Grand Central apply for Newcastle - Brighton direct

[Severnia333]

Direct reading to Gatwick train
But no train from Oxford to Gatwick or Reading to Brighton

I feel like the Birmingham -> South bits more interesting and useful to me and people I know especially Reading to Brighton and Brighton to Birmingham,
but the reading to Newcastle bit feels like a carbon copy of the current existing train

Reading to Brighton seems useful.

Birmingham to Brighton is surely quicker with change at Southampton you can already do?

 

[30907]

Reading to Brighton seems useful.

Birmingham to Brighton is surely quicker with change at Southampton you can already do?

Actual travelling time (ignoring waits) is currently about 40min longer than via Reigate.

Anyway, the pre-Covid timetable had a 2-hourly XC terminator at Reading which could, if paths and units were available, be extended to Gatwick and Brighton. It even started from Newcastle

 

[JonathanH]

Anyway, the pre-Covid timetable had a 2-hourly XC terminator at Reading which could, if paths and units were available, be extended to Gatwick and Brighton. It even started from Newcastle

Somewhat telling that XC had more interest in getting it through to Southampton than restoring anywhere further east to their network.

 

[cle]

The best part (and most original) is clearly the southern half.

Birmingham + Oxford -> Guildford / Gatwick / Brighton as many big new pairs. Plus then a few smaller ones like Brighton-Guildford.

Birmingham - Oxford and Reading needs a boost.

 

[Zomboid]

The best part (and most original) is clearly the southern half.

Birmingham + Oxford -> Guildford / Gatwick / Brighton as many big new pairs. Plus then a few smaller ones like Brighton-Guildford.

Birmingham - Oxford and Reading needs a boost.

They should combine it with the top half of that other idea and run Brighton - Birmingham - Shrewsbury - Chester - Liverpool.

 

[LittleRedTrain]

The best part (and most original) is clearly the southern half.

Birmingham + Oxford -> Guildford / Gatwick / Brighton as many big new pairs. Plus then a few smaller ones like Brighton-Guildford.

Birmingham - Oxford and Reading needs a boost.

I wonder if running it from Birmingham to the NW might be better than to the NE and Newcastle.
There are currently no direct trains from Reading/Oxford towards the Crewe/Liverpool/Preston direction (except a very occasional Manchester XC which runs via Crewe) so it'd be harder to argue that adding new services would be abstractive.

EDIT: @Zomboid beat me to it with a very similar suggestion while I was writing the post

 

[Bald Rick]

It’s not taking from the taxpayer, it’s saving the taxpayer money by meaning the DFT can continue to avoid investing in XC and meanwhile growing the overall railway. XC is brand-damaging and can’t cope.

It would take a source of revenue from the taxpayer funded railway, which in current circumstances could only mean more cuts to taxpayer funded services.

 

[Bristol LHS]

To be honest, I don't really think anyone is questioning the Birmingham to Brighton section, if that was proposed by itself then I think it would be a very different discussion. It's the Birmingham to Newcastle part which is the problem as it does nothing unique and by the time it does go unique, then you'd be quicker connecting via London

They are proposing to stop in Northallerton, which isn’t currently served by XC, so its advantageous for me and by neighbours in terms of opening up some direct connections to Sheffield and Birmingham, and (more usefully) giving us some more York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle services which have been ropey of late (qv the York to Newcastle LNER stoppers). Appreciate we’re not a massive town, but it’s stuff like this that helps open access operators make their case and build political pressure for approval.

 

[YorkRailFan]

The current XC service is clearly suboptimal due to poor speed as well as limited capacity. Instead of a new OA "abstractive" service, would not the best option be for XC to run 2 tph from Birmingham to Sheffield, with 1 tph from Reading to Leeds (at least 5 carriages) and 1 tph from Plymouth to Edinburgh bypassing Leeds (at least 8 carriages)? The Nottingham to Leeds service could be timed to arrive at Sheffield on an adjacent platform 5 minutes before the Plymouth service is due and to leave 5 minutes after it departs, to provide good connections from Nottingham to York and points north and from Bristol/SW England to Leeds.

