I doubt that Skipton will require major remodelling. In the morning rush hour, it has around seven trains an hour leaving towards Leeds/Bradford (some originating from further west) - there are a lot of four platform stations around the network which cope with a lot more. Some resignalling will obviously be necessary when the junction is inserted and this could easily be adapted to allow for two trains to occupy the same platform at the same time for example, allowing greater flexibility.
The most basic connection would join the line towards Carlisle and run it towards P3/P4. If the train is sitting there, no Rhylstone train will be able to proceed anywhere (either off the branch or off the main from Shipley).
The full range of platforms are used and only P2 is a reasonable platform to use for two separate trains. It will not be usable unless another set of points are put in at substantial cost. The best compromise for this would be to run it into the CS when required, but these are additional movements that require staffing and paying for.
So instead you propose a scheme which has absolutely no value at all to settlements such as Foulridge and Kelridge, let alone Earby. Your twenty five million pounds to get the station in Colne a mile closer to the town centre is really looking like money well spent :roll:.
In isolation, yes. But with the application of fly wheel/battery power and with a funded depot (£5 million), 8 trams (£17 million), New platform at Rose Grove (£5 million), new platform at Blackburn (£7 million) and reasonable conversion costs for the installation of 13 recharge points on the Colne - Blackburn route, we are left with a twenty minute frequency service that serves central Colne. Another £10 million??? can supply a heated transport exchange at Rose Grove with direct coaches taking passengers on the motorway to Manchester or the train via Rochdale. So we have £64 million already spent (and don't forget that SELRAP are unlikely to have got it all done yet).
In reality, there is no reason why stations have to be so expensive. A single platform halt can be a lot cheaper than Southend Airport.
Comfort, legal, Passenger information, expectations.
And what exactly do you propose for your tram scheme by way of stops? The Manchester Metrolink for example, involves platforms in the street which presumably, cost the same as platforms anywhere else - unless you are planning to lower the platforms at existing stations on the Colne branch (expensive as I am sure you will find), or are you expecting people to climb up onto your trams on ladders ? (good luck with that with disability legislation nowadays).
I expect to build a platform at Colne Bus Station.
But then again, why even worry about places such as Earby and Foulridge, since your 25 million hasnt even got you out of Colne yet.
With £30 million worth of road and coach improvements between them, they can go travel, which will deliver a lot more than a train that is going to run once an hour and dump them at either Skipton or Burnley. Lovely.
You do know how big these places are don't you?
The fact of the matter really is that a tram system serving the centres of Colne and Barnoldswick would be much more effective for public transport in East Lancs than a heavy rail service to Skipton ever will.
IF, and it is a BIG if, there is such a huge market for travel between Colne and Skipton, while providing a fast public transport link from those settlements in between, the tram option is going to provide much better connectivity and value for money, particularly if LR55 rail is used for street running.
Running fast out of Skipton on the old formation, branching in to Thornton for street running, on to new alignment adjacent the B6252 in to Barnoldswick, B6383 to Salterforth. Back on to the old railway formation to Foulridge, on to street running again down the A56 to Colne town centre with an interchange at the existing Colne railway station.
After Colne, an East Lancashire tram system linking many of the larger settlements to replace the bus services would provide a much better return on investment, taking in via a mixture of new alignment and street running;
Whitewalls Industrial Estate
Barrowford
Brierfield
Reedley
Burnley
Padiham
Altham
Great Harwood
Clayton le Moors
Accrington
Church
Oswaltwistle
Blackburn
It would then not be too great a leap to connect to Manchester Metrolink at Bury via Haslingden.
Either way, for East Lancs, connecting the disparate settlements with a tram system is going to provide much better connectivity and passenger loadings than the exorbitant amount of cash required to get from Colne to Skipton with heavy rail.
I am against a two steel rail solution. A tram is not going to make it any better.
I would love to see how you plan to get the tram out of Colne without rack and pinion.
Why would you assume that there isnt. If you take towns of a similar size to Colne, Skipton etc in a similar proximity to each other, there will always be a demand to travel between them. It is just that in this case that demand has been suppressed or shifted to road because the rail link has been severed. I come back to my point that where these sort of rail links have survived, such as between Ashford and Hastings, or indeed between Appleby and Settle, they are well used.
They are in two separate regions, with much of the traffic travelling a long the corridor going to a range of destinations. Any attempt at trying to put an intensive transport corridor in is doomed to failure because of the wide ranging area that the area covers
My point is that if you look at your proposed section between Burnley and Blackburn, for example, it would be performing a different function from the mainline railway also running between those points. Your system would be taking shorter distance local journeys whilst the mainline railway would carry people further afield. Both Nelson and Colne are quite large settlements which could benefit from the sort of longer distance connections offered by the main line railway, and this is what SELRAP are proposing by increasing connectivity further afield, which brings me to tbtcs point:
This is the reason why I am trying to provide them with the opportunity to travel to a place where they can get better connectivity such as Manchester, Skipton, Burnley and Blackburn.
