Most Inefficient Use Of Stock

[tbtc]

Without wanting to disrupt the “Northern 153s” thread further (https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/what-are-northerns-plans-for-their-10-class-153s.196181/), what is the most inefficient use of stock (and what was the most inefficient use of stock historically)?

For example, Northern are going to need two DMUs and two sets of staff to run the Huddersfield – Bradford shuttle because a single DMU cannot provide the hourly service, despite a round trip by rail being under thirty eight miles (a single journey is 18 miles 60 chains).

Yup - one train cannot reliably cover thirty eight miles in an hour (obviously allowing for station dwells, turnaround), so a TOC struggling to resource sufficient trains/staff on a daily basis is having to use two sets on this short local shuttle.

But there must be other examples where the need for an incoming unit to meet an outgoing path means that the dwell time is significant. Or a train spends almost as long at the terminus as it does on the journey.

The timetable EMR inherited from EMT means that the “fast” Nottingham service to London sits at St Pancras for seventy minutes (because services on the MML are divided into HSTs, short 222s and long 222s, so the HST used on the southbound service needs to wait for an HST path north (and ten minutes would be insufficient turnaround time to provide a reliable northbound service, so it has to wait seventy minutes – hopefully this will change when the long distance EMR services are run by one type of train – the 804).

What other examples are there (or were there)? E.g. when a frequent core splits into different branches, but one of the branches is slightly longer than the others, so units have to wait significantly longer than the other branches because they’d be too late to fit back into the “core”

(I appreciate that there are arguments about reliability and “having spare capacity” versus “stripping everything to the bare minimum” – and that the layover time needs to be seen in the context of how long the journey was – e.g. an Edinburgh service having a sixty minute layover in London may sound reasonable but a Nottingham service having a sixty minute layover in London may sound excessive - sometimes a long break is required for driver/guard’s “hours” but are there any examples like a train diagrammed to sit at a terminus for a long period each hour because the two paths couldn’t match up)

To avoid argument, I’m talking about off-peak – obviously there are some trains that sit unused between the peaks but you can’t do anything about that – I'm not bothered about trains that are idle from nine in the morning till five at night because there'll always be a need for diagrams like that - whereas you might be able to do something about improving line speeds or introducing faster accelerating trains or removing an intermediate stop to shave a few minutes off journeys to avoid situations like the Huddersfield – Bradford one.

 

[bramling]

Without wanting to disrupt the “Northern 153s” thread further (https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/what-are-northerns-plans-for-their-10-class-153s.196181/), what is the most inefficient use of stock (and what was the most inefficient use of stock historically)?

For example, Northern are going to need two DMUs and two sets of staff to run the Huddersfield – Bradford shuttle because a single DMU cannot provide the hourly service, despite a round trip by rail being under thirty eight miles (a single journey is 18 miles 60 chains).

Yup - one train cannot reliably cover thirty eight miles in an hour (obviously allowing for station dwells, turnaround), so a TOC struggling to resource sufficient trains/staff on a daily basis is having to use two sets on this short local shuttle.

But there must be other examples where the need for an incoming unit to meet an outgoing path means that the dwell time is significant. Or a train spends almost as long at the terminus as it does on the journey.

The timetable EMR inherited from EMT means that the “fast” Nottingham service to London sits at St Pancras for seventy minutes (because services on the MML are divided into HSTs, short 222s and long 222s, so the HST used on the southbound service needs to wait for an HST path north (and ten minutes would be insufficient turnaround time to provide a reliable northbound service, so it has to wait seventy minutes – hopefully this will change when the long distance EMR services are run by one type of train – the 804).

What other examples are there (or were there)? E.g. when a frequent core splits into different branches, but one of the branches is slightly longer than the others, so units have to wait significantly longer than the other branches because they’d be too late to fit back into the “core”

(I appreciate that there are arguments about reliability and “having spare capacity” versus “stripping everything to the bare minimum” – and that the layover time needs to be seen in the context of how long the journey was – e.g. an Edinburgh service having a sixty minute layover in London may sound reasonable but a Nottingham service having a sixty minute layover in London may sound excessive - sometimes a long break is required for driver/guard’s “hours” but are there any examples like a train diagrammed to sit at a terminus for a long period each hour because the two paths couldn’t match up)

To avoid argument, I’m talking about off-peak – obviously there are some trains that sit unused between the peaks but you can’t do anything about that – I'm not bothered about trains that are idle from nine in the morning till five at night because there'll always be a need for diagrams like that - whereas you might be able to do something about improving line speeds or introducing faster accelerating trains or removing an intermediate stop to shave a few minutes off journeys to avoid situations like the Huddersfield – Bradford one.