A good chunk of passengers travel directly between Leeds and SW England on XC, would loading them all onto a Northern service towards Sheffield simply make said Northern service overcrowded? In my opinion, probably, and a lot of these passengers would have lots of luggage, particularly in Summer heading down to Devon/Cornwall. Sounds like a recipe for disaster in my opinion.

This OA GC service will not solve XC's problems, and this service should not become a scapegoat for Government (DFT/HM Treasury) to avoid spending more on XC. XC needs to be funded properly, regardless of this proposed service.

 

[Iskra]

It would take a source of revenue from the taxpayer funded railway, which in current circumstances could only mean more cuts to taxpayer funded services.

That’s not necessarily the case. But that’s an ideological standpoint, that’s been covered a multitude of times on here before, so probably a conversation not worth repeating.

One of the issues that this proposed open access (OA) timetable exposes is the massive delay to through journeys on XC from Sheffield and further south to York and further north due to running via Leeds. For example the current XC service departing Birmingham New Street at 1803 arrives at York at 2030 and Newcastle-upon-Tyne at 2130. The proposed OA timetable shows a service departing Birmingham New Street at 1828, which arrives at York at 2016 and Newcastle-upon-Tyne at 2115. The journey time from Birmingham to Newcastle by the XC train is 207 minutes compared to 167 minutes by the proposed OA service.

The current XC service is clearly suboptimal due to poor speed as well as limited capacity. Instead of a new OA "abstractive" service, would not the best option be for XC to run 2 tph from Birmingham to Sheffield, with 1 tph from Reading to Leeds (at least 5 carriages) and 1 tph from Plymouth to Edinburgh bypassing Leeds (at least 8 carriages)? The Nottingham to Leeds service could be timed to arrive at Sheffield on an adjacent platform 5 minutes before the Plymouth service is due and to leave 5 minutes after it departs, to provide good connections from Nottingham to York and points north and from Bristol/SW England to Leeds.

Exactly the sort of journey time improvement that may attract new customers to rail.

Your idea for tinkering with XC though; reducing capacity at Leeds (the main revenue source in the North for XC), running two of the three ‘fast’ Leeds to Sheffield services within 5 minutes of each other, and forcing people onto an already busy 2-car DMU is ridiculous though.

A good chunk of passengers travel directly between Leeds and SW England on XC, would loading them all onto a Northern service towards Sheffield simply make said Northern service overcrowded? In my opinion, probably, and a lot of these passengers would have lots of luggage, particularly in Summer heading down to Devon/Cornwall. Sounds like a recipe for disaster in my opinion.

This OA GC service will not solve XC's problems, and this service should not become a scapegoat for Government (DFT/HM Treasury) to avoid spending more on XC. XC needs to be funded properly, regardless of this proposed service.

I’m in agreement with your first paragraph.

Regarding the second; there appears to be absolutely no appetite for the DFT to do anything positive for XC. If the state can’t (or won’t) provide an adequate service, then private investment should be welcomed. If you look elsewhere on the railway, Open Access involvement should grow the route and may encourage the DFT/XC to up the ante, which benefits all.

 

[Snex]

One of the issues that this proposed open access (OA) timetable exposes is the massive delay to through journeys on XC from Sheffield and further south to York and further north due to running via Leeds. For example the current XC service departing Birmingham New Street at 1803 arrives at York at 2030 and Newcastle-upon-Tyne at 2130. The proposed OA timetable shows a service departing Birmingham New Street at 1828, which arrives at York at 2016 and Newcastle-upon-Tyne at 2115. The journey time from Birmingham to Newcastle by the XC train is 207 minutes compared to 167 minutes by the proposed OA service.

The current XC service is clearly suboptimal due to poor speed as well as limited capacity. Instead of a new OA "abstractive" service, would not the best option be for XC to run 2 tph from Birmingham to Sheffield, with 1 tph from Reading to Leeds (at least 5 carriages) and 1 tph from Plymouth to Edinburgh bypassing Leeds (at least 8 carriages)? The Nottingham to Leeds service could be timed to arrive at Sheffield on an adjacent platform 5 minutes before the Plymouth service is due and to leave 5 minutes after it departs, to provide good connections from Nottingham to York and points north and from Bristol/SW England to Leeds.

