking into account there is no line north of darlington capable of going over 125. i note that south of darlington, almost all the long stretches of track are capable of doing 140mph +.

in other words, with the right trains now and in car signalling, newcastle to london could have express services running on it in under 2 hours and this includes things like having to slow down to 40mph at holgate junction! the biggest time saving would probably be by having services not stopping at york circumnavigate it by building a line from colton junction to skelton junction and upgrading offord curves south to holme LC to 140mph. its nuts trains can go through peterborough station at 120mph but only 30mph through york station.

assuming a time saving of 90 minutes that is a cost benefit of £1,278,000,000 just on the newcastle to london journeys alone for some new trains and in cab signalling and that still allows services with half an hour of time for stopping at stations and stuff. astonishing or what? the time savings on all journeys starting north of newcastle and terminating in london would also save 90 minutes.

london to edinburgh would save £684,000,000.
london to durham would save £369,000,000.
london to berwick upon tweed would save £72,000,000.

the value of passenger flows by per minute saved on each of the journeys!


the reason why I'm asking is because does this mean that values are values added to specific passengers going between these two and only these two points, or is it a value posted to the bottom of the balance sheet as a merged benefit calculated on the entire passenger spread? Are they aggregated when they form part of a longer journey? How is that included or discluded? What is the base condition? Does it assume any changes to operations such as IEP stopping at Huntingdon where NXEC currently does not? And if not how is Huntingdon relevent? Which begs the question...what exactly is the DfT's intent in their own words on what these stats are? Hence me asking.

the value of passenger flows by per minute saved on each of the journeys!

To me that means that the accountants are taking over. What I want to know is how many people get on and off.

they dont include the bigger part of the journey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! surely you'd realise that if i mentioned edinburgh to york seperately from edinburgh to london. thats why it says "journey".

it is per minute saved, it doesn't matter which sodding train stops at huntingdonm, it is the value of the journeys from huntingdon to london (and vice versa) by railway on the ECML. they could run the current services and save a minute and save 15.3 million. they could have unicycles do it and save a minute and save 15.3. the actual vehicle makes no difference.

What I want to know is how many people get on and off.

why??? lol. don't you understand the economic utility of the passengers is more important than their number? who gives a shit if a million unemployed travel from glasgow to london if half a million millionaires travel from london to edinburgh. what you are doing with any transport system is getting the maximum financial benefits for the economy! that means more jobs, more tax revenue, economic growth etc.

do you think the french built their HSR based on the idea of serving their biggest population centres? of course not. the french built their HSR based on the principle of the first lines making money allowing the expansion of it to become self funding. the choice is simple... either build loss making HSR lines and that's it or you build profitable ones first and then use that money to fund the loss making ones. this is what just about every country in the world does... except britain which funds a financial blackhole going through manchester to glasgow at the expense of the rest of the network. why was nothing else upgraded on the railways for a decade? because it was all being spent on the WCML.... cost benefit of 1.7 in 2005 when the public accounts committee did its report and its fallen even more since. what about the opportunity cost? they didn't factor that in but if you did it would be negative by rather a lot.

a smart person would have funded the upgrades of the profitable lines first - they'd have finished the upgrade of the ECML which would have returned even bigger franchise payments to the govt, then they'd have upgraded the GWML which would have done the same then they would have done WCML. any idea how much money the govt would have gotten out of in cab signalling and faster trains on the ECML with everything else the same as it is now in increased tax revenue and franchise payments? 5 billion more? you have 1.278 billion just on journeys starting in newcastle and finishing in london (and vice versa). it would be an absolute goldmine. the cost of upgrading the entire 225 stock would be about £250 / £300 million for example. anyone want to speculate on the cost of in cab signalling from darlington to london?

instead we have a bunch of absolute tits who despite having a railway capable of running at up to 155mph and over 50% of the route south of darlington able to go over 140mph don't have the trains to do it or the signalling installed.

