Transpennine Route Upgrade and Electrification updates

td97 · 7 May 2019

59CosG95 said:
Bit odd to stop the Phase 1 OLE at Church Fenton though, not the most useful for Leeds-York services.

Was exactly my thought too. Apart from accelerating southbound from York, it would provide very little journey time improvement or other benefits (presuming power changeover on the move would be permitted with the current ECML infrastructure at Colton Jn. If not, then arrivals into York from the south on electric would be another advantage).

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hwl · 7 May 2019

59CosG95 said:
So, it looks promising that WYCA have got OLE on the cards to some degree...let's hope that more of it comes in Phase 2.
Bit odd to stop the Phase 1 OLE at Church Fenton though, not the most useful for Leeds-York services.

Is it possibly just badly punctuatedand /or worded?
e.g. and via Church Fenton to Colton Jn i.e. they were try to make clear which route to York (i.e. Not via Harrogate). The ~6 mile gap created is a bit odd unless that is an item for early phase 2.

Spartacus · 7 May 2019

59CosG95 said:
And on that note...

7. Mirfield (exc.) - Mirfield East Jct - Thornhill LNW Jct - Ravensthorpe - Dewsbury (inc.); 30m 54ch to 33m 62ch
Major Obstacles: Thornhill LNW Jct (potentially grade-separated)

Neville Hill East Jct to Colton Jct is under the remit of a different principal designer/consultancy to the Huddersfield Line - they have yet to reveal the outcome of whether all of Leeds-York will also be electrified, not just Church Fenton to Colton Jct.

Personally I can't see a massive benefit of grade separation Thornhill LNW Jn if the route's going to be 4 track up until that point, it's a lot of money to spend on removing two conflicts between stoppers and expresses an hour: space is at a real premium west of the junction.

Thinking about it I can see the point in just planning on going as far as Church Fenton, especially if it's under a different contract. I think there's still structures that would need replacing between Church Fenton and Neville Hill Garforth footbridge for one, I suspect). No point in promising something that's out of your hands.

edwin_m · 7 May 2019

Could the gap be because of the bypass route between Leeds and Church Fenton that was being discussed a page or so back?

takno · 7 May 2019

edwin_m said:
Could the gap be because of the bypass route between Leeds and Church Fenton that was being discussed a page or so back?

Not sure that was anything more than a (fairly sensible) bit of forum crayon-work. In any case if you were going to do it you'd still want the existing route electrified for the expresses.

Given what an operationally obvious bit of electrification this has been for the past 20 years without anything ever happening on it, I think I'd believe almost any plan they came up with at all at this stage.

B Box · 8 May 2019

York to Church Fenton only doesn’t seem to have much application.

However, if Hambleton South to West was electrified as part of Leeds – York and Selby (as it presumably would be to provide alternative electric services to Leeds from ECML), it becomes relatively low cost to include the Gascoigne Wood through Sherburn in Elmet to Church Fenton section.

Three obvious benefits would be:

1. Diversionary route for ECML between Hambleton and York.

2. Allows electric freight from proposed development of Gascoigne Wood Coal Shed / Sherburn Trading Estate to/from the north.

3. Electric passenger services from Selby to York via Sherburn in Elmet, Church Fenton and Ulleskelf.

Bantamzen · 8 May 2019

I joined today's webinar on the project, which in the main was just around how the project is managed, scopes of responsibility etc. However towards the end a couple of interesting engineering points were discussed. Its worth noting at this stage that nothing is firmly in or out of scope at this stage, the final designs are still subject to change & consultation. But a few key ideas for the Stalybridge - Leeds section are as follows:

Stalybridge station: This may be redesigned again, with the removal of the current Piccadilly bay platform & rebuilding of Platforms 1-3 & potentially redesigning the eastern track layout to allow 40-50mph running.
Stalybridge - Huddersfield: Electrification is probably not in scope for CP6, but some general speed improvements & preparation for ETCS will be in the design. Not a lot else said about this section, other than the engineering challenges required to wire Standedge is not considered to be great & that could be achieved more easily than other tunnels along the North TP (which was very interesting coming from someone representing one of the engineering contractors to say the least!).
Huddersfield: Potentially looking at a redesign to improve through capacity, possible new through ones from what I could make of the slides, but all subject to quite a bit of public consultation due to the Grade I listed areas of the station.
Huddersfield - Thornhill Junc: The most interesting part, planned four tracking throughout, fully electrified & planning for ETCS, rebuilding / re-siting of Deighton / Mirifeld / Ravensthorpe, with potential for a flyover / flyunder at Thornhill Junc onto the Wakefield line. Southern two tracks will be the fasts for 100-100mph running, northern two tracks for slow lines with up to 75mph.
Ravensthorpe - Leeds: Not a lot of mention other than some track re-working, including at Dewsbury / Morley with the latter possible to be re-sited. Again fully wired & prepared for ETCS throughout.
Leeds-York: These will be handled by separate projects with view to raise capacity potential, especially feeding the North TP.

