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Scottish Electrification updates & discussion

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XC90

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Also a chord from E&G to Cumbernauld was scrapped. This would allow for diversions and semi fast from Glasgow central, Hamilton via Cumbernauld without having to go through Falkirk Grahamston. Add this to Almond,GARL,borders single line and it shows the short sightedness of the current Government.
 
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gingertom

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Also a chord from E&G to Cumbernauld was scrapped. This would allow for diversions and semi fast from Glasgow central, Hamilton via Cumbernauld without having to go through Falkirk Grahamston. Add this to Almond,GARL,borders single line and it shows the short sightedness of the current Government.
the earthworks for the Cumbernauld-Falkirk High chord was started n the 1930s and completion was interrupted by WW2. The project was abandoned after the war.
 

NotATrainspott

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It was included in the original EGIP.

Do you not mean the grade-separation of Greenhill Upper junction? That was definitely included in the original plans, and would have meant that trains from Stirling to Croy wouldn't conflict with trains going from Croy to Linlithgow.

This idea makes a lot of sense because the Stirling to Croy route is used by expresses to Aberdeen and Inverness, which can't easily be made a lower priority than the E&G shuttles. The Cumbernauld route is never going to be faster, so it'll always generally see slower trains which don't run as far. That means they're slightly easier to path - an extra minute wait at a station isn't that hard to pencil in - and they're not going as far so they're less likely to pick up delays. An Aberdeen to Glasgow train might be held up at Montrose and miss its path at Greenhill, meaning it either has to wait for a Glasgow to Edinburgh to pass or it has to delay it. The grade separation works will fix that.

A link from Cumbernauld to Falkirk High doesn't make a lot of sense to add in now. Cumbernauld station isn't that much more useful than Croy for passengers going to and from Edinburgh. Croy has and will always easily have the express service to Edinburgh. The relatively limited range of people wanting a service direct to Edinburgh from Cumbernauld station are best accommodated on the slower service via Falkirk Grahamston. Any new link wouldn't be grade-separated so using it would incur a timetabling penalty, while it's quite unlikely there would be any extra paths for a direct train to use it. If you could add in another train from Edinburgh heading out to Linlithgow and beyond, you'd probably send it up to Stirling rather than to a secondary station for an area already served by the main E&G service.
 

XC90

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Do you not mean the grade-separation of Greenhill Upper junction? That was definitely included in the original plans, and would have meant that trains from Stirling to Croy wouldn't conflict with trains going from Croy to Linlithgow.

This idea makes a lot of sense because the Stirling to Croy route is used by expresses to Aberdeen and Inverness, which can't easily be made a lower priority than the E&G shuttles. The Cumbernauld route is never going to be faster, so it'll always generally see slower trains which don't run as far. That means they're slightly easier to path - an extra minute wait at a station isn't that hard to pencil in - and they're not going as far so they're less likely to pick up delays. An Aberdeen to Glasgow train might be held up at Montrose and miss its path at Greenhill, meaning it either has to wait for a Glasgow to Edinburgh to pass or it has to delay it. The grade separation works will fix that.

A link from Cumbernauld to Falkirk High doesn't make a lot of sense to add in now. Cumbernauld station isn't that much more useful than Croy for passengers going to and from Edinburgh. Croy has and will always easily have the express service to Edinburgh. The relatively limited range of people wanting a service direct to Edinburgh from Cumbernauld station are best accommodated on the slower service via Falkirk Grahamston. Any new link wouldn't be grade-separated so using it would incur a timetabling penalty, while it's quite unlikely there would be any extra paths for a direct train to use it. If you could add in another train from Edinburgh heading out to Linlithgow and beyond, you'd probably send it up to Stirling rather than to a secondary station for an area already served by the main E&G service.
100% it was a chord from E&G towards Cumbernauld. There was also plans to have a bay platform at Croy which was scrapped.
 

clc

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100% it was a chord from E&G towards Cumbernauld. There was also plans to have a bay platform at Croy which was scrapped.

You might be thinking of the Garngad Chord which would have allowed trains to run from Queen Street Low Level to Cumbernauld without having to reverse at Springburn. It was cut from EGIP to save £50 million.
 

Altnabreac

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https://www.transport.gov.scot/news/15-million-approved-to-develop-options-for-waverley-approaches/

The three infrastructure options being explored are:

  • a new chord (Almond chord) with flat junctions at both Winchburgh and Almond
  • the Almond chord with a flat Winchburgh Junction and a grade separated Almond Junction
  • the Almond chord with grade separated junctions at both Winchburgh and Almond
The work being funded now will include detailed modelling to provide assurance on the performance benefits and help inform which option is most suitable, weighing up costs against the future needs of the railway.

