Reading station redevelopment

[ChrisH]

Part of the announcement about Thameslink's approval was that Birmingham New Street and Reading stations were to be redeveloped. This has been on the cards for quite a few years, but I haven't seen or heard any specific plans about what is to happen at Reading. Does anyone have any information they could share?

Thanks,
Chris

[LDN_EUROPE]

Ye, it mentions it today in the paper.

From The Sunday TimesJuly 22, 2007

Green light for Thameslink 2000Dominic O’Connell :

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/to...cle2115089.ece

[peterson]

more information here:
http://www.reading-forum.co.uk/forum...83&whichpage=1

and local press coverage here:
http://www.getreading.co.uk/news/201...ion_of_station

Several new platforms created on the north side of the station, and lots of messing about with the lines west of town to aid freight usage. This latter part will also involve shutting one of the Cow Lane road underpasses. Therefore the scheme also includes a budget to build a short new link road and railway bridge to by-pass the existing Cow Lane bridges.

Vital scheme to the future of Reading. Fantastic news

[ChrisH]

I've seen the proposed design of the station: basically, there will be four island platforms providing 8 tracks on the GWML, plus the existing 4a and 4b. Several flyovers east and west of the station as well to serve the freight traffic, Airtrack (Reading/Staines/Heathrow) and Cross-Country routes. Exciting stuff!

[Trainman Dave]

The 2007 Network Rail business plan identifies a quite a large number of potential projects which might be included in the Reading station upgrade. I believe that the details of the plans will not be finalised until there are final decisions on:

1) the extension of CrossRail (and thus electrification) to Reading
2) the implementation of Airtrack
3) the extent investment in the Southampton to West Coast freight route

[ChrisH]

The station redevelopment is only one part of upgrades to transport and commercial developments in Reading. Below is a map I've knocked together showing some of these:



Blue lines are road improvements:
- M4 J11 rebuilding with two new bridges and public transport priority.
- IDR (inner distribution road) made one-way with improvements for cyclists, pedestrians and public transport.
- Third Thames crossing east of the town, with a bypass of Caversham. This is very much up in the air, no funding has been secured as yet.
- New bridge under the railway, west of the centre, and new link roads. Part of the station area redevelopment scheme.
- Link road from the A33 to the A4 at M4 J12. Part of the Kennet Valley Park scheme.
- Several new park&ride sites (marked as P).

Red asterisks are rail improvements:
- Reading station rebuilding.
- New station at Green Park.

Purple lines are the proposed Mass Rapid Transit network (initially bus-based, but initially envisaged as tram-based).

Green areas are commercial developments. From west to east:
- Kennet Valley Park, a huge scheme providing up to 7,500 new homes over a 25-year period. See the masterplan.
- Green Park Village, an extension of the existing Green Park business park but providing homes as well as offices.
- Southside Reading, a residential/commercial scheme spanning the A33 and providing yet more housing and office space! See their masterplan.
- In the city centre, Chatham Place is ongoing and will eventually provide new apartments and public space, as well as a 600-space carpark.
- Station Hill is a 1.4m sqft planned mixed-use development including some towers up to 28 stories.
- New apartments have been planned also at Kenavon Drive.

Chris

[cle]

I've always thought it might be a good idea to build two underground platforms here - either for FGW intercity services, non-stopping trains (which aren't many) or those pesky Virgin trains which reverse to go to Basingstoke/Oxford. I guess they're shorter now so can use the bay platforms.

Reading is a mess though - won't more platforms lead to more conflicting crossings?

[ChrisH]

PDF of the project, including station diagram, here:

http://www.reading-travelinfo.co.uk/...eadingRail.pdf

[reading general]

update. sadly 3 years before things improve on the mainline but glad its moving.
http://www.getreading.co.uk/business...elopment_plans

[reading general]

more pics
http://www.getreading.co.uk/business...elopment_plans

[somersetchris]

The big question is will there be changes now that GWML electrification has been agreed?

[ChrisH]

Shouldn't be - all the required land for electrification has already been safeguarded as part of the potential Crossrail extension. I guess there might be some to-ing and fro-ing with engines heading off via Taunton to the West Country which aren't electrified.

