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Transpennine Route Upgrade and Electrification updates

td97

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Nope, same one that was reported earlier in the year. Should have done a search before posting. At least the Orangemen are working.
 
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Nathan F

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For some time now I’ve been trying to find out what’s planned for the TP route upgrade between Dewsbury and Huddersfield. In particular the Thornhill LNW Jn - Heaton Lodge Jn section. Anyone know anything about this?
 

61653 HTAFC

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For some time now I’ve been trying to find out what’s planned for the TP route upgrade between Dewsbury and Huddersfield. In particular the Thornhill LNW Jn - Heaton Lodge Jn section. Anyone know anything about this?
Post #2048 has some details of the proposed upgrade, including tunnel alterations at Stalybridge, and a proposed 4-track layout from Huddersfield to Ravensthorpe.
 

59CosG95

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deltic08

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Some sort of action at last! Might have to bookmark that thread and watch for any further additions, along with checking Northern's/TPE's websites for planned disruptions.
Why electrify before curve at Miles Platting is realigned, junction at Stalybridge is remodelled, again, and bay at Staly when it is planned to be removed?
 

yorksrob

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Surely they're not removing the bay platform at Stalybridge that's just been added ?
 

Greybeard33

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Why electrify before curve at Miles Platting is realigned, junction at Stalybridge is remodelled, again, and bay at Staly when it is planned to be removed?
Why should we have to wait years longer for electric local trains to Stalybridge, just because a few masts might have to be relocated if/when TRU eventually goes ahead?

Manchester - Stalybridge electrification was always an integral part of the North West Electrification Project. It is needed to reduce the congestion caused by reversing EMUs at Victoria.

Northern services normally use the Platform 5 bay at Stalybridge, whereas it is the P2 bay that might be lost in the proposed remodelling.
 

deltic08

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At least with TP upgrade they can start at the other end if necessary. Leeds Selby and Leeds York then to Huddersfield etc
But can they?
Bridges north of Church Fenton have been raised already, but south of Church Fenton stopped when electrification was cancelled in 2017. The curve at Church Fenton is being eased to 125mph by building a rail bypass.
Leeds to Micklefield is at capacity currently so is being quadrupled to separate stopping and non stopping trains to free up paths. I can't see uprights being installed before that is completed. It means new stations at Garforth, East Garforth and Micklefield, widening a long and deep cutting at East Garforth and acquiring and demolishing several houses just south of Micklefield. A start hasn't been made yet so neither Leeds-York or Selby can go electric for many years.
 

Killingworth

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But can they?
Bridges north of Church Fenton have been raised already, but south of Church Fenton stopped when electrification was cancelled in 2017. The curve at Church Fenton is being eased to 125mph by building a rail bypass.
Leeds to Micklefield is at capacity currently so is being quadrupled to separate stopping and non stopping trains to free up paths. I can't see uprights being installed before that is completed. It means new stations at Garforth, East Garforth and Micklefield, widening a long and deep cutting at East Garforth and acquiring and demolishing several houses just south of Micklefield. A start hasn't been made yet so neither Leeds-York or Selby can go electric for many years.

I can't believe that any work is being done without it being as near electrification ready as possible. That adds great expense.

The Hope Valley Capacity Improvement Scheme is more expensive than it would have been to ensure a foot bridge at Dore & Totley station is high enough for future wiring. The same goes for a pedestrian footbridge at Hathersage West, to be built for about £750k to replace a very lightly used pedestrian level crossing. From words gleaned at the public inquiry and comments from rail industry fellow travellers at that time, fairly advanced outline plans to electrify the Hope Valley route exist. (Doomed I gather by the long closure periods needed for Totley and Cowburn tunnels.) They most probably do for all other mainlines. They'll need dusting off and pursuing in more detail, but if funds become available it will be interesting to see priorities.
 

DynamicSpirit

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The Hope Valley Capacity Improvement Scheme is more expensive than it would have been to ensure a foot bridge at Dore & Totley station is high enough for future wiring. The same goes for a pedestrian footbridge at Hathersage West, to be built for about £750k to replace a very lightly used pedestrian level crossing. From words gleaned at the public inquiry and comments from rail industry fellow travellers at that time, fairly advanced outline plans to electrify the Hope Valley route exist. (Doomed I gather by the long closure periods needed for Totley and Cowburn tunnels.) They most probably do for all other mainlines. They'll need dusting off and pursuing in more detail, but if funds become available it will be interesting to see priorities.

