MML Electrification: progress updates

[Kettledrum]

If Grayling is suggesting the MML is about capacity, does that mean significant work will be done to raise bridges on the route so double deck trains can run?
That's the only realistic way to add capacity...

I mean, you can keep extending platforms but what happens when those trains are full too? Trains a mile long?
It's like this whole smart motorway business. Allowing people to run in the hard shoulder isn't really helping with the grand scheme of more and more cars on the roads.

There are other ways to raise capacity on the MML. Train lengths are not currently maximised. Some of the Meridians only run as 5 car trains (and are packed with to the luggage racks with passengers). And where the trains are run by HSTs, the two power cars take up platform space that could be occupied by passenger carrying coaches.

Electrification would helps (even to Corby), but electrification further north would surely add more capacity. If the government can't even afford the wires beyond Corby, there's no chance of double decker trains.

 

[richieb1971]

Capacity isn't the issue. Its sending everyone in the same direction that is the problem. We need a huge epicentre built away from London to draw commuters away from London. In a world where everything is done digitally it doesn't matter where you work. All this "London wages are the best" and causing house prices to sky rocket is all a man made problem that doesn't need to exist. It exists because its a can being kicked down the road until its unbearable.

 

[Flying Phil]

Sorry richieb "In a world where everything is done digitally it doesn't matter where you work" just isn't true - there are still a vast number of jobs which are not and cannot be done digitally and London (Like it or not) is still by far the largest city and employer in the UK. So the demands of commuters are not going to get less any time soon. However better and quicker transport links do spread the economic benefits further from the centre - so lets get the full MML electrified .....

 

[InTheEastMids]

https://www.eastmidlandstrains.co.uk/information/media/Disruption-Information/February2018/

Hopefully this significant planned disruption means that there will be some significant progress between Bedford and Kettering.

 

[richieb1971]

Sorry richieb "In a world where everything is done digitally it doesn't matter where you work" just isn't true - there are still a vast number of jobs which are not and cannot be done digitally and London (Like it or not) is still by far the largest city and employer in the UK. So the demands of commuters are not going to get less any time soon. However better and quicker transport links do spread the economic benefits further from the centre - so lets get the full MML electrified .....

Ok, but if you take away jobs which are computer based from London thats still quite a high population that would not need to commute. Even if the MML was fully electrified you still only have 4 tracks, eventually that won't be enough either. London home prices are out of reach for most folks now so all the London dwellers will be moving away from London with very few people moving into London. So its still a man made problem that is getting a little bit worse every year as things stand. As Grayling said HS2 will significantly dent the cost to benefit ratio of full OHLE on the MML (as long as the prices of tickets are competitive of course).

For the record I am not against the MML getting full OHLE. I'm shocked as a first world nation we need to ration our infrastructure spending to the point where can can't just make things happen because we want to. We pretend the railways are the answer to road traffic congestion but we all know that our railways are totally incapable of making anything more than a token dent in that statistic. The railways are not even attractive to most folks because of the cost of a ticket and even that doesn't buy you a seat, it just buys you a right to travel. Lets face it, the MML already exists, we are only upgrading it and it involves politicians getting involved and having to argue justification. My home town of Bedford is up in arms as one of the most important bridges is going to close this week which will mean 18 wheeler lorries using residential streets with parked cars on both sides of the road. Local newspapers and the BBC are hitting up my facebook time lines asking residents what they think the impact will be. It will be carnage, from Feb to Aug. WOW!

https://www.networkrail.co.uk/runni...ement-programme/ford-end-road-bridge-bedford/

Quote -
As part of the Midland Main Line Upgrade we are carrying out major work on Ford End Road bridge from 16 February until August 2018
Reasons for bridge upgrade
The electrification of the Midland Main Line requires some of the structures which lie along the route to be reconstructed to ensure that they allow sufficient safety clearance for 25,000 volt Overhead Line Equipment to pass safely beneath.

Ford End Road Bridge
Ford End Road Bridge to the south of Bedford Central station is a 19 span brick arch carrying Ford End Road over the Midland Main Line. Without sufficient clearance for overhead line equipment to safely pass beneath, the third span of the bridge from the west needs to be reconstructed.

Planned work
Following the successful completion of phase 1 preparation work last year, phase 2 (demolition and reconstruction) will take place from 16 February until August 2018. The work requires the road over the bridge to be closed to vehicles during this time.

Please note: Ford End Road pedestrian footbridge will remain open.

A vehicle diversion will operate via Hurst Grove and Bromham Road (A4280).

Please allow more time for vehicle journeys if you are using this route and thank you in advance for your patience.