^^ You know more about this than me. I just go by how many punters I see getting on and off. But back to the original subject, where in your opinion is the most valuable places to run a HSR between?

see the places i listed in post 197 but this doesn't mean there are not more valuable places off the line - you would probably want to go via cambridge if you built it because you could save £36.6 million per minute for trips to and from london but i am working on the basis you essentially keep what already exists.

if you were going to do something like the current alignment you would go for the top 10 or top 20 most valuable places. the amount you'd save per minute would be the same regardless of whether you upgraded the old line or built a new one i think we should just upgrade the existing one and then build relief areas to divert the slower services too off the faster portions of the track.

the reason i keep mentioning lincoln is because you can see newark is one of the top 10 and the passengers to there are almost entirely from lincoln (and those figures were compiled when lincoln was shut for 4 weeks in the summer)! that makes it completely unique, none of the other popular stations on any of the high speed lines we have are feeder stations.

it's an anomaly that needs sorting and just doing that alone would have substantial benefits... over 4 million per minute saved from lincoln to london which assuming every service connects (most of them don't) you'd save £148 million and taking the average timetabled speed you'd save £280 million and that's just by running the trains via lincoln instead of newark. you'd also bypass the newark crossing problem at the same time, no need to fix it then and the route would be one mile shorter saving a whole 27 seconds on all journeys north of newark. haha.

that may sound odd but i've just saved £9.54 million on london to leeds, £6.39 million on london to newcastle, £6.3 million on london to york, and so on.

that aside i would build a bypass for york and upgrade the stretch of line i have mentioned above. the whole idea is you want to have the maximum amount of cost benefits you can and then go from there using them to fund the less profitable stuff.

Okay......

Because all of this is coming second hand I won't trust any part of it, and that includes making inferences from the individual points. Sorry, but I won't take what anyone says on this site as wrote, and if you really wanted to prove you are correct in what you say you would provide a link. Either provide the link or don't, I'm not going to get drawn into discussing anything that essentially boils down to discussings things that just you have said, after I've asked for a link to the actual data.

And why would you want to bypass York? That's one of the big three long distance destinations?

Peterborough stops could be culled by providing separate express shuttles in the peaks, maybe also stopping at Huntingdon and Grantham if their importance is as you say!

noooo you don't understand what i mean. you bypass york for the trains NOT stopping at york. follow? services stopping at york go through it, everything else has to go round it. york station is the biggest slow down point in the entire network and it is impossible to upgrade it to add more track allowing trains to go through at high speeds which if you bothered to read post 207 you would know. i even bothered to give the speeds for the track and the names of which sections you would build from and to.

if you really wanted to prove you are correct in what you say you would provide a link.

yes, let me link you to the report i have sitting on my desk in paper!

The figures Gothic is reporting come from the ITT for the IEP programme.

http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/iep/iepinvitationtotender/ittappendixc.pdf

Not for the first time Gothic has got the wrong end of the stick. The values represent the total demand and revenue for each of the o-d pairs listed and how a 1 min journey time will increase demand/benefits (through the use of a journey time elastictity etc).

This allows the bidder to see if it is worthwhile providing a train above the base spec. They know how much it will cost to do so, the tables in the ITT provide a high-level estimate of the 30 year discounted benefits.

There will be an element of passengers value of time in there as well but this is very much secondary to the size of the market and more importantly it's overall yield per passenger mile. DfT Values of time are determined from journey purpose (business, commuting, leisure) and not individuals relative wealth.

The tables are effectively ranking the flows on each route in terms of demand/revenue without providing commercially sensitive numbers.

Can I fantasize over the following?

SINGLE LINE:
London Liverpool Street > Stratford International > (Stansted) > Cambridge > Peterborough > Grantham > Newark

THEN...

LIVERPOOL LINE:
(Worksop) > Sheffield > [Woodhead Tunnel] > Manchester > (Bolton) > (Wigan) > Liverpool

GLASGOW LINE:
(Retford) > Doncaster > (Wakefield) > Leeds > York > Darlington > Newcastle > Edinburgh > Glasgow

This serves everybody but the Midlands (who as a result can get everywhere even quicker) and utilises the high speeds possible on the low, flat land of the East.

Not for the first time Gothic has got the wrong end of the stick.

and how have i got the wrong end of the stick? it shows the cost benefit per minute saved on various journeys and the values of various journeys. it shows where the highest cost benefits are on the routes and it shows that population has little to do with them.

For example, Hull has a low figure, even though its population is higher compared with other places further up the scale. The input sensitivities are mainly what the base passenger flow is - historically low to Hull as there was such a poor service there until recently. Therefore speed increases have a less valuable affect as Hull is already behind the curve on value.

noooo you don't understand what i mean. you bypass york for the trains NOT stopping at york. follow? services stopping at york go through it, everything else has to go round it. york station is the biggest slow down point in the entire network and it is impossible to upgrade it to add more track allowing trains to go through at high speeds which if you bothered to read post 207 you would know. i even bothered to give the speeds for the track and the names of which sections you would build from and to.



yes, let me link you to the report i have sitting on my desk in paper!


