London Midland 110mph running from Monday 10th December

[MK Tom]

I've always yearned for Virgin services to stop at Northampton, offering non-stop 45 min services into Euston ... we currently only have one per day at 06:43.

Usually formed of one Voyager and packed more densely than the core of a gas giant.

The entire Northampton loop is 75mph north of Northampton. Upgrading it would require a lot of earthworks to the formation and replacing a lot of the OHLE. I expect changes would have to be made at Long Buckby too.

 

[All Line Rover]

There is a very good reason why Virgin prefer to avoid Northampton. The fares! An Anytime Return from Northampton to Euston is £51.70. An Anytime Return from Rugby to Euston (a journey of an extra minute) is £123. Says it all!

Also, once London Midland speed up some of their services, Virgin are unlikely to be any quicker.

 

[D1009]

But I think in theory they're ok with it, but it'll need to wait until the Dec 2013 timetable, which is a big shake up on the West Coast - I think this may be when Euston-Glasgows become first stop Preston as standard.

This would be a step forward, at present anyone travelling from Brum to Warrington and north thereof is forced to use the often overcrowded and unreliable hourly VT service.

 

[calc7]

(concerning post #62)

And they can't be making much money on that one service through ORCATS. A FOS is only £45 - they will get a tiny fraction of this, particularly as there is only one carriage on their one train. By the time you've served everybody breakfast and drinks, there can't be much profit to be had.

 

[All Line Rover]

(concerning post #62)

And they can't be making much money on that one service through ORCATS. A FOS is only £45 - they will get a tiny fraction of this, particularly as there is only one carriage on their one train. By the time you've served everybody breakfast and drinks, there can't be much profit to be had.

In my opinion Northampton gets a decent service anyway. The journey to London is not long enough to justify a proper intercity service. Rugby only gets one because of its location.

 

[calc7]

In my opinion Northampton gets a decent service anyway. The journey to London is not long enough to justify a proper intercity service. Rugby only gets one because of its location.

In full agreement.

 

[monty9120]

Im not surprised they are going to save 30 minutes but not stopping at Northampton.

Not only the issue with not being able to use the fast line but the awful idea of splitting or attaching any train there.
I havent been on one that has stopped and they gone off straight away again.
This takes 20 minutes sometimes depending if the other trains on time that needs to be attached

 

[WCML]

Im not surprised they are going to save 30 minutes but not stopping at Northampton.

Not only the issue with not being able to use the fast line but the awful idea of splitting or attaching any train there.
I havent been on one that has stopped and they gone off straight away again.
This takes 20 minutes sometimes depending if the other trains on time that needs to be attached

Why do most trains have to wait for what seems an eternity at Northampton? The Crewe to Euston service pulls in, opens the doors, closes them again, couples up to the ex-Birmingham service in front of it and then sits there for 10 minutes. Why can't it just carry on after this coupling?

The pathing doesn't seem great either as after Milton Keynes it has to crawl along the slows for a while before finally going onto the fasts.

 

[causton]

Why do most trains have to wait for what seems an eternity at Northampton? The Crewe to Euston service pulls in, opens the doors, closes them again, couples up to the ex-Birmingham service in front of it and then sits there for 10 minutes. Why can't it just carry on after this coupling?

The pathing doesn't seem great either as after Milton Keynes it has to crawl along the slows for a while before finally going onto the fasts.

I presume it's in case the Crewe service is late, or there is a coupling problem, or some other reason that might mean they miss the WCML path and get stuck behind a freight or something!

 

[calc7]

I presume it's in case the Crewe service is late, or there is a coupling problem, or some other reason that might mean they miss the WCML path and get stuck behind a freight or something!

One thing I have learned in my job (nothing to do with the railways) is to concentrate on the "happy path". If you choose to concentrate on what could go wrong than what ought to go right (90%+ of the time, say) then it's rarely optimal.

Say there's 10 of these services a day, and 8 or 9 make the expected optimistic coupling. Yeah, ok, so the other 1 or 2 are delayed by a few minutes on the journey onwards to Euston, but all things considered the situation is better.

 

[WCML]

One thing I have learned in my job (nothing to do with the railways) is to concentrate on the "happy path". If you choose to concentrate on what could go wrong than what ought to go right (90%+ of the time, say) then it's rarely optimal.

Say there's 10 of these services a day, and 8 or 9 make the expected optimistic coupling. Yeah, ok, so the other 1 or 2 are delayed by a few minutes on the journey onwards to Euston, but all things considered the situation is better.

Is there a standard coupling time that has to be put into the timetable? Just like minimum connection times, when in reality, you can change trains a lot quicker than the minimum time. Do they have, say a minimum 10 mins for coupling and that is why theres so much padding in the timetable?

 

[dave_wm]

Is there a standard coupling time that has to be put into the timetable? Just like minimum connection times, when in reality, you can change trains a lot quicker than the minimum time. Do they have, say a minimum 10 mins for coupling and that is why theres so much padding in the timetable?

According to Network Rail's Rules of the Plan 2011, trains scheduled to either attach or detach at Northampton must be booked to call there for at least 5 minutes. Combined with 4 minute headways, this means at least one the portions must be stopped in Northampton for at least 9 minutes, not including any recovery, pathing or engineering time. This is how the Crewe to London trains end up standing for up to 12 minutes at Northampton - there's not a lot that can be done to avoid it unfortunately.

HTH

 

[Pumbaa]

The down Crewe has a WTT arrival of xx37 and departure of xx45, so just 7 mins to uncouple and depart.

Surely providing that no train left Northampton immediately prior to the Crewe arriving, the trains do not have to adhere to the 4-min headway, as it will have already elapsed seeing as the RotP give 5 mins for the coupling procedure?

In all likelihood, the procedure both directions takes less than 2 minutes. That is now they don't rely on the rostered spare driver...

 

[The Planner]

What Pumbaa said, it would be pretty stupid to try and plan a train to leave in the same direction just before the LM needed to depart (not to say it wouldnt happen though.....)

 

[tbtc]

There is a very good reason why Virgin prefer to avoid Northampton. The fares! An Anytime Return from Northampton to Euston is £51.70. An Anytime Return from Rugby to Euston (a journey of an extra minute) is £123. Says it all!

I think the fact that a Northampton diversion would mean a Virgin service from Manchester/Birmingham would be so delayed that it would be caught up/overtaken by the service twenty minutes behind it is the main reason.

Not worth disrupting the longer distance passengers.