TRANSPORT | Metrolink - Future Phases & Fantasy Extensions

[MarkO]

Originally Posted by Johnny de Rivative

To me, the name that needs altering is Cemetery Road, but I have gone on about that before.

Agreed. maybe we should all start calling it "Dead end" and see how soon GMPTE realise that it really is an unwise name for a station. Anyone got any better ideas for that stop name?

[redux]

Cremation Street?

[iheartthenew]

only if its one stop after Weatherfield

[Wirlie G]

What football team do they support in Weatherfield?

Tram-near Rovers

[Motortownman]

Originally Posted by MarkO

Agreed. maybe we should all start calling it "Dead end" and see how soon GMPTE realise that it really is an unwise name for a station. Anyone got any better ideas for that stop name?

Will they be selling return tickets to Cemetery Road or just singles?

[Johnny de Rivative]

Johnny’s Big Bang

OLDHAM ROCHDALE LINE PART 6

Newton Heath and Moston

Thorpes Bridge and Dean Lane and Newton Heath and Moston

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showth...7&page=60#1186

79 images, updated to June 2012

Thorpes bridge is railway vernacular for the underpass of Thorp Road, an important link between Oldham Road, Newton Heath, Lightbowne and Moston. Here it was in 1934 :-



Thorpes Bridge was always something of a ‘pinch point’ in the original railway layout as it is today, and in the last section we saw something of the ingenious solutions that were necessary to insert a tramline, alongside but discrete from the railway, through its ‘needles eye’ :-



In railway days it needed a signal box, seen here in 1974 :-



The railway’s blueprints may have been the source of the mis-spelling, but the extent of its former realm is impressive, on these diagrams drawn with South at the top :-



Following the diagram Eastwards (to the left) towards Dean Lane station, the bowling green, allotments and a certain football ground are long gone (but Metrolink will closely encounter two more bowling greens later, which the railway had ignored!) :-



The Railway Hotel, near the centre of the next continuation to the East, is the sole Victorian building still extant :-



Seen here in 1960, the Railway Hotel forms a backdrop to Dean Lane overbridge as seen from Oldham Road, as it does to this day :-



Another signalbox was situated just West of Dean Lane overbridge, seen here in 1951 :-



A little bit of Dean Lane station’s history. 1959 :-



1966 :-





Coming forward three decades, GMPTE’s Metrolink plans were well advanced towards the Millennium, although still a couple more decades from fruition :-



Stop names and locations were revised many times in those days, on the Oldham Rochdale line as elsewhere. This was the position in about 1997 :-



But the Millennium came and went, with only Eccles as a new line (Phase 2). With the Big Bang, another proposed revision of stops meant that Dean Lane would close and be replaced by a stop at Failsworth Broadway, the main road to the M62 and Yorkshire. But in 2002 the Light Rail Transit Association reported the prevailing will of the people :-

15 November 2002: Oldham and Rochdale Line — Dean Lane station
GMPTE has withdrawn its application to close Dean Lane station on the Manchester to Oldham and Rochdale line.
When the Manchester to Oldham and Rochdale line is converted to Metrolink parts of the existing line will not be used. As a result GMPTE had to apply to close the line as a conventional railway. There were a number of objections, a large proportion about Dean Lane. The North West Rail Passengers Committee public hearing took place in the Oldham Civic Centre on the 6th September 2002.
When the line is converted to Metrolink, there will be two separate single lines at Dean Lane. The present Oldham bound track will be used for freight trains to the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Depot. The present Manchester bound track will be used for Metrolink. GMPTE stated it is undesirable to have a passenger stop on the single line for operational and safety reasons. However a similar situation exists at Navigation Road on the Altrincham line where there are two bi–directional lines and two level crossings in the section. Here Metrolink has a six minute service in both directions and there is a frequent service on the parallel heavy rail line.
GMPTE had also said that Dean Lane would reopen as a Metrolink stop if the proposed North Manchester Business Park (NMBP) stop had not been built. Objectors also showed that the NMBP stop was not readily accessible to the residential areas around Dean Lane. The closure of Dean Lane station will increase car use by those who have access to one and reinforce social exclusion of those who have no car access. Present usage of Dean Lane appears to be poor, though higher than both Hollinwood and Derker stations which are to become Metrolink stops. The peak service, six trains in three hours to Manchester in the morning and five in two and a half hours from Manchester in the evening, does not help. . . The increased frequency and city centre penetration of Metrolink services indicates that Dean Lane stop would be well used compared with the present station.
The North West Rail Passengers Committee recommended to the The Secretary of State for Transport that consent to the closure of Dean Lane station be refused on the grounds of hardship and social exclusion and the station should be developed.