The 2Cxx Cambridge to King’s Cross service is fairly inefficient, having half-hour turnarounds at both ends from the December timetable, and using eight units to provide a service which used to be provided by seven. This is because the timetable is based on the service running through to Maidstone. Having said that, these long turnarounds contribute positively to reliability, so I’m not knocking it.

 

[swt_passenger]

Similarly, SWR (and SWT for many years previously) use 3 units on the hourly Portsmouth to Southampton stopping service, the running time is an hour each way and the layover at the Portsmouth & Southsea end is about 55 mins. The incoming train usually waits for the departing train to leave. But the advantage is loads of recovery time, and in the peaks the service can extend to/from Portsmouth Harbour without significantly altering any other timings.

 

[Ianno87]

The Greater Anglia off-peak semi-fast Liverpool Street-Cambrige Greater Anglia service, until today, typically has a 57 minute turnround time at Cambridge. Though from Monday it will use this time to continue to Cambridge North and back.

Off-peak Hazel Grove-Blackpool North services have about 50 minutes or so at Hazel Grove (to parallel move at Edgeley No. 1 junction)

 

[Kite159]

Southern's Redhill - Tonbridge services spring to mind. Off-peak 30 minute turnaround at Tonbridge, 25 minutes at Redhill for a journey time of around 32 minutes.

West of England services at Waterloo on Sunday tend to hang around for around 70 minutes

 

[Ianno87]

Sheerness-Sitingbourne is quite inefficient - 2 units to do a half-hourly service that doesn't quite work with 1 unit.

 

[RailWonderer]

National Express East Anglia ran 3 car 170 DMUs from Lowestoft and Peterborough to Liverpool Street via Ipswich, taking 2 hours 30 and 2 hours 45, with an hour under the wires, when they only had 12 of them. In the morning peak they even ran one 6 car non-stop to Liv St from Ipswich with turnaround times at the London end of over an hour. Rural service gaps were larger and they withdrew them from long through services to London to avoid gross overcrowding all day and to increase frequency on the rurals.

 

[snookertam]

You call these inefficient, but surely having longer layover times means it is easier to recover from late running?

The Glasgow Central to Neilston off peak service usually has 25 minutes for turnaround at Neilston - notwithstanding the 6 or so mins necessary for the shunt - after a journey of around 28 minutes and a half hourly service. You could say it is inefficient, or you could say it makes the service more resilient as trains towards Neilston are less likely to be cancelled to avoid a late departure and reactionary delays to next workings.

 

[alexl92]

As someone who's not familiar with service patterns more recently, what's going on with the Huddersfield - Bradford service? Are they splitting it at H'fax or something?

 

[NoMorePacers]

As someone who's not familiar with service patterns more recently, what's going on with the Huddersfield - Bradford service? Are they splitting it at H'fax or something?

In December the Leeds-Huddersfield via Halifax service is being split into a Huddersfield-Bradford service, with the Halifax-Leeds portion merging with the Leeds-Selby service and being extended to Hull.

 

[tbtc]

You call these inefficient, but surely having longer layover times means it is easier to recover from late running?

The Glasgow Central to Neilston off peak service usually has 25 minutes for turnaround at Neilston - notwithstanding the 6 or so mins necessary for the shunt - after a journey of around 28 minutes and a half hourly service. You could say it is inefficient, or you could say it makes the service more resilient as trains towards Neilston are less likely to be cancelled to avoid a late departure and reactionary delays to next workings.

Sure, there's a balance between resilience/ recovery and efficient use of stock (permitting longer trains to be used) - but the Huddersfield - Bradford service got me thinking that there must be some other routes out there where the train spends almost as long at the terminus as it did on the journey - and, thanks to the knowledge of the Forum, I now know a lot more than I did.

 

[Horizon22]

You call these inefficient, but surely having longer layover times means it is easier to recover from late running?.

I think there's a difference (albeit a fine line) between comfortable turnarounds to assist service recovery with a robust timetable and an inefficient use of stock. In London & SE land however, turnarounds seem to be increasingly hitting the minimum allowed to squeeze as much capacity as usual. And people wonder why late running is never recovered without running fast...

That being said a Hayes service from Charing Cross and a Orpington service from Cannon Street both sit at the terminal for about 25 minutes in the off-peak. Journey time of an inward is about 50 minutes.

