Which routes in the UK make sense to increase linespeeds to 200 km/h (125 mph)

[Nottingham59]

One would hope that an incoming government would build a true HSR to the Central Belt.

The SNP certainly wouldn't support that. It would increase the level of economic intergration between Scotland and England, which is the exact opposite of the SNPs strategic interest.

 

[The Planner]

I would certainly support 4-tracking of existing mixed traffic sections over speed upgrades. Banbury to Leamington, Tamworth to Burton, and Preston to Carlisle (or off-line newbuild of passenger tracks from Oxenholme to Carlisle). would be my first places to start

Banbury Leamington just needs a 775m loop on the up, though the 50mph turn out at Reservoir Jn has sort of negated that, its also made Aynho loop a bit redundant too. Tamworth Burton needs the missing signals the original Water Orton resignalling didnt put in as part of cost cutting, Elford loop sorting out and grabbing the nettle of Kingsbury Branch Jn. Preston Carlisle has had more studies on looping strategies than I have had hot dinners.

 

[Meerkat]

above 125mph requires a lot of upgrades to track, signalling and OLE. It's simply not going to be cost effective to do any line other than maybe Peterborough to Doncaster.

So why was the GW OLE specced for 140mph?

I would certainly support 4-tracking of existing mixed traffic sections over speed upgrades. Banbury to Leamington,

Once HS2 opens the passenger trains on that line won't need to go faster than the intermodals (on average) will they?

One would hope that an incoming government would build a true HSR to the Central Belt.

You saw the fuss about the Chilterns, no government is going to fancy the storm from building HS from Lancaster to Glasgow!! Unless of course the environmental campaigners were actually just NIMBYs......

 

[zwk500]

So why was the GW OLE specced for 140mph?

Because I guess the decision was made that the additional cost wasn't too much and they thought it might be used.

Once HS2 opens the passenger trains on that line won't need to go faster than the intermodals (on average) will they?

Yes, the XC to/from Southampton and Bournemouth will want to go faster than slightly less than 75mph.

 

[Meerkat]

Because I guess the decision was made that the additional cost wasn't too much and they thought it might be used.

Or because there is no case for a new HS line but raising the speed on GW will be feasible when ECTS eventually turns up.

Yes, the XC to/from Southampton and Bournemouth will want to go faster than slightly less than 75mph.

Be quicker to go via OOC wont it? If you don't want to change then tough. What speed can a XC do and not catch up a intermodal between stops?

 

[HSTEd]

So why was the GW OLE specced for 140mph?

Because the GW OLE was going to be so magical and revolutionary that all previous OLE would be obsolete and swept away by the wonder of the HOPS train.

This is from the same era that believed re-electrification at 25kV would be cheaper than third rail renewals. You expect particularly sensible decision making on specification?

The Great Western Route Modernisation had an even worse version of the magical thoughts that pervaded the WCRM a generation before.

 

[Bartsimho]

You saw the fuss about the Chilterns, no government is going to fancy the storm from building HS from Lancaster to Glasgow!! Unless of course the environmental campaigners were actually just NIMBYs......

I mean they opposed HS2 on "environmental grounds" despite it being an environmental positive with Speed/Capacity increases from it.

The SNP certainly wouldn't support that. It would increase the level of economic intergration between Scotland and England, which is the exact opposite of the SNPs strategic interest.

So any incoming Unionist Westminster Party in a time where the SNP look to be shaky and loosing ground should look to use it to cement economic integration making the SNP's desire even more unlikely.

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

If the GWML is upgraded to 140mph, and Bristol to Exeter 125mph and electrified, it would be quicker to run Devon & Cornwall fast services the 'Great Way Round' via Bristol. The Berks and Hants could be relegated to semi-fasts and stone trains only - it is notoriously 'bouncy' and the 'old' bit between Westbury and Castle Cary notably curvaceous.

 

[Nottingham59]

If the GWML is upgraded to 140mph, and Bristol to Exeter 125mph and electrified, it would be quicker to run Devon & Cornwall fast services the 'Great Way Round' via Bristol. The Berks and Hants could be relegated to semi-fasts and stone trains only - it is notoriously 'bouncy' and the 'old' bit between Westbury and Castle Cary notably curvaceous.

Yes. Effectively four-tracking the route from Reading to Taunton. And if you slow the passenger trains on the B&H, and give them more calls, then you can enable more freight paths on that route too.

 

[Ken H]

isnt the big problem going faster that the faster you go the more energy you use, and it goes up quickly at faster speeds. That must surely eat into the viability of going faster. And thats on top of the costs of high speed signalling and the effect on the infrastructure.
I think there was a scheme to go faster than 125 between Penrith and Carlisle. What killed that off. or was it just Branson hyperbole

 

[stuu]

If the GWML is upgraded to 140mph, and Bristol to Exeter 125mph and electrified, it would be quicker to run Devon & Cornwall fast services the 'Great Way Round' via Bristol. The Berks and Hants could be relegated to semi-fasts and stone trains only - it is notoriously 'bouncy' and the 'old' bit between Westbury and Castle Cary notably curvaceous.

