East Midlands franchise prospectus

[thenorthern]

Also looking at East Midlands Trains its important to remember that they are the main local suburban operator in Stoke-on-Trent which is more North West than East Midlands but like the East Midlands cities there is one main station and two small stations which are served hourly by a single coach train on part of a semi rural service.

Realistically Cheshire East, Staffordshire County Council and Stoke-on-Trent City Council should should be pushing for better services within the area. However the main councils consulted for the franchise are East Midlands ones and Sheffield City Council not ones in the West Midlands and North West.

And the things are in a right state. They seriously need a full refurb.

Totally agree I was on a Class 153 by London Midland a couple of weeks ago and it wasn't the nicest train by any standard but it had much better annoucements and on train information boards.

 

[7griffinjack]

Sheffield Urban Area is much bigger than Nottingham Urban area

Incorrect. Nottinghams urban area is larger as defined by the Office for National Statistics.

 

[thenorthern]

Incorrect. Nottinghams urban area is larger as defined by the Office for National Statistics.

Indeed you are right I stand corrected.

 

[glbotu]

The actually useful number that needs to be used for transport planning purposes, is Greater Metropolitan Area, because that's the area that people will travel from to use the economic assets of your city (like a main railway station). By that definition, Sheffield is a "little" bigger. However, it is not bigger by enough to justify some preferential treatment when it comes to planning its transport.

 

[thenorthern]

The actually useful number that needs to be used for transport planning purposes, is Greater Metropolitan Area, because that's the area that people will travel from to use the economic assets of your city (like a main railway station). By that definition, Sheffield is a "little" bigger. However, it is not bigger by enough to justify some preferential treatment when it comes to planning its transport.

I think the fact that having the South Yorkshire PTE helps a lot as it if you think about it they set the fare and have some power in setting service levels. With the East Midlands cities on the other hand they are all unitary authorities surrounded by two tier counties which don't work together very well.

 

[ashworth]

Those who live in the large urban PTE areas often don't realise how lucky they are with their local ticketing that can include all forms of public transport within large areas. I think that is one of the main differences between Sheffield and the East Midlands. Sheffield is part of the wider South Yorkshire PTE area.

Nottingham is regularly praised for its public transport and how forward looking it is regarding the integration of its buses and trams and reasonable fares with the Robin Hood Card. However, things are not so good once you get outside the city boundary or those areas included within the city for ticketing purposes. In the County of Nottinghamshire there are no multi operator tickets. Even short journeys involving more than one operator can cost a fortune. In the Mansfield and Central Notts area there are two major bus operators in Trent Barton and Stagecoach but there are no tickets valid on both operators buses or any integration with the Robin Hood Line.

This just shows one major difference between the East Midlands and South Yorkshire.

 

[Philip Elliott]

The actually useful number that needs to be used for transport planning purposes, is Greater Metropolitan Area, because that's the area that people will travel from to use the economic assets of your city (like a main railway station). By that definition, Sheffield is a "little" bigger. However, it is not bigger by enough to justify some preferential treatment when it comes to planning its transport.

That wiki article is utter tosh. There is no Nottingham metropolitan listed but a "Nottingham-Derby". The figure for Leicester includes the whole county.... because the Vale of Belvior is sooo metropolitan

 

[Deerfold]

Those who live in the large urban PTE areas often don't realise how lucky they are with their local ticketing that can include all forms of public transport within large areas. I think that is one of the main differences between Sheffield and the East Midlands. Sheffield is part of the wider South Yorkshire PTE area.

Nottingham is regularly praised for its public transport and how forward looking it is regarding the integration of its buses and trams and reasonable fares with the Robin Hood Card. However, things are not so good once you get outside the city boundary or those areas included within the city for ticketing purposes. In the County of Nottinghamshire there are no multi operator tickets. Even short journeys involving more than one operator can cost a fortune. In the Mansfield and Central Notts area there are two major bus operators in Trent Barton and Stagecoach but there are no tickets valid on both operators buses or any integration with the Robin Hood Line.

This just shows one major difference between the East Midlands and South Yorkshire.

Although I'd agree South Yorkshire has it better, Mansfield PlusBus is one of the more impressive examples and allows travel on either operator to the Robin Hood Line for some distance.

 

[ashworth]

Although I'd agree South Yorkshire has it better, Mansfield PlusBus is one of the more impressive examples and allows travel on either operator to the Robin Hood Line for some distance.

Plusbus for most areas are very good value but compared to integrated multi operator bus and train tickets in PTE areas very inflexible. You can only use a Plusbus ticket if you purchase it with a rail ticket and is not very practical for on the day travel without buying your train ticket in advance. You cannot get on a bus in the Mansfield and buy one like you can The South Yorkshire PTE Day Ticket.