 

[Class195]

Sure, there's a balance between resilience/ recovery and efficient use of stock (permitting longer trains to be used) - but the Huddersfield - Bradford service got me thinking that there must be some other routes out there where the train spends almost as long at the terminus as it did on the journey - and, thanks to the knowledge of the Forum, I now know a lot more than I did.

I travel on this train regularly and it’s a crawl through Elland to Brighouse and then you normally spend a couple of minutes waiting to get on the main line into Huddersfield if the TPE services are to pot.

Frustrating and one of the routes where the X6 bus is quicker.

 

[scrapy]

Sure, there's a balance between resilience/ recovery and efficient use of stock (permitting longer trains to be used) - but the Huddersfield - Bradford service got me thinking that there must be some other routes out there where the train spends almost as long at the terminus as it did on the journey - and, thanks to the knowledge of the Forum, I now know a lot more than I did.

The unit on the Morecambe shuttles definitely spends more time at one of the terminuses than en route. On a Sunday (if they ever run) it spends 19 minutes each hour running and 41 idle.

 

[PeterJ]

Cheltenham ‐ Swindon spends 35min at Cheltenham and 1h 15min at Swindon for a 1h journey. In the evening peak it does the journey ECS, so spends nearly 4h without carrying passengers

 

[snookertam]

I think there's a difference (albeit a fine line) between comfortable turnarounds to assist service recovery with a robust timetable and an inefficient use of stock. In London & SE land however, turnarounds seem to be increasingly hitting the minimum allowed to squeeze as much capacity as usual. And people wonder why late running is never recovered without running fast...

That being said a Hayes service from Charing Cross and a Orpington service from Cannon Street both sit at the terminal for about 25 minutes in the off-peak. Journey time of an inward is about 50 minutes.

It's similar on many suburban routes in Glasgow and probably many other cities too to be fair. The Glasgow Central to Lanark route has a journey time of aprox 54 minutes, with a half hourly service, and so is covered by four units with 5-6 minute turnaround times at each end, which makes it quite difficult to recover from only the slightest delay. The Edinburgh-Shotts-Glasgow Central service also has very tight turnaround times at the Glasgow Central end, this after a journey time of over an hour through a number of major busy junctions through which that service usually has the lowest priority, so again difficult to recover from delays. Where a route has longer turnaround times built in it can be a welcome respite from this way of planning and is better for passengers in that it provides a service which is more likely to actually run, even if it is delayed.

 

[Whisky Papa]

I travel on this train regularly and it’s a crawl through Elland to Brighouse and then you normally spend a couple of minutes waiting to get on the main line into Huddersfield if the TPE services are to pot.

Frustrating and one of the routes where the X6 bus is quicker.

X63 I think you mean? The X6 was split at Bradford some years back, and the Bradford - Leeds section retained that number. Running time seems to be 45-49 minutes off-peak, so currently similar to the train and (as I said in an earlier post) quite possiby more convenient for the town centre in Huddersfield but much less so for anyone making a train connection. From the Dec 19 timetable change, the train has been noticeably accelerated: I've not checked every journey on RTT but the random off-peak one I chose was 35 mins northbound and 37 southbound.

As for the robustness of timetables, the Leeds - Bradford - Huddersfield used to have a very short layover at Huddersfield, leading to frequent late running or cancellation (diverted ECS via Dewsbury). As this was the booked connection from Bradford Interchange at Leeds into the Cross Country services in both directions, this was extremely frustrating. Where possible, we advised customers booking tickets to catch the service 15 mins earlier to be sure of their connection.

The Manchester Piccadilly to Hadfield line used to be a model of tight train utilisation. However, I often found that evening peak trains gradually built up delays on subsequent trips so that by the early evening, they were running 15-20 minutes late and action would be taken to restore this by culling a Hadfield or Glossop call - just at the point people were heading out for a drink n the evening or possibly heading to football. With buses, it would have been easy to drop back the service as the frequency reduced at the end of the evening peak to give a longer layover, but it's not so easy to plan that when running trains in and out of a limited number of platforms at Manchester Piccadilly.

 

[Cricketer8for9]

One of my old timetable trains from Purley Oaks to Victoria did one journey up to London, then into the sidings and one journey back out in the evening. It may have run in service later that night. Kid tend to call two journeys of 20 miles max in a day pretty inefficient.