 

[38Cto15E]

Fun for southbound Corby passengers on the last two weekends, bus to Kettering, then a bus to Bedford then a train to London.

 

[richieb1971]

Fun for southbound Corby passengers on the last two weekends, bus to Kettering, then a bus to Bedford then a train to London.

Why not just catch a bus to London?

 

[edwin_m]

If Grayling is suggesting the MML is about capacity, does that mean significant work will be done to raise bridges on the route so double deck trains can run?
That's the only realistic way to add capacity...

I mean, you can keep extending platforms but what happens when those trains are full too? Trains a mile long?
It's like this whole smart motorway business. Allowing people to run in the hard shoulder isn't really helping with the grand scheme of more and more cars on the roads.

Double deck trains on existing UK routes are a non-starter. As well as raising every bridge and tunnel, all the platforms would need re-building to increase the width below platform level, or a highly bespoke train would be needed with very cramped space on the lower deck. The bi-modes will allow more seats in the same length, as the HSTs have "wasted" length for the power cars and although 222s have more seating space in the same length than Voyagers they are still inefficient in this respect compared with other designs.

Between Sharnbrook and Leicester the signalling is widely spaced three aspects, and adding extra signals could improve capacity to some extent. The other main constraint is having only four platforms at St Pancras, but there's probably scope to use these more efficiently by timetabling (for example the Nottingham fast lays over for more than an hour in the off-peak).

But as far as I'm aware Grayling hasn't said anything about capacity and I haven't heard any suggestion of extra signals.

 

[Flying Phil]

Mention has been made of the Braybrook power supply to the wires and this is where the National Grid passes over the MML, just South of Market Harborough. The MML is in the background, either side of the planning notice.

 

[jayah]

Mr Grayling performed very well.....I was almost convinced that Bi-Modes are so much better than electric only .... and when we get Hydrogen fuelled trains they will be even better. A much cheaper solution to get the 1 minute shaved off the London to Sheffield time, and it already is electric in London, so the air quality there will not change.......
However he did say the extra cost of MML bi-modes would be £23M pa and electrification would cost £1B so, over about 40 years, would not the cost of electrification be covered by the savings? He kept talking about increasing capacity but I thought electric only trains could accelerate better than Bi-mode, and so you could run more trains per hour?

It wouldn't because the £23m would be discounted for each year into the future. The £1bn has to be paid for up front. Typically these things aren't appraised over 40 years because you will be buying a new fleet of trains after 25-28 after which all bets are off.

He also said elsewhere that he doesn't think these BiModes will be running as diesel in even 10 years.

A BiMode with 6/9 powered cars @950hp will comfortably match a 390/221.

 

[jayah]

There are other ways to raise capacity on the MML. Train lengths are not currently maximised. Some of the Meridians only run as 5 car trains (and are packed with to the luggage racks with passengers). And where the trains are run by HSTs, the two power cars take up platform space that could be occupied by passenger carrying coaches.

Electrification would helps (even to Corby), but electrification further north would surely add more capacity. If the government can't even afford the wires beyond Corby, there's no chance of double decker trains.

IETs and 390s are little better, with much dead space in the driving trailers. At least the HST power cars are shorter. The plan sounds something like a 110/125mph Class 387 type solution for Corby taking care of capacity and providing most of the benefits in the BCR for the whole line.

 

[jayah]

If it improves the C:B ratio of HS2, then it looks like we will. I think Chris Grayling even (reluctantly) admitted something of that nature recently.

Most of the benefit of improving MML is from Sheffield, Derby, Nottingham. If that is made irrelevant by HS2 it sinks whole schemes - places like Loughborough will never warrant the same investment.

This is very much what Grayling said last week - spending £1bn on saving 1min to Sheffield is worth even less if HS2 has been built and is carrying all your passengers.

Unfortunately this is the sort of hazard that occurs with schemes like HS2 and why I would rather see the money spent on supporting existing routes or the NHS.

 

[Domh245]

He also said elsewhere that he doesn't think these BiModes will be running as diesel in even 10 years.

That sounds incompatible with the cancellation of the MML electrification. If it had been deferred then maybe, but being cancelled makes me think that it'll be more than 10 years before there are wires to and beyond Leicester. Also not convinced about a 6/9 bimode matching a 222 - the voyager has about 16bhp tonne, a 6/9 would work out at something like 12.

 

[snowball]

I thought 9-car 80x's had 5 powered cars, not 6.

 

[jayah]

No he didn't. He said he didn't expect all the Vallley lines to be electrified. Interpret that how you will but he may have meant the Maesteg, Ebbw Vale, Penarth and Vale of Glamorgan lines wouldn't be electrified (which most people think is the case anyway).

