Shrewsbury/London,Prime Ministers questions

[Tracky]

Well it makes no sense to have additional DMU paths from the Midlands to London and it would make no sense to replace the hourly Wolves Pendo with a Voyager.

It makes sense to go for electrification Oxley to Salop in a world without massive government debt but otherwise that makes no sense either.

 

[exile]

How much London traffic would you expect a 50,000 population town 150 miles from London to generate?

 

[Clip]

How much London traffic would you expect a 50,000 population town 150 miles from London to generate?

Its irrelevant. They simply must have a direct service to London.

 

[Tracky]

Its irrelevant. They simply must have a direct service to London.

I love this post!

 

[David10]

Didn't Virgin briefly extend a few Wolverhampton services to Shrewsbury services in the late 90s?

 

[burty76]

The simplest option, as mentioned in this thread before, is swapping the double-voyager that works Birmigham - Glasgow/Edinburgh services for a Pendolino, then using the double voyager on a Euston-Wolverhampton diagram and extending it to Shrewsbury.

 

[Rhydgaled]

Are we talking counties, or county towns? If the former, then Pembrokeshire only has through London services on summer Saturdays (and these are on shakey ground now thanks to IEP). If the latter, then Shrewsbury is not alone since Haverfordwest (the county town of Pembrokeshire) has no through London services either at the moment. Ceredigion doesn't have London trains either (the county town (Aberaeron) isn't even rail-served).

The logical route (looking at Google Earth) for extending Chiltern mainline services to Shrewsbury while still being able to call at Moor Street or Snow Hill is now the Midland Metro I think, and a bit of new line would be needed to link that to Wolverhampton station anyway.

I don't think London services for Shrewsbury is a realistic proposition without putting up OHLE to allow some Woverhampton - Euston trains to be extended, or using Voyagers as others have suggested but that makes getting them off ICWC in favor of extra Pendos harder.

 

[The Planner]

Doubt you could get a Voyager to Shrewsbury and back in time for the return working from Wolves, can imagine it would screw the diagrams.

 

[pemma]

How much London traffic would you expect a 50,000 population town 150 miles from London to generate?

Probably less than a 30,000 population town 200 miles from London in Wilmslow.

 

[merlodlliw]

DBS have plenty of 67s on duties that could be covered by other locos, not to mention a few are in store. The £13 million losses, right from the horses mouth http://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...ire-rail-to-halt-london-services-2194727.html
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WSMR managed to, ok they would have to call at New St in lieu of Moor St.

Straight from the iron horses mouth, this figure included start up,hire of stock etc, plus offices & cafe I just pondered the figure you mention , I heard from Andy Hamilton the figures he mentioned were different on year to year.
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Didn't Virgin briefly extend a few Wolverhampton services to Shrewsbury services in the late 90s?

Yes there was always a London/Shrewsbury service some via Cambrian & one failed example extended from Chester via Wrexham

 

[Proud Salopian]

Shrewsbury would have a direct London service today if it weren't for WSMR. Funny old world...

Yeah but only with ATW 158s. No thanks.
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How much London traffic would you expect a 50,000 population town 150 miles from London to generate?

Oh for goodness sake. Shrewsbury is 70,000 and the service would also serve Telford (130,000). Shrewsbury is also a notable junction for Welsh Marches/Mid-Wales services.
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Didn't Virgin briefly extend a few Wolverhampton services to Shrewsbury services in the late 90s?

Yes, it lasted about a year!

WMSR would have survived if it weren't so constrained by our supposed privatised system. It's not truly privatised when it is a state-backed system of monopolies.

 

[Michael.Y]

London Midland seem the obvious candidates here, although that would probably involve electrifying BHM-SHR so the 350s can be used; unless you fancy Turbostarring it all the way to Euston.

 

[pemma]

Yeah but only with ATW 158s. No thanks.

At one point Shrewsbury did have a London Waterloo service operated by FNW 158s. I wonder if that could have become a class 180 operated service had FNW been bullied out of running London services by Virgin.

 

[Proud Salopian]

At one point Shrewsbury did have a London Waterloo service operated by FNW 158s. I wonder if that could have become a class 180 operated service had FNW been bullied out of running London services by Virgin.

You do realise how long that train took to get to London? It was never meant to be a serious Shrewsbury-London service. I remember being a bit bemused at the sight of places like Bath on the (old) screens at Shrewsbury!

 

[tbtc]

The county is certainly one of the few (are there any others?) English counties with no direct London service

Are we talking counties, or county towns? If the former, then Pembrokeshire only has through London services on summer Saturdays (and these are on shakey ground now thanks to IEP). If the latter, then Shrewsbury is not alone since Haverfordwest (the county town of Pembrokeshire) has no through London services either at the moment. Ceredigion doesn't have London trains either (the county town (Aberaeron) isn't even rail-served)

Having a school friend who lives in Broadhaven, I appreciate that a lot of people refer to the bottom left corner of Wales as "Little England beyond Wales", but even so...

 

[The Informer]

How much London traffic would you expect a 50,000 population town 150 miles from London to generate?

