Clitheroe to Hellifield northern Dalesrail info needed.

I assume this has been discussed before; cant find any link so Admin move if you like...

As usual, Northern are running a Sundays only Blackpool N to Carlisle via the S&C. under the name of Dalesrail.I would like to know why it cant be a regular daily return passenger service between Clitheroe and Hellifield,the track must be in good condition to be used by Dalesrail, specials and freight.
Is it down to finance,something in franchise agreement, getting people to run the service, or lack of rolling stock? Surely Northern would have spare DMUs when new electrics replace diesels in use by Northern. Could not services to Clitheroe be extnded to Hellifield to terminate or run north to connect with servces?Im not sure whether Northern still has use of class 37s (that were used on Cumbrian coast )but it seems to be a loco 37 hauled service could be an attraction if only at weekends.

There is a general shortage of DMU's and I assume they don't think passenger numbers/revenue would justify it.

Logistically where would you start and end such a service? (Crayon time...)

As enthusiasts, it's something we'd all like, but realistically Northern have other priorities that need dealing with first.

It's not going to be profitable, so subsidy would need to be agreed for it, probably from Lancashire County Council, who like most Councils are not exactly rolling in it, and if they had some funds would probably be better spending it on reinstating a withdrawn subsidised bus route.

DalesRail is a bit different, as being a busy excursion train it probably is profitable in itself (a bit of a pseudo-charter). What I don't entirely get is the "winter DalesRail" which is a Preston-Hellifield service and when I've used it carried fresh air so must be costing someone money.

I'm sure there is a logical explanation for this, but what would be wrong with simply extending Clitheroe terminators to Hellifield? Yes, possibly one extra diagram (or possibly nothing at all if creatively interworked) but surely it is worth it to avoid the silly situation where a journey like Blackburn to Skipton is massively circuitous, except on summer Sundays . I can't imagine that Hellifield is so busy, either, that it would be impossible to have an hourly service turn around there.

It would be good for connectivity. That said, passengers changing from an extended service at Hellifield would likely find their S&C service already very busy, so they would need to eliminate most of the 2 carriage workings to make it worthwhile.

ForTheLoveOf said:

I'm sure there is a logical explanation for this, but what would be wrong with simply extending Clitheroe terminators to Hellifield? Yes, possibly one extra diagram (or possibly nothing at all if creatively interworked) but surely it is worth it to avoid the silly situation where a journey like Blackburn to Skipton is massively circuitous, except on summer Sundays . I can't imagine that Hellifield is so busy, either, that it would be impossible to have an hourly service turn around there.

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Precisely the problem - an extra diagram...which costs money almost certainly not justified by the number of potential passengers (Blackburn to Skipton etc not being huge flows and being well-served by roads).

Can anyone comment on the operational feasibility of terminating and reversing at Hellifield on a regular basis?

To me, even if it's possible it would seem a strange place to terminate. It would possibly make sense if you look at it from a point of view of minimising the number of DMU's required, but as a service it's a bit strange as it doesn't have the best service for onward journeys. So it would make more sense to do one of the folllowing:

1) run from (Manchester/Blackburn or wherever) Clitheroe-Hellifield-Skipton, to provide a meaningful journey opportunity to an actual destination, which has a good train service for onward journeys and has the added benefit of potentially improving the service for Gargrave too. Skipton is also the base for train crew and has stabling facilties.
2) run through to Settle, again it's an actual destination. But, there's nowhere to turn around so the train would have to continue to Blea Moor, then if you're going to do that you may as well continue to Appleby. But if you're going to do that you may as well continue to Carlisle, again it's an actual destination. However, it also has the railway logistics required to support a train service and you could offer cheap tickets to abstract revenue from the WCML for non-time critical travellers at the same time as improving journey opportunities.

...but it all comes back to the lack of DMU's and the economics which probably don't stack up.

Ianno87 said:

Precisely the problem - an extra diagram...which costs money almost certainly not justified by the number of potential passengers (Blackburn to Skipton etc not being huge flows and being well-served by roads).

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Though where is the overcrowding found? If it's north of Hellifield (e.g. due to coach tours), portion working through to Carlisle might not actually be a bad plan. (Really, commuters should be on the Skipton EMUs).

Iskra said:

1) run from (Manchester/Blackburn or wherever) Clitheroe-Hellifield-Skipton, to provide a meaningful journey opportunity to an actual destination, which has a good train service for onward journeys and has the added benefit of potentially improving the service for Gargrave too. Skipton is also the base for train crew and has stabling facilties.

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If you were going to go that far, I'd have thought it would be sensible to continue on to Leeds. There'd then be a new direct train to Manchester for people from stations between Leeds and Hellifield. Based on timings of existing services it'd take about 2 hours from Skipton to Manchester, so reasonably competitive with going via Leeds, but less competitive the nearer you get to Leeds.

Bletchleyite said:

Though where is the overcrowding found? If it's north of Hellifield (e.g. due to coach tours), portion working through to Carlisle might not actually be a bad plan. (Really, commuters should be on the Skipton EMUs).

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That sort of crowding is unlikely to be an all day thing. If you had an extra unit, you'd probably use it to extend a Clitheroe train pair onward to/from Carlisle each way as a tactical extra train at a certain time of day out and back. A bit like the Sunday Dalesrail!

ForTheLoveOf said:

If you were going to go that far, I'd have thought it would be sensible to continue on to Leeds. There'd then be a new direct train to Manchester for people from stations between Leeds and Hellifield. Based on timings of existing services it'd take about 2 hours from Skipton to Manchester, so reasonably competitive with going via Leeds, but less competitive the nearer you get to Leeds.

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It can be driven (in decent traffic) in 75 minutes - or less to reach a Greater Manchester Park and Ride.

2 hours is nowhere near good enough to stimulate demand for travel by rail - 90 minutes tops would be the magic figure.

TOCs have no incentive to develop new services. At the end of the franchise another operator comes along and scoops up the benefit. It's one of the barmier aspects of the current franchising system.
You really need a County Council, or equivalent, to come up with the initiative, and then bankroll the idea for a while.

Bovverboy said:

TOCs have no incentive to develop new services. At the end of the franchise another operator comes along and scoops up the benefit. It's one of the barmier aspects of the current franchising system.
You really need a County Council, or equivalent, to come up with the initiative, and then bankroll the idea for a while.

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I'd say more "those services that had potential to be commercially viable and spare capacity to implement" have by and large already been done over the last 20-odd years, e.g.

4tph Midland Main Line (now 5tph)
Norwich-Cambridge
Stansted Express 4tph
LM 110mph
Etc.