So not a massive amount of engineering detail, but certainly some interesting thoughts on how the project might start to pan out.

Spod · 8 May 2019

Bantamzen said:
I joined today's webinar on the project, which in the main was just around how the project is managed, scopes of responsibility etc. However towards the end a couple of interesting engineering points were discussed. Its worth noting at this stage that nothing is firmly in or out of scope at this stage, the final designs are still subject to change & consultation. But a few key ideas for the Stalybridge - Leeds section are as follows:

Stalybridge station: This may be redesigned again, with the removal of the current Piccadilly bay platform & rebuilding of Platforms 1-3 & potentially redesigning the eastern track layout to allow 40-50mph running.

Stalybridge - Huddersfield: Electrification is probably not in scope for CP6, but some general speed improvements & preparation for ETCS will be in the design. Not a lot else said about this section, other than the engineering challenges required to wire Standedge is not considered to be great & that could be achieved more easily than other tunnels along the North TP (which was very interesting coming from someone representing one of the engineering contractors to say the least!).

Huddersfield: Potentially looking at a redesign to improve through capacity, possible new through ones from what I could make of the slides, but all subject to quite a bit of public consultation due to the Grade I listed areas of the station.

Huddersfield - Thornhill Junc: The most interesting part, planned four tracking throughout, fully electrified & planning for ETCS, rebuilding / re-siting of Deighton / Mirifeld / Ravensthorpe, with potential for a flyover / flyunder at Thornhill Junc onto the Wakefield line. Southern two tracks will be the fasts for 100-100mph running, northern two tracks for slow lines with up to 75mph.

Ravensthorpe - Leeds: Not a lot of mention other than some track re-working, including at Dewsbury / Morley with the latter possible to be re-sited. Again fully wired & prepared for ETCS throughout.

Leeds-York: These will be handled by separate projects with view to raise capacity potential, especially feeding the North TP.

So not a massive amount of engineering detail, but certainly some interesting thoughts on how the project might start to pan out.

Thanks for that, I watched too but you've saved me summarising! One interesting point was that it's possible with all the possible upgrades to get Manchester - Leeds down to 39.5 minutes, but they settled on 42 (67 to York) as a better balance of spending the budget between speed, capacity and performance (i.e. reliability and punctuality, which is one of the deliverables - I think they said 92.5% less than 5 mins late). Those last 2.5 minutes would be really expensive, and would stop them doing other important stuff. I grabbed some screenshots of the most interesting slides (note these are the current state of thinking but not finalised).
(My first attempt at uploading pictures here, bear with me if I get it wrong).
Stalybridge layout:

Example of tunnel modifications (maybe someone can work out where from the chainage):

Summary of major interventions between Huddersfield and Ravensthorpe:

jonesy3001 · 8 May 2019

Are they not putting up the overheads between guide bridge - stalybridge?
Seems a waste has they have the old kit up from the woodhead days, unless they renew it.

59CosG95 · 8 May 2019

jonesy3001 said:
Are they not putting up the overheads between guide bridge - stalybridge?
Seems a waste has they have the old kit up from the woodhead days, unless they renew it.

It would make sense to electrify that short stretch, it's true. However, the "old kit" from the Woodhead days might require in-situ structural analysis to make sure they're safe to carry modern equipment at higher, varying tensions (IIRC, the Woodhead DC catenary was all fixed-tension).
However, it would make sense from a connectivity perspective (for freight and perhaps passenger services) to then electrify the Guide Bridge - Heaton Norris line; these could come in at a later date to avoid another potential boom-and-bust cycle.

jonesy3001 · 8 May 2019

and in case if there's an accident at the crossing on the ashton line they can divert through guide bridge to stalybridge pant up.
One for the list incase they do electrify the line?

