They're extremely unreliable, unclean, smelly, overcrowded and expensive
Unreliable?
You've either had terrible luck, or you are just spouting...
Since you don't seem to have the faintest clue what HS2 is about I would just point out that the effect of Phase 2 upon the CrossCountry network will be enormous. There will be two 550m high speed trains an hour from Birmingham to Leeds and to Manchester and one to Newcastle, serving the East Midlands at Toton and Sheffield Meadowhall. Most of the passenger demand on the XC network is between Birmingham and the North East so this will massively increase capacity, reduce journey times and enhance reliability. In future it is by no means implausible that there will be a high speed line between Bristol and Birmingham, on top of the completion of HS2 towards Scotland and Newcastle, so the only way is up for the CrossCountry network as a result of HS2.
^^ This ^^
"Cross Country" will be very different come HS2, I think that people are too fixated on the "businessmen saving thirty seconds to get from London to Birmingham" nonsense and forgetting that many non-London journeys are going to benefit too.
We did well with this weekly occurance of XC must have HSTs, it took 14 posts.
I don't think we've had a "Vomitter" comment yet - are people growing up or falling in love with the 220/221s?
FGW have 58 HST sets at the moment and most if not all of them are over 30 years old. The power cars were recently re-engined so they're not too much of a concern, but the Mk3 coaches would need to be DDA compliant by 2020
True.
We need to forget about HSTs being the long term answer to anything
HS2 will not reduce journey times for the residents of sheffield and Derby. After changing train at Meadowhall and Trent Junction the end to end timing will actually be longer than at present. HS2 will also create more traffic congestion in the East Mids and South Yorkshire unless massive road expansion programs are started and timed to be ready by the launch of HS2.
There is clearly taxpayers money available to fund HS2, in view of the incipient effects of building it, I suggest that the money would be better spent improving what we already have, reopening closed lines and purchasing new rolling stock. HS2 will be built at the expense of an already decaying rail network with the highest fares in Europe.
You're assuming that people's entire journey is Sheffield station to Derby station though.
And assuming that HS2 is intended to solve every single problem - it won't be the fastest way to get between every two stations in the UK, but it may still improve such journeys (e.g. if a significant number of passengers from the Sheffield City Region to Birmingham/ London are going to use HS2 then that frees up thousands of seats from Sheffield to Derby on conventional services - which may mean that they are free to stop at Dronfield/ Clay Cross/ Belper etc).
I thought this was going to be about Arriva CrossCountry's many flaws rather than something inherent to the CrossCountry franchise itself.
Arriva seem to be coming out of this thread fairly well - given that the "mistakes" were all made before they took over that seems reasonable. Arriva seem to have made a reasonable fist of it to be fair (which is a concept that people find hard to apply to XC!)
A stopping service from Edinburgh-Newcastle has been talked about as part of the upcoming re-franchising of Scotrail
It always seems to have a bad business case, when considered.
Worth remembering that you can flight an XC service to do a couple of stops (perm two from Dunbar, Berwick & Alnmouth) between faster EC services between Edinburgh and Newcastle...
...but you may struggle to fit a 100mph EMU with at least half a dozen stops (such as Mussleburgh, Wallyford, Prestonpans, Dunbar, Berwick, Alnmouth, Morpeth, Cramlington) on a two track railway...
...if it's going to get overtaken en-route then that restricts it's revenue to only shorter distance passengers
Leaving aside the silly jibe at HS2 the CBA of more stock for XC doesn't stack up well at all. Things will get better if the electric spine goes through as Manchester-South Coast can go to dual voltage 110mph electrics.
True.
I think that the "solution" would be to turn XC into a "Derby/Leicester - Gloucester" franchise and put a half hourly Manchester - Reading/ Bournemouth service into the WCML franchise (i.e. no more "X")...
...this would allow the Manchester - South Coast service to go wholly EMU (and free up DEMUs for the York - Bristol corridor).
You'd lose some links (like Manchester to Bristol, Sheffield to Reading), but some of these could be provided by other franchises (Manchester - Bristol via the Marches, Sheffield - Reading via Marston Vale).
Although this is only one route it would free up 10 sets to be used elsewhere. Assuming that they are all 220's (or any 221's would be swapped with 220's so that they are) that would mean that two 220's could run together to replace a 221 (increasing the number of seats from 250 to 400), the 221 can then replace another 220 (an increase from 200 to 250 seats).
Then repeat until you have used up all the 220's (including those which are being replaced by 221's) and that's at least 20 services would see an increase in seating available and more if there were a few 221's in the mix to start with.
Then of course there maybe services which are busy through the core, but not so much towards the outer edges, meaning that the second of each pair of 220's could be more intensively used by joining and splitting it so it only runs through the core
It wouldn't take a *huge* number to double up the units from York - Bristol - depending how many Voyagers are freed up by Virgin...
And for every overcrowded XC train in the core there is one running around half-empty at the extremities of the network.
It is a very difficult franchise in which to manage the balance of capacity around the network
True.
I don't know how we solve the problem (short of replacing all services by coupled up 153s so that an eight coach 153 at New Street sheds coaches every half hour and becomes a single unit by Penzance
)
I'm a frequent user of them on the Bristol to Newcastle run and do this at least once a week. Despite my name I've actually warmed to the voyager somewhat
...surely it's just German for "The Voyager, The"?
When I were a lad - and working for the then OPRAF - I was amazed to find that XC basically lost money. Fast forward to the 22x revolution - still lost money (despite substantial service changes , new trains and so on.
The base problem is that it is a "national" service - with low high income traffic , lots of small flows and a service which is very busy in the core - but quiet at the extremities. Any worthwhile suggestions as to how to square the circle , no doubt welcome.
The most interesting post on this thread.
).
