Service changes at Liverpool - WMR/long distance

AndrewE said:

...but it would be nice to have the Scottish services (Glasgow and Edinburgh) as well as trains to the SouthWest back! I don't think Scotland really comes within Liverpool's region...

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The Scottish ones are coming with TPE

AndrewE said:

...but it would be nice to have the Scottish services (Glasgow and Edinburgh) as well as trains to the SouthWest back! I don't think Scotland really comes within Liverpool's region...

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TPE will be providing Liverpool-Glasgow via Carlisle and Liverpool-Edinburgh via Newcastle. Glasgow won't be every hour but I think there will still be more than there were in the days of class 50s and coupling to a Manchester portion at Preston.

cle said:

What's the difference? There are trains to Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield and Newcastle. Clearly there isn't demand for the highest comfort 'inter city' stock except to London.

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Not wishing to start a rolling stock debate, but I would say a 350/1 or /3 has a higher comfort level in Standard than said stock operating to London. A 185 definitely does, as the interior is significantly lower density, though there is the lack-of-seats issue, though stock is on order to deal with this.

SeanM1997 said:

But as the Liverpool to Birmingham International service is fairly local compared to Liverpool/Crewe to London Euston services it would be ideal to attach them onto that....even better would be to put the local stops onto the new Shrewsbury-Birmingham service providing a stopper and a fast in addition to Wales services

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Would make more sense I think to add the local stops into the Crewe to Birmingham via Stoke (which then continues to London for operational reasons) rather than one of the Liverpools - as that is presumably intended as a purely local service.

However I agree that making one of the Liverpools a proper fast (stopping at principal stations only e.g. South Parkway, Runcorn, Hartford maybe, Crewe, Stafford and Wolverhampton only) and adding the smaller, non-inter-city stations onto the other Liverpool (Winsford, Coseley, Smethwick - Penkridge would presumably be covered by the Crewe service) would make sense from the POV of giving Liverpool one proper fast service to Birmingham an hour (and by changing, points south) would be a good idea. Perhaps this could be timed for best XC connectivity from Birmingham to points south?

Not really sure why three trains an hour _off peak_ from Shrewsbury to Birmingham are needed .Peak, yes, but one of the problems of the current railway is over-congestion of the network at off-peak times leading to lower reliability and scheduled waits at signals increasing journey times. If the current service is not adequate capacity-wise why not lengthen it instead to avoid congestion?

The question is, as I said above, would people rather have an hourly fast (and a fairly useless second train), or 2tph which are both medium-speed and therefore both useful, which is roughly how the present service is?

I think people would vote for 2tph, myself. Only above that do I think you get benefits from a split.

Rather than calling at Coseley, or Sandwell and Dudley for that matter, I would rather protect the calls at Smethwick Galton Bridge, as I have found it to give excellent connections into the Kidderminster/Worcester services in 1 direction and Jewelry Quarter/Stratford in the other.

fowler9 said:

Regional Expresses is one way of describing overcrowded Desiros and a few 158's. Ha ha.

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Well the Liverpool will more than likely be worked by the new 5 car Aventra EMUs when they are in operation.