Ideas/suggestions & other speculation for Okehampton / Exmouth lines

[21C101]

£40m only announced yesterday but they must have known it was coming and this money is also for provision for an hourly service next year. Network rail seem to want to get the line ready as soon as possible and not a December opening when the traffic might not be so good.. Maybe for an end of lockdown opening so the MP can be trotted out with the local dignatries at socially distanced space. They have probably all been jabbed.

Where on earth did you get the idea that this £40 million is going to fund an hourly service?

Replacing track and ballast costs in the order of £1 million a km and GSM-R radio will likely cost a seven figure some.

An hourly service would need Coleford Junction to be reinststed to provide "double track" between Crediton and Coleford along with major signalling alterations and a new down platform at Yeoford.

 

[REVUpminster]

"is also for a provision"

It would be good if they moved the Crediton trailing crossover to Coleford junction but an hourly service can work with the existing infrastructure.

Shoot me down again.

 

[21C101]

"is also for a provision"

It would be good if they moved the Crediton trailing crossover to Coleford junction but an hourly service can work with the existing infrastructure.

Shoot me down again.

They can't run a two hourly clockface service with one train, and thats with turnrounds as little as five minutes at Okehampton, so you couldn't just add a second unit and have an hourly service.

 

[24Grange]

I originally posted this on one of the other (many threads about Okehampton) and got told off - so i'm reposting here

Back up the line to Okehampton. I had a thought, just before falling asleep last night about the station and car parking, now that the station has rejoined Network Rail. I was wondering if they were going to start putting up ticket machines and white lines to pull in some revenue ? Its a big car park beside the station ( between the turntable well and the old engine shed), as well as a few spaces immediately outside the station on the approach road). The station is still owned by Devon County Council ? Is is it now just the buildings? And Network rail own the platform ? I can't see them missing a trick for income generation for paying to park at the station when its open again. In a normal situation, they (DCC or NR ) would charge top dollar to park at the station for those commuting into Exeter?) and also change the parking arrangements on the approach and on the hill all the way into town, to prevent the residents complaining that "commuters" are taking all the spaces outside their houses.(Residents only?)

If Okehampton has properly rejoined the "fold" and is a proper station again, these things are bound to happen surely?

One other point about polsloe bridge down platform - apart from its bad state of repair - surely modern disability legislation would prevent it reopening? No grandfather's rites like the up platform? All those stairs.

 

[REVUpminster]

They are having ticket machines and a help points. pay and display in the car park. I only read that yesterday. Cafe to open, hopefully by the volunteers who have kept the station in good order.

 

[30907]

They can't run a two hourly clockface service with one train, and thats with turnrounds as little as five minutes at Okehampton, so you couldn't just add a second unit and have an hourly service.

2-hourly with 7+ minutes at OKE and an hour apart at Crediton is what appeared on RTT a couple of days ago (but has mostly disappeared since), so once the relaying is complete hourly should be do-able once traffic builds (and subject to whatever arrangements are made for Meldon traffic).

 

[24Grange]

Thanks for the info - where did you read about the car park and cafe (good news about the cafe, if it happens)-Online?Local paper?

 

[21C101]

2-hourly with 7+ minutes at OKE and an hour apart at Crediton is what appeared on RTT a couple of days ago (but has mostly disappeared since), so once the relaying is complete hourly should be do-able once traffic builds (and subject to whatever arrangements are made for Meldon traffic).

It was roughly two hourly, but not properly clockface and with at least one three hour gap

 

[REVUpminster]

Better rail services for Crediton and Okehampton residents within months | News | Crediton Country Courier (creditoncourier.co.uk)

Finally found it!!!

 

[reddragon]

So, not only for residents of Okehampton then!

Better rail services for Crediton and Okehampton residents within months | creditoncourier.co.uk

CHANCELLOR of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak has committed more than £40 million in today’s budget to restoring rail services between Okehampton and Exeter via Crediton that were lost to the Beeching cuts of the 1960s.

www.creditoncourier.co.uk

The rail service is expected to bring in millions of pounds of tourism revenue, boosting the economies of both Okehampton and Crediton, and will benefit students who live in or near Okehampton but travel into Exeter to study.