Fairly semantic debate, he said he 'expects the same decision' on the Valley Lines, despite WAG giving him a hard time over Cardiff Swansea, though no decision or decisions have actually been made.

Given his fairly systematic destruction of the rationale for electrification and focus on passenger benefits rather than an irrational fixation on traction, unless the plan is to electrify urban Cardiff and have everything switch to diesel outside the polluted city limits it looks pretty unlikely any Valley Line will actually be electrified.

As I noted at the time, the Valleys business case relied on comparing peppercorn lease Class 315s, run until age 60, followed by a second hand me down EMU fleet, set against all new build DMUs to justify it. Financially, even the do nothing option of buying the same DMUs a few years later stacked up better.

It was quite a good watch with Louise Elman interrupting Grayling and the Committee's questions constantly for the first hour each time she thought she had found a new argument for spending £1bn saving 1min on the journey to Sheffield, only to be left railing about how daft it was for DfT to have ever agreed to the scheme in the first place.

Perhaps she should catch up with Lord Adonis who thought the purpose of a business case was to justify what he wanted to do rather than critically evaluate and compare all of the options.

 

[Domh245]

I thought 9-car 80x's had 5 powered cars, not 6.

They do, but the feeling is that a conventional 9 car AT300 with 5 powered vehicles wouldn't come close to maintaining current timetabling on the MML, let alone improving it

 

[jayah]

They do, but the feeling is that a conventional 9 car AT300 with 5 powered vehicles wouldn't come close to maintaining current timetabling on the MML, let alone improving it

5/9 is a shade slower than a HST but how much of this is caused by hp and how much is software is still debatable. Voyagers keep up with 390s on WCML dialled down from the build of 750hp per vehicle.

 

[jayah]

That sounds incompatible with the cancellation of the MML electrification. If it had been deferred then maybe, but being cancelled makes me think that it'll be more than 10 years before there are wires to and beyond Leicester. Also not convinced about a 6/9 bimode matching a 222 - the voyager has about 16bhp tonne, a 6/9 would work out at something like 12.

Voyagers often operate either with 1 car on hotel power or all derated.

 

[jayah]

That sounds incompatible with the cancellation of the MML electrification. If it had been deferred then maybe, but being cancelled makes me think that it'll be more than 10 years before there are wires to and beyond Leicester. Also not convinced about a 6/9 bimode matching a 222 - the voyager has about 16bhp tonne, a 6/9 would work out at something like 12.

The 9 car Class 802 is 10.3KW/tonne on electric and 8.0 at 5/9. So very close to electric on 6/9 and far better than 8.2 for a HST.

It appears the current operation with Voyagers is they are all running at a derated 700hp, still keeping up with those 390s though.

Clearly the DfT have decided 1min can be sacrificed but otherwise the necessary traction is waiting for someone to tender for it.

 

[IanXC]

It was quite a good watch with Louise Elman interrupting Grayling and the Committee's questions constantly for the first hour each time she thought she had found a new argument for spending £1bn saving 1min on the journey to Sheffield, only to be left railing about how daft it was for DfT to have ever agreed to the scheme in the first place.

Perhaps she should catch up with Lord Adonis who thought the purpose of a business case was to justify what he wanted to do rather than critically evaluate and compare all of the options.

I think we are fairly off topic here, talking about Graylings efforts to undermine the electrification scheme with the best BCR of all.

 

[jayah]

I think we are fairly off topic here, talking about Graylings efforts to undermine the electrification scheme with the best BCR of all.

The BCR of Kettering to Sheffield electrification was 0.77. If you are confusing the non electrification benefits of the MML modernisation, I recommend watching the piece where this is explained to Chair. Repeatedly.

In the context the 'same decision' to me means Valley Lines will be scrapped, though he also said he didn't expect 'all lines to be electrified' which might also be taken to mean that some will.

But if he really scrapped the best scheme, what chance of a much worse one going ahead?

 

[IanXC]

The BCR of Kettering to Sheffield electrification was 0.77. If you are confusing the non electrification benefits of the MML modernisation, I recommend watching the piece where this is explained to Chair. Repeatedly.

I'm not confusing anything with anything thank you very much. I'm quire well aware of what Grayling said to the Transport Select Committee but I'm also entirely convinced that he has been purposefully evasive towards the committee and has tried very hard to make his ideological decisions look like good government since he was appointed to the DfT, when they are nothing of the sort.

