Your Sheffield Transport Solutions

[muddycoffee]

Originally Posted by Crookes

It's 2h7 on the traditional xx.27 departure from Sheffield to London.

The "new" train takes around 2h20/2h30 IIRC (because it's an extension of a Derby - London train that stops at Long Eaton/ Loughborough etc).

Thanks crookes.
I booked this train because it was the cheapest. We normally go to london to visit someone in the car, but parking is a hassle, so we thought we would try using the train. It cost £100 for two adult return tickets and it will cost around £20 for travel from st pancras to the district we want. It's a dear do! Especially when the equivalent petrol is only about £40-50.

Although when driving I like to spend a little less time there as I want to get the driving out of the way on the way back so I can get ready for work and have a good night's sleep. Whereas using the train and tubes means we can have a drink and a look around some of london as we go....

[Rothbiz]

Sheffield's Liberal Democrats have launched a campaign for a new high speed rail station at the old Sheffield Victoria Station site.

http://www.sheffieldlibdems.org.uk/2...tion-campaign/

[NewcastleOwl]

Originally Posted by Rothbiz

http://www.sheffieldlibdems.org.uk/2...tion-campaign/

Seems a bit late in the day for LibDems to be getting their campaign together. Don't get me wrong, I've been advocating as much as the next man the idea that (whatever the preferred route submitted by HS2 to the DfT in March 2012 is) it's not too late for political / business community pressure, and people power to influence the final route, but really the politicians should have been having the discussion, that's taken place on this thread, over a year ago!

I can't see how Victoria could be big enough a site (even if you knock down the Victoria Hotel modern extension - which will be decades old itself by 2033 and lacks the character or charm of the original part of the building), unless they are assuming a terminus station with no passing loop. That would seem to need a change of route strategy from HS2 Ltd who've been talking of a S. Yorks "intermediate station" (i.e. thru' station) and I have my doubts that a Sheffield-only spur would attract enough services. Also Victoria is not as well connected to public transport and large roads as the Nunnery site next door would be. I hope their Victoria obsession isn't driven by misguided sentimental railway nostalgia.

The Victoria site IS amply big enough though, I would have thought, to accommodate a HS2 through line to the north (after a Nunnery station / pass loop) with a realigned slow single-track retained classic line for Stocksbridge freight and Don Valley Railway commuter line.

Personally I welcome their belated campaign for a city centre HS2 station, but I think the engineering realities would favour Nunnery over Victoria.

Any know who owns all that wasteland at the Nunnery site? I assume it's whatever became of BR Estates as it was the old goods depot and engine works wasn't it; surely the easiest of all owners to transfer land from for the HS2 project?

[larven]

How on earth is it going to be possible for through trains to pass through the city centre at over 200mph?

Surely any station in the city centre can only be a spur off the main line, as Birmingham station will be?

[poshbakerloo]

If Nunnery is used, Sheffield Parkway / Park Square are gonna be even more jammed than they currently get!

[jt132]

Originally Posted by poshbakerloo

If Nunnery is used, Sheffield Parkway / Park Square are gonna be even more jammed than they currently get!

It won't be used- so it won't be a problem!

[Goldie]

Originally Posted by Rothbiz

http://www.sheffieldlibdems.org.uk/2...tion-campaign/

Blimey! I hope they've actually got some kind of - y'know railway engineer to cast an eye over that plan. God knows I don't have the expertise to say where a station should go, but my gut feeling is that Victoria is all wrong - wrong alignment, wrong decimation of struggling-yet-historic part of city centre, insufficient space. If Iwas a gambling man, I'd be maybe putting my money on a Midland Railway old road Rother Valley type alignment with a "parkway" station somewhere near the M1 - not so good for affluent west Sheffield - surely a core market? - but technically easier and justifiable on the basis of its Sheffield-Rotherham-Barnsley catchment area.

That's not the location I would personally want, but there seems to be a huge void between the Lib Dems grabbing a quick photo opportunity and someone with route planning responsibility discussing Sheffield's station with someone else with budgetary responsibility and the two of them deciding that actually, Sheffield needs a city centre station...

[Crookes]

Originally Posted by muddycoffee

Thanks crookes.
I booked this train because it was the cheapest. We normally go to london to visit someone in the car, but parking is a hassle, so we thought we would try using the train. It cost £100 for two adult return tickets and it will cost around £20 for travel from st pancras to the district we want. It's a dear do! Especially when the equivalent petrol is only about £40-50.

Although when driving I like to spend a little less time there as I want to get the driving out of the way on the way back so I can get ready for work and have a good night's sleep. Whereas using the train and tubes means we can have a drink and a look around some of london as we go....

Frustratingly (but understandably) the cheap EMT tickets tend to be on the slower service, rather than the 2h7 journeys.

Sadly the five/seven coach trains used on the Sheffield services mean that there's not the spare capacity to flog cheap tickets that Virgin/East Coast can do on the nine coach Manchester/Leeds - London trains

[Irish Blood English Heart]

Sometimes you can pick up bargain tickets to London on megatrain.com too.