Shrewsbury is 171m 40ch!

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Shrewsbury is 171m 40ch!

This is measured from Paddington via Didcot and Birmingham Snow Hill.
It's 155m from Euston via Birmingham New St.
And would have been 162.5m via the Trent Valley if they hadn't closed the Stafford-Wellington branch.

 

[exile]

I love this post!

I demand my house (population 3) has a direct service to London!

 

[pemma]

I demand my house (population 3) has a direct service to London!

My house (population 4) has greater demand! As there isn't room for a spur from the line to my house I propose closing the main road in to an industrial estate and turning it in to a rail line.

 

[The Informer]

This is measured from Paddington via Didcot and Birmingham Snow Hill.
It's 155m from Euston via Birmingham New St.
And would have been 162.5m via the Trent Valley if they hadn't closed the Stafford-Wellington branch.

Very good. But no matter where its measured from we all know a direct link to london has as much chance of happening than an hourly service on the cambrian!!

 

[merlodlliw]

Shrewsbury would have a direct London service today if it weren't for WSMR. Funny old world...

Now TBTC, the fact of this is well known.

ATW put in the Shrewsbury/Marybone run as a pure spoiler to WS, if WS had not
been around, ATW would have never dreamed of this service,which was floored by ATW fudging figures. If it had run DB would have killed it stone dead.

The same goes for VT into Wrexham, that would never have occurred if WS was not present.

 

[PHILIPE]

At one point Shrewsbury did have a London Waterloo service operated by FNW 158s. I wonder if that could have become a class 180 operated service had FNW been bullied out of running London services by Virgin.

Can you provide more details on this, please, as I think you are mistaken. Which route etc.

 

[Gareth Marston]

Can you provide more details on this, please, as I think you are mistaken. Which route etc.

It was Wales and West introduced in about 97/98 and lasted until killed off by Wales and Border franchise gained SW Mainline via Bradford on Avon, they ran to West Wales as well using 158's. Manchester to Portsmouth and Penzance were also done up until 2004.
Used Maindee curve at Newport and Severn Tunnel to get to Bristol.

 

[PHILIPE]

Yes. I recall it now. When Gareth mentioned Manchester that jolted me. Returned from Waterloo at 15 17. Sorry to poster for querying your post.

 

[Proud Salopian]

Can you provide more details on this, please, as I think you are mistaken. Which route etc.

Certainly not mistaken: I remember this service very well! Though of course I never travelled all the way to Waterloo on it... only the utterly mad would!

 

[6Gman]

My house (population 4) has greater demand! As there isn't room for a spur from the line to my house I propose closing the main road in to an industrial estate and turning it in to a rail line.

Yes, but my house is a county house and therefore takes precedence!

And I'm still waiting to hear where the WCML touches Shropshire!

 

[Rhydgaled]

Having a school friend who lives in Broadhaven, I appreciate that a lot of people refer to the bottom left corner of Wales as "Little England beyond Wales", but even so...

Sorry, missed the 'English' there. Still, Ceredigion has no through rail link to either the Welsh capital or London, and no rail service at all to the county town. If not all Welsh counties have through trains to Cardiff (most of Wales doesn't even have a roughly direct rail route to Cardiff available, not even a freight-only one), or London, does this reduce the inportance of any claim that all English counties should have direct links to London?

 

[tbtc]

Sorry, missed the 'English' there. Still, Ceredigion has no through rail link to either the Welsh capital or London, and no rail service at all to the county town. If not all Welsh counties have through trains to Cardiff (most of Wales doesn't even have a roughly direct rail route to Cardiff available, not even a freight-only one), or London, does this reduce the inportance of any claim that all English counties should have direct links to London?

As I've said many times in the "Holyhead must have lots of services to Cardiff" threads, there are plenty of places in Scotland that have no service to Edinburgh (Dumfries, Galloway, Ayrshire, Inverclyde, Renfrewshire...) - that's not including the West Highlands (which only have the overnight sleeper service to Edinburgh) and places that have no railway station whatsoever (Borders, Western Isles, Orkney, Shetland, Ulapool).

Plenty places in England have no link to their "county town" either, but it seems to be much less of an issue.

 

[TomJ93]

Reopen the Severn valley railway and give Shrewsbury and Bridgnorth a direct link!

 

[Rhydgaled]

As I've said many times in the "Holyhead must have lots of services to Cardiff" threads, there are plenty of places in Scotland that have no service to Edinburgh (Dumfries, Galloway, Ayrshire, Inverclyde, Renfrewshire...) - that's not including the West Highlands (which only have the overnight sleeper service to Edinburgh) and places that have no railway station whatsoever (Borders, Western Isles, Orkney, Shetland, Ulapool).

Plenty places in England have no link to their "county town" either, but it seems to be much less of an issue.

Fair point. My opinion on the Holyhead debate is that it doesn't need the present high frequency of through services to Cardiff (services to Manchester or Crewe would probably be much more useful), but two or three Gerald-style express services (via Wrexham) to Cardiff each day would be no bad thing.