CdBrux · 8 May 2019

On the other hand in case of issue between Stalybridge and Victoria anything that may get diverted via Guide Bridge (i.e. not a shuttle to Victoria or an eventual electric beyond Victoria on the Bolton line) would have to be Bi-mode or Diesel, so what do you gain from electrification of guide bridge to Picc line? Better to spend that money elsewhere I would suggest.

cle · 8 May 2019

You could have electric metro services from Piccadilly to Stalybridge, alongside the Glossop services.

61653 HTAFC · 8 May 2019

59CosG95 said:
It would make sense to electrify that short stretch, it's true. However, the "old kit" from the Woodhead days might require in-situ structural analysis to make sure they're safe to carry modern equipment at higher, varying tensions (IIRC, the Woodhead DC catenary was all fixed-tension).
However, it would make sense from a connectivity perspective (for freight and perhaps passenger services) to then electrify the Guide Bridge - Heaton Norris line; these could come in at a later date to avoid another potential boom-and-bust cycle.

The "old kit" from Woodhead already carries 25kv AC from Ardwick to Guide Bridge. There are a few bare "Woodhead" gantries towards Stalybridge through the sidings, otherwise it'll all be new kit because there isn't any old.

CdBrux · 8 May 2019

cle said:
You could have electric metro services from Piccadilly to Stalybridge, alongside the Glossop services.

Which would therefore have to make their own case for prioritisation of resources above something else!

xotGD · 8 May 2019

If you relocated Deighton station to Bradley, doesn't that really mean you close Deighton and open a new station serving a different area? Claiming 'relocation' sounds like a way to avoid going through a closure process.

It might not be far away, but far enough to inconvenience many of the current users, including occasionally me.

WatcherZero · 8 May 2019

From the image and looking at a map it looks to be just under kilometre and a main road runs between the two points, it wouldn't radically affect the stations catchment, inconveniencing those in Deighton but offset by the others it would benefit.

61653 HTAFC · 8 May 2019

xotGD said:
If you relocated Deighton station to Bradley, doesn't that really mean you close Deighton and open a new station serving a different area? Claiming 'relocation' sounds like a way to avoid going through a closure process.

It might not be far away, but far enough to inconvenience many of the current users, including occasionally me.

WatcherZero said:
From the image and looking at a map it looks to be just under kilometre and a main road runs between the two points, it wouldn't radically affect the stations catchment, inconveniencing those in Deighton but offset by the others it would benefit.

Based solely on the map above and my own knowledge of the area, the relocated station would be somewhere around the Antich factory/outlet. Therefore not "right on the doorstep" of as much housing as the current site but with the space for a modestly sized car park.

From the above track diagram, it appears the loop at Dewsbury is being removed? The loop as-is isn't ideal due to being short, meaning trains being passed have extended dwells. If there were space, starting the loop around where the line crosses the Greenway would solve that, but a third bridge over Huddersfield Road would be too low for large road vehicles. Presumably with platform 1 being built out to the fast line, that would turn a slightly narrow platform into a ridiculously wide one!

Edit: meant to add that removing the loop at Dewsbury does seem to introduce an element of risk, with no overtaking point between the end of the 4-tracking at Ravensthorpe, and the approaches to Leeds. Capacity is effectively halved beyond Ravensthorpe, but the Dewsbury route takes much more than half the traffic. Unless there are plans for an additional loop somewhere further down the line.

Glenn1969 · 8 May 2019

Does 4 through platforms at Huddersfield mean Platform 9 has been greenlit?

61653 HTAFC · 8 May 2019

Glenn1969 said:
Does 4 through platforms at Huddersfield mean Platform 9 has been greenlit?

The diagram posted upthread suggests a new through platform beyond 8, and a Leeds-facing bay on the other side of that. Also appears to have got rid of the current bays 5&6. This strikes me as potentially short-sighted not keeping at least one, but on the bright side maybe it means fewer short trains will be running around Yorkshire!

No idea if anything's been green-lit, but it seems that the cogs are at least starting to turn...

I'd hope that the opportunity is taken to re-number the platforms: if rebuilt to the layout depicted 1&2 stay the same, then 4 becomes 3, 8 becomes 4, with 5 (through) and 6 (bay) in the extension. Those extra platforms might be a bit on the curvy side unless heavy work is undertaken to straighten the alignment through P8. As the island platform buildings are grade-2* listed, that might be another tricky one.

