Ordsall Chord

[Philip Phlopp]

Shocking journalism from the MEN (for a change) - Whitby being described as a 'Rail expert'

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/one-man-battle-derail-ordsall-11088626

Hah. There was a time the Institute of Civil Engineers didn't even consider him an engineering expert, and that was when he was Vice President.

 

[wadia13]

Wonderful to hear the news about the Chord. Progress in the right direction. I just hope Whitby now takes the defeat with good grace and allows the project to be completed.

I doubt it. As others have mentioned, he will likely try to take the case to the Supreme Court. Don't celebrate too early here.:-x

 

[deltic08]

There is a god - wonderful.

You wouldn't be saying that if you lived in one of the 500 properties swept away in the path of HS2 or worse still living in a property within sight and sound of it.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

You wouldn't be saying that if you lived in one of the 500 properties swept away in the path of HS2 or worse still living in a property within sight and sound of it.

He would be too busy taking photographs of the construction and expecting LDECRexile to look after the combined volume, I suspect, to say anything at all.

 

[ainsworth74]

We have dedicated threads for HS2 discussion. I would ask that we use them rather than this one thank you

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

I doubt it. As others have mentioned, he will likely try to take the case to the Supreme Court. Don't celebrate too early here.:-x

Does the cap (that was referred to in an earlier posting upon this thread) on the legal fees of Whitby carry on from appeal to appeal until all legal avenues are then finally closed to him?

 

[duffield]

Supreme Court next?

I suspect he will be refused leave to appeal and if he asks the supreme court to override this they will also refuse. The supreme court has to be selective about which cases to take and if the appeal court judgement is legally watertight, this case probably doesn't fit the SC's criteria (e.g. does not contain such things as important untested points of law to be decided, important precedents to set, resolving conflicting legislation, fundamental human rights principle etc.).

 

[SodTheDrummer]

I suspect he will be refused leave to appeal and if he asks the supreme court to override this they will also refuse. The supreme court has to be selective about which cases to take and if the appeal court judgement is legally watertight, this case probably doesn't fit the SC's criteria (e.g. does not contain such things as important untested points of law to be decided, important precedents to set, resolving conflicting legislation, fundamental human rights principle etc.).

Sincerely hope so. Is that a fairly quick process? i.e. SC can see fairly quickly that the criteria obviously isn't met so therefore kicks it out straight away..
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Hah. There was a time the Institute of Civil Engineers didn't even consider him an engineering expert, and that was when he was Vice President.

Haha! Priceless!

 

[anorack 1]

Was it a unanimous decision by the Justices to reject the Appeal. Or do we have to wait till the judgements published after Easter to find out?

 

[DaveNewcastle]

I suspect he will be refused leave to appeal and if he asks the supreme court to override this they will also refuse. The supreme court has to be selective about which cases to take and if the appeal court judgement is legally watertight, this case probably doesn't fit the SC's criteria . . . .

Sincerely hope so. Is that a fairly quick process? i.e. SC can see fairly quickly that the criteria obviously isn't met so therefore kicks it out straight away..

There is a very short period (7 days) in which the Applicant can request permission for a Judicial Review of a Decision by the Queens Bench Division, and then it is a matter of time before that request can be considered. They will, eventually be given a decision on two points : Is permission granted to Appeal against the Decision of the QBD?, and, Is permission granted for Judicial Review?
If the first permission is refused, then there is no recourse to the Supreme Court. But if the first is accepted and the second is refused, then the Supreme Court does have jurisdiction to hear the matter. [I still don't know which of these was refused yesterday. It's common for a Judge to immediately grant permission to Appeal and a few minutes later refuse permission for a JR]
In that situation, the Applicant then has 28 days to apply to the Supreme Court.

The Registrar will inform an appellant if they have no jurisdiction within a few days (holidays excepted).
The Supreme Court has a backlog of cases and a new matter is likely to take several months before it is listed - at this time of year we would now be looking at the late autumn.
Matters brought to the Supreme Court where the Administrative Court (in this case the QBD) had given permission to Appeal but had refused a JR, would be listed for a first hearing of an Appeals Committee to decide if it is eligible. Since last year, that has become a stricter test for both Criminal and Civil matters, and well over half of the matters brought forward have failed. For a Civil matter to be accepted, it must address a point of law of general public importance. If it succeeds, then a date will be set for the parties to attend the full hearing, typically many months later.

