London>Edinburgh

[uktrain225]

Is there any routes from london to Edinburgh?If yes, How was the speed limits?What kind of trains does it use??
ps.I'm come from HK.

 

[Tom]

The East Coast Main Line is the line between London & Edinburgh. Average maximum speed is 125mph, about 210km/h. It uses class 91 DVT sets.

 

[ikar]

125 mph is 201 kph

 

[evil_hippo]

A useful railway map of Britain is at www.project-design.co.uk/railmap.html

 

[yorkie]

Is there any routes from london to Edinburgh?If yes, How was the speed limits?What kind of trains does it use??
ps.I'm come from HK.

HSTs (aka InterCity 125s) and 225s.

From memory...

Line speed reaches 90mph by Finsbury Park, then up to 110mph by New Southgate. 125mph starts between Digswell and Woolmer Green and continues uninterrupted until Peterborough (115), then back up to 125 all the way to Newark (100 for the flat crossing), then back up to 125 until Doncaster[1] (which I believe is 100 n/b and 80 s/b but I am not sure, it's rare to achieve full speed and TSRs are here common), then 125 with a short 100 section just north of Donny, then 125 all the way to the outskirts of York. 40mph through York station, then shortly after it's back up to 125 until Darlington (100), then back up to 125.

North of Darlington it's mostly 125 but there are significantly more restrictions, notably very slow (15 IIRC?) on the approach to Newcastle. In general the restrictions increase the further north you go, with the exception of north (west? ) of Dunbar which is a very fast run into Edinburgh.

Here are the actual timings of today's (Mon 13 March) 0550 EDB-KGX, which was delayed into Berwick (as were other trains, not sure of reason) but then had a very good run arriving early into London.

STATION            TIMETABLE ACTUAL  STATUS   DISTANCE AVG SPD
Edinburgh Waverley Dep 05:50 On time 
Berwick-upon-Tweed Arr 06:31 06:37   6 LATE   57 miles 73mph
Berwick-upon-Tweed Dep 06:31 06:38   7 LATE 
Newcastle          Arr 07:16 07:22   6 LATE   67 miles 91mph
Newcastle          Dep 07:18 07:23   5 LATE 
York               Arr 08:08 08:14   6 LATE   80 miles 94mph
York               Dep 08:10 08:16   6 LATE
London Kings Cross Arr 10:04 10:00   4 EARLY 189 miles 108mph

There are many ways of getting from London to Edinburgh (a vast amount of permitted routes exist), but you can only get direct trains on the WCML (sleepers and one Pendo a day) and ECML (fast and frequent). I'd be shocked if anyone bothered with the direct Pendo for the entire journey though

London to Glasgow is less clear-cut, with the WCML offering a relatively frequent (but not as frequent as ECML to Edinburgh!) service, and a less frequent, slightly slower (as it's a much longer way round) ECML service. Passengers whose priorities are customer service and comfort would take GNER via the ECML.

 

[Techniquest]

Isn't London to Edinburgh also valid via Glasgow? I recall being told that at Euston by the advance travel staff!

As for the early arrival into London, isn't that due to the fact PBO - KGX, on GNER services at least, is pumped with quite a bit of slack time? Also relies on not being put behind a WAGN semi-fast or stopper IIRC. ATF use that cheat as well, pumping some services with truck loads of slack time on its mainline services to both enable a clockface timetable for most of the day and to ensure delays are dealt with accordingly. Gloucester to Maesteg services can be seen sitting in Cardiff for 20 minutes! Manchester/Crewe to Milford Haven/Carmarthen services can be seen in Cardiff sitting there for 10 - 15 minutes too. I've seen services at Hereford arrive 7 minutes ahead of its booked arrival time, which was outstanding. But that had to be due to slack times being used. There are plenty of other examples, but these can be found easily browsing ATF's timetables.

Point is this seems to happen with GNER south of PBO, hence it being able to arrive early despite leaving YRK 6 down. Can't have been on a non-stop service to KGX at that time of day, and it would have had to have the best run on the ECML in ages to manage to pick up that much time.

EDIT: Forgot to add that Glasgow probably doesn't get such high levels of service due to it not being the capital of Scotland. If it were, it would deserve good service, but Edinburgh is the capital, hence the reasonable service to it.

 

[yorkie]

Isn't London to Edinburgh also valid via Glasgow? I recall being told that at Euston by the advance travel staff!

Yep, you can even go out of Paddington and arrive back into Liverpool St!

As for the early arrival into London, isn't that due to the fact PBO - KGX, on GNER services at least, is pumped with quite a bit of slack time?

Yep, typically 10 mins and WAGN tend to get priority That train did very well and must have had very few signal checks!

Also relies on not being put behind a WAGN semi-fast or stopper IIRC. ATF use that cheat as well, pumping some services with truck loads of slack time on its mainline services to both enable a clockface timetable for most of the day and to ensure delays are dealt with accordingly. Gloucester to Maesteg services can be seen sitting in Cardiff for 20 minutes!

