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Possible East Coastway Service Changes

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JamesRowden

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GTR have released a consultation document which includes possible service changes across the franchise (http://www.southernrailway.com/your-journey/timetable-consultation).

I have created this thread so that we can get a better understanding (than was given in the consultation document) of the effects of the proposals, so that we can work together to give GTR better feedback and perhaps develop alternative solutions (where the consultation permits) that we can show GTR.

The proposals which I think may have complicated interconnected effects in terms of the timetable and diagrams are:
  • Cut peak Lewes-Seaford line services to 2tph rather than 3tph to improve reliability on single track sections by either cutting the services which split/attach with Victoria services or reducing the Brighton-Seaford service from 2tph to 1tph during the peak.
  • Increasing the frequency of the Brighton-Lewes shuttle from 1tph to 2tph.
  • Running the Brighton-Ore services non-stop between Brighton and Falmer.
  • Terminating the hourly Victoria-Ore services at Hastings with an hourly Southeastern Charing Cross-Hastings service being extended to Ore. This is suggested to improve reliability by removing the interworking between the Victoria-Ore and Brighton-Ore services.
  • Splitting the hourly diesel Brighton-Ashford service into an electric and a diesel service which both terminating at Eastbourne or Hastings. This is suggested to solve the overcrowding between Brighton and Hastings which according to the graph GTR showed peaks between Bexhill and St Leonards Warrior Square. GTR also want the public to potentially suggest other ideas to solve this problem which do not require extra diesel stock or doubling up 171s at stations which don't have long enough platforms for passengers to get in/out of both sets.

I will now analyse the effects on the diagrams of each proposal:

Cut peak Lewes-Seaford line services to 2tph rather than 3tph to improve reliability on single track sections by either cutting the services which split/attach with Victoria services or reducing the Brighton-Seaford service from 2tph to 1tph during the peak
Cutting the Victoria train would mean the Victoria service would have a better journey time beyond Lewes via Polegate, would be longer as far as Eastbourne and would be more reliable. Cutting the Brighton-Seaford service level would result in two trains being required to operate the rather than three (since the 37 minute Brighton-Seaford time makes the service too much for one train to cover) or the service to be interworked with another service.

Increasing the frequency of the Brighton-Lewes shuttle from 1tph to 2tph
This service takes 15-17 minutes end to end and is presently operated using one train. Doubling the frequency would require two trains or it could be interworked with another service. This service could perhaps be interworked with a 1tph Brighton-Seaford service during the peak using 4 trains. The same number of 313s as is presently used for the Brighton-Lewes(-Seaford) service.

Running the Brighton-Ore services non-stop between Brighton and Falmer
This obviously reduces the journey time.

Terminating the hourly Victoria-Ore services at Hastings with an hourly Southeastern Charing Cross-Hastings service being extended to Ore
This would mean that the Victoria service would arrive at Hastings 13 minutes before it heads back to Victoria (if the current timings are maintained). The Brighton-Ore service which this service is presently interworked with has Brighton bound service leave Ore just 5 minutes after the service from Brighton arrives. Therefore implementing this proposal in isolation would save an EMU and the service could be interworked with the Brighton-Lewes service and/or combined with the proposal to run the service non-stop between Brighton and Lewes to provide enough reliability for the Brighton-Ore service.

Splitting the hourly diesel Brighton-Ashford service into an electric and a diesel service which both terminating at Eastbourne or Hastings
Splitting the service at Eastbourne might allow something similar to the present timetable to operate with a cross platform connection at Eastbourne. The most used section of the service was shown to be Bexhill-St Leonards Warrior Square, but the trains not running beyond Eastbourne and the Brighton-Ore service running non-stop between Brighton and Lewes might transfer demand to the service from Ore. Splitting the service at Hastings has the complication of its present Brighton-Hastings time being 64 minutes. The service would therefore require 3 trains or it would need to be interworked. The consultation states that the Ashford-Brighton journey time would be extended by around 27 minutes with that time requiring changes at Hastings and Lewes. This fact suggests that GTR would interwork the service at the Brighton end with one of the services which I have already stated could benefit from interworking. GTR are clearly prioritising the saving of running an extra EMU compared to the 23 minutes (if one assumes a 4 minute connection at Hastings) of Brighton-Ashford journey time and hiding this fact from the public.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I would think that the proposal to split the Brighton-Ashford service at Eastbourne could be improved by having both services call at Hampden Park so that the subsequent connections could improve the service reliability and/or journey time for non-Eastbourne passengers capable of climbing a bridge. It would also give the local area a better service.
 