Personally if I was going to pluck changes I'd split the XC service into 3 and have something like.

Newcastle - Local Stations - York - Doncaster - Current service to Birmingham only

Edinburgh - Local Stations - Newcastle - York - Leeds - Wakefield - Barnsley - Meadowhall - Chesterfield - Alfreton - Nottingham
** This would take over the fast Leeds to Sheffield Northern service **

Leeds - South West as now

Birmingham - Reading / Brighton

It's much shorter services and less likely to be stuck with delays and also creates new links to Midlands / North to Scotland rather than having a long way round Birmingham service. The two Birmingham services to/from Newcastle follow each other currently so it's a waste of a path.

They are proposing to stop in Northallerton, which isn’t currently served by XC, so its advantageous for me and by neighbours in terms of opening up some direct connections to Sheffield and Birmingham, and (more usefully) giving us some more York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle services which have been ropey of late (qv the York to Newcastle LNER stoppers). Appreciate we’re not a massive town, but it’s stuff like this that helps open access operators make their case and build political pressure for approval.

Yeah that's a fair point about Northallerton. Tbh I thought XC still served there but the points change so much I've lost track.

 

[The Prisoner]

Another vote for one of these OA services serving the west coast mainline rather than offering yet more options for the ECML traveller.

 

[ainsworth74]

I think we might be just starting to wander a bit too far off-topic if we get much more into the weeds of XC service patterns and what they should do. There's some relevance if it's in terms of "What should XC do in reaction to a GC service?" but wider service changes are definitely more appropriate for a different thread.

 

[cle]

I wonder if running it from Birmingham to the NW might be better than to the NE and Newcastle.
There are currently no direct trains from Reading/Oxford towards the Crewe/Liverpool/Preston direction (except a very occasional Manchester XC which runs via Crewe) so it'd be harder to argue that adding new services would be abstractive.

EDIT: @Zomboid beat me to it with a very similar suggestion while I was writing the post

It might be less adventurous than some suggestions - but I think this would be way neater going into Moor St to terminate. Avoid New Street entirely. And it’s way less abstractive.

That said, if one had to - taking a through running approach is better for New Street - ie one of the Liverpools or a Shrewsbury makes sense.

 

[Class 170101]

I think it would be better if it went via Leicester and Bedford and EWR rather than Birmingham purely from an Abstractive point of view However from a service point of view I think its a worthy idea or just maybe it would encourage GBR to reinstate XC services from Reading to Gatwick / Brighton (using the existing Reading Terminators vice Southampton) and / or solve the capacity issues at XC.

 

[stevieinselby]

Newcastle, Durham, Darlington, Northallerton, York, Doncaster, Sheffield, Derby, Burton-on-Trent, Birmingham New Street, Warwick Parkway, Banbury, Oxford, Reading, Wokingham, Guildford, Redhill, London Gatwick, Haywards Heath, Brighton

Calling at Congestion Halt, Orcatsraid Junction, Cherry Picking Parkway and Comedy Central...

Brighton to Newcastle via St Pancras/Kings Cross would, at a rough guess, be about 1½ hours quicker than taking this "direct" train.
Many of the lines they imply have surplus unused capacity are already over-congested and suffer from poor reliability and problematic pathing as a result.
With the exception of a handful of intermediate stops, there are already trains running over that exact route from Newcastle to Reading several times a day.

Surely via Kensington Olympia would be more direct, and might fail the abstraction test slightly less embarrasingly?

With the increased service on the West London Line (Mildmay plus Southern now run 5tph through Olympia) compared to when XC last ran to Brighton, and having to cross between the fast and slow lines at Balham, pathing the route would be even more challenging than going via Guildford. I'm not sure why it would be any less abstractive to run via Olympia either...

Are there no current direct trains from Oxford/Reading to Gatwick/Brighton? I don't think so - so that could be a useful addition as Reading is a bit of a hub though?

There is a half-hourly service between Reading and Gatwick (along this same route, but calling at more intermediate stations), but passengers for Oxford and/or Brighton would need to change. The journey time from Reading to Brighton is typically a few minutes quicker going via London than using the North Downs line and changing at Gatwick, but obviously a direct train would speed things up.