c/- lrta.org

And so it came to pass. Looking East from Thorpes Bridge in about 2003 :-



A little bit of blue fencing appeared during that early surveillance period :-



Looking back West from Dean Lane :-



This shows how the line was to be severed and singled to accommodate both the Waste Disposal line and Dean Lane station. So it was written, and so it was done :-



Looking East from Dean Lane station platform towards the former railway crossover, and through Reliance Street overbridge towards the waste plant :-



And from Reliance Street towards the Waste Destructor plant itself :-



By July 2009 the Oldham Loop was in its last days as a railway, and it finally closed on 3rd October that year :-



The first stirrings of something new in May 2010 – blue fencing across the track :-



November 2010 – the track base is prepared on a new double-track occupying a former long-abandoned alignment, from just West of the sloping wall at Dean Lane towards the camera on Thorpes Bridge. The former Manchester-bound track of the Oldham Loop has been truncated with a buffer stop :-



New track approaches in March 2011 :-



Looking West along the new single line section by the sloping wall at Dean Lane :-



Further progress as the line re-doubles towards Manchester :-



Still in March 2011, the single platform takes shape, for the tramstop now to be known as Newton Heath and Moston :-



The prospect of a commuter line through the city centre has already stimulated new housing, and much more was to follow between here and Oldham Road, Newton Heath :-



By the Waste Disposal depot, only one half of the double formation has been renewed and re-ballasted. The other track will continue to be used as a run-around by freight locomotives :-



What was formerly the Oldham-bound track was temporarily severed with a buffer stop, at the new limit of the run-around loop. The new Metrolink track re-doubles beyond Mill Lane and Mill Street, two very close bridges out of the ten between Newton Hath and Failsworth, all of which had to be fortified to modern standards :-



Between Mill Lane and Mill Street, hoppers are stored on a siding created beyond the new headshunt and the re-doubling crossover :-



Here’s the shunter at the head of the hopper wagons, between Mill Street and Failsworth Broadway :-



Seen from the other end, still in March 2011 :-



In April 2011, the same shunter was at work between Dean lane and Thorpes Bridge :-



Overhead line poles appear in May 2011, before the second track is completed :-





August 2011 the layout on the ground is virtually complete :-





Back at Newton Heath & Moston’s single platform, there are now shelters, ohle poles and the two discrete tracks are clearly no longer part of the same railway. The re-doubling facing point can be seen under the bridge towards Manchester :-



Looking East, the overhead, complete with contact wire, re-doubles towards Oldham as well as the track :-





Still in August 2011, here’s a short sequence showing the waste destructor train on its new single line, which now looks timeworn beside its spanking new companion. Here the shunter, away from the camera, has pulled alongside the destructor plant with its load:-



Seen at the other end from Morton Street :-



It has now disengaged and pulled towards the new buffer at Mill Lane :-





Then the shunter reverses towards Manchester, along what was previously the Oldham-bound line of the Oldham Loop, and is now a single exclusive runaround. The Skylon of Central Park is otherwise preoccupied in the background :-



Many of the waste-carrying wagons have already been off-loaded – no time to mess around in these target-driven days! :-



Ready to reverse again and re-engage with the tail of its fast-emptying train :-



Back on Metrolink, some shining copper arrived on a wet October day in 2011 :-





November 2011 and the leaves, the station, and the expectation all turn to gold :-





New Year 2012 , the layout lies pristine and ready, with some interesting special work on the railway headshunt :-



In March 2012, the shunter appears on the line again, under catenary but with no single-line signals as yet :-



Remember the Railway Hotel from fifty years ago ? . . .



Well here it is in April 2012, with a new splendid companion :-



More yellow signage down on the tramstop :-



Signals were also installed in April 2012. Both are on Stop/Danger here – the amber one will show the lie of the points on a diagonal, and the white one will go to vertical for proceed – at present the middle dot is missing as there is no tram within its field of recognition :-



But later the same month here comes one at last! :-









And another . . .



It takes two to tango, and see how it works! :-



More testing shots in May 2012 :-







A new freshness goes floating through the waste depot :-





A tester takes the Eastern crossover :-


c/- highfi





Come 13th June 2012 – notice anything different? Well, this shot was taken from the platform! :-


c/-kriis

The signs direct passengers to opposite ends of the one platform, for each direction of travel :-



Each end has its own dedicated Public Information Display panel, with discrete displays, e.g. next “St Werburgh’s Road” at the Southbound end, :-



And “Oldham Mumps” at the other :-



At last we can ride on it, and this front view towards Manchester shows that the link to the Railway line has been restored, albeit gated with a red dot :-



Well, the GMPTE ‘advance’ visual from 2003 wasn’t all that flattering for this station :-



Even after the projected conversion to Metrolink :-



Happily, the end result in reality turned out nice again!! :-



continues in Part 7. . .

