(Entirely) new railway lines

[southern442]

There's been a thread on here lately, with much debate, about how most of the Beeching closures were justified, at least at the time. One of the more interesting propositions raised on that thread is that rather than focusing entirely on reopening old railway lines, it might be more sensible to also construct entirely new ones as it's less of a big deal to do so today (i.e. the skills and technology are much more readily available), and plus many old railway lines went near to, but not close enough to, the places they were intended to serve.

So with that said, my question is: Where in this country do we think that entirely new lines, rather than simple reopenings, are justified?
Perhaps a good start would be Skelmersdale, as looking at Google Maps there would have to be some sort of completely new infrastructure in order to facilitate a station that is in any sort of convenient location for the new town. Any other ideas? I assume there would be some airport links etc, and obviously high speed rail but for the purposes of this thread I'll say the latter doesn't count.

 

[Bald Rick]

Presumably we are also excluding NPR, Crossrail 2, Heathrow Western Access etc as new line proposals already in development.

 

[Railwaysceptic]

A Dawlish avoiding line between Exeter and Plymouth has been suggested several times.

 

[Ianno87]

East West Rail Central Section (Bedford-Cambridge)

Honestly struggling to think of decent ideas that aren't already in development in some form!

 

[40129]

In terms of Airport links the three that stand out would be Leeds-Bradford, East Midlands and to a lesser extent John Lennon.

In respect of John Lennon, I realize there is a station nearby at South Parkway. However, the connecting bus service is far from ideal as single door double deckers (albeit low floor) and airline passengers with luggage don't mix well. Furthermore, the step-free access at South Parkway isn't particularly convenient as there is only one (small) elevator to each platform. Could some form of people mover be constructed or would the best option be to construct a proper railway?

A Dawlish avoiding line between Exeter and Plymouth has been suggested several times.

And if WW2 hadn't intervened, the GWR might have built one

 

[southern442]

Presumably we are also excluding NPR, Crossrail 2, Heathrow Western Access etc as new line proposals already in development.

Well NPR is high speed unless the Tories have let everyone down yet again, but the other two certainly count. Obviously any new line in London would have to be entirely new, and the ones that have closed probably wouldn't serve an awful lot of purpose.

 

[Irascible]

Without wanting to start yet another Dawlish discussion, the wall has been armoured instead ( would have needed doing even with a DAL ).

I mean, I'd love HSR ( or at least higher speed ) something like London-Southampton-Exeter-Plymouth, but it's not at a need stage yet. The other obvious ones I can think of right now you'd probably want to mostly follow an old alighnment for anyway, because it's already on what is probably the best one.

Could just building a new north end of the WCML provide anything?

 

[Mikey C]

These don't have to be heavy rail either

Metrolink keeps expanding, while there are always plans to expand the DLR. And while it's not a conventional railway, the Luton Airport elevated people mover has the same effect, removing traffic from the roads and onto "rail" transport

 

[Halifaxlad]

Well I like this thread!

Cue: Crayons!

Here's a few so I just going to briefly listed them:

Bradford Interchange - Bradford Forster Square
Skipton - Ikley (Roughly along the A65 before tunneling under Ikley)
Burley in Wharfdale - Otley (Old Line) then to Weeton alongside the A658 (New)
Otley - Leeds Bradford Airport - Cookridge rejoining the Harrogate Line
Sowerby Bridge - Triangle - Littleborough - Rochdale
Neville Hill - A1 (Tunnel) then all the way up to Scotch Corner (High Speed)
Scotch Corner - Barnard Castle (Specsavers) - Penrith (Mostly new alignment)
Scotch Corner - ECML above Darlington (Adjacent to the A1)
Branham, following the A64 the the outer York Ring Road to Poppleton
Sheffield - Doncaster alongside the M1 & M18
Sheffield - Manchester
Knottingley - Micklefield (Up the A1)
Barton Upon Humber (New Humber Rail Bridge) - Market Weighton - Selby
Bradford - Clayton (Tunnel) - Thornton - Burnley (Tunnel)

 

[quantinghome]

East West links are generally lacking. I'd suggest a London orbital railway in a similar position to the M25. Reading-Gatwick already performs that function in the SW quadrant, but the rest is poorly served. EWR will serve an entirely different market so it doesn't really come into consideration.