Yep. Heading South on the ECML, there is not much slack time until the approach to King's Cross. If you get a clear run you can be early. I expect to be early if we're on time at Peterborough.

Manchester/Crewe to Milford Haven/Carmarthen services can be seen in Cardiff sitting there for 10 - 15 minutes too. I've seen services at Hereford arrive 7 minutes ahead of its booked arrival time, which was outstanding. But that had to be due to slack times being used. There are plenty of other examples, but these can be found easily browsing ATF's timetables.

None of this nonsense on the ECML. There is a little pathing time here and there, but nothing on that scale. The only exception would be Edinburgh Waverley for through trains, but given the huge number boarding/alighting it is fully justified.

Point is this seems to happen with GNER south of PBO, hence it being able to arrive early despite leaving YRK 6 down. Can't have been on a non-stop service to KGX at that time of day, and it would have had to have the best run on the ECML in ages to manage to pick up that much time.

I listed all stops, and yes it's non-stop (as is the 0700 from Newcastle). Yes it had an excellent run. This train is probably the best southbound to get if you want a good run, definitely better than the one that precedes it. You have to be late at York to do it in 1 hr 45 though, if it's on time leaving York it will take at least 1 hr 50 as it will catch up with preceding trains before King's Cross!

EDIT: Forgot to add that Glasgow probably doesn't get such high levels of service due to it not being the capital of Scotland. If it were, it would deserve good service, but Edinburgh is the capital, hence the reasonable service to it.

I think the service levels will be related to demand and capacity.

 

[Techniquest]

Just want to reply to the last bit this time.

I know it would be due to demand. The capital is going to get quite a lot of demand, whereas Glasgow wouldn't get so much, so the demand is definately there for Edinburgh, rather than Glasgow. Edin gets a lot of people travelling through and onwards to places like Perth, Inverness, Aberdeen, Dundee and more no doubt, so hourly (or is it half-hourly?) to Edin is definately worth while IMO. Pity about the traction and that, but hey.

 

[ChrisCooper]

Slack in timetables is very common these days, especially when it comes to long distance services. If it's cheating, MML definitly don't deserve all the praise they get for their performance since this is achieved through hellish slack both during the journey and at turn arounds. This is in prticulr related to the Meridiens, where the semi fasts are timetables little quicker than Turbostars, yet can acheive much faster times, and of cource many are operating to HST times, which again they can beat easily (although the difference is less, in particular on limited stop runs). The Meridiens are rarely drivern hard. It's not like they run particularly long distances either. People can't view something as cheating when some TOCs do it and either praiseworthy or just turn a blind eye when other TOCs do the same.
I have to admit, my personal opinion is that small amounts of slack at critcal points in the journey is a very good idea, but having massive amounts of slack just before the terminus is cheating. The former benefits all passengers by imporving reliability along the whole route, the latter benefits passengers travelling to the terminus, but mainly benefits the performance statistics. Whatever is done, TOCs should be honest, and people should judge them equally and without predudice.

 

[yorkie]

I have to admit, my personal opinion is that small amounts of slack at critcal points in the journey is a very good idea, but having massive amounts of slack just before the terminus is cheating. The former benefits all passengers by imporving reliability along the whole route, the latter benefits passengers travelling to the terminus, but mainly benefits the performance statistics. Whatever is done, TOCs should be honest, and people should judge them equally and without predudice.

I'd argue it's not cheating.

Firstly, the slack in the paths are set by Network Rail, not GNER and are pretty much unchanged since the days of InterCity.

Secondly, there is far less of a need for slack time until Peterborough, but south of Peterborough you are far more likely to get put behind a WAGN, and indeed it is timetabled to occur some times (I doubt GNER requested that!). A lot of the 'slack' time is really pathing allowances for WAGNs to go ahead. My theory is that there is some sort of agreement whereby GNER get priority heading North, and WAGN get priority heading South.

If you split up the ~10 mins slack south of PBO and put it elsewhere, it would end up with an MML-style padded timetable where trains wait pointlessly, and you could still end up being late into London if you don't get a good run. That would not be progress.

On the other hand you could re-jig the timetable to give GNER more priority heading South, but then there is more chance of the GNER losing it's path, as they won't want to keep WAGNs waiting at places like Hitchin junction if the GNER is a couple of minutes down.

 

[Julian G]

On the other hand you could re-jig the timetable to give GNER more priority heading South, but then there is more chance of the GNER losing it's path, as they won't want to keep WAGNs waiting at places like Hitchin junction if the GNER is a couple of minutes down.

I agree with that
Don't they get held up at Woolmer Green Junction?
I've noticed some are always stuck behind the Cambridge/Peterborough slow WAGN trains

 

[Donny Dave]

then back up to 125 until Doncaster (which I believe is 100 n/b and 80 s/b but I am not sure, it's rare to achieve full speed and TSRs are here common)

IIRC, It's 110mph both North and South, except if the train is coming from, or going onto the Leeds line which is a 70mph junction