You don't understand what I mean! I was questioing why you would have trains that skip York at all on the existing ECML, as it's one of the main destinations.

I do understand the concept of a bypass, thanks. But it wouldn't be viable surely as the opportunity cost of skipping York wouldn't cover the minutes saved, I'm sure.

and how have i got the wrong end of the stick? it shows the cost benefit per minute saved on various journeys and the values of various journeys. it shows where the highest cost benefits are on the routes and it shows that population has little to do with them.

It shows where the greatest benefit is to be gained from speeding up journeys. This is driven by the existing demand and more importantly existing revenue. It's not all about catchment populations, but it is certainly a key factor.

It says nothing about the cost of providing journey time improvements nor therefore whether it is economically viable. Remember these benefits reported are discounted 30 year values and represent the benefit gained from a 1 min reduction in journey time over and above those already proposed under the IEP base specification.

Incedentally, you even if the 225s were allowed to operate at speeds above 125mph, you'd actually lose capacity due to the greater differnece between running speeds. They may be able to run up to 155mph but even ignorinbg the need for in-cab signalling etc the infrastructure couldn't support a working timetable with >125mph running.

I do understand the concept of a bypass, thanks. But it wouldn't be viable surely as the opportunity cost of skipping York wouldn't cover the minutes saved, I'm sure.

no? i think it would... and if you look at the document linked to above you can see the portion of the track and how slow it would be. it's only a destination for the trains that stop there. so for the slowdown area around york the fastest you could do it in would be 217 seconds and thats for ALL trains passing through york to do 3.362 miles and that doesn't include the fact you have to slow down first and then accelerate out which adds even more to the journey time. bypassing york at 155mph would take 78 seconds and create a 155mph stretch of track between two 155mph capable stretches already. you'd save approximately 2 and a half minutes.

They may be able to run up to 155mph but even ignorinbg the need for in-cab signalling etc the infrastructure couldn't support a working timetable with >125mph running.

yeah thats the catch which is why i also said you could just add more tracks for the fast sections and by that i mean build relief tracks for the slow trains to go on. you're right though that the faster they go the more problems you get thanks to the line being so congested. i think what i am trying to say is we don't need a new high speed line from london to newcastle, we already have one! we do need a slower line to get the traffic off it. the infrastructure did used to support a working >125 mph timetable though just fine.

But all trains should stop at York on the traditional line! It's a major destination - a huge railhead for the region, a big tourist spot and a fairly important business/first class location, especially with the Harrogate connections. Southbound it's also a major connection point for Leeds and through to Manchester.

but all trains DON'T stop and secondly you have high value london to newcastle and london to edinburgh journeys which should be express during the peak periods. express journeys to newcastle would take two hours and there IS the demand. you are aware that when they start running trains to lincoln they will run less services to york? more trains will go through it without stopping.

But all trains should stop at York on the traditional line! It's a major destination - a huge railhead for the region, a big tourist spot and a fairly important business/first class location, especially with the Harrogate connections. Southbound it's also a major connection point for Leeds and through to Manchester.

Yes but it'd make more sense for the line to run through Leeds and Harrogate than it would through York. York would be linked to Leeds by TPE, basically switching the current set up where Leeds is linked to York by TPE and Harrogate by Northern.

but all trains DON'T stop and secondly you have high value london to newcastle and london to edinburgh journeys which should be express during the peak periods. express journeys to newcastle would take two hours and there IS the demand. you are aware that when they start running trains to lincoln they will run less services to york? more trains will go through it without stopping.

York isn't going to see a reduction in services, it will see an increase. There will be a 5th path per hour which under the NXEC proposals will alternately serve York and Lincoln as a semi-fast service allowing a reduction in station calls on other services to speed them up.

You wouldn't skip York though. In the current timetable all 31 southbound services between Newcastle and London call at York. There simply isn't the overall demand to justify a fast service from Newcastle - York is the bread and butter which makes it viable.