Scotch Corner to Penrith sustains a dual carriageway so could be a realistic route for a new railway.

If there is to be no full high speed line from the North-east to Scotland then bypasses of the tighter curves should be built - Darlington to Newcastle, Cramlington-Alnmouth, Berwick-Dunbar. Same goes for WCML but as others have said this could get the full HS treatment.

If you wanted to integrate the South Wales and South-West England economies then new crossing of the Bristol Channel from Cardiff to Weston-super-Mare may be worth looking at.

Other estuary crossings may be worth looking at - the Dee, Dornoch, Lower Thames Crossing should be rail not road.

 

[southern442]

Well I like this thread!

Cue: Crayons!

Here's a few so I just going to briefly listed them:

Bradford Interchange - Bradford Forster Square
Skipton - Ikley (Roughly along the A65 before tunneling under Ikley)
Burley in Wharfdale - Otley (Old Line) then to Weeton alongside the A658 (New)
Otley - Leeds Bradford Airport - Cookridge rejoining the Harrogate Line
Sowerby Bridge - Triangle - Littleborough - Rochdale
Neville Hill - A1 (Tunnel) then all the way up to Scotch Corner (High Speed)
Scotch Corner - Barnard Castle (Specsavers) - Penrith (Mostly new alignment)
Scotch Corner - ECML above Darlington (Adjacent to the A1)
Branham, following the A64 the the outer York Ring Road to Poppleton
Sheffield - Doncaster alongside the M1 & M18
Sheffield - Manchester
Knottingley - Micklefield (Up the A1)
Barton Upon Humber (New Humber Rail Bridge) - Market Weighton - Selby
Bradford - Clayton (Tunnel) - Thornton - Burnley (Tunnel)

If it was down to me, some of these would certainly have legs.
The A1-parallelling route is something I have considered myself, (although it would have high-speed trains I am counting it as it could also serve local traffic too), and Barnard Castle-Penrith could parallel the A66.
Adding on from this could be some extension northwards, up to the ECML as you say, but perhaps then veering off to serve Washington before Newcastle? In this case I would be proposing a new line rather than using the Leamside line as whilst I still think the Leamside line could and should be re-opened, Washington town is probably large enough to warrant a station closer to the town centre.

 

[hst43102]

Weymouth-Axminster, along the coast. Would allow Weymouth trains to carry on to Exeter.

 

[Irascible]

Weymouth-Axminster, along the coast. Would allow Weymouth trains to carry on to Exeter.

There's the slight issue of some of that being a world heritage site the original proposal was to go up to Dorchester first, which is probably slightly less red tape. I live on it, there can be quite some red tape.

 

[Bald Rick]

Well NPR is high speed unless the Tories have let everyone down yet again

That depends on your definition of high speed. There certainly won’t be trains operating at 300km/h across the Pennines. 30 minutes for 40 miles including one stop implies 200km/h, perhaps 225.

And the linespeed has nothing to do with the Politicans.

 

[hst43102]

There's the slight issue of most of that being a world heritage site the original proposal was to go up to Dorchester first, which is probably slightly less red tape. I live on it there is quite some red tape.

I see, that is a bit of an issue....

Dorchester to Axminster wouldn't really create any new journeys, though...

 

[The Planner]

Talacre to West Kirby tunnel, makes North Wales a commuter region for Merseyside

 

[southern442]

That depends on your definition of high speed. There certainly won’t be trains operating at 300km/h across the Pennines. 30 minutes for 40 miles including one stop implies 200km/h, perhaps 225.

And the linespeed has nothing to do with the Politicans.