How long would the journey Birmingham - Brighton be, and would it leave from New St? If that were around 2 - 2.5 hrs it may be useful for those in the NW (ie Preston/Wigan/Manchester - Birmingham) to avoid London?

Very unlikely that it would be attractive for passengers coming from the North West, where the trains to London are much better than trains to Birmingham.
In the time it takes you to get from Manchester or Liverpool to Birmingham, you could be approaching Milton Keynes on a Euston service.
While a lot of people try to avoid cross-London transfers, changing at New Street is a pretty grim experience as well.

If you're going through it anyway, surely a call at Leamington would be in order.

Possibly they have to put in and take out a few random stops to be able to claim they are offering something different and not just doing an Orcats raid.

I doubt it would make a difference by itself, but I think dropping planned Durham and Darlington calls and maybe going for Thirsk (depending on how difficult moving onto the slow lines would be) would make it less likely to be declined on abstraction grounds. Or they could keep playing speculative bingo and apply to run a Middlesbrough – Birmingham – Brighton service.

Thirsk shouldn't be a problem – the slow lines only run between Northallerton and York so it wouldn't be a conflicting move, it's just a case of avoiding freight paths.
Teesside or Hull to Birmingham wouldn't be without merit, although I doubt there would be enough demand to justify an OOA service.

The Oxford/Reading to Birmingham section will be a massive draw. No one wants to use XC anymore if they can help it unless you want to stand. This would be a great plan.

If XC have been unable to resource it properly, how do you think GC will be able to do so? Are we not into the territory of robbing Peter to pay Paul?

If you think about the route they're proposing, there's quite a lot of potential for revenue growth, especially considering XC hasn't reinstated a lot of paths on the same route, so I think there's a strong case to be argued that this service would essentially create new revenue (in the sense that, its gone since XC pruned their routes).

Arriva OOA fighting against Arriva TOC shows what a mess the privatised railway is. If they haven't been able to get their act together as a properly established TOC on this route then you have to question their credibility for running a not-established open access service.

The big advantage is that you don’t have to go via London which is typically cheaper and means you avoid going to London.

Avoiding London is a fairly big draw.

Avoiding London may be attractive in terms on not having to use the Underground, but it is not generally cheaper than XC these days.
Comparable fares may be cheaper – for York to Southampton, an off-peak ticket via Birmingham is cheaper than an off-peak ticket via London ... but you are much more likely to get cheaper Advance tickets going via London, even looking a couple of weeks ahead I can get York to Southampton for £60 each way, whereas advance tickets on XC are rarer than hens' teeth and you'll be lucky to do better than the £160 off-peak return even booking much further ahead.

It is always strange when people refer to towns and cities as though they are people. No town or city deserves or has a right to anything. If there are potentially high enough flows between two points then a direct service is probably justified but I seriously doubt there is much of a flow between Newcastle and Reading. Why would there be? Just to pre-empt some replies, population size doesn’t equate to potential number of passengers between two places hundreds of miles apart.

I think there is a formula that estimates the relative travel flow between two towns as proportional to the product of their populations divided by the square of the distance between them.
On that basis, demand for travel between Newcastle and Reading would be somewhat less than demand for travel between Newcastle and Thirsk.

Again, XC would rather both via Leeds as that is where the demand is.

It's a tricky balance – Leeds is obviously the biggest population centre on the north-eastern leg of the route before Edinburgh so it's important that it is well served ... but it costs 25 minutes compared with running via Doncaster (which in itself is a substantial place and a good connection point), so you've got to think that having 1 of 2 hourly services bypassing Leeds would make the service considerably more attractive to passengers to/from the north east.

 

[The Ham]

Regarding the second; there appears to be absolutely no appetite for the DFT to do anything positive for XC. If the state can’t (or won’t) provide an adequate service, then private investment should be welcomed. If you look elsewhere on the railway, Open Access involvement should grow the route and may encourage the DFT/XC to up the ante, which benefits all.

Indeed, if the state isn't willing to take a risk (or at least be proactive), then it's reasonable for private companies to show the way.

The cost of providing extra capacity to XC is almost solely longer trains (which will also mean more depot capacity), as a 5 coach 80x (or similar) would accommodate more passengers for not much more cost.