The work will also provide a more detailed understanding of the potential costs of any option being taken forward.

Excellent news. I’m confident that Option 2 will have the best business case.

A flat junction at the Almond end will just create conflicts which are as bad as the existing ones. No point in spending all that money and ending up with that.

The original EGIP scheme included grade separation at the Winchburgh end. However this is very much a luxury that can be avoided.

If you were to move the Winchburgh station to be located on the new Chord then how many trains would actually need to go via the existing route?

In theory none. The 4tph Edinburgh Park stoppers can be replaced with Edinburgh Gateway calls. The 4tph Falkirk High trains can go either route.

So the only limitation on sending all services via Almond Chord is the capacity on the Fife lines and dwell times at Edinburgh Gateway / Haymarket.

It may be that a 2tph residual service via Newbridge makes sense but I can’t imagine it will be more than that.

So you vastly reduce the flat conflicts at:
Newbridge Junction (8 vs 4 tph becomes 0-2 vs 4)
Haymarket East Junction (12 vs 3 tph becomes 4-6 vs 3 tph).

Overall this will allow a number of potential extra services:
4tph becomes 6tph Edinburgh - Bathgate
4tph becomes 6tph Edinburgh - Falkirk High
2tph becomes 3tph Edinburgh - Shotts
 

InOban

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Would there be platform capacity at Waverley for these extra services?
 

InOban

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Only if you're planning to join up, say, Shotts services with North Berwick.
 

Altnabreac

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I think that that's part of the reason that 5 can be joined to 12 (think I got that right) to give more room.

I think 5 joins to 12 and 6 joins to 13.

If we’re talking about creating more capacity for the north lines though I think we’re more likely to see the extension of 18 right through to the east side and smaller extensions of 14-17, 20 and 1.

At the moment though I believe platform capacity is less of a constraint than the approach capacity in the west around Newbridge / Haymarket.
 

najaB

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Only if you're planning to join up, say, Shotts services with North Berwick.
Even if they aren't joined up services, you've got twice the available platform face. Plus, if they include a mid-platform crossover as with 1/2 and 19/20 it gives you options.
 

najaB

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At the moment though I believe platform capacity is less of a constraint than the approach capacity in the west around Newbridge / Haymarket.
I wonder if there would be benefit in making all four tracks fully bidirectional at the way out past Haymarket west (with a few more crossovers).
 

PaulLothian

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the earthworks for the Cumbernauld-Falkirk High chord was started n the 1930s and completion was interrupted by WW2. The project was abandoned after the war.

It was included in the original EGIP.

The original plans for that chord included a flat junction on the Edinburgh-Glasgow line. Not a popular option these days.
Searching old web pages on EGIP doesn't suggest it was considered anew.
 

Stopper

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Can’t see any need for 6tph Edinburgh-Bathgate any time soon. 6tph E-G via Falkirk High is already needed, not sure about 3tph Shotts as I don’t go that way much
 

Class 170101

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6tph E-G via Falkirk High is already needed, not sure about 3tph Shotts as I don’t go that way much

Even with 8 car working? In my limited experience maybe at peak times but certainly not off peak. 4tph seems adequate.
 

najaB

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Can’t see any need for 6tph Edinburgh-Bathgate any time soon. 6tph E-G via Falkirk High is already needed, not sure about 3tph Shotts as I don’t go that way much
Are there other city pairs in the UK that have that frequency of service - 12tph excluding long distance through services?
 

edwin_m

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I wonder if there would be benefit in making all four tracks fully bidirectional at the way out past Haymarket west (with a few more crossovers).
Maybe for disruption/engineering access, but in normal service with the frequencies envisaged a "wrong line" move will almost always conflict with one in the right direction on the track in question.
 

edwin_m

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Are there other city pairs in the UK that have that frequency of service - 12tph excluding long distance through services?
Excluding long distance through services skews the question a bit, as of the E-G services only the hourly XC and the solitary LNER working would count. Ignoring that condition, National Rail Enquiries gives me 15 services from London to Reading between 1000 and 1057 tomorrow morning.
 

NotATrainspott

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Can’t see any need for 6tph Edinburgh-Bathgate any time soon. 6tph E-G via Falkirk High is already needed, not sure about 3tph Shotts as I don’t go that way much

I think the 6tph suggestion involved 2tph of all-stops services which would be overtaken at a Bathgate station rebuilt to have a third platform in the stabling area. Therefore it's not a true 6tph end-to-end service, as you'd sometimes get there earlier by taking a later train.

