10.14 Kings Cross - Cambridge is anything faster non-stop city to city?

[theageofthetra]

As I am on it was wondering if there was a faster non stop City to City journey?
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Well clearly not this one- been diverted via Hertford North.

 

[IanXC]

From London to Cambridge? Or from any city to any city?

If the latter Leeds to Wakefield is often booked 11 minutes...

 

[Big Chris]

I think the OP was referring to fastest average speed and I would hazard a guess that there are a few on 125mph railways.

Virgin 16:30 London Euston to Preston
Takes 2 hours for circa 220 miles.

1014 Kings Cross to Cambridge takes 48 minutes for approx 60 miles.

If referring to London To Cambridge the 10:44 beats the 10:14 by two minutes.

 

[D6975]

From London to Cambridge? Or from any city to any city?

If the latter Leeds to Wakefield is often booked 11 minutes...

That's a short journey, not a fast journey.

 

[eastwestdivide]

I think the OP was referring to fastest average speed and I would hazard a guess that there are a few on 125mph railways.

Virgin 16:30 London Euston to Preston
Takes 2 hours for circa 220 miles.

1014 Kings Cross to Cambridge takes 48 minutes for approx 60 miles.

If referring to London To Cambridge the 10:44 beats the 10:14 by two minutes.

58 and 209 miles respectively in my UK timetable, so averages of 72.5mph and 104.5mph respectively.
Over a similar distance the GC 1650 Kings Cross-York does 188.5 miles in 1h50 for an average of 102.8mph.
Years back there was a column in Railway Magazine which occasionally showed the fastest point-to-point average speeds on various routes. There were some heroic timings for Deltics in their final years.

 

[455driver]

There were some heroic timings for Deltics in their final years.

Which didnt have OTMR fitted, the readouts would have been 'interesting' to say the least with a very liberal interpretation of speed limits.

 

[Jonny]

Which didnt have OTMR fitted, the readouts would have been 'interesting' to say the least with a very liberal interpretation of speed limits.

That depends on how the speedometer was calibrated (see http://www.raib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/130916_R162013_Stafford.pdf )

Or, to put it another way, the speedo might have been under-reading by a ^few^ percent, which is how it was back in the day.
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Which begs the question, does the OTMR record the speedometer reading, take a recording from some other source, or both?

 

[trickyvegas]

City to city in the shortest time would be Manchester Victoria to Salford Central in about 3 minutes.

 

[higthomas]

Now, depending on whether you were being strict with only cities, the fastest non-stop runs are either the 20:17 from Grantham to Stevenage, at an average of 111mph, or if we are only using proper cities, it would seem it is the 13:47 from Peterborough to York at an average of 106.8mph.

This info is taken from a very interesting spreadsheet to be found here, produced by the Rail performance society.

There are no 100mph plus average runs on any lines other than the WCML, ECML and HS1.

 

[jopsuk]

Is the 1014 any faster than other off-peak services?

 

[theageofthetra]

I am not sure it just happened to be the one I was on. I was just surprised it was non stop. There aren't that many non stop terminating services between to cities in the UK are there?

 

[STEVIEBOY1]

What about London to Brighton, that's fast, not sure if any non stops now though?

 

[SPADTrap]

The xx:14s are the hourly "Cambridge Expresses" with the xx44 Kings Lynn Via Elys often being first stop Cambridge. The other services are the semi fast xx:53s but the 10:14 would be the quickest at that time, provided it isn't diverted that is!

 

[yorkie]

What about London to Brighton, that's fast, not sure if any non stops now though?

An average of 52 minutes, so not very fast at all. By ECML standards that's really slow.

 

[nuneatonmark]

The bizarre thing I find about the stats from the Rail Performance site is why HS1 trains are not the quickest between two points? They have a higher top speed on a dedicated high speed line? Surely they should be averaging 120-130mph at least?

 

[eastwestdivide]

The HS1 point-to-points are relatively short hops compared to the faster runs on the ECML/WCML, so acceleration/deceleration and any timetable padding would have a disproportionate effect.
They're comparable to point-to-points of a similar distance (sort the spreadsheet by distance, and compare the top averages that way)

 

[JamesRowden]

The HS1 point-to-points are relatively short hops compared to the faster runs on the ECML/WCML, so acceleration/deceleration and any timetable padding would have a disproportionate effect.
They're comparable to point-to-points of a similar distance (sort the spreadsheet by distance, and compare the top averages that way)

From Realtime Trains: the '1J15 0730 Ramsgate and Sandwich to St Pancras International' runs non-stop between Ashford and Stratford and does the 50+11/80 miles in a scheduled time of 28 minutes (which it managed today). This is an average speed of 107.4mph. But of course, Ashford isn't a city.

 

[yorkie]

Given that they're timed for 125mph (but can run at 140mph if delayed to make up some time) and the longest non-stop run is only 50 miles (Stratford-Ashford) and would involve slowing down for the junction to come off HS1, it's not that surprising.

 

[Taunton]

City to city in the shortest time would be Manchester Victoria to Salford Central in about 3 minutes.

Temple (City of Westminster) to Blackfriars (City of London), about 90 seconds on the District Line.

 

[theageofthetra]

Neither terminate or start their journey there.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

From Realtime Trains: the '1J15 0730 Ramsgate and Sandwich to St Pancras International' runs non-stop between Ashford and Stratford and does the 50+11/80 miles in a scheduled time of 28 minutes (which it managed today). This is an average speed of 107.4mph. But of course, Ashford isn't a city.

Eurostar services well exceed these speeds.
London-Paris in 2h16m is 134.6mph.
London-Lille in 1h12m is 121.1mph (all Brussels trains call at Lille).
I think Paris and Lille count as cities.

The Euston-Preston speed should increase a bit from 2017 when the Watford Jn and Norton Bridge speed restrictions have been eliminated.
If Milton Keynes or Warrington get city status that would change the city-city scene quite a bit.
They are both lobbying for it (as is Reading, which might bring GW journeys into play).