Electrification after chat moss routes. etc.

[connor7777]

If they really went for it they could do.

Liverpool to Manchester via Warrington Central.
Preston to Ormskirk.
Kirkby and Southport to Wigan.
Warrington Bank Quay to Chester and Halton Curve.
Crewe to Chester.
Sandbach to Northwich, then Northwich to WCML via Greenbank Curve.
OR. Sandbach to Northwich and all of the mid Cheshire line. Or convert to Manchester Metro.
Blackpool South.
Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury.
Hereford to Bromsgrove.
Stockport - Sheffield
Stoke - Derby

 

[hairyhandedfool]

I doubt that the benefits outweigh the costs on any of those routes.

Blackpool South to Preston - Currently the service runs to Colne, so unless you run electric trains from Blackpool South to Preston and diesel trains onward to Colne, there is no operating cost reduction from this.

Warrington Bank Quay/Crewe to Chester - Why, when most of the services go along the North Wales Coast line, would you only wire to Chester?

Wigan to Kirby/Southport - Would you not need to also wire Wigan to Bolton/Salford Crescent? Or have I missed something?

Stockport to Sheffield - What benefit would this bring?

Liverpool to Manchester via Warrington - aside from losing some pacers and sprinters on the stoppers, there is no benefit that I can see.

Mid Cheshire line - If your going to do any of it you might as well do all of it, but would it be of benefit? Or would you just be replacing a couple of units on the local services?

 

[WatcherZero]

Someone told me they were doing the tiny stretch from Wigan NW/WCML to Wigan Wallgate but ive never seen anything to confirm that. Wigan Wallgate to Bolton line is only a couple of miles and probably will have a positive BCR after the lines dones. I wouldnt hold out much hope for Atherton or Southport lines though, probably remain a diesel island for some time to come. Kirkby line Headbolt Lane-Wallgate I could see happening if some form of Merseyrail vertical integration occured, theres also reportedly a positive BCR for reopening to Skem either from Ormskirk or Kirkby approachs.

 

[connor7777]

I am a very green person
If you electrify Crewe to Chester, then Chester to Warrington can be a diversion route for the WCML.

It's the same as painting a house, you paint 1 room then you notice others need doing, we electrify Blackpool North, then Blackpool south looks odd, you see what I mean.


Proposing 100% electrified railway on our network by 2030.

 

[tbtc]

Warrington Bank Quay/Crewe to Chester - Why, when most of the services go along the North Wales Coast line, would you only wire to Chester?

Most services from Crewe to Chester terminate at Chester (the hourly ATW shuttle and the hourly VT service from Euston), its only a few morning services from Holyhead and a few evening ones to Holyhead which run further. Wiring Crewe - Chester would allow Virgin to get rid of all Voyagers *if* they could sort out a drag for the token Holyhead services.

 

[PhilipW]

I think that we should all be very pleased that these 4 schemes are going ahead. It is a lot more than many of us were expecting given the state of the national finances and the change of government last May.

Once completed in 2016 it is quite likely that other add-on schemes will be authorised. Once you have the core routes electrified, it becomes far easier to justify add-ons.

The one I would like to see is the big one -- over the top to Leeds. With a little in-fill in Yorkshire, the whole route from Liverpool to Newcastle would be electrified. To me, that's the prize to go for.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

Okay, I stand corrected on Crewe-Chester trains terminating there, for some reason I thought the Holyhead trains still went to Crewe.

IMO Network Rail would still be crazy to electrify Warrington-Chester just for a diversionary route which is only going to be around 20-30 minutes quicker than Crewe-Manchester-Warrington (BQ) and of no real time difference to Crewe-Manchester-Preston.

 

[Welshman]

Most services from Crewe to Chester terminate at Chester (the hourly ATW shuttle and the hourly VT service from Euston), its only a few morning services from Holyhead and a few evening ones to Holyhead which run further. Wiring Crewe - Chester would allow Virgin to get rid of all Voyagers *if* they could sort out a drag for the token Holyhead services.

Extending the wires to from Crewe to Chester would be a good idea, allowing Virgin to stop running diesel Voyagers all the way from Euston to Crewe, and start running pendolinos to Chester.

The service onwards to Holyhead, though, is far from a "token" service. It serves growing markets at Flint, Rhyl, Llandudno in addition to the student market at Bangor University and holiday traffic, and the existing Virgin services along the NW Coast are usually well-patronised.