 

[Cowley]

So, not only for residents of Okehampton then!

Better rail services for Crediton and Okehampton residents within months | creditoncourier.co.uk

CHANCELLOR of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak has committed more than £40 million in today’s budget to restoring rail services between Okehampton and Exeter via Crediton that were lost to the Beeching cuts of the 1960s.

www.creditoncourier.co.uk

The rail service is expected to bring in millions of pounds of tourism revenue, boosting the economies of both Okehampton and Crediton

I wonder if Crediton is ready to welcome the millions of pounds of tourist revenue expected?
It didn’t look very much like it when I drove through the town this afternoon...

 

[reddragon]

I wonder if Crediton is ready to welcome the millions of pounds of tourist revenue expected?
It didn’t look very much like it when I drove through the town this afternoon...

Sounds like some business opportunities exist in Okehamton & Credition!

Visit Devon needs to update its Visit Okehamton to see our sewage pipe over a dirty stream with some dead trees image and a deserted street with an old banger approach!!

 

[30907]

It was roughly two hourly, but not properly clockface and with at least one three hour gap

It is as near clockface as anything in the Exeter area, and the one gap in the late afternoon is (or was, as most of the trains have disappeared) of obvious benefit to commuters.

 

[21C101]

It is as near clockface as anything in the Exeter area, and the one gap in the late afternoon is (or was, as most of the trains have disappeared) of obvious benefit to commuters.

Including making sure the evening peak timings are robust by having a long layover.

If you went hourly everything would have to cross at Credition with tokens and staffs being swapped and any lateness causing chaos due to the short turnrounds at both Okehampton and Exmouth Junction, both being in the region of 25 minutes journey time from Crediton.

The only way you would get away with hourly is by terminating everything at St Davids which would result the service being little used, however popular that idea might be with some posters here who seem unable to grasp that St Davids is essentially a parkway on the edge of the city and several hundred feet below it, minus the large car park.

 

[REVUpminster]

Okehampton is the goal but Crediton the prize with the Tesco superstore and nearby housing developments and potential to the south of the station. with the Barnstaples a half hour service could really encourage patronage.

 

[21C101]

Okehampton is the goal but Crediton the prize with the Tesco superstore and nearby housing developments and potential to the south of the station. with the Barnstaples a half hour service could really encourage patronage.

It has a population of 6,837 (about the same as Crewkerne) and unlike Okehampton wont be the railhead for miles around.

Are there plans to desigate it a new town and build large amounts of houses?

 

[Cowley]

It has a population of 6,837 (about the same as Crewkerne) and unlike Okehampton wont be the railhead for miles around.

Are there plans to desigate it a new town and build large amounts of houses?

The issue with expanding anywhere on this side of Exeter has always been the traffic levels on the A377 which before lockdown could be queued right back to Newton st Cyres on a busy rush hour morning.

 

[24Grange]

Thanks for posting - hadn't seen written anywhere before.

 

[REVUpminster]

1,200 homes at Sweetham, 750 at Crediton and 500 at Cowley in new plan | News | Crediton Country Courier (creditoncourier.co.uk)

Some of the new housing that could be built.

 

[Parallel]

Would be good if the Okehampton trains could stop at Newton St. Cyres, even by request only. I know the village gets a more frequent bus service but the train service leaves a little to be desired. The first northbound train of the day used to be about 5pm!

 

[Watershed]

Would be good if the Okehampton trains could stop at Newton St. Cyres, even by request only. I know the village gets a more frequent bus service but the train service leaves a little to be desired. The first northbound train of the day used to be about 5pm!

Issue is that it's smack bang in the middle of a high speed stretch on a single line.

By no means impossible to call there but it lengthens the overall journey time by about 3 mins for a considerable number of other passengers.

 

[Cowley]

Issue is that it's smack bang in the middle of a high speed stretch on a single line.

By no means impossible to call there but it lengthens the overall journey time by about 3 mins for a considerable number of other passengers.

Indeed, and it’s a strange place in that it’s effectively two villages separated by a bit of a walk.
The area of the village that’s the largest is around the main (A377) road and is served by a pretty decent bus service.
The other part of the village that’s around the railway station probably isn’t worth having a station on its own but history has left things that way.
If you were putting a railway through the area nowadays I’m not sure if Newton st Cyres would warrant the building of a station really.
I would say that there’s only about a third of the place that’s more convenient for rail rather than bus...