If First group get the open access rights then York could gain from a London - York - Harrogate service instead.

there are 12 flights a day from london heathrow to newcastle and back alone. there are 40 from edinburgh. we could count the other airports around london too if you like. that means there very clearly IS the demand to circumnavigate york with express services and the majority of the flights from london to newcastle happen to leave in rush hour. do people here think britain is alone in people liking to fly and that a rail link wouldnt take 80 to 90 percent of the airline passengers?

there are 12 flights a day from london heathrow to newcastle and back alone. there are 40 from edinburgh. we could count the other airports around london too if you like. that means there very clearly IS the demand to circumnavigate york with express services and the majority of the flights from london to newcastle happen to leave in rush hour. do people here think britain is alone in people liking to fly and that a rail link wouldnt take 80 to 90 percent of the airline passengers?

Because there is the requirement for direct services doesn't mean that the most efficient use of the route is to go direct with no stops. Otherwise there would only be direct express services between any two stations!!!!

The stop cost of York is low, because the train has already slowed down due to the poor alignment in the area. so it makes even more sense to stop at the important interchange. Bypassing York would only make sense if it actually was bypassed.

there are 12 flights a day from london heathrow to newcastle and back alone. there are 40 from edinburgh. we could count the other airports around london too if you like. that means there very clearly IS the demand to circumnavigate york with express services and the majority of the flights from london to newcastle happen to leave in rush hour. do people here think britain is alone in people liking to fly and that a rail link wouldnt take 80 to 90 percent of the airline passengers?

If I'm right, their is also more flights from Newcastle to London in the other airports, and vica versa, also the A1 road from Newcastle to Edinburgh is at full capacity as well, this road has also been denied widening and up grades to let it carry more road transport, so a line from Newcastle to Edinburgh is a must as well as a line From Newcastle to London.

Because there is the requirement for direct services doesn't mean that the most efficient use of the route is to go direct with no stops. Otherwise there would only be direct express services between any two stations!!!!

The stop cost of York is low, because the train has already slowed down due to the poor alignment in the area. so it makes even more sense to stop at the important interchange. Bypassing York would only make sense if it actually was bypassed.

:okay: The only practical way to bypass York station is to build a new track
bypassing the whole area altogether.

Actually Newcastle has the same problem as well but since it is an important
station there's not much point bypassing it with dedicated tracks.

So having two stops before Edinburgh isn't such a hardship! They make more money than Edinburgh currently and provide connections from lesser served areas.

And Gothicform, you can't compare stopping patterns with obviously direct flights. Tenuous and desperate. All trains stop at York for a reason - demand for them to do so. Trains slow to go through other places, like Crewe for example, and don't always stop. They could easily and not add much on to journey times, but they don't as there isn't a need.

Just thinking, if Scotland win the Euro 2016 bid, do you think it would help the case for a HSR link?

Probably not as it would never be done by then.

Some infill could be done to shorten journeys, such as a fast line from Newcastle to Edinburgh which could in time be dedicated to HSR. Or increasing linespeeds north of Preston - but I doubt they'd get their arses in gear by then. Would be great though.

But don't they and Wales not have enough stadiums big enough?

I doubt there would be any difficulty supplying eight stadia between the two countries:

Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Dundee, Kilmarnock, Cardiff, Swansea, and Inverness or Llanelli

Glasgow - two from Hampden, Ibrox and Parkhead (52K, 54k and 65k)
Edinburgh - Murrayfield (68.5k)
Aberdeen - Aberdeen Arena (in the process of being planned, 30K temp and then 25K)
Dundee - New combined Stadium for both Dundee Clubs (30k temp, then 20K)
Cardiff - Millenium Stadium (72K)
Swansea - Liberty Stadium (30 K Temp)
Kilmarnock (30K Temp)

So the infrastructure of the stadia is there. As far as transport is concerned:

1)Scotland to Wales connected via the M6
2)Scotland to Wales connected via the WCML
3)All cities in Scotland connected by both Motorway and Rail
4)Cardiff, Glasgow (2) Edinburgh and Aberdeen all have international airports
5)Wales can be served further by Birmingham international

Now just to cover off the trouble of those dickhead Rangers fans............

I doubt there would be any difficulty supplying eight stadia between the two countries:

Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen, Dundee, Kilmarnock, Cardiff, Swansea, and Inverness or Llanelli

Glasgow - two from Hampden, Ibrox and Parkhead (52K, 54k and 65k)
Edinburgh - Murrayfield (68.5k)
Aberdeen - Aberdeen Arena (in the process of being planned, 30K temp and then 25K)
Dundee - New combined Stadium for both Dundee Clubs (30k temp, then 20K)
Cardiff - Millenium Stadium (72K)
Swansea - Liberty Stadium (30 K Temp)
Kilmarnock (30K Temp)

So the infrastructure of the stadia is there. As far as transport is concerned:

1)Scotland to Wales connected via the M6
2)Scotland to Wales connected via the WCML
3)All cities in Scotland connected by both Motorway and Rail
4)Cardiff, Glasgow (2) Edinburgh and Aberdeen all have international airports
5)Wales can be served further by Birmingham international

Now just to cover off the trouble of those dickhead Rangers fans............