Spartacus · 8 May 2019

After studying it for a while the Ravensthorpe grade separation does make sense they way they've done, it, and perhaps is the only possible way to do it. I would have thought a dive under would be best with the three tracks going underneath near the site of the current station and the Down/Leeds slow coming up roughly where the current station access road is: there's plenty of land to do it, with the station moving to a site potentially below the level of the current running lines to the west of Calder Road. One thing not on there which would be useful and cost very little would be the retention of Mirfield platform 3 for use during disruption or engineering works on the slow lines.

YorkshireBear · 9 May 2019

At Huddersfield It looks as if curent platform use stays same except p4 becomes for Manchester terminators only. The slow lines then head toward the new island platform to North. This keeps the slow trains out of the way of the fast lines completely. Negating need for the short restrictive current p5 & p6. So while no extra platforms it would appear much less conflict and better length platforms.

Regarding loop at dewsbury, if it does go to improve linespeed there then there is a lot of talk of big rebuilds at morley and batley and there could be oppurtunity for loops there.

LM93 · 9 May 2019

Spod said:
Example of tunnel modifications (maybe someone can work out where from the chainage):
View attachment 62677

13100m is 8.1 miles which is Stalybridge tunnel?

deltic08 · 9 May 2019

61653 HTAFC said:
Edit: meant to add that removing the loop at Dewsbury does seem to introduce an element of risk, with no overtaking point between the end of the 4-tracking at Ravensthorpe, and the approaches to Leeds. Capacity is effectively halved beyond Ravensthorpe, but the Dewsbury route takes much more than half the traffic. Unless there are plans for an additional loop somewhere further down the line.

Batley is planned to be four tracked.

matacaster · 9 May 2019

61653 HTAFC said:
The "old kit" from Woodhead already carries 25kv AC from Ardwick to Guide Bridge. There are a few bare "Woodhead" gantries towards Stalybridge through the sidings, otherwise it'll all be new kit because there isn't any old.

Think in 'old kit' days they tended to over-engineer anyway, so unlikely to be a problem.

61653 HTAFC · 9 May 2019

matacaster said:
Think in 'old kit' days they tended to over-engineer anyway, so unlikely to be a problem.

Maybe, though my point was that someone mentioned re-using the old Woodhead kit, but the only old Woodhead kit on the route was already converted to 25kv AC in the late 1980s. My main concern would not be engineering as such, more whether the supply on the Ardwick to Guide Bridge section would cope with an added Stalybridge electric local each hour, plus TPE 802s also drawing current if on diversion.

61653 HTAFC · 9 May 2019

deltic08 said:
Batley is planned to be four tracked.

Do we know the extent of this 4-tracking as yet? If it's just the immediate station area, that has the same issues as the Dewsbury loop. The viaduct is the Western limit either way but if the 4-tracking goes all the way to the vicinity of the Western portal of Morley tunnel that's a big boost in capacity: possibly enough to allow White Rose centre station to open without completely junking performance across the whole of the North!

Spartacus · 9 May 2019

61653 HTAFC said:
Do we know the extent of this 4-tracking as yet? If it's just the immediate station area, that has the same issues as the Dewsbury loop. The viaduct is the Western limit either way but if the 4-tracking goes all the way to the vicinity of the Western portal of Morley tunnel that's a big boost in capacity: possibly enough to allow White Rose centre station to open without completely junking performance across the whole of the North!

I’d imagine it would go almost as far as the box and level crossing. Minimal work would need to be done to have a loop through the station on the Up/Manchester if you sent the loop round the back of the platform but one on the Down/Leeds would have to be after the station (in many ways little different to the current situation at Mirfield, or involve a rebuild.

SideshowBob · 9 May 2019

Appreciate this might be a silly question, but do we actually have a date for this 39-week (rolling?) blockade to start? Just from the point of view of the commute! Or might I be as well asking how long a piece of string is? :lol:

deltic08 · 9 May 2019

Spartacus said:
I’d imagine it would go almost as far as the box and level crossing. Minimal work would need to be done to have a loop through the station on the Up/Manchester if you sent the loop round the back of the platform but one on the Down/Leeds would have to be after the station (in many ways little different to the current situation at Mirfield, or involve a rebuild.

The Leeds bound platform track would be the slow, the Dewsbury bound track would become the Leeds Fast, then two new westbound tracks where the Dewsbury platform is now would become the Fast and Slow with a new westbound platform and I would presume a new viaduct also to take the two new westbound lines.

Four tracks could extend a little bit further towards Leeds than the level crossing and further towards Dewsbury viaduct than Batley viaduct

Transpennine Route Upgrade and Electrification updates

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