At that hearing, the Supreme Court will hear the arguments on the point of law, and not on the substantive matter from the lower Court. In the event that the Supreme Court finds that the lower Court had erred in law, then it has a range of powers, but would most probably simply quash (i.e. overturn) the Decision which it found to be unlawful.

In this case, I'm not sure that I can think of a decision which could be found unlawful, and which the Supreme Court might agree might be unlawful and in the public interest, and which they would then quash, and which decision would then halt the development in Manchester. But we can admire people who display tenacity (a.k.a. stubborness, commitment, enthusiasm, etc.).

 

[po8crg]

Was it a unanimous decision by the Justices to reject the Appeal. Or do we have to wait till the judgements published after Easter to find out?

The press release says Simon LJ joined by the other LJJ, which means that there was a single judgment, written by Simon, which all three judges signed.

So not just a unanimous decision, but a unanimous judgment (ie they didn't just all agree on who won, but on all the reasons). That's the strongest verdict.

Doesn't prohibit an appeal to SCOTUK, but it does make it (slightly) less likely to succeed.

 

[anorack 1]

The press release says Simon LJ joined by the other LJJ, which means that there was a single judgment, written by Simon, which all three judges signed.

So not just a unanimous decision, but a unanimous judgment (ie they didn't just all agree on who won, but on all the reasons). That's the strongest verdict.

Doesn't prohibit an appeal to SCOTUK, but it does make it (slightly) less likely to succeed.

Thanks for the info. Couldn't the appeal court now deny Whitby leave to appeal to the SCOTUK?

 

[TheKnightWho]

Thanks for the info. Couldn't the appeal court now deny Whitby leave to appeal to the SCOTUK?

So the lower court can deny appeal, but it is possible to appeal directly the Supreme Court and ask them to bypass that denial. It's less likely to be granted, though.

 

[snowball]

Chord-related work is now happening on a really serious scale, with Victoria and Salford Central closed for 11 days. For example, one span of Middlewood Viaduct (alongside Trinity Way, between Ordsall Lane Junction and Salford Central) has been demolished and is being replaced. For fascinating pictures see LDECRexile's album (linked from his posts in the Blackpool-Manchester Electrification thread).

 

[SodTheDrummer]

Chord-related work is now happening on a really serious scale, with Victoria and Salford Central closed for 11 days. For example, one span of Middlewood Viaduct (alongside Trinity Way, between Ordsall Lane Junction and Salford Central) has been demolished and is being replaced. For fascinating pictures see LDECRexile's album (linked from his posts in the Blackpool-Manchester Electrification thread).

That would appear (from looking at the diagrams) to be the point where the chord will join the viaduct..

 

[rebmcr]

Chord-related work is now happening on a really serious scale, with Victoria and Salford Central closed for 11 days. For example, one span of Middlewood Viaduct (alongside Trinity Way, between Ordsall Lane Junction and Salford Central) has been demolished and is being replaced. For fascinating pictures see LDECRexile's album (linked from his posts in the Blackpool-Manchester Electrification thread).

Linked here so nobody else has to go looking for it...

https://www.flickr.com/photos/127646831@N03/albums/72157661069863633

 

[Railway Dave]

The link below should be of interest to anyone interested in the Ordsall Chord saga. I don't know of any other article that shows all the impacts of the chord and the rationale for it.
http://shirresrailarticles.com/ordsall-chord

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

The link below should be of interest to anyone interested in the Ordsall Chord saga. I don't know of any other article that shows all the impacts of the chord and the rationale for it.
http://shirresrailarticles.com/ordsall-chord

This link to the April 2016 Rail Engineer article is one that some on here may not have seen, but I feel that certain people on this thread are like me in already having this magazine delivered to us.

 

[snowball]

New press release

http://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/alliance-formed-to-make-new-ordsall-chord-a-reality

Network Rail has formed an official construction partnership to build the new Ordsall Chord in Manchester, which will help improve rail travel for commuters across the north of England.

A contract has been signed alongside Amey, Skanska, Bam Nuttall, and Siemens.

----------

Warning to anyone who reads this thread but not the Blackpool-Manchester electrification thread: a lot of the discussion on the last couple of pages of that thread really belongs here.

 

[LDECRexile]

Warning to anyone who reads this thread but not the Blackpool-Manchester electrification thread: a lot of the discussion on the last couple of pages of that thread really belongs here.