Yes, but one city can only provide two stadiums maximum, so their is a little problem when it comes to Glasgow.

Also, last month the transport minister was asked a question from an MP in Wolverhamton, "MR minister I thank you for the investment in the WCML, but by 2015 it will still reach capacity, isn't it time to have a HSR link running along side it, going in to Scotland?", the Ministers response was "I'm glad you acknowledge the investment in to the WCML, but may I remind you their is more then one route to Scotland". hinting that he favours the backwards S shape route.

Also, I am a Geordie, and I must say that we have received a lot more trouble from the Celtic fans when they have came to Newcastle then we have when Rangers fans have came.

Maglev!!

Its nice to speculate. Even dream. But given the HG Wellsian speed of this system, we know:

a. It will cost a fortune.

b. It will thus have to part of an overall keenly developed and organised intrgrated transport policy.

So (huh) dont it will ever happen in the UK.

Been seriously Maglev (if its ever to happen) would probably be a system to connect the major cities.

A substantial upgrading of the remaining inter-city/provincial rail and air system would have to occur to ensure that places like Gothic's Lincolnshire coast or Nottingham (with its irritating e-w rail lines) or even yer Southamptons or Middlesbrough's ain't cut off.

That they are connected to those core cross UK Maglev lines.

So lots of investment. Erm!!

Maglev!! ...
Been seriously Maglev (if its ever to happen) would probably be a system to connect the major cities. ...
The Maglev proposals have it connecting airports, one to another, rather than connecting cities. Arguably a small distinction, but it shows they are after a different market from the conventional rail proposals.

Two groups -
(1) Fast connection of nearby airports to each other (eg Heathrow-Gatwick or Liverpool-Manchester) - to effectively change two airports into one airport on two campuses.
(2) 300 mph connections of medium distance airports (eg London/Newcastle) to take the patronage of people that would otherwise fly.

Los Angeles - Las Vegas would be an ideal route for Maglev.

Maglev!!

Its nice to speculate. Even dream. But given the HG Wellsian speed of this system, we know:

a. It will cost a fortune.

b. It will thus have to part of an overall keenly developed and organised intrgrated transport policy.

So (huh) dont it will ever happen in the UK.

Been seriously Maglev (if its ever to happen) would probably be a system to connect the major cities.

A substantial upgrading of the remaining inter-city/provincial rail and air system would have to occur to ensure that places like Gothic's Lincolnshire coast or Nottingham (with its irritating e-w rail lines) or even yer Southamptons or Middlesbrough's ain't cut off.

That they are connected to those core cross UK Maglev lines.

So lots of investment. Erm!!

It would only cost a fraction more of what the London crossrail will cost, if not the same price.

And it's more to connecting regions rather then cities, Tyneside-Teeside, Central belt Scotland, Manchester-Liverpool (Lancashire), Birmingham-London.etc.

Would be interesting to see it happen and the government have just told UK ultraspeed to look into the possibility again, but somehow I think another excuse will come up not give it the go ahead.
I mean, it wouldn't really be much benefit to London now would it?????????

I think the WCML will get to the pinch point sooner than the ECML. Ultimately both need to be superseeded. My approach would be to start a HS2 along the WCML corridor from the south, whilst starting the HS3 along the ECML from Newcastle southwards - at least to Northallerton. A lot of the ECML can be upgraded to silly speeds the way Germany has done with it's classic lines. I would prefer a program to re-shape the existing ecml - removing flat junctions, level crossings, adding loops at bottlenecks, and having new alignment in certain section such as Northallerton to Edinburgh. With new signalling we could see 250kph+ on the classic ecml. 300kph Northallerton to York too.

ECML should already be capable of doing rather high speed (225~250km/h) with minimal upgrades (mainly signaling) already (and the same goes for GWML), that's why a lot of people would rather concentrate on the West Coast instead of the East. If there's ever any HSR replacement of these two corridors (ECML and GWML), it'll be done as extensive upgrades rather than completely new and dedicated high speed lines, and all these have nothing to do with "feasibility".