[VoldemortBlack]

So I was researching and obsessing over Liverpool's Merseyrail system today. I have to say, our railway system is dismal compared to Liverpool's.

For a start, their system has an underground. Plenty of you will know how much I envy an underground subway.

Secondly, their system (apart from the City Line) is all electrified.

Thirdly, each station on their network has Live PID's; something which even our Metrolink doesn't yet have!

Fourthly; their trains are much much longer. I counted 5 carriages on average on each train picture I saw.

Fithly; the inside of their trains look spectacular.

Why can't our system be like this? I thought about Metrolink adopting the line from Bolton to Stockport via City, (more on this fantasy later ) Our system could be so much better, and it needs to be so much better! We're the bigger city for christ's sake! We NEED to push for a better rail network, and we need to shove to get Metrolink more funding for MORE lines!

Rant over. Oh and, I've started a few more transport fantasy schemes. Probably won't have them up here for a while yet as I'm quite busy with other things, but I'll get them on asap.

[Accura4Matalan]

The problem is that many of Liverpool's suburban lines are largely self contained. The fact that Liverpool's location makes it a bit of a dead end city, its railways don't really go anywhere and they can more easily uniform them as if they were a metro. Manchester in contrast is at the heart of the northern rail network. Pretty much every line that goes out of central Manchester is an intercity line. Most of the ones that aren't have already been converted to Metrolink. Its much harder to maintain a level of uniformity similar to Merseyrail on lines where trains are going halfway across the country. Look at the City Line on Merseyrail, they have struggled to maintain the uniformity that they have on the Northern and Wirral Lines. They used to have Merseyrail branded trains. However, it was pretty daft when these trains were showing up in places like Huddersfield. As a result, the branding on the City Line has gradually faded in recent years.

As for the underground, lets remember that the railway is primarily underground to allow it to cross the river. As it is in Newcastle. While it may seem enviable, is it really that much better? In order to construct Liverpool's Northern line underground through the city centre, they lost 2 magnificent stations which have been replaced by 2 disgusting stations, one of which is operating at a level that is massively over capacity.

That said, Merseyrail is an impressive system and its something that Metrolink should aim to mirror in terms of operating efficiency in the future.

[Wirlie G]

Merseyrail is much more akin to a German S-Bahn than a tram system that Metrolink would normally be described as (especially in the centre).

Remember the scousers PTE also wanted street running trams to compliment their underground not so long ago.

The Northern network is the closest we have to Merseyrail, but those bits that can be converted are slowly becoming some sort of tram / S-Bahn hybrid.

Remember, this underground you pine for costs a fortune to operate.

Merseyrail costs about £100m / year to run (Metrolink - £18m). Merseyrail doesn't return a profit so expanding the network makes our expansion troubles look like childs play.

Most of you concerns about what are lacking on Metrolink are either being dealt with or vanity issues and not really transport related.

Look at what the passenger numbers are in 2017 and compare the finances between the two.

[VoldemortBlack]

I'm not having a crack at Metrolink - that's a fine system, and will be more so once the TOS and PID's are installed.

What I'm talking about is the rail system, where only 20% (or less even) is electrified in Greater Manchester. I realise that two lines (Piccadilly - Bolton & Piccadilly - Patricroft) are being electrified soon, but is that enough? For a coonurbation the size of Manchester's, should we still be being left with cracked up old Pacer trains that run on diesel and only have an average of two carriages?

I'm talking about Manchester being left with junk yard trains. How much does it cost to give us a better system, with more carriages on very busy lines (I can think of at least 4 lines that need more carriages on a daily basis, not just on rushours), and yet we still don't get them? PID's at every station? Too much to ask? ...

[marni1971]

Hi all.
I thought it was time I reactivated my account since I`ve been lurking for so long. I live very near the planned Airport line Northern Moor stop and as such am starting to get blurb through the door.

Amongst other things is a date of demolition of property in this area during winter 2010-2011 and construction starting in earnest in spring 2011.

Oh, and slightly OT, the Corrie tram - both the prop and CGI - was totally a T68. Some people thought design had mixed and matched with a M5000. They didn`t. And they even had seats and handrails inside

[VoldemortBlack]

It was a mix of the two. The first viaduct scene as it sweeped round the corner was a T-68, painted in M5000 colours, then when the tram crashed and the back end smashed down onto Rita's shop it was a M5000. For the rest of the week it remained an M5000

[Nathan Dawz]

Originally Posted by Johnny de Rivative

And a large geographical diagram, still showing the "Peel Holdings" extension to Port Salford, about which everyone is tight-lipped at present :-

Also to note, I think this is the first published network map that shows the removal of the 4 removed stops from the Wythenshawe line - Hough End, Hardy Farm, Martinscroft and Woodhouse Park.