I would have thought that Hope Valley would in some ways be a great candidate for electrification because it's so curvy: The extent to which even fast trains have to repeatedly slow down and then accelerate again must mean the potential for journey time savings with electric trains would be very significant. And with plans for 4tph on it, you can't use lack of trains as an excuse for not doing the work. On the other hand, as you say, there are the long tunnels. And I suspect the thing about putting visible wires in an area of outstanding natural beauty would cause controversy.
 

hwl

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I would have thought that Hope Valley would in some ways be a great candidate for electrification because it's so curvy: The extent to which even fast trains have to repeatedly slow down and then accelerate again must mean the potential for journey time savings with electric trains would be very significant. And with plans for 4tph on it, you can't use lack of trains as an excuse for not doing the work. On the other hand, as you say, there are the long tunnels. And I suspect the thing about putting visible wires in an area of outstanding natural beauty would cause controversy.
6tph is often seen as the point where electrification becomes "interesting"
 

Killingworth

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6tph is often seen as the point where electrification becomes "interesting"

It's currently over 6 tph if you take both directions into account, but wiring almost 6 miles of the two tunnels, plus Disley, is a bit of a barrier.
 

59CosG95

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Why electrify before curve at Miles Platting is realigned, junction at Stalybridge is remodelled, again, and bay at Staly when it is planned to be removed?
The structure behind P2 (the bay from Stockport) might not necessarily be a termination anchor structure. I have every suspicion that NR are perhaps waiting on further survey data, or a design change in positioning any further masts.
We'll just have to wait & see.
 

yorksrob

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I don't understand why tunnels are seen as such an obstacle to electrification. Compared to overbridges, they tend to be less likely to be rebuilt, which isn't surprising, given their profile tends to be a lot more gothic than most overbridges.
 

DynamicSpirit

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6tph is often seen as the point where electrification becomes "interesting"

I assume that's not rigid though. I'm pretty sure Preston-Blackpool North and Wootton Bassett-Cardiff Central don't see 6tph of trains that can be made electric.
 

Killingworth

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I don't understand why tunnels are seen as such an obstacle to electrification. Compared to overbridges, they tend to be less likely to be rebuilt, which isn't surprising, given their profile tends to be a lot more gothic than most overbridges.

It's the time it takes. Using the Hope Valley as an example, the profiles are already too tight to take modern container traffic. The linings are over 100 years old and leak water so badly the line has to be closed most winters, sometimes for days, due to icicles in the tunnels.

It's a hostile environment for wires to be, and appears to have been calculated as needing years of weekend closures to install , or a blockade of many months to install one tunnel, then the other to keep an exit route from the cement works. I gather that project took a year to be seriously considered and has been filed away in the "never, ever" box. Nevertheless the new footbridges at Hathersage West and Dore & Totley station will be built high enough to take wires. Maybe some sort of hybrid electrification can happen down part of the route.

Which is why I, not entirely in jest, have suggested going the whole hog by driving a brand new 21st century tunnel from the centre of Sheffield to the centre of Manchester. It would be only 32 miles instead of current 42, straight, level, and not subject to high winds, winds, trespassers and infuriating delays crossing congested junctions in the final approaches. Keep it simple, all underground, no intermediate stations, 50 minute journey reduced to 20 minutes, old route relieved of traffic for more freight and stopping trains, job done! Cost in billions. Shock, horror.

That can't happen because there's a much more demanding need already existing to connect Manchester with Leeds and serving West Yorkshire cities and towns as well as giving connections to Hull, York and Newcastle. Demanding, but threading 21st technology through congested twisting valleys with old buildings, lineside obstacles and through old tunnels is an unsatisfactory way of producing a satisfactory longer term transport system.

The cost of HS2 appals me, but I'm coming round to the view that it's the only way to go - although not necessarily the precise way it may be going. Holding off on Trans-Pennine routes to get it right may not be such a bad idea. But we're going to need an awful lot of money!
 

Bantamzen

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It's the time it takes. Using the Hope Valley as an example, the profiles are already too tight to take modern container traffic. The linings are over 100 years old and leak water so badly the line has to be closed most winters, sometimes for days, due to icicles in the tunnels.

It's a hostile environment for wires to be, and appears to have been calculated as needing years of weekend closures to install , or a blockade of many months to install one tunnel, then the other to keep an exit route from the cement works. I gather that project took a year to be seriously considered and has been filed away in the "never, ever" box. Nevertheless the new footbridges at Hathersage West and Dore & Totley station will be built high enough to take wires. Maybe some sort of hybrid electrification can happen down part of the route.