I would also like to see HS2 splitting at about Rugby, going northwards to serve Leicester, Nottingham, Derby, Sheffield and Leeds, but then linking up with the upgraded ECML. This would then give high speed XC aswell.

This would be a perfect replacement of Midland Main Line, with services south of Leicester being fully taken over by Thameslink. I think HS2 should follow M1 between Rugby and Radett, then take over the 4~6 tracks section of Midland Main Line (which is more or less parallel to M1 anyway) all the way down to West Hamstead, where it will branch off to join St. Pancras, Euston and HS1. The sufficient amount of space around the M1 green belt should make an upgrade of HS2 to 4 tracks possible in the future when needed. Also, if Nottingham to Lincoln Line can be upgraded into a high speed line, it should be used as a connection to ECML as well.

List of lines and stations (Southbound):
Birmingham/Trent Valley/Leicester -> (Tradition Lines with connections to HS2) -> (All lines join at Rugby with no intermediate stops, HS2 begins here, following M1) -> Northampton Parkway -> Milton Keynes Parkway (Interchange with Oxford/Aylesbury-Bletchley-Bedford Line) -> [Luton -> Luton Airport Parkway] -> West Hamstead Interchange (For Metropolitan Line, Overground and Thameslink) -> HS1/St. Pancras/Euston

Note: Not all trains will call at the stations above, and I predict most services will be operated nonstop all the way to London terminals anyway.

[] = The Luton loop will share with Midland Main Line to save cost of building another parkway station on M1, as well as transport link to Luton Airport and Luton town centre.

If we were building a new rail system from scratch perhaps we might seriously consider maglev, but we're not.

Conventional high speed rail can make use of the existing rail network to reach a much wider range of destinations direct by branching off onto the classic network. It can also use existing stations. Costs are less, benefits are greater.

Taikoo I've since changed my mind over ECML upgrades. Some need doing, but to allow for future growth of freight and local/regional services the Long Distance High Speed services should be removed and put on a new route.

If we were building a new rail system from scratch perhaps we might seriously consider maglev, but we're not.

Conventional high speed rail can make use of the existing rail network to reach a much wider range of destinations direct by branching off onto the classic network. It can also use existing stations. Costs are less, benefits are greater.

But that's where people forget, we are building a new one from scratch.
No matter if it is track based or not, it will be built from scratch and that will mean that all other lines will not be needed to be upgraded for it.

Actually although the original cost for a Maglev system would be higher then a track based system, within a few years the costs of a Maglev system would be cheaper then a rail based system.
DUE to maintenance costs.
Also like I said before, it would only cost a small amount more then a track based system in London is receiving (London cross rail). A similar amount of money can be spent on a High speed rail link in London, which already has large transport network in the underground (London Cross rail will serve the same purpose) then surly it can be spent on a nation wide system, but then again it wouldn't benefit London would it, so too much to ask their then, lol.

Their are no moving parts in the Maglev system, meaning virtually no wear and tear. Also the track bed for a Maglev system would be magnetised so it will NOT rust unlike a track bed system.
It will also not need power line which the theft of are on the up.

It has already been said that the new system whatever it will be will go primarily to Airports and Central stations where needed, so their is not a real need for it to link up with traditional infrastructure.
Plus if it was to be a rail based system then it would more then likely have a wider carriage and axle which would stop it from ever running on the traditional infrastructure.

Plus it seems to be apparent that so many people on here are wanting the system to go to where they live and not considering other areas, the fact is the cities have already been virtually decided along with the track layout.
I mean how can it be a High speed link if you have a stop in Birmingham then one in Stoke, and other people seem to take it around the world as well.

If it was to go the way that some people on here then it would just turn in to a new network that would have the ability to at fast speeds but can't because it has so many stations and so many corners taking it to places it doesn't really need to be.

Think about it logically like gothic has, at least he/she knows the facts and where it should be, which is similar or the same to what all of the government agencies working on it have came up with.

Some interesting points, especially on maintenence costs. I take it you can back up these claims by producing factual data on the relative maintenence costs of Maglev and HSR?

A maglev from (say) London to Birmingham provides services from London to Birmingham.

A conventional high speed line (greengauge21's HS2 proposal) from London to Birmingham, by being compatible with the classic network, would direct fast intercity services from London to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, North Wales, and Scotland, as well as high speed commuter services to Oxford, Aylesbury and Milton Keynes.