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Bishopstone

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JamesRowden said:
The proposals which I think may have complicated interconnected effects in terms of the timetable and diagrams are:
  • Cut peak Lewes-Seaford line services to 2tph rather than 3tph to improve reliability on single track sections by either cutting the services which split/attach with Victoria services or reducing the Brighton-Seaford service from 2tph to 1tph during the peak.
  • Increasing the frequency of the Brighton-Lewes shuttle from 1tph to 2tph.
  • Running the Brighton-Ore services non-stop between Brighton and Lewes.
Click to expand...


  • They'll stop at Falmer, so not quite non-stop.

    JamesRowden said:
    Cutting the Brighton-Seaford service level would result in two trains being required to operate the rather than three (since the 37 minute Brighton-Seaford time makes the service too much for one train to cover) or the service to be interworked with another service.
    Click to expand...


    No, you need three units and crews to operate a half-hourly service taking 37 minutes.

    JamesRowden said:
    Splitting the hourly diesel Brighton-Ashford service into an electric and a diesel service which both terminating at Eastbourne or Hastings
    Click to expand...

    Splitting the service at Eastbourne seems to involve a relatively tight connection which, with current levels of service reliability, will be broken frequently leaving a wait of 60 minutes heading east beyond Hastings/Ore. It also does nothing to alleviate overcrowding between Eastbourne and Hastings.

    Conversely, splitting at Hastings seems to involve a substantial increase in journey times heading west, even assuming the TWO connections en route are made, which is unlikely unless performance steps up several gears.

    Option 3 is 'carry on as we are, but don't blame us for the overcrowding.'

    Option 4 is crowd-sourcing a better solution which none of the industry bigwigs had considered, without saying 'electrification' or 'four car diesel trains', and with a flat budget.

    In hindsight, the industry must curse the day it extended the Ashford-Hastings/Eastbourne service through to Brighton, with much fanfare. Today, it's nothing but an insoluble problem.
 
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JamesRowden

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Bishopstone said:
They'll stop at Falmer, so not quite non-stop.
Click to expand...
Reading all that I was bound to get one thing wrong :D

Bishopstone said:
No, you need three units and crews to operate a half-hourly service taking 37 minutes.
Click to expand...
I was referring to the option to cut the Brighton-Seaford service to hourly (and maintain the hourly Victoria-Seaford service) during the peak.
 
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Bishopstone

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JamesRowden said:
I was referring to the option to cut the Brighton-Seaford service to hourly (and maintain the hourly Victoria-Seaford service) during the peak.
Click to expand...

Ah, okay. Well, in the evening there's only one Victoria-Seaford service, but there are other oddities such as the Brighton-Newhaven Harbour 'parliamentary' service, which reverses ECS at Newhaven Marine.

There's also a morning train to Brighton which starts at Newhaven, in addition to the ex-Seaford services. The consultation is silent as to whether the 'simplification' of the Seaford timetable at half-hourly will result in the end of these additional Newhaven trains, though I would assume not.

In fact, as the infrastructure constraint is the single line section between Newhaven Harbour and Seaford, it seems to me there is no impediment to running the current peak 3tph between Lewes and Newhaven, at least.
 
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The Seaford - Victoria peak services are well used, so I doubt there will be many wanting them to be removed. The best case could be to remove a Brighton service when these operate and replace it with a Lewes/Newhaven - Brighton service instead to connect with the London train.

Running the Brighton - Ore non-stop between Brighton and Falmer makes sense, especially at peak times due to the high loadings at Falmer. Adding an extra Lewes shuttle to replace this could work, as well as increase capacity. Another option could be to extend all the shuttles to Newhaven, increasing the service level there.

RE Ore terminators, the services that currently come from VIC go back out as a BTN stopper and services from BTN then go back out to VIC. This could be reversed to have a service to return to where it came from (BTN to BTN, VIC to VIC). The issue will come when a train is delayed heading to Hastings and then because of the now reduced journey time, it would either have to start it's next journey late or terminate short at Bexhill or Eastbourne to prevent further late running, which would reduce the service. The current system means that even if a service is 15/20 minutes late, it can still run through to Hastings at least.