If you ever believe any of my contributions fall into this category I would take it kindly if you copied or linked them to this thread.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

New press release

http://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/alliance-formed-to-make-new-ordsall-chord-a-reality

Warning to anyone who reads this thread but not the Blackpool-Manchester electrification thread: a lot of the discussion on the last couple of pages of that thread really belongs here.

In projects of this scale there is bound to be some overlap. I am sure the mods will take care of if it gets really out of hand.

 

[PDG1949]

Not sure if this might've appeared before, but found site which gives the official NR Chord plans superimposed on Google Maps

http://cleveret.net/stuff/ordsallchordoverlay.htm

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Not sure if this might've appeared before, but found site which gives the official NR Chord plans superimposed on Google Maps

http://cleveret.net/stuff/ordsallchordoverlay.htm

That is really helpful - thanks for posting.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Not sure if this might've appeared before, but found site which gives the official NR Chord plans superimposed on Google Maps

http://cleveret.net/stuff/ordsallchordoverlay.htm

Thanks that's interesting.

One thing puzzles me about the chord, which I wonder if anyone has an answer to....

As far as I can see, a train using the chord to get from Deansgate to Manchester Victoria will have to negotiate 3 flat crossings with potentially conflicting moves: Just west of Deansgate where the line to Warrington Central splits off. Then when the line to Eccles/Salford Crescent diverges, and finally when merging with the lines from Eccles/Salford Crescent into Victoria.

Separately, I would assume the timetable will be constrained by the flat junctions at Salford Crescent and where the Deansgate-Salford Crescent line crosses the Eccles-Salford line.

With all those flat junctions and trains basically going in all directions at each one - are we really going to see a reliable timetable with any kind of reasonable frequency of trains using the chord?

 

[Altfish]

Thanks that's interesting.

One thing puzzles me about the chord, which I wonder if anyone has an answer to....

As far as I can see, a train using the chord to get from Deansgate to Manchester Victoria will have to negotiate 3 flat crossings with potentially conflicting moves: Just west of Deansgate where the line to Warrington Central splits off. Then when the line to Eccles/Salford Crescent diverges, and finally when merging with the lines from Eccles/Salford Crescent into Victoria.

Separately, I would assume the timetable will be constrained by the flat junctions at Salford Crescent and where the Deansgate-Salford Crescent line crosses the Eccles-Salford line.

With all those flat junctions and trains basically going in all directions at each one - are we really going to see a reliable timetable with any kind of reasonable frequency of trains using the chord?

In the ideal world they would be grade separated junctions but unfortunately that means £££s. The money was not available so we get what can be afforded.

 

[lejog]

Plus the fact that the design capacity was quoted at 4tph and the current franchise specs only show 2tph running on opening with a 3rd in 2019.

 

[HowardGWR]

Plus the fact that the design capacity was quoted at 4tph and the current franchise specs only show 2tph running on opening with a 3rd in 2019.

DynamicSpirit will probably conclude it wasn't worth the bother then!

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

What is the latest news of the bête noire of the Ordsall Chord project?

 

[edwin_m]

With all those flat junctions and trains basically going in all directions at each one - are we really going to see a reliable timetable with any kind of reasonable frequency of trains using the chord?

That is an extremely good question.

I would expect to see a timetable where as every train goes through the series of junctions, it is scheduled to pass another one in the opposite direction but the same route. That way the two cannot conflict with any other train - except of course when one of them is running late - so the timetable needs to be reliable everywhere as well as scheduling most of Northern England round this particular constraint. Fortunately the travel time to the key destination of the Airport is about right for a train heading there to pass the one an hour earlier coming back again.

Ensuring that this works reliably over a whole series of junctions, which takes a minute or two to travel through, means that timetabled headways will be significantly longer than would normally be possible on a route with, no doubt, signals at the closest spacing allowed.

 

[Philip Phlopp]

That is an extremely good question.

I would expect to see a timetable where as every train goes through the series of junctions, it is scheduled to pass another one in the opposite direction but the same route. That way the two cannot conflict with any other train - except of course when one of them is running late - so the timetable needs to be reliable everywhere as well as scheduling most of Northern England round this particular constraint. Fortunately the travel time to the key destination of the Airport is about right for a train heading there to pass the one an hour earlier coming back again.

Ensuring that this works reliably over a whole series of junctions, which takes a minute or two to travel through, means that timetabled headways will be significantly longer than would normally be possible on a route with, no doubt, signals at the closest spacing allowed.

That's one reason why Mr Whitby's scheme wasn't pursued further - his layout wasn't going to provide as robust a timetable.