Dragging pendos, though, is not the answer. I think this route would be an ideal candidate for the bi-mode Voyager, if the pantograph cars ever see the light of day. Electric from Euston to Chester, diesel along the coast.

And if the bi-mode Voyager never materialises, perhaps something on the lines of the bi-mode IEPs proposed for Paddington-Swansea could be used?

 

[cle]

I'm surprised the North Wales coast line in its entirety hasn't come out more positive.

Crewe - Chester would enable electric working formany services. And there is a shuttle between the two, which could also go EMU - maybe extend the LM Trent Valley stopper to Chester and back to replace the shuttle (timetable permitting?) Would open Chester and North Wales up to some new markets.

That's all Crewe-Chester would release. But with North Wales and Warrington Chester, you could run the Llandudnos with EMUs as well as Crewe-Holyheads and all London trains. And with Halton too, it'd be a new era for North Wales.

The Warrington Central Liv-Manc line would only make sense if combined with wires across to Leeds (and York). But EMU-ing the stoppers would be good, and help with pathing in terms of acceleration. Maybe there could be more capacity - there is already some random skip-stopping with Birchwood and Widnes which helps even things out.

 

[Welshman]

I'm surprised the North Wales coast line in its entirety hasn't come out more positive.

Crewe - Chester would enable electric working formany services. And there is a shuttle between the two, which could also go EMU - maybe extend the LM Trent Valley stopper to Chester and back to replace the shuttle (timetable permitting?) Would open Chester and North Wales up to some new markets.

That's all Crewe-Chester would release. But with North Wales and Warrington Chester, you could run the Llandudnos with EMUs as well as Crewe-Holyheads and all London trains. And with Halton too, it'd be a new era for North Wales.

Agreed. Yes. Bring it on!

Wires from Crewe to Chester and Bi-mode from there was the best I dared hope for in the present financial climate.

 

[tbtc]

I think that we should all be very pleased that these 4 schemes are going ahead. It is a lot more than many of us were expecting given the state of the national finances and the change of government last May

I'm certainly no Tory, but I was very pleasantly surprised to see these schemes continuing, I honestly didn't expect them to commit to much more than build Crossrail - the fact that Blackpool/ Chat Moss etc are getting electrified is great news

The one I would like to see is the big one -- over the top to Leeds. With a little in-fill in Yorkshire, the whole route from Liverpool to Newcastle would be electrified. To me, that's the prize to go for.

Its still just one train an hour (plus a stopper from Huddersfield to Leeds, usually Pacer run). To do Transpennine properly you have to decide whether to electrify to Middlesbrough/ Scarborough/ Hull, to cut their direct services to Manchester or to run DMUs under the wires. I think the electrification from Manchester to York would be a good thing, but only if the majority of services on the line move to EMU. This may mean cutting some of the direct services from Middlesbrough/Scarborough to Manchester since you'd need to convert a lot of the Transpennine services to EMU to justify wiring it.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I'm surprised the North Wales coast line in its entirety hasn't come out more positive

The problem is that the electrification suggested on this thread would only really "save" one train an hour (Manchester - Llandudno). The London - Holyhead service is only a few a day, and there's no talk of wiring the ATW line through Wrexham/ Shrewsbury - Wolverhampton/Cardiff. It'd only be worth electrifying the North Wales coast line if you were going to switch most services to EMU. To do this would mean terminating the Birmingham/Cardiff - Wrexham - Holyhead services at Chester and running an EMU from the WCML/ Crewe instead. However, that won't happen for political reasons.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

The service onwards to Holyhead, though, is far from a "token" service. It serves growing markets at Flint, Rhyl, Llandudno in addition to the student market at Bangor University and holiday traffic, and the existing Virgin services along the NW Coast are usually well-patronised

Its only three (?) from Holyhead to London on the morning and a similar number of return journeys in the evening. With Ryanair etc taking the bulk of the London - Ireland market there are fewer people still using the train to get the Holyhead ferry, which was one of the justifications of this service in the past.

I agree with the need to serve Bangor etc better, which is why I've argued for a Liverpool service on other threads.

 

[cle]

I think there are 8 London - Holyhead trains per day (M/F), mostly in the peaks. There are also some Bangor terminators, clearly not serving the Irish ferries. It's not an insignificant amount for a secondary trunk line.

 

[Fincra5]

Surely one line that should be electrifed is Ore to Ashford Intl, its only 30miles or so but is a large gap in SE electrification.