 

[anti-pacer]

Incorrect. Nottinghams urban area is larger as defined by the Office for National Statistics.

I'll say it again... Nottingham Urban Area includes towns that are not even in Nottinghamshire let alone its urban area. I don't care what the ONS says, Ripley, Heanor, Eastwood, Hucknall, Ilkeston and Long Eaton are NOT part of Nottingham.

Sheffield's urban area includes Rotherham which is ridiculous. The population of Sheffield City is larger than Nottingham City and associated suburbs (i.e. Arnold, Beeston, Carlton, Stapleford, and West Bridgford - all of which fall under other councils but are still suburbs of Nottingham).

Sheffield City Council covers countryside as well as the whole city. Stocksbridge in my opinion is a separate town and not to be included in the city population for Sheffield, in exactly the same way that Otley and Wetherby should not be included in the population for Leeds.

 

[tbtc]

Given the relatively poor line speed profiles compared with ECML and WCML, I believe the fastest possible London journey times for Derby, Nottingham and (until HS2 phase 2) Sheffield are of primary importance. The most logical timetable would have a fast for Sheffield leaving just before a semi for Nottingham, vice versa half an hour later with the Corbys probably midway between those pairs to fit with the 15min grid on Thameslink. I'd have the fasts non-stop to Leicester, the semis calling at Parkway, Kettering, and Market Harborough, and the Corbys calling at Parkway, Luton, Bedford, Wellingborough and Kettering. This should mean the Corby would be overtaken by the fast somewhere south of Kettering and arrive there just ahead of the next semi, providing connections from Luton and Bedford northwards.

I like the idea, but if you want to have one "fast" Nottingham service per hour (i.e. non stop south of Leicester) and one "fast" Sheffield service per hour then that presumably means having the "slow" services leaving London just a few minutes after the fast ones (which was the case in the Turbostar days).

At least at the moment we have something closer to half hourly on both corridors - albeit not exactly every fifteen minutes from Leicester to London (it just means that Nottingham has two services per hour that stop south of Leicester whilst Sheffield has two non-stop services).

I don't know if there's any easy answer here - presumably it'd be too negative to try to smooth the timetables out so that a "fast" service from London to Leicester becomes a "slow" service north of Leicester (serving Beeston or Long Eaton) whilst a "slow" service from London to Leicester becomes a "fast" service north of Leicester - so that all services from London to Nottingham (and from London to Sheffield) took roughly the same time- as a significant enough percentage of people are doing the "end to end" journeys that we need to keep competitively fast. But then the alternative is to have such a big difference between the "fast" and "slow" services that they end up arriving in London within a few minutes of each other.

In your example ("The most logical timetable would have a fast for Sheffield leaving just before a semi for Nottingham, vice versa half an hour later") then the "semi fast" Nottingham service would have been almost caught up by the "fast" Nottingham service by the time it got to Leicester - but leaving the "semi fast" to still call at Loughborough and Beeston, so the two trains may be providing something more like a 10/50 gap by the time they've arrived into Nottingham.

Sheffield proper has six stations with regular services between many of them and a tram network with 3 lines and 48 stations.

Nottingham has two stations with a tramway that has two lines and 50 stations

This is the problem with any arguments about Nottingham - the selective quoting that affects stats massively.

So, for Sheffield, you are counting:

• Sheffield Station (call it "Midland" if you want to sound like a purist, of course)
• Meadowhall (a station for the shopping centre, rather than a suburban one)
• Chapletown (seven and a half miles out of town, one of the few stations to get fewer services today than twenty years ago - down from three trains per hour to two trains per hour)
• Darnall (hourly service)
• Woodhouse (hourly service)
• Dore (generally just a bi-hourly service during the week - generally hourly at the weekend)

...i.e. no suburban stations with a "turn up and go" frequency.

Using the distance from Sheffield to Chapletown as a benchmark then around Nottingham Station you've got Bulwell, Hucknall, Beeston, Attenborough, Long Eaton, Carlton, Burton Joyce, Lowdham... so a lot more than just three stations in the area. But the tightly drawn boundaries around the city mean that these conveniently don't count in such comparisons as they are "Nottinghamshire" (despite being closer to central Nottingham than some suburban Sheffield stations are). Hence Nottingham is both bigger than Sheffield and has significantly fewer stations, depending on how you want to play it.

 

[thenorthern]

This is the problem with any arguments about Nottingham - the selective quoting that affects stats massively.