The Clitheroe - Hellifield would indeed improve connectivity between the Settle/Appleby area and parts of Lancashire (most noteably Clitheroe) so perhaps it is worth considering on its own merits, but we would be back to square 1 as far as connectivity between East Lancs and the Aire valley is concerned. Someone intending to go from Nelson to Skipton, for example, would still have to make a hefty detour South, then West, then North via Clitheroe, then East, which unless they were rail enthusiasts they probably wouldnt. Also, youre missing out on serving the intermediate settlements such as Earby.
There are 3bph performing this role.
Possibly true about the construction costs, although from crossing swords with you on previous occasions Im not sure you recognise the value of regional railway links to start off with.
Perhaps some of the engineering people on here can break down some of the added costs which have been introduced. I cant immediately see any reason why building or running a tram should require so much less spent on health and safety than a non-electrified railway, with the exception of signalling.
They are much lighter than a normal rail vehicle. They can also interact better with other modes of transport such as a footpath. Whilst a 75mph railway might need to look at a footbridge, a 50mph tram can look at a simple crossing (and probably stop).
Easy solution to the problem of the Rylstone stone train.
The wide area between the Down Shipley Main and the Loop line is enough to install an additional loop.
In width yes, but not length if it was to have sufficient overlaps
It is interesting that this thread has got more complicated as time as gone on. To me it is very simple, are the plans of SELRAP practical. It is my opinion that they are, they have been working on them for some time. Are they likely to happen in the near future? Sadly I feel not that likely. For some reason rail reopenings in England rarely happen compared to Wales and Scotland, for heavens sake even in western Ireland they are reopening a railway.
As far as the suggestion that the route is used for a tram link, is about as practical as the Cambridge Busway, it is an answer to the wrong question. The idea that the route between Clitheroe & Hellifield should be reopened for passenger trains is a good one, but basically of no benefit to passengers from East lancashire to West Yorkshire. I know that the Copy Pit route is open, but again that is no benefit for those passengers who wish to get to the Aire Valley towns. Only the reopening of the Colne to Skipton route does those things.
How many are there? Are some people trying to fit an area to the transport project rather than vice versa?
Again considering the trams, anyone who has tried to drive though Colne will know, there is no space for them execpt if you use the old rail route, which defeats the idea that sending them through the various town centres. Which if anybody has ever driven through, Brierfield, Nelson, Colne & Earby, will tell you, a tram is a none starter, unless you keep it on the old rail route. If that happens, what we get is an isolated tram route, which means that anyone travelling from East Lancashire to the Aire Valley, will have to change from rail to tram in Colne and back to rail at Skipton. Again a disincentive to those who would use this route.
Sadly, I am of the opinion that if they dont reopen the rail line, it is a complete waste of time putting in a tram line.
Only if rail is continued on the Colne branch, which it would lose if a tram line was put in. Anyone travelling in the area under my plans would have a number of options for getting to the Aire Valley from Colne with an intensive Coach service across the hills to Keighley and Skipton, providing a direct and comfortable service. They can then change to tram or continue by coach to Rose Grove where trains, trams and coaches will be waiting for them to access the rest of the North West.
This thread has got very complex, and above my tech-know-how to respond to at length, but 2 quick points.
Remember SELRAP is a campaign group, and as far as I am aware, and of course things may have changed since I was involved, it is campaigning for the line to be re-opened as part of the national network, not to tun trains itself. The poster SELRAP hints that a major announcement is expected in the next few months, that apart, the line, and associated works such as improving Colne-Burnley and north of Bolton (if not included in the Manchester Hub) would be very largely funded as part of Network Rail's settlement in the appropriate control period... not from council tax as someone has suggested, although contributions could come from the counties' budgets and developers, and many other sources. The East-West rail project is a reasonable model.
On electrification, even if money were to fall from heaven right now, it will take some years before the line is built - 2 years to get the Act through parliament to start with. As time passes, so acquiring new diesel units will become even harder for the DfT (the line may not have brand new trains, but units will have to be found from somewhere and new ones bought for someone), and thus the emphasis will be on more and more electrification. So to suggest the line is electrified from Day 1 is probably both the most cost-effective and green solution. And, again as an example, extending the Leeds/Bradford-Skipton electrics to Colne etc is probably the best use of capacity in the Aire Valley.
Oh yeah course, shaft the bill on to Network Rail. £3.25 million per mile for electrification my good sir. Mere pennines, just mere pennies. In the end, we all pay anyway
Finally, also remember that SELRAP's reports have been written by professional consultancy firms (except the very first preliminary look see), and while they can be debated and dissected, they do have some weight behind them. The costings and engineering feasibility are not plucked from thin air!!
Halcrow (another professional rail consultancy) clearly stated in the mid nineties that the railway industry would be in profit by 2005. Professional indeed if the figures for construction (quite an important part of this project if I may say) can be pulled apart from someone who knows how to negotiate the area and a Spons.