 

[Aictos]

Lines that ought to be electrified but will never be done:

Wokingham Junction to Aldershot South Junction
Shalford Junction to Reigate

These would remove the diesel island that currently exists between Reading and Redhill via Guildford which in turn would mean a move to EMU operation.

Uckfield to Hurst Green Junction

This again would remove the existing diesel island that currently exists between Reading and Hurst Green which in turn would mean a move to EMU operation.

Ore to Ashford International

This once done would mean a end to diesels on the Southern except for the South West Trains services to Exeter and Bristol via Salisbury and the token First Great Western services between Brighton and Great Malvern.

Ipswich to Cambridge and Ely with Ely to Peterborough and Norwich

Would free up a awful lot of DMUs to be used elsewhere and apart from being EMU operated would mean a lot more freight being electrically hauled between Ipswich and Doncaster via Peterborough and Grantham

Only thing is though you're still going to have the Birmingham to Stansted and Norwich to Liverpool services as DMUs until these areas are electrified.

 

[lm321412]

I am sorry but Stoke - Derby would be a waste.

Currently it has 1tph, and as far as I know it wouldn't paticularly help freight either.


Also Hereford to Bromsgrove!?

So we are going to leave Bromsgrove - Barnt Green then!?



The only one I would like to see is Crewe - Chester.

 

[Mojo]

So we are going to leave Bromsgrove - Barnt Green then!?

Already funded and planned by Network Rail for a few years now as part of the plan to extend some Cross-city trains to Bromsgrove. My local knowledge is a bit out of date now so not sure what is going on with this and the re-siting of Bromsgrove station.

 

[lm321412]

Already funded and planned by Network Rail for a few years now as part of the plan to extend some Cross-city trains to Bromsgrove. My local knowledge is a bit out of date now so not sure what is going on with this and the re-siting of Bromsgrove station.

I know it has been planned but as far as I know, the move of Bromsgrove Station is still in its very early days...


I think it will be a long time to come, but brilliant for Bromsgrove when it does.

 

[connor7777]

Do you think another study could be done to extend merseyrail lines from Ormskirk, Kirkby, and the borderlands line which I know was ruled out, but maybe another study should be done.

Electric trains from Hereford to Birmingham, thats what we need aswell, would be a big project aswell. Plus a future proposal to Oxford when the GWML is completed. aLlowing electric trains from Hereford to London aswell.

 

[Bald Rick]

Lines that ought to be electrified but will never be done:

Ipswich to Cambridge and Ely with Ely to Peterborough and Norwich

Would free up a awful lot of DMUs to be used elsewhere and apart from being EMU operated would mean a lot more freight being electrically hauled between Ipswich and Doncaster via Peterborough and Grantham

Only thing is though you're still going to have the Birmingham to Stansted and Norwich to Liverpool services as DMUs until these areas are electrified.

Hurrah! "An awful lot" of DMUs = 8 x 170s (total 21 vehicles) that it takes to run Ipswich - Cambridge, Ipswich - Peterboro and Cambridge - Norwich. And for only 128 route miles of knitting!

Alternatively, the money could be spent on the 125 route miles from Bedford to Sheffield / Nottingham, freeing up almost a whole fleet of Meridians (143 vehicles) and 9 HSTs.

And/or, as PhilipW says, North Trans-Pennine Machester - York, which with a bit of selective service alteration would release most of the 185s.

Electrification has to be prioritised on the routes where the most diesel vehicles (and thus mileage) is replaced with electric mileage for the lowest cost.

My cunning plan would be to wire the MML in time for HS2 opening in the mid 2020s, then the displaced Pendolinos can find a new home on the twisty turny MML, which will also reduce journey times.

 

[bluenoxid]

If they really went for it they could do.

Liverpool to Manchester via Warrington Central.
Preston to Ormskirk.
Kirkby and Southport to Wigan.
Warrington Bank Quay to Chester and Halton Curve.
Crewe to Chester.
Sandbach to Northwich, then Northwich to WCML via Greenbank Curve.
OR. Sandbach to Northwich and all of the mid Cheshire line. Or convert to Manchester Metro.
Blackpool South.
Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury.
Hereford to Bromsgrove.
Stockport - Sheffield
Stoke - Derby

Wow you have spent a lot of time spending hard earned tax payers cash with very little idea.

Kirkby line Headbolt Lane-Wallgate I could see happening if some form of Merseyrail vertical integration occured, theres also reportedly a positive BCR for reopening to Skem either from Ormskirk or Kirkby approachs.