So, for Sheffield, you are counting:

• Sheffield Station (call it "Midland" if you want to sound like a purist, of course)
• Meadowhall (a station for the shopping centre, rather than a suburban one)
• Chapletown (seven and a half miles out of town, one of the few stations to get fewer services today than twenty years ago - down from three trains per hour to two trains per hour)
• Darnall (hourly service)
• Woodhouse (hourly service)
• Dore (generally just a bi-hourly service during the week - generally hourly at the weekend)

...i.e. no suburban stations with a "turn up and go" frequency.

Using the distance from Sheffield to Chapletown as a benchmark then around Nottingham Station you've got Bulwell, Hucknall, Beeston, Attenborough, Long Eaton, Carlton, Burton Joyce, Lowdham... so a lot more than just three stations in the area. But the tightly drawn boundaries around the city mean that these conveniently don't count in such comparisons as they are "Nottinghamshire" (despite being closer to central Nottingham than some suburban Sheffield stations are). Hence Nottingham is both bigger than Sheffield and has significantly fewer stations, depending on how you want to play it.

With Nottingham however within Nottingham City Council area there is only Nottingham and Bulwell. The rest of the stations are in Nottinghamshire and because there is no Nottingham-Nottinghamshire PTE the city council and the county council don't work together very well in coordinating transport.

 

[7griffinjack]

I'll say it again... Nottingham Urban Area includes towns that are not even in Nottinghamshire let alone its urban area. I don't care what the ONS says, Ripley, Heanor, Eastwood, Hucknall, Ilkeston and Long Eaton are NOT part of Nottingham.

Sheffield's urban area includes Rotherham which is ridiculous. The population of Sheffield City is larger than Nottingham City and associated suburbs (i.e. Arnold, Beeston, Carlton, Stapleford, and West Bridgford - all of which fall under other councils but are still suburbs of Nottingham).

Sheffield City Council covers countryside as well as the whole city. Stocksbridge in my opinion is a separate town and not to be included in the city population for Sheffield, in exactly the same way that Otley and Wetherby should not be included in the population for Leeds.

At no point have I said that places such as Heanor and Hucknall are part of Nottingham, because they are not. They are a part of the Nottingham urban area though whether you like it or not. I think you need to take a look at what an urban area constitutes. County boundaries are irrelevant.

Rotherham being included in Sheffield's urban area isn't ridiculous at all, it's just a fact that there is a continuous built up urban area between the two settlements, which means that they become part of a the same urban area.

I am fully aware that the population of Sheffield city is larger than that of Nottingham city but as I have said (on numerous occasions), invisible local authority boundaries mean nothing when it comes to people deciding which rail stations to use (relevant to this topic).

I did previously say that many places in Sheffield city, such as the many outlying villages, are not part of the urban area..

I fully understand that Sheffield's city population is larger than that of the city of Nottingham but Nottingham's urban area is slightly larger. That is a fact.

 

[anti-pacer]

At no point have I said that places such as Heanor and Hucknall are part of Nottingham, because they are not. They are a part of the Nottingham urban area though whether you like it or not. I think you need to take a look at what an urban area constitutes. County boundaries are irrelevant.

Rotherham being included in Sheffield's urban area isn't ridiculous at all, it's just a fact that there is a continuous built up urban area between the two settlements, which means that they become part of a the same urban area.

I am fully aware that the population of Sheffield city is larger than that of Nottingham city but as I have said (on numerous occasions), invisible local authority boundaries mean nothing when it comes to people deciding which rail stations to use (relevant to this topic).

I did previously say that many places in Sheffield city, such as the many outlying villages, are not part of the urban area..

I fully understand that Sheffield's city population is larger than that of the city of Nottingham but Nottingham's urban area is slightly larger. That is a fact.

So if we're going to include places like Ripley in Nottingham's urban area, let's include Barnsley and Chesterfield in Sheffield's.

These urban areas have no real meaning. I doubt if anyone in Heanor for example has even heard of the Nottingham Urban Area.

 

[glbotu]

That wiki article is utter tosh. There is no Nottingham metropolitan listed but a "Nottingham-Derby". The figure for Leicester includes the whole county.... because the Vale of Belvior is sooo metropolitan

It's not about whether the area itself is "metropolitan" it's where the primary economic activity of the area concerned exists. If the point of the discussion is to acccurately define what a town or city is, then no, this is not a useful definition.