For the Brighton - Ashford services, they should have never been extended when using 2-car 171s. They are perfectly fine for use between HGS and AFK, but past Hastings they are unsuitable, therefore for me, splitting the service there with 377s running onwards to Brighton would be the best option. This would also mean less 171 units would be required on the East Coastway line which could see them being moved to the Uckfield line. This would also fit for Southern's OBS plans with less conductors being needed to operate the service, with the 377 service from BTN - HGS being DOO with an OBS on board. The change at Hastings could also be more convenient than Eastbourne with the 171s using the bay platform at Hastings and the connection using P2, with the 377 possibly going into the Park sidings to clear the platform depending on the timetable. The journey time will inevitably increase, but so would the capacity. You could have the option of peak services running to/from Eastbourne as well.
 
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Bishopstone

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ushawk said:
The Seaford - Victoria peak services are well used, so I doubt there will be many wanting them to be removed. The best case could be to remove a Brighton service when these operate and replace it with a Lewes/Newhaven - Brighton service instead to connect with the London train.
Click to expand...

I'm sure GTR/DFT would like to get rid of the through Seaford services in the interests of 'simplification', which has become a strategic imperative outside the TfL area.

Hence, the withdrawal of the through trains is mooted first in the consultation, with the reduction in the peak Brighton-Seaford service mentioned second as a 'less good' option.

I'm confused as to what is intended in the a.m peak, where the consultation talks of a 'five minute connection' at Lewes replacing the through service. But this implies a train will continue to run at these times between Seaford and Lewes to connect, whereas the whole point of the changes is supposedly to run fewer trains between Seaford and (at least) Newhaven: not to eliminate splitting/joining at Lewes.

Therefore, I suggest what is actually being proposed is that this Up Victoria train, ex-Eastbourne, won't have a connection from Seaford at all, and the 'five minute connection' is between other (unspecified) trains at Lewes, quite possibly heading for London Bridge rather than Victoria.

If we're going to run a simplified network with a reduced timetable, the starting point must be robust connections and remaining trains which run and aren't cancelled. That isn't the railway we have in Sussex.
 
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An every 45 minute service between Hastings and Ashford should be possible since Hastings-Rye takes 18 minutes with a single stop, trains can pass each other at Rye and Rye-Ashford takes 22 minutes. It would require three units to be in service at a time. It would provide connections with different services at Hastings and Ashford across its 3 hour cycle.
 
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Ianno87

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JamesRowden said:
An every 45 minute service between Hastings and Ashford should be possible since Hastings-Rye takes 18 minutes with a single stop, trains can pass each other at Rye and Rye-Ashford takes 22 minutes. It would require three units to be in service at a time. It would provide connections with different services at Hastings and Ashford across its 3 hour cycle.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't that leave a unit + driver sat around at Ashford for 61 minutes every hour? Plus, trains crossing at Rye normally seemed to be planned with slightly longer dwell times to account for crossing in the loop.
 
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Ianno87 said:
Wouldn't that leave a unit + driver sat around at Ashford for 61 minutes every hour? Plus, trains crossing at Rye normally seemed to be planned with slightly longer dwell times to account for crossing in the loop.
Click to expand...

It would wait for about 45 minutes at Ashford rather than an hour. But I guess you were refering to the units collectively in which case you are correct.

The cushion at Rye would be maintained by scheduling the westbound service a little float time there (which would reduce the waiting time at Ashford).
 
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JamesRowden said:
It would wait for 45 minutes at Ashford rather than an hour.

The cushion at Rye would be maintained by scheduling to westbound service a little float time there (which would reduce the waiting time at Ashford).
Click to expand...

Sorry, 45 minutes (dodgy Friday evening mental atithmetic!). With some line speed improvement, I guess one could 'step up' and save a unit by arriving Ashford earlier and departing later...
 
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Ianno87 said:
Sorry, 45 minutes (dodgy Friday evening mental atithmetic!). With some line speed improvement, I guess one could 'step up' and save a unit by arriving Ashford earlier and departing later...
Click to expand...

I doubt that a realistic speed increase would be enough to provide a robust every 45 minute service with just 2 units.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I think that a 2.5 minute speed upgrade between Hastings and Rye (which I think is already taking place) would allow an every 40 minute service to operate between Hastings and Ashford with 3 units.
 