 

[backontrack]

Indeed, and it’s a strange place in that it’s effectively two villages separated by a bit of a walk.
The area of the village that’s the largest is around the main (A377) road and is served by a pretty decent bus service.
The other part of the village that’s around the railway station probably isn’t worth having a station on its own but history has left things that way.
If you were putting a railway through the area nowadays I’m not sure if Newton st Cyres would warrant the building of a station really.
I would say that there’s only about a third of the place that’s more convenient for rail rather than bus...

If you were building a railway through the area these days, though, then you probably don't have many stations.

Crediton, Yeoford, Copplestone, possibly Morchard Road...a station serving Chulmleigh a bit further north than Eggesford is ('Chulmleigh Road'?), maybe Umberleigh and then Barnstaple.

 

[Irascible]

The issue with expanding anywhere on this side of Exeter has always been the traffic levels on the A377 which before lockdown could be queued right back to Newton st Cyres on a busy rush hour morning.

Not that great towards Stoke Canon either, the bottleneck starts in Exeter proper... if only there was some alternate way of travel that avoided roads.

 

[30907]

If you went hourly everything would have to cross at Credition with tokens and staffs being swapped and any lateness causing chaos due to the short turnrounds at both Okehampton and Exmouth Junction, both being in the region of 25 minutes journey time from Crediton.

I presume, then, that the Barnstaple and Exmouth lines are chronically unpunctual, as they operate on equally short turnrounds?

The relaid track, which I mentioned upthread, should permit an uplift in start-to-stop average speed from 40mph to 45 or even 50, which would give the necessary margin at Okehampton when/if traffic justifies going to hourly.

And if the Axminster extension doesn't happen, and 2tph turn round at Exmouth Jn or Pinhoe, then some work needs doing there to facilitate that.

 

[24Grange]

To prevent delays could they not "upgrade" the token system at Credition for both lines at some point? At Topsham they seem to be able to exchange tokens (Exmouth junction box throws a switch?) without the need to carry out the ballet of manually exchanging a token ( unchanged since steam was on the line 50+ years ago? - more in line with a heritage railway surely?) It takes minutes to crawl past the little signal platform, with a chat and a smile,then to accelerate up to line speed only to slow again and crawl over the later level crossings. I guess thereby lies the problem - rip everything out over the years to a " basic " freight only, in effect siding and then when you want to recommission ( and low and behold passengers actually want to use the new service) to any thing other than a bare minimum level, you have to invest more and more to try and "tweak" the minimum standards in place. I guess we should be grateful that the line still exists to upgrade - it could have been all ripped up when the quarry closed.

Exmouth ,they kept adding stations (and dwell/loading times at them) to the route without any thought on how it would effect crossover at Topsham. Newcourt and to a lesser extent Digby the more busy it gets, screwed with the timings - especially on rugby match days - which although is good for the line in terms of usage and revenue,completely mucks up the timings and adds to delays. With the timetable as it is - I don't think there is any spare recovery time anywhere as the branch is at or near capacity? I suppose the new banner repeater at blackboy tunnel will help a little?

 

[Cowley]

1,200 homes at Sweetham, 750 at Crediton and 500 at Cowley in new plan | News | Crediton Country Courier (creditoncourier.co.uk)

Some of the new housing that could be built.

The plan for Cowley is fairly bonkers and the person who speculatively bought the land has been trying to push this through for a while now. It would involve sending the buses up and around a new estate on the hills behind ours. Hopefully it’ll be thrown out as there’s far better places to build around the city than there.

 

[REVUpminster]

With all the house building going on Exeter will overtake Torbay in population although hundreds of houses have been built there.

 

[Cowley]

With all the house building going on Exeter will overtake Torbay in population although hundreds of houses have been built there.

I’ve got an OS map from the 1970s and it’s astonishing to see how much Exeter has expanded since then.

 

[Dave Beeching]

Indeed, and it’s a strange place in that it’s effectively two villages separated by a bit of a walk.

The station is well worth it for the nearby pub though....