The thing is an OAO has to add a load of additional costs as they are running additional trains (which at the very least means an additional driver for each diagram).

The issue with saying:

Arriva OOA fighting against Arriva TOC shows what a mess the privatised railway is.

Isn't an Arriva issue, but probably more likely Arriva being like "we know that is we were allowed to lengthen XC services we could cover the costs of doing so".

The bottom line is that the government is currently being too risk adverse when it comes to running more services.

Personally, if they are concerned about the risk of it costing more, set up a fund which TOC's can bid for to run new services.

The basis of this fund would be that it's a fixed amount each year from the government (let's say £20 million) each bidder has to put forwards a business plan as to how the money would decrease the cost of running the railways.

Any TOC which won it would have to agree that any extra money they made (not just on that improved service) for the next three years would be split (say) 75% to them 15% back to the fund and 10% back to the DfT.

As an example of XC said we want £5 million to allow us to lease an extra 10 coaches for the next 3 years and by doing so they make an extra £12 million in year one, £18 million year two and £22 million in year three (total of an extra £52 million), the DfT would get £5.2 million, the fund £7.8 and XC would get the rest.

Whilst the amount that those extra services would generate may not be very much from that total, the TOC's would benefit at they could have money to invest, the DfT would be seen to reducing their cost to the tax payers and the customers would get a better service.

If the TOC's don't make money by ruining the trains, then in the next year it's likely they wouldn't bid or they would be more cautious about the income they're likely to get from the extra services.

Of course because the DfT gets money and the funds gets money, there's a good chance that the DfT could reduce the amount of money which goes into that fund (as the £20 million could be paid from the TOC's) and so further reduce the money needed from the government.

 

[YorkRailFan]

Regarding the second; there appears to be absolutely no appetite for the DFT to do anything positive for XC. If the state can’t (or won’t) provide an adequate service, then private investment should be welcomed. If you look elsewhere on the railway, Open Access involvement should grow the route and may encourage the DFT/XC to up the ante, which benefits all.

Looking at this proposal however, the taxpayer funded railway will have to make adjustments to accommodate this service. I'm fine with OAOs making use of surplus capacity to launch new services, but that extra capacity doesn't exist in this case. In my opinion, the taxpayer funded railway should not have to bend over backwards to accommodate what private companies want to do on the railway, the taxpayer funded railway should always come first.
This proposal won't solve XC's problems, far from it, a few extra trains a day won't be the solution. I agree that XC is far from good, but this isn't the solution.

 

[daodao]

It's a tricky balance – Leeds is obviously the biggest population centre on the north-eastern leg of the route before Edinburgh so it's important that it is well served ... but it costs 25 minutes compared with running via Doncaster (which in itself is a substantial place and a good connection point), so you've got to think that having 1 of 2 hourly services bypassing Leeds would make the service considerably more attractive to passengers to/from the north east.

I agree, but the delay caused to trains to York and points north by running via Leeds leads to trains running that way being overtaken by trains running via Doncaster, so there is relatively little point in trains from Birmingham to Leeds extending beyond West Yorkshire. I compared the existing XC train leaving Birmingham at 1803 with the proposed open access train leaving Birmingham at 1828, and noted that the latter would be 40 minutes quicker to Newcastle and arrive 15 minutes earlier.

 

[MatthewHutton]

I agree, but the delay caused to trains to York and points north by running via Leeds leads to trains running that way being overtaken by trains running via Doncaster, so there is relatively little point in trains from Birmingham to Leeds extending beyond West Yorkshire. I compared the existing XC train leaving Birmingham at 1803 with the proposed open access train leaving Birmingham at 1828, and noted that the latter would be 40 minutes quicker to Newcastle and arrive 15 minutes earlier.

Yeah I think an hourly or half hourly Birmingham-Leeds service followed by a 2 hourly Newcastle-Birmingham direct service would be better.

 

[stevieinselby]

I agree, but the delay caused to trains to York and points north by running via Leeds leads to trains running that way being overtaken by trains running via Doncaster, so there is relatively little point in trains from Birmingham to Leeds extending beyond West Yorkshire. I compared the existing XC train leaving Birmingham at 1803 with the proposed open access train leaving Birmingham at 1828, and noted that the latter would be 40 minutes quicker to Newcastle and arrive 15 minutes earlier.