[reading general]

perhaps the new iep trains will run electric and diesel.

electification i want, but crossrail i don't. i think its useless to people in reading, would only be useful if it was a fast line through london. i doesn't even go to st pancras international! easier to get a mainline train to paddington and change onto crossrail or the underground there.
and besides which i don't want my council tax to go to another tube line for london. give us a link to heathrow from the west instead. rant over

[ChrisH]

Calm down calm down

Airtrack should be built by 2014, which will be a direct link to Heathrow T5 from Reading. An alternative, now that the electrification is going ahead, would be a western chord at Airport Junction so that trains could serve T123/4 as well/instead. Or, if the HS2 project goes ahead, there might be a Heathrow hub station on the Great Western line which all trains stop at! So there are plenty of options.

On the Crossrail front, I agree with you that stopping trains wouldn't be very attractive, although note that with the performance of electric trains you'd be looking at ~40 minutes to Paddington as opposed to 25. That's enough of a similarity to tempt a lot of people off the fast trains, especially as the interchange penalty at Paddington could be quite high (a good 5 minutes I would expect). If the timetables could be arranged so that some Crossrail trains run fast/semi-fast to Reading then I would be delighted

[reading general]

when this crossrail project first was spoke about i always assumed it was a fast line under london i.e. stopping a padd and another london terminal and then joining a mainline towards essex/east anglia. this made sense to me.
they could do non stop if they were allowed to use the fast lines instead of the relief lines.
is the crossrail electrification going to cover just the relief lines, or both sets?

[Rational Plan]

Now that electrication is to be extended west of Maidenhead, why not have some semi fast services use the tunnel. They are currently planning twelve trains from the east to stop at paddington, some of those could be semi fasts to Reading, Newbury and Oxford, therebt creating even more platform space at Paddington and negating the need to rebuild it for more platforms.

[Harry]

I heard that John Madejski had plans a few years back to drive the regeneration of the Station Hill area in Reading. How do these plans sit with those?

[ChrisH]

They're both being planned and should fit together well. The Station Hill scheme (sponsored by Madejski) seems to be crawling through the planning process and has probably ground to a halt in the recession. Hopefully it will get underway before too long.

[ChrisH]

Originally Posted by reading general

when this crossrail project first was spoke about i always assumed it was a fast line under london i.e. stopping a padd and another london terminal and then joining a mainline towards essex/east anglia. this made sense to me.
they could do non stop if they were allowed to use the fast lines instead of the relief lines.
is the crossrail electrification going to cover just the relief lines, or both sets?

You're right: Crossrail joins Paddington and Liverpool Street, with stops at Bond Street, Tottenham Court Road and Farringdon on the way. Trains from Reading will be able to run through to Shenfield and Abbey Wood via Canary Wharf. The electrification will be over all four tracks, because it's the intercity line to Bristol and South Wales that new electric trains will use.

[cle]

Originally Posted by Rational Plan

Now that electrication is to be extended west of Maidenhead, why not have some semi fast services use the tunnel. They are currently planning twelve trains from the east to stop at paddington, some of those could be semi fasts to Reading, Newbury and Oxford, therebt creating even more platform space at Paddington and negating the need to rebuild it for more platforms.

I suspect they will be.

There is already talk of an additional non-stop London Reading shuttle per hour, the path of this could certainly be on Crossrail.

Now that Reading will be electrified - the final problem of Twyford service will be resolved. And Greenford will be a shuttle like the other branches. Therefore, unless Marlow/Henley/Windsor have peak services, all trains on the slow lines can now be Crossrail.

I think they're already taking over the semi/slow Oxford trains, but these still have about 6-7 stops before Reading. Maybe the fast Oxford trains which stop at Slough only would be good for Crossrail, but some continue to Worcester/Hereford. Equally, Bedwyn trains will be diesel.

So I think more trains should terminate at Reading, such as the slow Oxfords and then paths could be found for Crossrail trains to run nonstop to Paddington, basically adding Reading to the tube map and making it the terminus for many services.

Can they now save on Crossrail in terms of axing terminating/stabling at Maidenhead? Slough is a better point for slow trains.