Which is why I, not entirely in jest, have suggested going the whole hog by driving a brand new 21st century tunnel from the centre of Sheffield to the centre of Manchester. It would be only 32 miles instead of current 42, straight, level, and not subject to high winds, winds, trespassers and infuriating delays crossing congested junctions in the final approaches. Keep it simple, all underground, no intermediate stations, 50 minute journey reduced to 20 minutes, old route relieved of traffic for more freight and stopping trains, job done! Cost in billions. Shock, horror.

That can't happen because there's a much more demanding need already existing to connect Manchester with Leeds and serving West Yorkshire cities and towns as well as giving connections to Hull, York and Newcastle. Demanding, but threading 21st technology through congested twisting valleys with old buildings, lineside obstacles and through old tunnels is an unsatisfactory way of producing a satisfactory longer term transport system.

The cost of HS2 appals me, but I'm coming round to the view that it's the only way to go - although not necessarily the precise way it may be going. Holding off on Trans-Pennine routes to get it right may not be such a bad idea. But we're going to need an awful lot of money!

The only problem is that a tunnel that length almost certainly wouldn't be straight. There will be geological issues such as faults & unsuitable geology to negotiate, water passages, mine works to avoid, even before you find a suitable point to bring the line to the surface at each end. Plus you'll then need ventilation, drainage, and escape routes to factor in. Boring a route under the Pennines might seem like an easy win, but it really isn't and would be far more costly than even fully wiring all three Pennine crossings. Its for these reasons that I don't expect for there ever to be a NPR new alignment for the Leeds-Manchester section, let alone anywhere else.

I'm afraid we are pretty much stuck where we are. The North TP does have some potential to increase capacity & speed, even at Standedge where two unused bores could potentially, though expensively be brought back into traffic operation. Indeed factoring these in would potentially reduce the amount of blockage needed to fully complete the upgrade. Sadly this is highly unlikely to ever happen.
 

DynamicSpirit

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Which is why I, not entirely in jest, have suggested going the whole hog by driving a brand new 21st century tunnel from the centre of Sheffield to the centre of Manchester. It would be only 32 miles instead of current 42, straight, level, and not subject to high winds, winds, trespassers and infuriating delays crossing congested junctions in the final approaches. Keep it simple, all underground, no intermediate stations, 50 minute journey reduced to 20 minutes, old route relieved of traffic for more freight and stopping trains, job done! Cost in billions. Shock, horror.

That can't happen because there's a much more demanding need already existing to connect Manchester with Leeds and serving West Yorkshire cities and towns as well as giving connections to Hull, York and Newcastle. Demanding, but threading 21st technology through congested twisting valleys with old buildings, lineside obstacles and through old tunnels is an unsatisfactory way of producing a satisfactory longer term transport system.

The cost of HS2 appals me, but I'm coming round to the view that it's the only way to go - although not necessarily the precise way it may be going. Holding off on Trans-Pennine routes to get it right may not be such a bad idea. But we're going to need an awful lot of money!

I would not be too surprised if what we end up with in about 20 year's time is not too dissimilar from your suggestion, but a new line that runs from Manchester, not directly to Sheffield, but to a new junction with the HS2 line, meeting it somewhere between Sheffield and Leeds. A North-facing junction will obviously allow very fast trains from Manchester to Leeds, York and the North-East. A triangular junction should additionally allow fast Manchester-Sheffield-Toton trains, although I'm not sure if stopping at Sheffield could be blocked by changes to HS2 forced by Sheffield's insistence on a city centre, not a Meadowhall, HS2 station.
 

edwin_m

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I assume that's not rigid though. I'm pretty sure Preston-Blackpool North and Wootton Bassett-Cardiff Central don't see 6tph of trains that can be made electric.
The 2009 electrification strategy, which spawned the various electrification schemes that have happened or not happened since, was based on a metric of vehicle-miles converted to electric operation per mile of electrification. This was influenced by some schemes assuming that other schemes had already happened, but Preston-Blackpool would have been boosted by the scope to reduce diesel operation under the wires in the Manchester area and maybe between Manchester and Preston if that was assumed to have been electrified first. The metric was also based on vehicle-miles not train-miles, so the case for the South Wales main line would have been boosted by it running longer trains. The big change since then has been the advent of bi-modes, which cost more but allow trains to use electric power on electrified sections even if their journeys include non-electrified sections.
I would not be too surprised if what we end up with in about 20 year's time is not too dissimilar from your suggestion, but a new line that runs from Manchester, not directly to Sheffield, but to a new junction with the HS2 line, meeting it somewhere between Sheffield and Leeds. A North-facing junction will obviously allow very fast trains from Manchester to Leeds, York and the North-East. A triangular junction should additionally allow fast Manchester-Sheffield-Toton trains, although I'm not sure if stopping at Sheffield could be blocked by changes to HS2 forced by Sheffield's insistence on a city centre, not a Meadowhall, HS2 station.
I thought that was a real possiblity when the HS2 phase 2 route was first announced, with perhaps a re-opened Woodhead leading to a triangular junction somewhere near Barnsley. However when I did the maths the Manchester-Leeds time was uncompetitive by this route. Since then (partly due to Sheffield's attitude) HS2 has been moved to the east of Sheffield so can't* play any role in Manchester-Sheffield journeys.

