How about combining this new ECML from Skipton with the Carlisle/Morecambe service ?
I have suggested this in another threat only to be met with criticism about the economic argument for LNER although my thoughts were to provide decent length trains upon the S&C.
Potentially it might even be possible to extend these services to Glasgow which is an aspiration of the 'Settle & Carlisle Railway Development Company' and the Friends Group.
London - Leeds - Skipton - Settle - Carlisle? Really?
The problems at Leeds are common to a lot of other places north of Watford and the solution isn't to build a 12 track viaduct costing ££bn.
Too many tiny trains.
London gets the money because the trains are maxed out on length and height so you can only add capacity be removing seats, adding a second deck or digging new tunnels. This simply isn't true in Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and others that are plagued by 2-3 coach micro trains.
Looking east, the off peak pattern is 9tph 4x TPE from York - 2x Newcastle, 1x, Scarborough, 1x Middlesbrough then a fast Hull, slow Selby, 2 more Northerns from York one fast, one slow and 1 XC.
This is not especially high density for a 2 line railway, but already far more than what is needed and not one of is them anything close to 'full length' - does Newcastle - Leeds really need 3tph and a fourth from Middlesbrough? The timetable needs what Gardeners World might call a rejuvenating prune
Agreed - nine trains per hour at the eastern end is OTT - we'd be fine with half a dozen (four to York and a couple to Selby) *if* they were proper lengths.
Instead we increase the frequency (making services less reliable) by throwing more tiny trains onto infrastructure that can cope with longer trains (e.g. Northern recently doubled their Leeds - York frequency through Garforth by turning the Preston - Leeds - York - Leeds - Preston diagrams into Preston - Leeds - York - Leeds - York - Leeds -Preston diagrams (so there are now two short Northern DMUs per hour on that line between Leeds and York, when what we really need is all trains to be at least four coaches).
As we are seeing in/around places like Manchester/ Bradford though, politicians/representatives will always prefer new hourly services with a variety of destinations (which are therefore short services) instead of using resources to increase the length of existing services.
Places like London need additional infrastructure because there are only so many 200m+ long trains you can run on existing lines - places "up north" can generally cope with longer trains but instead we clog up lines with additional tiny ones.
This sounds a bit like the Southern entrance. It cost ££m but gets so little use it scarcely scratches the surface of the issue occuring around the main gateline. Opening the place up in the direction of Boar Lane would be far more effective.
A proper entrance/exit near the eastern footbridge, linking it with the Brewery Tap etc, would be a great way to remove the current bottlenecks (and encourage people away from both the main entrance and the busy western footbridge)
Leeds station doesn't seem like it is at capacity, i think it's just the track layout which makes it so hard for trains to get around eachother and a slight reluctance to use the split platforms. on 8, 9, 15 and 16. That could help with capacity if they called on and utilised the A/B platforms a little bit more. Passengers are happier in a station than sat outside.
Agreed - we should have A/B platforms on all 200m+ platforms.
The track is generally fine, it's the complicated interworking of trains and service patterns, so that the throat has to be empty for a train getting from one side to the other (which we spent large sums of money avoiding at Manchester Piccadilly - the Scarborough to Liverpool service no longer crosses the full throat).
The overall strategy of cross-city services has long been advocated by Leeds CC and WYCA, with a turnback provided at Micklefield. This has now shifted to providing a new station at Thorpe Park, which will provide a similar function as your suggested station(s) at Scholes / Pendas Way. The turnback idea seems to have been dropped, presumably as NPR will provide separate fast and slow lines
Thorpe Park makes a lot of sense - it'd also see commuters in both directions (given what an employment hub it is becoming) - so make more of a difference to roads.
Unfortunately the temptation is to ram even more 2-3 carriage trains down the same bottleneck and hope for the best
Yes (sadly!)
I am sure I saw a proposal related to the Transpennine route upgrade whereby Garforth and East Garforth stations would be replaced by a single four platform (or maybe four track with loops) station sited roughly in between them. There is no space for four tracks through the current Garforth station.
As a regular user of the line, somewhere for fast trains to pass the stoppers would be invaluable when services are running late. Currently stoppers can be held to allow fast trains to get a clear run, sometimes for ten minutes or more but even so fast trains can often crawl from Garforth to Micklefield. One less stop will help too. Furthermore if the Huddersfield to Leeds section is improved presentation times at Leeds ought to be more as per the timetable.
Similar things could be said about other lines in the area with a mix of services such as Leeds to Sheffield via Wakefield Westgate.
I hadn't heard of that but am in favour of it on all major lines into Leeds (shame there wasn't space at Kirkstall for this). Same would be great on the Wakefield Westgate line (especially as it'd mean the Leeds - Wakefield commuters wouldn't crowd onto the "stoppers" if they are overtaken at somewhere like Outwood)
One solution could be for the Blackpool - York express and the future Leeds - Hull service to be routed via Castleford to partially relieve the real pinch-point between Leeds and Micklefield
One problem is the lack of platform space for existing services on the Woodlesford line, so I'm not sure how running Hull services that way will help (given that we need any platform capacity for, e.g. Pontefract services)
If im honest, I actually don't think Leeds to skipton and the Shipley triangle routes are generally that busy, I mean there's always a fair few seats left over even at peak times - so it isn't like everyone is squashed together - like the service in peak times to Lancaster from Leeds, on a 142/144 sometimes.
We shouldn't be running services like the Lancaster one all the way into Leeds
at peak time, if it means a thirty/forty metre DMU taking up a path that an eighty+ metre EMU could be providing