Pfffffttttt. No chance unless Merseyside takes over the area. The other issue is the tunnel and the route being closed from 7pm onwards due to the local people. They would be better off extending to Skelmersdale then running a Skem to Wigan Parry People Mover.

I am a very green person
If you electrify Crewe to Chester, then Chester to Warrington can be a diversion route for the WCML.

It's the same as painting a house, you paint 1 room then you notice others need doing, we electrify Blackpool North, then Blackpool south looks odd, you see what I mean.


Proposing 100% electrified railway on our network by 2030.

#

WTF is that logic. You're ****ing away a lot of money. I assume you have heard of embodied carbon of the trains and the infrastructure.

Most services from Crewe to Chester terminate at Chester (the hourly ATW shuttle and the hourly VT service from Euston), its only a few morning services from Holyhead and a few evening ones to Holyhead which run further. Wiring Crewe - Chester would allow Virgin to get rid of all Voyagers *if* they could sort out a drag for the token Holyhead services.

Yeah, they could ditch them. If Wales wants to electrify it they can. If not, they can get the diesel trains. It is not our problem in England.

The one I would like to see is the big one -- over the top to Leeds. With a little in-fill in Yorkshire, the whole route from Liverpool to Newcastle would be electrified. To me, that's the prize to go for.

Only half of the TPE's will become diesel if that was undertaken so it is not that big of a prize.

Its still just one train an hour (plus a stopper from Huddersfield to Leeds, usually Pacer run). To do Transpennine properly you have to decide whether to electrify to Middlesbrough/ Scarborough/ Hull, to cut their direct services to Manchester or to run DMUs under the wires. I think the electrification from Manchester to York would be a good thing, but only if the majority of services on the line move to EMU. This may mean cutting some of the direct services from Middlesbrough/Scarborough to Manchester since you'd need to convert a lot of the Transpennine services to EMU to justify wiring it.

Scarborough would get an extension on the York to Man Vic, whilst the Scarborough TPE would terminate at York.

I think there are 8 London - Holyhead trains per day (M/F), mostly in the peaks. There are also some Bangor terminators, clearly not serving the Irish ferries. It's not an insignificant amount for a secondary trunk line.

But is 8 trains per day enough to justify so many miles of electrification? I don't think it is and it is a devolved decision anyway. We should leave it to the devolved Welsh adminstration to decide if they can afford a London service for these towns.

Already funded and planned by Network Rail for a few years now as part of the plan to extend some Cross-city trains to Bromsgrove. My local knowledge is a bit out of date now so not sure what is going on with this and the re-siting of Bromsgrove station.

Check out the FoI that I put in and responded to by the DfT in January. It is on their website.

Hurrah! "An awful lot" of DMUs = 8 x 170s (total 21 vehicles) that it takes to run Ipswich - Cambridge, Ipswich - Peterboro and Cambridge - Norwich. And for only 128 route miles of knitting!

Alternatively, the money could be spent on the 125 route miles from Bedford to Sheffield / Nottingham, freeing up almost a whole fleet of Meridians (143 vehicles) and 9 HSTs.

And/or, as PhilipW says, North Trans-Pennine Machester - York, which with a bit of selective service alteration would release most of the 185s.

Electrification has to be prioritised on the routes where the most diesel vehicles (and thus mileage) is replaced with electric mileage for the lowest cost.

My cunning plan would be to wire the MML in time for HS2 opening in the mid 2020s, then the displaced Pendolinos can find a new home on the twisty turny MML, which will also reduce journey times.

This is the cunning thinking of electrification.

The quick wins are the enhancements that will deliver additional capacity and replacements of the network. For example, the Morecambe and Windemere branches would be ideal candidates removing wasteful DMU use and allowing for services to be enhanced in the area. It then leaves Barrow as the only route in North West TPE that remains diesel post electrification. Leeds services can be diverted from Morecambe to serve Barrow instead.

 

[WatcherZero]

You rubbish all that on cost grounds and then suggest two lines with 1tph?

 

[trickyvegas]

Extending from Guide Bridge to Stalybridge.

This would allow a Piccadilly stopper to run from the bay platform and with considered connecting times in relation to the Hadfield services would provide many stations an alternative connection to TPE services rather than travelling all the way into to Piccadilly as well as increasing local journey options that don't involve changing at Piccadilly.

Due to the short distance, it would be a fairly cheap option.

 

[Welshman]

[Its only three (?) from Holyhead to London on the morning and a similar number of return journeys in the evening. With Ryanair etc taking the bulk of the London - Ireland market there are fewer people still using the train to get the Holyhead ferry, which was one of the justifications of this service in the past.