Furthermore, when long distance intercity services divert onto a HSL there is a lot of space freed up on the existing lines (in this case the WCML) which can be used for freight and local services. This isn't possible with a maglev without passengers having to change trains, and thus any speed benefits are lost.

But then I guess a TGV just doesn't look sci-fi enough... :ohno:

Some interesting points, especially on maintenence costs. I take it you can back up these claims by producing factual data on the relative maintenence costs of Maglev and HSR?

A maglev from (say) London to Birmingham provides services from London to Birmingham.

A conventional high speed line (greengauge21's HS2 proposal) from London to Birmingham, by being compatible with the classic network, would direct fast intercity services from London to Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, North Wales, and Scotland, as well as high speed commuter services to Oxford, Aylesbury and Milton Keynes.

Furthermore, when long distance intercity services divert onto a HSL there is a lot of space freed up on the existing lines (in this case the WCML) which can be used for freight and local services. This isn't possible with a maglev without passengers having to change trains, and thus any speed benefits are lost.

But then I guess a TGV just doesn't look sci-fi enough... :ohno:

It's not the fact that it doesn't look Sci-Fi enough, it's the fact that Maglev is currently the best option, unless you all want to wait for planes still, or the unreliability of the rail network.

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/58702DC8-8744-4ACD-9575-37C17E832280.html

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/023FB01E-29A3-48C8-8572-FC1BB8237B43.html

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/192EE9E1-D174-498B-92B0-44B418F611A9.html

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/FDF9453E-B02D-4C69-AD79-F9F09C77D334.html

This is the main one.

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/A47D7AEF-BF8D-4744-812F-A048A35CA407.html

Conservatives consider the plans:

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/3135D8F9-FEA0-4BF3-AD66-BD3AEEEB7E42.html

Lib Dems back the plans:

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/21BF2346-465B-42B1-ACED-DBB85BBE701C.html

The only MAIN political party to not even mention the bases on Maglev and High speed rail is the current government party Labour.

This is the route that UK ultraspeed want to build, and you have to agree that it would be the most sensible.

http://www.500kmh.com/projectinfo.html

Also more information about the costs here.
http://www.500kmh.com/Resources/Ultraspeed_Factbook.pdf

ECML should already be capable of doing rather high speed (225~250km/h) with minimal upgrades (mainly signaling) already (and the same goes for GWML), that's why a lot of people would rather concentrate on the West Coast instead of the East. If there's ever any HSR replacement of these two corridors (ECML and GWML), it'll be done as extensive upgrades rather than completely new and dedicated high speed lines, and all these have nothing to do with "feasibility".


yes i didn't realise this either until i read the documents. it's clear that all you need to do is fill in the gaps in between, perhaps with diversions and you can have pretty nice speeds from london to newcastle. i find it bizarre we have a railway capable doing X when it isn't and that we spent a fortune building it to do X.

Interesting that the website of the main proponent of Maglev in the UK, with a strong business interest in selling their product, suggests that it's a good idea.

I used to love the idea of Maglev too, especially after reading the website you've linked to when I found it a couple of years ago, it's a nice shiny futuristic picture. Feels nice.

Unfortunately pragmatism gets in the way.

Conservatives consider the plans:

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/3135D8F9-FEA0-4BF3-AD66-BD3AEEEB7E42.html

Lib Dems back the plans:

http://web.mac.com/alan_james/iWeb/UltraspeedMedia/Latest%20News/21BF2346-465B-42B1-ACED-DBB85BBE701C.html

The only MAIN political party to not even mention the bases on Maglev and High speed rail is the current government party Labour.
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Yeah but Conservatives only consider it so they can use it against Labour I think. Labour probably want to back it but if they do, knowing they can't carry out the plans with the current budget, then they'll be branded a failure. So it's better for them not to back it in the first place. On the other hand, Cons have nothing to lose.

yes i didn't realise this either until i read the documents. it's clear that all you need to do is fill in the gaps in between, perhaps with diversions and you can have pretty nice speeds from london to newcastle. i find it bizarre we have a railway capable doing X when it isn't and that we spent a fortune building it to do X.

I think Virgin would have done the right thing for ECML, shame they couldn't make their proposal through as they lost the bid to NEX...:ohno:

Speaking of Maglevs...I reckon the advantage of conventional HSRs would be offset if we have decided to build a completely new line at once, instead of building it in stages or upgrading/diverting existing lines. In that case they should be taken into consideration, and with Maglevs we can turn Britain into a SF Bay Area-like megalopolis, making us a de facto "City State".