 

[RailWonderer]

If you want longer turnaround times you need more or longer platforms and to procure more rolling stock because you will have more diagrams. With the DMU shortage and lack of investment, neither is an option

 

[snookertam]

If you want longer turnaround times you need more or longer platforms and to procure more rolling stock because you will have more diagrams. With the DMU shortage and lack of investment, neither is an option

Yes it can only work if you have the stock and infrastructure available. However the other side of the coin is that the more intensively you use stock, the more regularly they require maintenance - it is usually mileage based and there will reach a stage where the unit must recieve an exam where things like brakes are checked over (Like a railway version of an MOT). Most unit types will have low mileage diagrams available to them which will maybe involve working shorter routes or working fewer services over the course of a day.

It's all basically a balancing act - most of the railway is like that.

 

[NoMorePacers]

To be honest, I first thought this thread was for a different type of inefficient usage of rolling stock (like 170s on the Harrogate Loop).

 

[156478]

It's similar on many suburban routes in Glasgow and probably many other cities too to be fair. The Glasgow Central to Lanark route has a journey time of aprox 54 minutes, with a half hourly service, and so is covered by four units with 5-6 minute turnaround times at each end, which makes it quite difficult to recover from only the slightest delay. The Edinburgh-Shotts-Glasgow Central service also has very tight turnaround times at the Glasgow Central end, this after a journey time of over an hour through a number of major busy junctions through which that service usually has the lowest priority, so again difficult to recover from delays. Where a route has longer turnaround times built in it can be a welcome respite from this way of planning and is better for passengers in that it provides a service which is more likely to actually run, even if it is delayed.

Shotts services have been accelerated for December on each half of the route. Trains will wait time at Shotts to permit them to be Presented at or originate at Glasgow and Edinburgh at the current times for pathing etc. Not ideal if your going though Shotts but a handy buffer for performance.

 

[Class 170101]

National Express East Anglia ran 3 car 170 DMUs from Lowestoft and Peterborough to Liverpool Street via Ipswich, taking 2 hours 30 and 2 hours 45, with an hour under the wires, when they only had 12 of them. In the morning peak they even ran one 6 car non-stop to Liv St from Ipswich with turnaround times at the London end of over an hour. Rural service gaps were larger and they withdrew them from long through services to London to avoid gross overcrowding all day and to increase frequency on the rurals.

The 6 car arrival formed the 09:38 and 10:38 back and provided sufficient capacity on the Up Road as a 6 car and then split to form two down services.

Only the three cars were planned to be used (8 of these). The two cars were used between Norwich and Cambridge.

 

[RailWonderer]

Even as 3 car services they were full and standing much of the day between Liverpool Street and Shenfield - Chelmsford - Witham. Many would omit stops to kerb overcrowding like the 16:32 ex-Liv St pre December 2010. I digress.

 

[darloscott]

The Dec 19 timetable definitely has a contender in the newly split Sheffield-Doncaster stopper that currently works through to Hull... which gives it a 54 minute layover at the Doncaster end, thankfully the 48 minute layover at Sheffield end is sorted by interworking it with the Gainsborough runs. Equally though on the other half hour the other one is extended to Adwick, giving a very inefficient 51 minute layover in Sheffield and just short of half an hour at Adwick (admittedly there's an ECS run to cross over)

 

[trainmania100]

I don't know why they bother with the Hove - Brighton shuttle there's more than plenty of services between Brighton and Hove, they could use the 313/377 elsewhere, they're always running out of 313s

 

[Kite159]

I don't know why they bother with the Hove - Brighton shuttle there's more than plenty of services between Brighton and Hove, they could use the 313/377 elsewhere, they're always running out of 313s

Isn't it to provide connections with the services which go towards Preston Park from Hove?

 

[Mitchell Hurd]

What's the reason that Northern have some / few routes that can be worked by any DMU from a Class 142 to a 158 or 170 like the Leeds to Lancaster / Morecambe service? Given the frequency, anything's better than nothing - in this weather especially as you'd expect the train to be safe and warm!

 

[Ianno87]

Isn't it to provide connections with the services which go towards Preston Park from Hove?

Yes, gives a Brighton-Littlehampton connection (into a faster Coastway train)

 

[61653 HTAFC]

What's the reason that Northern have some / few routes that can be worked by any DMU from a Class 142 to a 158 or 170 like the Leeds to Lancaster / Morecambe service? Given the frequency, anything's better than nothing - in this weather especially as you'd expect the train to be safe and warm!

Because the fleets up here have been fairly static for 20+ years, so crews were generally passed out on all the various classes and different units could be used to match varying demand. The loss of flexibility may well come back to bite Northern on the backside, particularly with the two Huddersfield services which will be allocated single 153s for the foreseeable.