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The best thing for the Marshlink would be an hourly fast, stopping only at Rye and possibly Ham Street if required at peak times, with a cross platform connection at Hastings to an hourly fast Brighton. Much like it used to be, only faster. And a third unit to be used to provide a two-hourly stopper. This should be entirely feasible within the current capacity constraints.

I don't get why there is any need for any additional SN/SE service to Ore. Ore station is not particularly conveniently located for Ore "village" or anything else, and there are frequent buses from all parts to the forecourt of Hastings station, St Leonards, etc.

Since moving away 20 years ago, I haven't travelled down that way very often, but when I have the main issues with reliability seem to originate from the splitting/dividing of London trains at Haywards Heath, which in addition seems to slow the service down significantly.

In my experience, the outer ends of both Coastway routes have always suffered poor punctuality as a result of late-running inbound trains. Before privatisation, the down London formed an up Brighton at Hastings, and vice versa, and the up Hastings at Brighton formed a Seaford and v.v., and delays and cancellations were common. I'm not optimistic about any magic solution being found, but separating London trains, Hastings/Eastbourne - Brightons, and Seafords to the maximum practical extent would seem sensible.
 
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Ore is used as a turn around point as it's quite easy to park a train ready for the turn around. You have to be careful looking at shorter turn around times. Any delays on the trip Vic -Ore/ Btn to Ore can be ended for the return service by a decent turn around time. Thats why the west coast service to Southampton often turns round at Fareham. A 2hr 40 journey time from Vic, or 1.50 from Btn, and then a 10* min turn around at Sou, means any delay and you just don't have the time.
It's also the same with some of the peaks to Seaford. Some only have a 4-5 turn around. Any slight delays and the fact that the driver has to swap ends and then set up again which takes a min 3 mins (at best) and your delayed back out.
As for the Ashfords. One of the reasons they were extended to Brighton was Eurostar connections. Since so few stop at Ashford anymore, a through service is perhaps a luxury. Ok, it's another change, but from whats I've seen, punters doing the whole coastway trip can sometimes be counted on one hand. The way to do it is have some leeway in train connections being held at the switch over point (Ebn or Hgs). Say 7 mins, with a poss of another 3 for late runners/connections.

*Some are less, some a tiny bit more. Sundays a lot more.
 
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Perhaps GTR should keep the Brighton-Ashford service and offer cheap advance fares on the electric services along the East Coastway to transfer demand away from the Brighton-Ashford service. It would attract more passengers to the railway by attracting those who:
  • Highly rate cheap options
  • Would use the trains if the Brighton-Ashford services were not so full (since the consultation claims that the crowding is detracting potential passengers from the railway)

There might be enough demand during the peak to replace the Brighton-Ashford service with a Brighton-Hastings fast service and an Eastbourne-Ashford service during the peak. This would require 4 171s to be in service in both the peak (including the peak only Hastings/Rye-Ashford shuttles) and off-peak, rather than the 5 171s required during the peak at the moment.
 
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I think it would be a step backwards splitting the Ashford - Brighton service (much as I have happy memories of changing at Hastings and Lewes back in he day.

Given the central division seems to be getting new electric stock a lot of the time, perhaps the best idea would be to run a Brighton - Hastings service a quarter of an hour in front of the Ashford's to relieve some of the intermediate traffic.
 
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yorksrob said:
I think it would be a step backwards splitting the Ashford - Brighton service (much as I have happy memories of changing at Hastings and Lewes back in he day.

Given the central division seems to be getting new electric stock a lot of the time, perhaps the best idea would be to run a Brighton - Hastings service a quarter of an hour in front of the Ashford's to relieve some of the intermediate traffic.
Click to expand...

They could always have the xx:22 Brighton - Lewes shuttle leave a few minutes earlier and extend it to Eastbourne? (Hastings is a possibility but by this point the Ashford service would have caught up with it)
 
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yorksrob said:
I think it would be a step backwards splitting the Ashford - Brighton service (much as I have happy memories of changing at Hastings and Lewes back in he day.

Given the central division seems to be getting new electric stock a lot of the time, perhaps the best idea would be to run a Brighton - Hastings service a quarter of an hour in front of the Ashford's to relieve some of the intermediate traffic.
Click to expand...
Do that! I haven't travelled on the East Coasteay route, but I did on a train splitting at Haywards Heath, which meant it wasn't crowded too much, and was 12 coaches to HHE.
 
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