And how great is it to see the Trafford Centre line now in play! I really hope that this is a sign that something positive is about to happen with this in the near future. And since it's shown extended to Port Salford, can't they just extend the line that teency bit further to City Airport?

[marni1971]

Originally Posted by VoldemortBlack

It was a mix of the two. The first viaduct scene as it sweeped round the corner was a T-68, painted in M5000 colours, then when the tram crashed and the back end smashed down onto Rita's shop it was a M5000. For the rest of the week it remained an M5000

Not trying to stir things, but it was a T68. I spent 5 weeks climbing over the damn thing night after night.

[Wirlie G]

Volde - indeed, hence I suggested that Merseyrail should not really be compared to Metrolink rather the Northern Rail service which is poor due to decades of under investment.

The non-London cities with decent local heavy rail services are all (as Accura would say) at the dead end of countries.

Newcastle, Glasgow and Liverpool all have much more stand alone networks compared to what we have - primarily due to where they are in the country.

Compare the links to other cities though.

You will find that as a trade off of having had lower long term investment due to the geographical position is that we have better connections to other parts of the country.

Liverpool has very good local heavy rail services, but in comparison to Manchester the longer haul rail services are nothing like as good. I suspect these are linked.

[Wirlie G]

Spent last week in Frankfurt.

Amazing U-Bahn, S-Sahn, trams, regional heavy rail and ICE trains servicing the city.

That is a city that you can look to and think what can we do to improve each of the modes of transport.

When looking at the trams the right of way and segregration of the Frankfurt trams is something that could be copied.

By spending a tiny fraction of what it costs to stick the tracks under the ground we could have a 100% segregrated tram network which delivers people to the street where they want to get to and not 5mins on escalators underneath where they want to get to.

[nerd]

Originally Posted by VoldemortBlack

I'm not having a crack at Metrolink - that's a fine system, and will be more so once the TOS and PID's are installed.

What I'm talking about is the rail system, where only 20% (or less even) is electrified in Greater Manchester. I realise that two lines (Piccadilly - Bolton & Piccadilly - Patricroft) are being electrified soon, but is that enough? For a coonurbation the size of Manchester's, should we still be being left with cracked up old Pacer trains that run on diesel and only have an average of two carriages?

I'm talking about Manchester being left with junk yard trains. How much does it cost to give us a better system, with more carriages on very busy lines (I can think of at least 4 lines that need more carriages on a daily basis, not just on rushours), and yet we still don't get them? PID's at every station? Too much to ask? ...

I ltoo like Merseyrail, and when I was growing up in Birkenhead, we used it a lot.

But then, when I actually came to work in Liverpool for some7years, I never used it at all. Indeed, I know of several former studends in Liverpool Uni who went through a 3 year degree course and never even knew that Merseyrail existed.

Which shows that it is a great system for connecting commuter satellite towns into Liverpool city centre (and Lime Street station); but totally useless as an urban transportation system. This is not surprising, of course, as Liverpool once had a very effective metro-type system in the form of the Overhead Railway.

But the result is that current Mersyerail doesn't serve well any of the major traffic generators of the Liverpool urban area: - Universities, Hospitals, Airport - and effectively has no stations serving inner residential areas a all.

Which again means that its passenger numbers are heavily concentrated into the morning and evening peak; which again means that it is largely empty at other times; which means that it cannot funciton except with the majority of operating cost covered by subsidy.

Of course, all of the above criticisms apply equally to the commuter rail services around Manchester. What they show, however, is that upgrading of the existing commuter rail system in Manchester (electrification, new rolling stock) is likely to be seen as money down the drain. What is needed is a new economic model of how future commuter rail should funciton; and at the moment, tram-train seems like the favoured version.

[Mostly Lurking]

SOME services are very empty off peak but not all.

Southport - Liverpool is busy all day, and Chester - Liverpool has just had its service doubled to 4tph.

I agree it is pretty crappy for moving people around the city center.

[Wirlie G]

Whether or not the services are empty or not Merseyrail gobbles subsidies massively. It's been (possibly incorrectly) been stated that it would be cheaper to put the passengers into a taxi than to run Merseyrail.

That is the point (I think) nerd was making, expanding such a system is just seen as more money down the drain.

[Mostly Lurking]

I know what the point is - but my point is that it is wrong to suggest the trains run around empty from 10am-4pm - they are busy. Usually full of old dears using their free passes - and that is a social benefit to the area (as it is to any area of course).