One thing they could do to rebalance the service would be to have the calls at Burton and Chesterfield on the Doncaster train instead of the Leeds train, which would reduce the time difference between the two. Leeds northwards is a connection that is definitely worth retaining.

 

[NCT]

We'll soon see how the Dec 25 timetable performs (provided there are no surprises) then we can all work out whether capacity exists for such a service ...

 

[Peterthegreat]

We'll soon see how the Dec 25 timetable performs (provided there are no surprises) then we can all work out whether capacity exists for such a service ...

December or May?

 

[MatthewHutton]

One thing they could do to rebalance the service would be to have the calls at Burton and Chesterfield on the Doncaster train instead of the Leeds train, which would reduce the time difference between the two. Leeds northwards is a connection that is definitely worth retaining.

Isn’t there a transpennine express that does that?

 

[NCT]

December or May?

The December timetable change is the big ECML recast.

 

[stevieinselby]

Isn’t there a transpennine express that does that?

There are TPX trains from Leeds to Newcastle, but not through to Edinburgh. Retaining through services from the sizeable populations of West Yorkshire to Edinburgh is important, plus one 5-car TPX per hour would not on its own give enough capacity for passengers travelling between Leeds and points to Newcastle.

 

[cle]

Because Thameslink connects the MML and Gatwick/Brighton so directly and frequently (not to mention - passing through a city with a little demand) - the EWR route feels wrong for this.

EWR on a cross country service, to me is better linking to the west, i.e. to the Oxford-Bristol, as somebody has proposed. Tons of new possibilities. More capacity than via Reading/Basingstoke, if you have fast enough stock. But in time, they could swap them around I suppose. I don't see Chiltern running those, but they could easily reinvent themselves with a 'cross country' network based around Oxford - once that is fully rebuilt - if they were ambitious again.

Anyone from the MML heading to Gatwick/Brighton would change at St Pancras, it's super easy. ECML too. EWR might be the choice for Reading (obviously it would be for Oxford) - Guildford you're probably trekking through London although Redhill might work.

 

[nerosrmc@gmail]

I'm sorry if this has been mentioned before but what type of trains will they use?

 

[duffield]

That’s not necessarily the case. But that’s an ideological standpoint, that’s been covered a multitude of times on here before, so probably a conversation not worth repeating.


Exactly the sort of journey time improvement that may attract new customers to rail.

Your idea for tinkering with XC though; reducing capacity at Leeds (the main revenue source in the North for XC), running two of the three ‘fast’ Leeds to Sheffield services within 5 minutes of each other, and forcing people onto an already busy 2-car DMU is ridiculous though.


I’m in agreement with your first paragraph.

Regarding the second; there appears to be absolutely no appetite for the DFT to do anything positive for XC. If the state can’t (or won’t) provide an adequate service, then private investment should be welcomed. If you look elsewhere on the railway, Open Access involvement should grow the route and may encourage the DFT/XC to up the ante, which benefits all.

"Regarding the second; there appears to be absolutely no appetite for the DFT to do anything positive for XC."

The DfT's past and current actions may soon be irrelevant if GBR is given enough autonomy to decide its own priorities; there's serious talk of massive civil service cuts, so we may actually end up with GBR running the railway instead of the much reduced numbers of DfT civil servants.

 

[weeklycommuter]

I'm sorry if this has been mentioned before but what type of trains will they use?

The form P states Class 180 or Class 22x rolling stock.

https://sacuksprodnrdigital0001.blob.core.windows.net/sale-of-access-rights/Consultations/Current%20Track%20Access%20Consultations/25.04.2025%20-%20Grand%20Central%20Railway%20Company%20Limited%20-%20Section%2017%20-%20Closes%2025.05.2025/passenger-access-application-form-p%20-%20Grand%20Central%20-%20Newcastle-Brighton.pdf

Grand Central (GC) is seeking new access rights by way of a new Track Access Contract with Network Rail (NR), to operate up to 6 return services per day between Newcastle and Brighton via London Gatwick. GC is seeking a 7-year contract and will operate the services using Class 180 or Class 22x rolling stock.