The best long-term future plan for the E&G is a new service running on new tracks built for high speed rail. The services from Glasgow and Edinburgh to Stirling and beyond would then become the focus of the E&G route timetable rather than the shuttle.

Moving any LDHS services to Carlisle and beyond onto a new set of tracks would allow the Shotts/Carstairs services to be radically improved with a consistent and frequent outer metro timetable like on the Airdrie-Bathgate route. This will be especially useful for the city since the line has a few suburban stations which can only currently get a 1pth service. A 4tph service would make the towns along the route much more desirable for commuting into the city centre.
 

Clansman

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How did you arrive at 12tph?
Presumably from the combined amount of all ScotRail services between Edinburgh and Glasgow per hour on average;

4tph via Falkirk High (Queen Street)
4tph via Bathgate (Queen Street Low Level)
2tph via Cumbernauld (Queen Street)
2tph via Shotts (Central)
=
12tph (excluding North Berwick extensions, peaks via Carstairs, and XC/LNER services)
 

Altnabreac

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Can’t see any need for 6tph Edinburgh-Bathgate any time soon. 6tph E-G via Falkirk High is already needed, not sure about 3tph Shotts as I don’t go that way much

The peak services from Bathgate are already pretty much full. Bathgate, Livingston North and Uphall have more passengers (3 million) than Linlithgow, Polmont and Falkirk High and are more focussed on the Edinburgh direction.

I don’t see demand for it all day necessarily but as a peak service it would help meet growing demand.
 

najaB

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Presumably from the combined amount of all ScotRail services between Edinburgh and Glasgow per hour on average;

4tph via Falkirk High (Queen Street)
4tph via Bathgate (Queen Street Low Level)
2tph via Cumbernauld (Queen Street)
2tph via Shotts (Central)
=
12tph (excluding North Berwick extensions, peaks via Carstairs, and XC/LNER services)
Exactly that.
 

Stopper

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The peak services from Bathgate are already pretty much full. Bathgate, Livingston North and Uphall have more passengers (3 million) than Linlithgow, Polmont and Falkirk High and are more focussed on the Edinburgh direction.

I don’t see demand for it all day necessarily but as a peak service it would help meet growing demand.

Peak E-G services are pretty much full too and given previous proposals of 6tph x 6-car an hour it would surprise me to see 6tph on the E-G (Scotland’s premier line) post-Almond chord. They’re certainly a lot busier than the A-B services.

Exactly that.

Edinburgh-Glasgow has a lot of different services per hour but for example most people wouldn’t use the Shotts or Carstairs services unless they needed specifically to get to Central. Nobody would really use the Cumbernauld services end-to-end either so while 12tph is true, there’s a mark next to some of the services for sure.
 

clc

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Presumably from the combined amount of all ScotRail services between Edinburgh and Glasgow per hour on average;

4tph via Falkirk High (Queen Street)
4tph via Bathgate (Queen Street Low Level)
2tph via Cumbernauld (Queen Street)
2tph via Shotts (Central)
=
12tph (excluding North Berwick extensions, peaks via Carstairs, and XC/LNER services)

Exactly that.

And in Altnabreac’s potential services scenario that would increase to 15tph with the extra Falkirk High and Shotts services, and to 17tph if the extra Bathgate services were extended through to Glasgow.
 

Altnabreac

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Peak E-G services are pretty much full too and given previous proposals of 6tph x 6-car an hour it would surprise me to see 6tph on the E-G (Scotland’s premier line) post-Almond chord. They’re certainly a lot busier than the A-B services.

Assuming you meant wouldn’t surprise above?

To make a business case for Almond Chord then of course you’re going to need more services. If you spend a few hundred million pounds on Almond Chord it won’t be to just improve reliability of existing services.

I think 2tph extra on E-G via Falkirk High is a likely first priority for that extra capacity.

But it’s likely that Almond Chord will
A - create more than 2tph of extra capacity
B - need more than 2tph extra to run to justify the (expensive) business case.

If you look at the Scotland Route Study 2043 Indicative frequency pattern you can see that an extra 2tph to Bathgate is one of the services proposed.

It also proposes an extra 1tph via Carstairs. I happen to think it’s more likely this would be something like a Motherwell to Edinburgh via Shotts service rather than Carstairs.
 

CEN60

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I thought this investigative work might have already been done as part of the original EGIP plan, I guess not. Hopefully something gets announced during CP6.


It was - all of the options were looked at! I still have the drawings (along with the grade separated option at Winchburgh!
 

Class 170101

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It was - all of the options were looked at! I still have the drawings (along with the grade separated option at Winchburgh!

Are you allowed to say if Grade Separation applied both ends of the Almond Chord.
 
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