[NewcastleOwl]

Originally Posted by larven

How on earth is it going to be possible for through trains to pass through the city centre at over 200mph?

Surely any station in the city centre can only be a spur off the main line, as Birmingham station will be?

Granted maybe 200mph is pushing it a bit, but if through trains went on a passing loop past a station on the wide Nunnery site (not Victoria) then it needs to be remembered that the GCR (formerly MS&LR) line corridor from Beighton along which it would approach was designed as a fast line with long radius bends - a line well ahead of its time when built; I would have thought speeds not much short of 200mph for thru' trains on new HS2 track built on this corridor could be accommodated.

Whilst the continuation of this line beyond Nunnery is more twisty, particularly north of Beeley Woods, this wouldn't be a problem to speeds if the HS2 line turned into a tunnel before then (ultimately towards East Barnsley or M1).

Although I acknowledge HS2 through trains might need to slow a little to pass thru' Sheff along this route this has to be viewed against the speeds possible on more likely thru alignments with stations near Meadowhall / Tinsley or Masbrough. These other alignments would pass through built-up urban areas and I can't see the full 225mph being allowed here either. Any localised difference (say a ten mile stretch including re-accelerating zone) in speed limit of 225mph to, say, 150mph, would only result in less than two minutes of extra thru-journey time.

The HS2 line speed specification and bend radius is relaxed for city approaches, so trains on the spurs to the termini at Brum and Leeds for example will be going much much slower than 200mph; they'd have to anyway because of deceleration distance before their stop. So surely the through line speed spec through Sheff could be relaxed to, say, 150mph, for a few miles?

[Mr Brightside]

Originally Posted by muddycoffee

Thanks crookes.
I booked this train because it was the cheapest. We normally go to london to visit someone in the car, but parking is a hassle, so we thought we would try using the train. It cost £100 for two adult return tickets and it will cost around £20 for travel from st pancras to the district we want. It's a dear do! Especially when the equivalent petrol is only about £40-50.

Although when driving I like to spend a little less time there as I want to get the driving out of the way on the way back so I can get ready for work and have a good night's sleep. Whereas using the train and tubes means we can have a drink and a look around some of london as we go....

If you go on Megatrain or east Midlands Trains you can get a Sheffield-London return for about 30ish quid and sometimes even cheaper.

[muddycoffee]

Thanks chaps, I have bookmarked megatrain for my next journey. Incidentally Mr Brightside, I did book on east midlands this time.

[arepeejee]

What I do is book East Coast trains from Doncaster. More often than not you can get tickets (about 6 week in advance) for about £21 return (£10.50 each way). You have to of course add in costs of getting to doncaster (About £5 return on the train)

[Rothbiz]

‘Too early’ to decide on station
The Star 2/2/12

Labour cabinet member for business, jobs and growth Coun Helen Mirfin-Boukouris said: “We believe that a station should be located in Sheffield but at this stage we do not believe it is appropriate to comment on specific potential sites as discussions are ongoing between South Yorkshire representatives, HS2 and the Department for Transport which are strictly governed by confidentiality agreements.”

She said that the council giving a public view on the station site could put the project ‘at risk’. Consultation on the route through Sheffield will not begin for a further two years, she added.

http://www.thestar.co.uk/community/t...tion_1_4205893

[AdamBlade]

Well, one of my best friends is working on the route right now, with a large number of other consultants. So, I'd be on it right now!

Unfortunately she's sworn to secrecy on the route, so she can't even tell me the work she's doing!

[Steel City Suburb]

Appears a tram has broken down at Don Valley this morning. Rare.

[Rothbiz]

Passengers are on track to benefit from faster, longer trains and over 12,000 extra seats each day on journeys into London, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, Newcastle, Sheffield, Glasgow and Edinburgh, Rail Minister Theresa Villiers announced today.

But Sheffield has to settle for redeployed existing diesel rolling stock following the electrification of the line between Manchester and the West Coast Main Line south of Wigan.

http://nds.coi.gov.uk/content/detail...96&SubjectId=2

[Fozberg]

According to this months LTT magazine HS2 Ltd was studying a station at Trowell beside the A52 to serve Notingham and Derby and a station near Meadowhall to serve Sheffield.

[Bladerunner]

Given this route will probably last for many decades and possibly hundreds of years, I reckon the extra investment should be made to actually bring the trains into the cities - through expensive tunnels if necessary. If we can't afford it, let's wait until the economy picks up before commiting.

Imagine the fuss if Londoners were told they had to travel to Brent Cross to catch the train, or Mancs were told they had to go out to the airport?

[larven]

London and Manchester are totally different beasts to Sheffield. The city centres of the first two absolutely have to be served directly by HS2....the latter doesn't.

The sooner the Meadowhall HS2 station is announced and the sooner Sevenstone disappears into irrelevance, the sooner we can seriously begin to consider the future direction of the city centre.