This is true, perhaps I should clarify what I meant, because I realised it might seem like I'm not making sense

When I said I am not counting high speed, I meant that I'm not counting *dedicated* high speed lines like HS1 and HS2, because it goes without saying that they need their own, new build alignment.

By contrast, if you have a railway line that so happens to be 125mph (or higher) capable, but carries a variety of different traffic, this *would* count.

 

[Irascible]

Maybe the Weston,Flat Holm & Lavernock Tidal Barrage Railway... cut huge chunks off Cardiff-Exeter and provide power all at once!

and, um, probably an environmental catastrophe...

This is pretty hard cooking up sensible new routes when a lot of the places I want to connect used to be connected anyway.

 

[southern442]

Talacre to West Kirby tunnel, makes North Wales a commuter region for Merseyside

Whilst I am in no way endorsing this, it does make me wonder that surely somewhere down the line there must have been a proposal like this before?

 

[drb61]

A new high-speed line from Rutherglen to Carstairs - for Avanti WC, XC, LNER and TPX services - is much needed to free up capacity on the congested Lanarkshire commuter routes and also complement any future extensions of HS2 northwards. One question is how that could be achieved without bypassing Motherwell - a notorious pinch point, but also an important interchange station between long distance and local services.

 

[NoRoute]

If it was down to me, some of these would certainly have legs.
The A1-parallelling route is something I have considered myself, (although it would have high-speed trains I am counting it as it could also serve local traffic too), and Barnard Castle-Penrith could parallel the A66.

On a similar theme, I'm amazed we don't have a rail route which follows the M1 corridor.

The WCML follows the M1 corridor north upto Rugby but then heads along M6 corridor. Meanwhile the MML follows the M1 corridor south from Leeds, but at Leicester it goes off on a tangent along the route of A6, through mostly minor towns until Bedford.

Some form of new, or re-instated line between the MML and WCML south of Leicester to parallel the M1, to allow an 'M1' rail service along all the towns and cities along the M1 seems an obvious one to explore.

 

[stuu]

Northampton-Wellingborough-Rushden has quite a large population without a rail link. I know there was one previously but it didn't go where people actually live now. Maybe better as an LRT though

 

[Mills444]

Weymouth-Axminster, along the coast. Would allow Weymouth trains to carry on to Exeter.

I would say another issue is what are you going to serve? If you serve West Bay you'll miss Bridport and similar with Lyme Regis how are you going to manage gradients and serving towns at Sea level.

Plus Is there any demand now that the buses have gone commercial (mostly) they have declined from a bus every 2 hours Monday to Saturday across the whole route they have declined to around 4-8 buses per day depending on the route.

 

[southern442]

On a similar theme, I'm amazed we don't have a rail route which follows the M1 corridor.

The WCML follows the M1 corridor north upto Rugby but then heads along M6 corridor. Meanwhile the MML follows the M1 corridor south from Leeds, but at Leicester it goes off on a tangent along the route of A6, through mostly minor towns until Bedford.

Some form of new, or re-instated line between the MML and WCML south of Leicester to parallel the M1, to allow an 'M1' rail service along all the towns and cities along the M1 seems an obvious one to explore.

I've already done some fantasy diagrams along those lines in my free time

 

[gg1]

On a similar theme, I'm amazed we don't have a rail route which follows the M1 corridor.

The WCML follows the M1 corridor north upto Rugby but then heads along M6 corridor. Meanwhile the MML follows the M1 corridor south from Leeds, but at Leicester it goes off on a tangent along the route of A6, through mostly minor towns until Bedford.

Some form of new, or re-instated line between the MML and WCML south of Leicester to parallel the M1, to allow an 'M1' rail service along all the towns and cities along the M1 seems an obvious one to explore.

If you're looking at a direct rail link between the northern and southern half of the M1 corridor, re-opening Northampton - Market Harborough would make more sense than a new route. The only section of the trackbed which has been built on is in Market Harborough itself which can be easily bypassed by a short new alignment across farmland to join the MML a mile or 2 further south of the point the routes originally crossed.