Sorry, tbtc, but as cle says it's much more than three:-
In the down direction, 0910, 1610, 1710, 1810 & 1910 Euston to Holyhead plus an 0810 finishing short at Bangor, and a 0530 from Birmingham New St to Bangor.
In the up direction, 0449,0551,0655,0855 and 1358 from Holyhead to Euston, plus a 1224 from Bangor and a 2020 Bangor to Birmingham New St.

I accept that the Birmingham services are positioning moves.

I also agree that the Holyhead ferry was the reason the service was introduced originally, [indeed the "Irish Troubles" was the main reason the Chester-Holyhead line was built], but Virgin has recently grown the North Wales market, and the trains I have travelled on have been well-filled, regardless of any ferry passengers. Virgin [or its successors] should develop the service rather than curtail it, and as I said in an earlier post, bi-mode would be one way of doing it.

 

[The Planner]

IMO Network Rail would still be crazy to electrify Warrington-Chester just for a diversionary route which is only going to be around 20-30 minutes quicker than Crewe-Manchester-Warrington (BQ) and of no real time difference to Crewe-Manchester-Preston.

Makes perfect sense to me, allows many more possession opportunities on the West Coast this way including Hartford and Weaver in their entirety and half of Acton Grange Jn and still allows all the electric flows to operate.

 

[junglejames]

[/QUOTE]Yeah, they could ditch them. If Wales wants to electrify it they can. If not, they can get the diesel trains. It is not our problem in England.

You realise this was in response to electrifying Crewe to Chester?
Chester being in England, as was Crewe the last time I checked. So its not our problem here in England?
Hold on, just going to get the Scots to Electrify the Settle Carlisle line. Im sure they wont mind. Afterall, Carlisle is close enough to the border.

 

[bluenoxid]

You rubbish all that on cost grounds and then suggest two lines with 1tph?

Shorter than the other suggestions with more operation (2-3) units saved. under the wires saved. In addition, the Morecambe branch has the benefit of being very easy to double the frequency with 11 minutes each way. Both projects together would be 16 miles of electrification. 10 + 3 for each line.

I would also suggest that the Marple lines in South Manchester are also candidates with a number of Pacers ditched for approx 18 miles of electrification

 

[martinsh]

I'm surprised the North Wales coast line in its entirety hasn't come out more positive.

Crewe - Chester would enable electric working formany services. And there is a shuttle between the two, which could also go EMU - maybe extend the LM Trent Valley stopper to Chester and back to replace the shuttle (timetable permitting?)

Well the TV stopper currently spends 55 mins each hour waiting in platforms 2/3 in Crewe, so a hop to Chester and back should be perfectly possible in that time.

 

[bluenoxid]

Yeah, they could ditch them. If Wales wants to electrify it they can. If not, they can get the diesel trains. It is not our problem in England.

You realise this was in response to electrifying Crewe to Chester?
Chester being in England, as was Crewe the last time I checked. So its not our problem here in England?
Hold on, just going to get the Scots to Electrify the Settle Carlisle line. Im sure they wont mind. Afterall, Carlisle is close enough to the border.

Stop being so cocky and read the quote again. :roll:

Wiring Crewe - Chester would allow Virgin to get rid of all Voyagers *if* they could sort out a drag for the token Holyhead services.

So they could get rid of all Voyagers if they ditched Holyhead and not have a token pendo service.

 

[Bevan Price]

If they really went for it they could do.

Liverpool to Manchester via Warrington Central.
Preston to Ormskirk.
Kirkby and Southport to Wigan.
Warrington Bank Quay to Chester and Halton Curve.
Crewe to Chester.
Sandbach to Northwich, then Northwich to WCML via Greenbank Curve.
OR. Sandbach to Northwich and all of the mid Cheshire line. Or convert to Manchester Metro.
Blackpool South.
Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury.
Hereford to Bromsgrove.
Stockport - Sheffield
Stoke - Derby

I suspect that many of these lines will be electrified - but not in the lifetime of the majority currently viewing this forum.

Bevan

 

[junglejames]

So you were saying scrap the Holyhead service altogether? Not very obvious if that was the case.

However my point still stands.
The original quote was about wiring Crewe to Chester. Holyhead was never mentioned for electrification. But you said:
'If Wales wants to electrify it they can'.

Perhaps you were on about Holyhead when you said this, but it was in response to a post that only mentioned electrifying Crewe to Chester. So my cockiness was fully justified.