If the point of the discussion is to figure out what railway service to provide certain areas, then it is a useful figure, because it gives an accurate representation of who will use the "main" railway station. Now, you need to look at some caveats. For example, the "Sheffield" metropolitan area includes Doncaster, the Nottingham one includes Derby, but it's more useful than the "urban area", which is just the limit of the built up area, because people from nearby towns will drive to main stations to get to London, even at the preference of their own railway stations (like, say, Dore). Even then, if you're using it to determine what service the railway needs to have, then someone in Barnsley will still get a local service and change at Sheffield to get to London.

Realistically, what you want is a "main station catchment area" or "service type catchment area", but that doesn't exist, so you have to look at specific cases. In many situations, I'd argue that Sheffield, by virtue of being better connected by rail (to places like Rotherham, Swinton, Barnsley etc), requires a better London service, because people from those areas are more likely to get the train than those from Hucknall, Carlton and Radcliffe.

 

[sheff1]

because people from nearby towns will drive to main stations to get to London, even at the preference of their own railway stations (like, say, Dore).

Many people from the affluent south west Sheffield areas drive to Chesterfield if they are catching the train to London. Judging by the large numbers who use the peak time fasts between Dore & Totley and Manchester, I expect a direct service from reopened main line platforms at D&T to London would be very popular indeed.

 

[43074]

I like the idea, but if you want to have one "fast" Nottingham service per hour (i.e. non stop south of Leicester) and one "fast" Sheffield service per hour then that presumably means having the "slow" services leaving London just a few minutes after the fast ones (which was the case in the Turbostar days).

At least at the moment we have something closer to half hourly on both corridors - albeit not exactly every fifteen minutes from Leicester to London (it just means that Nottingham has two services per hour that stop south of Leicester whilst Sheffield has two non-stop services).

I don't know if there's any easy answer here - presumably it'd be too negative to try to smooth the timetables out so that a "fast" service from London to Leicester becomes a "slow" service north of Leicester (serving Beeston or Long Eaton) whilst a "slow" service from London to Leicester becomes a "fast" service north of Leicester - so that all services from London to Nottingham (and from London to Sheffield) took roughly the same time- as a significant enough percentage of people are doing the "end to end" journeys that we need to keep competitively fast. But then the alternative is to have such a big difference between the "fast" and "slow" services that they end up arriving in London within a few minutes of each other.

I'd agree, I don't think there is an easy answer at all - I'd argue the best way of doing things on the MML would be to have overtaking of slow* services by faster trains at Leicester - so provide 2tph non-stop and 2tph slow South of Leicester so that those stations which need and justify fast services (Leicester, Derby, Nottingham, Sheffield) get fast services whilst connectivity from places like Wellingborough, Kettering & Market Harborough to the North is good and equally passengers from places like Long Eaton & Loughborough can have reasonably fast journeys to London with a change at Leicester - basically the MML timetable between 1999 and 2003.

The fly in the ointment here is Corby I think - spending money on doubling and electrifying the Corby branch is all very well, but then running a half hourly slow service to Leicester doesn't make much sense as it would leave Corby with some sort of shuttle, which after all that investment would be wasteful. Therefore it makes sense to have services from Sheffield & Nottingham running non-stop South of Kettering, but the difference between the non-stop and semi-fast services from Leicester becomes negligible, so you might as well have 2 reasonably spaced services with different calling patterns - e.g. a departure at xx28 calling at Kettering, Market Harborough, Leicester, Loughborough and Nottingham, the other at xx58 calling at Leicester, Loughborough, East Midlands Parkway, Beeston and Nottingham, both of which would take roughly 1 hr 35 mins with a 222...

* When I mention slow services, I mean those which call at Luton Airport or Luton, Bedford and all stations to Leicester.

 

[RichmondCommu]

Many people from the affluent south west Sheffield areas drive to Chesterfield if they are catching the train to London. Judging by the large numbers who use the peak time fasts between Dore & Totley and Manchester, I expect a direct service from reopened main line platforms at D&T to London would be very popular indeed.

Are there any plans to reinstate the platforms at Dore? I never understood why they were removed in the first place. Just a thought but is there room in the timetable for an additional station stop at Dore? Just asking that's all

 

[YorkshireBear]

Are there any plans to reinstate the platforms at Dore? I never understood why they were removed in the first place. Just a thought but is there room in the timetable for an additional station stop at Dore? Just asking that's all

Was meant to be part of Northern hub but appears to have been quietly dropped....

 

[dosxuk]

Was meant to be part of Northern hub but appears to have been quietly dropped....

I thought that was only the second platform on the lines to Manchester allowing Dore curve to be redoubled, not on the mainline to Chesterfield?

 

[lejog]

So if we're going to include places like Ripley in Nottingham's urban area, let's include Barnsley and Chesterfield in Sheffield's.