To my knowledge we have no more recent comparison of electrification schemes than the Network Rail Electrification RUS, which rated MML Electrification as having "effectively infinite socio-economic BCR", and whilst I would accept that the underlying cost assumptions have changed, I am far from convinced that the comparison between projects is in any way invalidated. http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/NR_ElectrificationRUSFinal2009.pdf

 

[Flying Phil]

Thank you for posting the RUS paper - difficult to disagree with the conclusion!
Also how realistic is the chance of using Hydrogen to replace diesel fuel in Bi-mode trains?....and in 10 years?? Car makers with deeper pockets have been trying for about 20 years ....

 

[jayah]

I'm not confusing anything with anything thank you very much. I'm quire well aware of what Grayling said to the Transport Select Committee but I'm also entirely convinced that he has been purposefully evasive towards the committee and has tried very hard to make his ideological decisions look like good government since he was appointed to the DfT, when they are nothing of the sort.

To my knowledge we have no more recent comparison of electrification schemes than the Network Rail Electrification RUS, which rated MML Electrification as having "effectively infinite socio-economic BCR", and whilst I would accept that the underlying cost assumptions have changed, I am far from convinced that the comparison between projects is in any way invalidated. http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/documents/NR_ElectrificationRUSFinal2009.pdf

Option A19 has a positive financial case, meaning that the cost part of the BCR is negative, hence the BCR is infinity.

However this includes the whole scheme including Corby which as Grayling points out all the benefit comes from, as well as the non electrification interventions. There were no sub options or BiModes evaluated in 2009.

Clearly there has been a more recent and detailed evaluation including KO2 (Kettering - Sheffield) on its own producing the 0.77 figure.

 

[Kettledrum]

The BCR of Kettering to Sheffield electrification was 0.77. If you are confusing the non electrification benefits of the MML modernisation,

But if he really scrapped the best scheme, what chance of a much worse one going ahead?

The obsession with business cases is foolish, as you can change the assumptions to make radically different conclusions.
For example,

(1) the Kettering to Sheffield route includes some of the HS2 route between Chesterfield and Sheffield. The costs of electrifying this will no doubt have been included in Graying's latest business case to depress it down to 0.77, but none of the benefits that HS2 passengers will get will have been counted.
(2) there will have been questionable assumptions that passenger traffic from Nottingham and Derby will reduce significantly because of HS2, but no assumptions that traffic from further south might increase because passengers might want to travel North to get a connection to HS2.

 

[CdBrux]

How do you want to evaluate how best to spend taxpayers money then? Just on what you would like?

 

[Flying Phil]

How do you want to evaluate how best to spend taxpayers money then? Just on what you would like?

There was an earlier discussion on this and it seems that decisions are made on a complex combination of financial/environmental/political/social/vanity factors......and then justified by the civil service?

 

[B&I]

That sounds incompatible with the cancellation of the MML electrification. If it had been deferred then maybe, but being cancelled makes me think that it'll be more than 10 years before there are wires to and beyond Leicester. Also not convinced about a 6/9 bimode matching a 222 - the voyager has about 16bhp tonne, a 6/9 would work out at something like 12.

It could just be that he doesn't know what he's talking about. Still, It's interesting to see that he has at least some support from the electrophobic element on here.

 

[Class 170101]

The obsession with business cases is foolish, as you can change the assumptions to make radically different conclusions.
For example,

(1) the Kettering to Sheffield route includes some of the HS2 route between Chesterfield and Sheffield. The costs of electrifying this will no doubt have been included in Graying's latest business case to depress it down to 0.77, but none of the benefits that HS2 passengers will get will have been counted.
(2) there will have been questionable assumptions that passenger traffic from Nottingham and Derby will reduce significantly because of HS2, but no assumptions that traffic from further south might increase because passengers might want to travel North to get a connection to HS2.

I would agree with Point 1 I suspect there is more than meets the eye.

Point 2 traffic further south may also increase if there is supressed demand towards London. ie Nottingham / Derby passengers (some) transfer to HS2 which allows passengers south of there to actually board trains - or believe that they have a greater chance so come to those stations.

In terms of electrification has the cost of wiring and associated maintenance been quantified and compared with the cost of maintenance of the trains and the track as the trains will still be carrying Hydrogen around instead of diesel. This has a weight penalty compared to electric trains and are less reliable too.

 

[HowardGWR]

I suspect (more than suspect) that every mainline in UK has a better electrification BCR if you just take it to reach the outer limits of commuting. The BCR from London to the end of the line will look good as a combined BCR, but not so good on its own from where the commuters get off, to the outer limit.

The MML electrification project was justified as a whole line one. Similarly, the GWML line was so justified.

This trick that the anti-electrification civil servants have come up with (not Grayling, they are just playing him along) has them chuckling to each other at the water cooler, I'll be bound.