Borders Railway at Portobello Jct - slow?

[frvic93]

I'm sure this has been mentioned somewhere else but I honestly can't find where I saw it. Why do trains on the Borders Railway seem to go so slowly through Portobello Junction? They even seem to go slowly just north of Brunstane. Comparing journey times, it seems to take about 7 minutes to get to Musselburgh from Waverley but more like 13-14 minutes to get to Newcraighall, which isn't that much further away. Is it an infrastructure issue?

 

[FuelledByTea]

Just the infrastructure, the speed limit is 15mph for that junction.

 

[TriumphRat]

I'm sure this has been mentioned somewhere else but I honestly can't find where I saw it. Why do trains on the Borders Railway seem to go so slowly through Portobello Junction? They even seem to go slowly just north of Brunstane. Comparing journey times, it seems to take about 7 minutes to get to Musselburgh from Waverley but more like 13-14 minutes to get to Newcraighall, which isn't that much further away. Is it an inf

Yep, it's 15mph over Portobello Jn, 30mph before Brunstane and then 20mph over Niddry South Jn just before Newcraighall.

The stop at Brunstane will also add a few minutes and Borders trains are always cautioned down to Portobello (owing to the PSR) and often stopped to await late running services across the Jn.

So it's PSRs at junctions together with a station stop at Brunstane vs a 90/95mph straight shot to Musselburgh.

 

[Acfb]

It's a single lead junction but it really needs improving and proper double tracking to Newcraighall as well.

The LNER train I was on yesterday evening got held at Portobello junction heading into Edinburgh as the ex Tweedbank service was a few minutes late.

 

[The Puddock]

It's a single lead junction but it really needs improving and proper double tracking to Newcraighall as well.

There was a project looking at changing the junction layout and increasing linespeeds at Portobello Junction back in 2013 in anticipation of Borders opening (but seperate from the Borders and Millerhill EMU depot projects) and it was binned because it was going to cost too much. I’m surprised it hasn’t been dusted off now we’re a decade further on and the performance impact of the very heavy use of this junction is known.

 

[Bill57p9]

It isn‘t a typical single lead junction either as the two tracks towards Niddrie are two separate single lines, one to Niddrie West and the other to Niddrie South Junctions. Following the (re)opening of the Borders Railways and Millerhill EMU depot I am surprised the arrangement to avoid the need for Niddrie North Junction, whilst the south cord of the triangle remains double track, is still considered fit for purpose.

 

[och aye]

There was this article from 2020 of awarding a contract to Arup, but I don't think there has been much news since. I think it was also listed as part of the CP6 enhancements.

Arup wins contract on Portobello Junction Enhancement Project

Network Rail has appointed Arup to deliver engineering services for its planned Portobello Junction Enhancement project in Edinburgh to bolster the reliability of services to the Scottish Borders and beyond.

www.scottishconstructionnow.com

Arup’s work on the project has been valued at about £800,000 but there is a further £23 million worth of work that could be added.

The contract is for multi-disciplinary design services including engineering feasibility studies and engineering assessment of the Portobello project with four further options that could be added.

The work on the junction is the most pressing improvement necessary for the Borders Railway as it is currently a bottleneck that has caused delays to trains since the railway opened in 2015.

Further options being considered include the renewal and remodelling of the Niddrie South Junction, a project valued at £1.5m; improvements at Millerhill, also worth £1.5m, electrification and resignalling of the Edinburgh Suburban Line and work worth £11-15m on the Scotland East to England Connectivity programme.

 

[mcmad]

COVID and the lack of funding have put this and any other capacity enhancements firmly on the back burner.

 

[frvic93]

Interesting replies, thanks. So if the junction issue was sorted out (however unlikely it might be these days), then journey times from TWB would decrease? That would be nice.

 

[waverley47]

Interesting replies, thanks. So if the junction issue was sorted out (however unlikely it might be these days), then journey times from TWB would decrease? That would be nice.

Eh it's not exactly that simple.

Capacity is limited by the single track sections. The capacity is perfectly fine for 2tph in each direction. Any speeding up of journey times will also need to confirm to the same infrastructure, and the same single track sections. If you could speed up the junction, you might shave a minute or two off.

Currently, the section from Portobello Junction to Shawfair is a single track section. The junction itself is single lead, 15mph in both directions, which chews through capacity on the ECML. It's not the biggest issue as it's the first junction adjacent to a terminal, meaning that a Tweedbank can just slot behind a fast in either direction, and so timekeeping is pretty rigid. But it's still twice an hour, in each direction.

Realistically the best option is double tracking the whole lot from Portobello Junction through to Shawfair, and associated trackwork, but that's a huge job. Making the junction double lead doesn't achieve anything with the single track section still there, so you'd need to build a second platform at both Brunstane and Newcraighall, and rejig all the junctions on the triangle. If you did all this, you'd maybe gain another five minutes.

Even just replacing the the junction itself with a faster single lead is a huge job, requiring probably a week or two of the ECML being closed, or at least the Tweedbank line closed for the duration.

It's not easy.

The easiest way to speed up journeys is actually going to be electrification.

 

[Blindtraveler]

The reality is that this should have been added into the borders railway scope but due to the high cost neither transport Scotland or ultimately network Rail or Westminster wanted to touch it with a 10-foot barge pole. If the line is wired and or double tracked even if it's only as far as Newton range or gorbridge then this will have to be done, likewise if reopening south of tweed bank gains any serious movement and ultimately is upgraded to a standard that would make it suitable for freight to Carlisle and beyond, avoiding some of the well-known issues using the wcml


A future Scottish government may also see it as more of a priority and indeed could even start to appear on the very corner of Edinburgh councils radar if they are determined to remove traffic from the roads in the east of Edinburgh and or enforce a citywide low emissions or lower traffic zone as far out as this

 

[Carntyne]

The reality is that this should have been added into the borders railway scope but due to the high cost neither transport Scotland or ultimately network Rail or Westminster wanted to touch it with a 10-foot barge pole. If the line is wired and or double tracked even if it's only as far as Newton range or gorbridge then this will have to be done, likewise if reopening south of tweed bank gains any serious movement and ultimately is upgraded to a standard that would make it suitable for freight to Carlisle and beyond, avoiding some of the well-known issues using the wcml


A future Scottish government may also see it as more of a priority and indeed could even start to appear on the very corner of Edinburgh councils radar if they are determined to remove traffic from the roads in the east of Edinburgh and or enforce a citywide low emissions or lower traffic zone as far out as this

Westminster don't have anything to do with it, it's Transport Scotland who hold the purse strings.

 

[68000]

The enhancement project was binned as the pandemic killed the business case. The interlocking is getting renewed with some new banner repeaters going in to improve sighting on some problematic signals