Hi all, this is my first post so please be gentle! Happy new year.

My suggested high-speed route(s) is/are as follows:
(Click image for larger JPG, or click here for complete PDF (http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/Proposed_High_Speed_Railways.pdf))

http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/thumb_highspeed_top.JPG (http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/uk_highspeed_top.JPG) (top)

http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/thumb_highspeed_bottom.JPG (http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/uk_highspeed_bottom.JPG) (bottom)

I have also worked out a reasonable service pattern to operate with this suggested network. I might post it if anybody is interested?

As others have said, I think it is important that the high-speed network is extended gradually, carefully linking into the existing system to (a) provide the most benefit to existing services, and (b) create capacity on the existing network for better local/mid-distance & freight services. I also think it is important to retain familiarity with the existing network, by allowing as many of the current journey patterns to be retained - albeit at a higher speed. Hence, my plan has many links to/from the existing network, to allow access to city centre stations for direct services, but also including several 'parkway' stations for those through routes as required.

I would obviously envisage HS2 being completed first, from London (& Heathrow) to Birmingham / Manchester - probably in two phases: the first to Birmingham and linking onto the Trent Valley line; the second to Manchester. The remaining order of construction would depend on capacity and demand data which I don't have to hand, but probably the priority would be linking Leeds - Newcastle - Edinburgh (- Glasgow) next, maybe at the same time as the Great Western line.

Just a bit of fun - enjoy and comments welcome! :)

Edit to add: Service Specification (http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/Fictional_Service_Specification.pdf) for above routes and Possible Outline Timetable (http://pauldurose.stsg.co.uk/Sky/Fictional_Service_Timetable.pdf) for West- and East-Coast routes.

As others have said, I think it is important that the high-speed network is extended gradually, carefully linking into the existing system to (a) provide the most benefit to existing services, and (b) create capacity on the existing network for better local/mid-distance & freight services. I also think it is important to retain familiarity with the existing network, by allowing as many of the current journey patterns to be retained - albeit at a higher speed.

I agree, although not mainly for the reasons you cite. The main argument, methinks, is political: the first step in the HS direction is always contoversial. Loud voices will claim that (a) we don't need it - the old systems has served us well enough, thank you very much; (b) if money is available then it should be spent on upgrading shoddy commuter lines rather than fanciful projets; (c) this new line benefits but a few municipalities - what about the rest of the country?; (d) if this cannot be fully user financed then, for that reason, it constitutes a waste of tax payers' money... and so on. If government proposes "a grand design for a bright HS future" then most people will baulk at it. The leap of faith is simply to big.

Much better to propose a "small, pragmatic solution" to deal with congestion on the London-Birmingham line. Only... given that we have to build a new line, surely we should go for a modern solution for the 21st century? And so on... once you have your first intra-British HSL the press will write about it, the newschannels will show jubilant footage from the breaking of speed records, and... a big chunk of the populace will be mightily proud and decide that this is what they wanted all along. I know what I'm talking about: when my native Denmark embarked on its first bridge project (Great Belt) there was a howl of protest - citing all the arguments a-d and more besides - and opinion polls showed 72% of the population against. Now, some 20 years later, the Danes are proud like peacocks of their grand bridge and, by a wide margin, ready to support any new bridge project. - EVEN the Fehmarn link to Germany that our tiny country has to pay for all by it self. :nuts:

I would obviously envisage HS2 being completed first, from London (& Heathrow) to Birmingham / Manchester - probably in two phases: the first to Birmingham and linking onto the Trent Valley line; the second to Manchester.


Based on French experiences (I live in Paris) I'd say the coast should be clear for a HSL London-Birmingham-Manchester/Liverpool with some sort of pragmatic prolongation toward the Northwest and Glasgow. The passenger basis logically MUST be there. However, for an eastern line from London into Yorkshire I'd be more wary. You seem to be thinking in terms of point-to-point connections between designated provincial towns? IMHO this is dangerous: you lose a lot of time running though one urban centre (e.g. Leeds) which is generally justified if at least 1/3 of the passengers get in or out. I'd argue in favour of something like the current LGV-Est which connects Paris with... the middle of nowhere. - From which the TGVs branch out like the leaves of a palm tree, many of them - but by far not all - continuing straight to Strasbourg.