One possibly viable new route which hasn't been mentioned so far is Manchester Airport to the Mid Cheshire line.

 

[A0wen]

Northampton-Wellingborough-Rushden has quite a large population without a rail link. I know there was one previously but it didn't go where people actually live now. Maybe better as an LRT though

Apart from the fact both Northampton and Wellingborough have stations in their own right. And between Northampton & Wellingborough you've only got Ecton and Earls Barton, both of which are villages (Earls Barton's only 5000 people).

Rushden is a growing town, now 30,000 - and I think there *could* be justification for a station between Rushden and Irchester on the Midland Mainline between those two places.

Between Rushden and Wellingborough again, there really isn't anywhere that justifies being rail linked and I'm far from convinced there's enough traffic to justify a new East-West link - bearing in mind I've lived in the area for 20 years.....

 

[hst43102]

Apart from the fact both Northampton and Wellingborough have stations in their own right. And between Northampton & Wellingborough you've only got Ecton and Earls Barton, both of which are villages (Earls Barton's only 5000 people).

Rushden is a growing town, now 30,000 - and I think there *could* be justification for a station between Rushden and Irchester on the Midland Mainline between those two places.

Between Rushden and Wellingborough again, there really isn't anywhere that justifies being rail linked and I'm far from convinced there's enough traffic to justify a new East-West link - bearing in mind I've lived in the area for 20 years.....

Any railway built between Northampton and Rushden would have to be a new alignment - the old alignment along the river doesn't serve any of the villages!

 

[A0wen]

If you're looking at a direct rail link between the northern and southern half of the M1 corridor, re-opening Northampton - Market Harborough would make more sense than a new route. The only section of the trackbed which has been built on is in Market Harborough itself which can be easily bypassed by a short new alignment across farmland to join the MML a mile or 2 further south of the point the routes originally crossed.

One possibly viable new route which hasn't been mentioned so far is Manchester Airport to the Mid Cheshire line.

This one keeps cropping up - but nobody explains what problem it solves, apart from 'linking Leicester and Northampton' - the problem with that is in all the time I've lived in Northampton, I've yet to meet anyone who commutes to Leicester. MK, definitely, Bedford, yep, London, Birmingham, Coventry, all yes. But not Leicester. Add in the only place en route is Brixworth and even then the station was a good 30 minute walk at the bottom of a hill for the village - that line in common with many others took a few liberties in claiming stations 'served that place'.

The only one I can suggest in the Northants area would be to link Corby to Peterborough - which I think would be best done by putting north to east curves at Manton Junction.

The only other places in Northants that aren't rail linked are places like Daventry or Towcester - but there's no obvious line to build, nor did the old lines which served them make much (any ?) sense today.

Any railway built between Northampton and Rushden would have to be a new alignment - the old alignment along the river doesn't serve any of the villages!

Good luck with finding an alignment - it's surprisingly hilly and there are no shortage of things in the way.

 

[Mikey C]

If we're getting crayons out, then a major City which seems very poorly connected is Norwich. Yes it has trains to most places, but they are very slow - new lines aren't just about connecting places without railway stations to the network, but also about catering for modern travel requirements

Thus I'd build a new 125mph mainline from Cambridge to Norwich, directly linking Norwich to the most important commercial and technological City, possibly outside of London. Just one stop (Bury St Edmunds) and a drastically reduced journey time over the pitiful existing one via Ely

This also gives the possibility of reducing journey times from Norwich to London, by having express trains from Norwich to Kings Cross, especially if HS2 takes takes over some of the existing ECML services to give some spare capacity. The Hitchin to Cambridge line would need to be heavily upgraded too or possibly bypassed, plus Cambridge station would probably need expanding

Give me £20bn, and I'll get on with it

 

[A0wen]

the Luton Airport elevated people mover has the same effect, removing traffic from the roads and onto "rail" transport

I bet you alot of money that the only move from road to rail there will be passengers who previously caught the shuttle bus to the airport from Luton Airport Parkway will use the people mover.

That is absolutely *not* a modal shift example.