Getting out the electronic equivalent of crayons, a straight line between Manchester and Sheffield would pass through Hyde and Glossop. So perhaps the former four-track alignment to Guide Bridge could be used to reduce the tunneling and allow a portal in a less urban area. After Hattersley that alignment is is more curved, goes well north of the straight line and soon enters the National Park, but a portal there would probably not get down quickly enough to avoid re-surfacing in the Etherow valley. There's no obvious place to surface in Sheffield given the way the built-up area extends into the Pennine foothills.

*It's conceivable, but not really relevant here, that the western leg will carry NPR trains between Manchester and Liverpool that carry onto Sheffield on the existing route.
 

yorksrob

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It's the time it takes. Using the Hope Valley as an example, the profiles are already too tight to take modern container traffic. The linings are over 100 years old and leak water so badly the line has to be closed most winters, sometimes for days, due to icicles in the tunnels.

It's a hostile environment for wires to be, and appears to have been calculated as needing years of weekend closures to install , or a blockade of many months to install one tunnel, then the other to keep an exit route from the cement works. I gather that project took a year to be seriously considered and has been filed away in the "never, ever" box. Nevertheless the new footbridges at Hathersage West and Dore & Totley station will be built high enough to take wires. Maybe some sort of hybrid electrification can happen down part of the route.

Which is why I, not entirely in jest, have suggested going the whole hog by driving a brand new 21st century tunnel from the centre of Sheffield to the centre of Manchester. It would be only 32 miles instead of current 42, straight, level, and not subject to high winds, winds, trespassers and infuriating delays crossing congested junctions in the final approaches. Keep it simple, all underground, no intermediate stations, 50 minute journey reduced to 20 minutes, old route relieved of traffic for more freight and stopping trains, job done! Cost in billions. Shock, horror.

That can't happen because there's a much more demanding need already existing to connect Manchester with Leeds and serving West Yorkshire cities and towns as well as giving connections to Hull, York and Newcastle. Demanding, but threading 21st technology through congested twisting valleys with old buildings, lineside obstacles and through old tunnels is an unsatisfactory way of producing a satisfactory longer term transport system.

The cost of HS2 appals me, but I'm coming round to the view that it's the only way to go - although not necessarily the precise way it may be going. Holding off on Trans-Pennine routes to get it right may not be such a bad idea. But we're going to need an awful lot of money!

The Severn tunnel hasn't taken that long to electrify. If it can be done there, it can be done here. And whilst I know they've had problems with water ingress, that's salt water because it's under the sea. The Hope Valley is too high up for salt water.

(If they can't fit modern containers through it, they'll just have to go another route).
 

edwin_m

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The Severn tunnel hasn't taken that long to electrify. If it can be done there, it can be done here. And whilst I know they've had problems with water ingress, that's salt water because it's under the sea. The Hope Valley is too high up for salt water.

(If they can't fit modern containers through it, they'll just have to go another route).
A lot of the water in the Severn Tunnel comes from a fresh water spring that was discovered while digging it.

But I think I agree with you on the containers, despite believing that electrification should normally include clearance to W11/W12 as a matter of course. There's very little Transpennine container traffic as the east-west distances are too short for rail to be competitive, and any that exists now or in the future would probably have an eastern origin/destination more easily accessed via Diggle or Calder Valley. Plus the stone and cement trains use most of the available Hope Valley freight capacity. In this case it would be reasonable to adopt a smaller gauge to save a lot of money on any electrification.
 

yorksrob

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A lot of the water in the Severn Tunnel comes from a fresh water spring that was discovered while digging it.

But I think I agree with you on the containers, despite believing that electrification should normally include clearance to W11/W12 as a matter of course. There's very little Transpennine container traffic as the east-west distances are too short for rail to be competitive, and any that exists now or in the future would probably have an eastern origin/destination more easily accessed via Diggle or Calder Valley. Plus the stone and cement trains use most of the available Hope Valley freight capacity. In this case it would be reasonable to adopt a smaller gauge to save a lot of money on any electrification.

I did read recently that the corrosion of the catenary in the Severn tunnel was due to salt water.
 

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