These urban areas have no real meaning. I doubt if anyone in Heanor for example has even heard of the Nottingham Urban Area.

They have far more meaning and validity when used in economic planning than any totally meaningless figures based on arbitrary historical council boundaries.

 

[edwin_m]

In your example ("The most logical timetable would have a fast for Sheffield leaving just before a semi for Nottingham, vice versa half an hour later") then the "semi fast" Nottingham service would have been almost caught up by the "fast" Nottingham service by the time it got to Leicester - but leaving the "semi fast" to still call at Loughborough and Beeston, so the two trains may be providing something more like a 10/50 gap by the time they've arrived into Nottingham.

Journey time London to Nottingham by the faster service would be 90min or a bit less, assuming it omitted the Market Harborough call and was speeded up a bit by new traction. The Nottingham semis are 1hr 50min now and would get a bit faster with removal of Bedford and Wellingborough stops. So a semi leaving London at the minimum 3min behind the Sheffield fast would still be 15min or so ahead at Leicester and get to Nottingham around 10min ahead of the following fast, assuming stops north of Leicester roughly as today. But at present it leaves London under 15min behind the Nottingham fast, so not much different - as you say there is no easy answer to this. I don't think many people use the Nottingham semi for end-to-end journeys today anyway, as it is so much slower.

 

[sheff1]

Are there any plans to reinstate the platforms at Dore? I never understood why they were removed in the first place. Just a thought but is there room in the timetable for an additional station stop at Dore? Just asking that's all

As another poster has said, it was mooted but now seems to have been quietly dropped. There would certainly be room northbound as pretty often the train is held a couple of minutes at the signal there anyway to allow trains to pass to/from the Totley Tunnel direction.

 

[thenorthern]

I know when the last franchise round came up one of the options that East Midlands Trains didn't take up was to re-introduce the Project Rio service that ran from Manchester to London via Leicester during West Coast Main Line rebuilding. I know its unlikely that the new franchise holder will choose to introduce more Manchester services I wouldn't say its impossible.

 

[YorkshireBear]

I thought that was only the second platform on the lines to Manchester allowing Dore curve to be redoubled, not on the mainline to Chesterfield?

Sorry yes that has been quietly dropped.... Mainline platforms are not planned.

 

[unlevel42]

I did previously say that many places in Sheffield city, such as the many outlying villages, are not part of the urban area..

You originally said that "...There's not much point in using the metropolitan borough population's as a third of Sheffield's lies within the peak district so incorporates villages miles out..."

Again please tell where these "many outlying villages" are and what percentage you think they are of the population of Sheffield.
High and Low Bradfield are the only Sheffield settlements in the Peak District and have less than 200 people between them.


If these mythical villages are in the big area between the urban Sheffield and its NW, W and SW with the National Park boundaries then think of moorland above 1000', mostly catchment for reservoirs and/or national Park and totally unsuitable for housing.
There are no villages to the S, E and NE.

The upper Don valley up towards Stocksbridge is gradually being settled as the valley floor industries close. The valley sides are too steep or in Barnsley so gaps will remain between Middlewood and Oughtibridge 0.5miles and Wharncliffe and Deepcar 1.5 miles of which a mile is a tip.

The town of Stocksbridge was allocated to Sheffield on the demise of the West Riding-Its closer to Barnsley and even closer to Penistone station. Meadowhall is the same distance as Sheffield.
Which station do they use for London?

 

[thenorthern]

How does Rutland council come into this as only 7 East Midlands Trains per day call at Oakham but at the same time they manage Oakham station.

If you asked me though CrossCountry only stations should be managed by CrossCountry as all of them are within a similar area and it would make more sense.

 

[Deerfold]

How does Rutland council come into this as only 7 East Midlands Trains per day call at Oakham but at the same time they manage Oakham station.

If you asked me though CrossCountry only stations should be managed by CrossCountry as all of them are within a similar area and it would make more sense.

Though then you'd need to set up back office support and supply chains which could be quite expensive for just a handful of stations.

 

[edwin_m]

Though then you'd need to set up back office support and supply chains which could be quite expensive for just a handful of stations.

Stamford and Water Orton are probably the widest spaced, 70 miles and 100min drive for the man in the van with the mop and bucket according to Google. Doesn't seem too cost-effective for around ten stations spread over that sort of distance.

 

[Deerfold]

Stamford and Water Orton are probably the widest spaced, 70 miles and 100m drive for the man in the van with the mop and bucket according to Google. Doesn't seem too cost-effective for around ten stations spread over that sort of distance.

And having backup staff in case of illness would be trickier - so more chance of closed ticket offices.