I think you need to show your working. Taunton to Reading takes 70 minutes via the Berks & Hants. 125mph running between Taunton and Bristol would save 3 or so minutes, and there's no way a train wouldn't stop at BRI. That leaves less than 40 minutes to get to Reading, which would need an average speed of 120mph to get there. Seems highly unlikely even with 140mph top speeds

 

[The Planner]

Be quicker to go via OOC wont it? If you don't want to change then tough. What speed can a XC do and not catch up a intermodal between stops?

It doesnt come into it, trains will get pathed at the speed they can attain. If the Intermodal is getting caught its getting looped.

 

[cle]

Yes. Effectively four-tracking the route from Reading to Taunton. And if you slow the passenger trains on the B&H, and give them more calls, then you can enable more freight paths on that route too.

Ok so a Penzance service might be non-stop from Reading to Bristol TM (still more stops than today and full with Bristol pax, let's forget Parkway here for a moment) - would that route to Taunton ever be quicker than the 1h40 of today (with a sole Reading call) ?

140mph running not being in scope of the thread, also. But even still, I'd be surprised if it beat that.

I do think the B&H could be better used though! The semi-fast should be hourly, at least to Westbury but arguably to Taunton or Exeter.

I'd overlay another hourly service in an ideal world - alternating between Plymouth and Paignton - and speed up the Penzance to be Reading-Exeter-Plymouth. Given the renaissance in Devon and Cornwall tourism, especially.

 

[Bartsimho]

Ok so a Penzance service might be non-stop from Reading to Bristol TM (still more stops than today and full with Bristol pax, let's forget Parkway here for a moment) - would that route to Taunton ever be quicker than the 1h40 of today (with a sole Reading call) ?

140mph running not being in scope of the thread, also. But even still, I'd be surprised if it beat that.

I do think the B&H could be better used though! The semi-fast should be hourly, at least to Westbury but arguably to Taunton or Exeter.

I'd overlay another hourly service in an ideal world - alternating between Plymouth and Paignton - and speed up the Penzance to be Reading-Exeter-Plymouth. Given the renaissance in Devon and Cornwall tourism, especially.

Devon and Cornwall Tourism has been on the up but there is a serious issue with Cornwall's capacity to get people in and out of the County so there could be some returns on investment for projects which aids capacity and speed to Cornwall.

 

[zwk500]

Devon and Cornwall Tourism has been on the up but there is a serious issue with Cornwall's capacity to get people in and out of the County so there could be some returns on investment for projects which aids capacity and speed to Cornwall.

The issue is Cornwall's geography makes any changes to linespeed very expensive.

 

[Bald Rick]

In response to the OP…

Reading to Taunton via the Nerks & Hants is more or less maxed out now. Phillip Rees (the legendary former Western Region Civil Engineer, just recently departed aged 104) squeezed every last drop of speed out of it, including with exceptional curving rules. The only way to get more out is tilting trains, and even then it won’t be much.

The issue with going from 100mph to 125mph is that a lot of the rules change at 101mph - staff safety, level crossings, OLE, and that’s on top of signal spacing and sighting And all the rest of it (gauging, structure stability, station safety, Lx risk assessment, I could go on…) Some track standards change at 110mph too.

Then, you have to be able to sue it, both by it being driveable - ie the trains can actually make use of it - and also in the timetable. No point getting to Cogload Jn 2 mins earlier if you are just going to sit waiting for a path as the faster timetable doesn’t work. Ask Transport Scotland how the journey time improvement project on the Highland Line went.…

so, you need some long decent stretches to increase the linespeed, a timetable that works for it, and a market that will generate enough revenue / socio economic benefit to justify what can be considerable expenditure.

The only possibles I can think of are Westerleigh - Blackwell (lots of LX though) and maybe Reading to Leamington. But very unlikely, even in a world where DfT had any money.


And then you have to compare against the potential alternatives. By far and away the best value option in terms of benefits gained vs costs incurred for reducing journey time between London and Norwich is to have every other train run non stop through Diss and Manningtree.

above 125mph requires a lot of upgrades to track, signalling and OLE. It's simply not going to be cost effective to do any line other than maybe Peterborough to Doncaster.

It won’t be cost effective between Peterboro and Doncaster, of that I’m reasonably sure.

I think there was a scheme to go faster than 125 between Penrith and Carlisle.

That was one of the test sites for the Pendolinos. It was never seriously proposed asa permanent >125 railway.

 

[snowball]

So why was the GW OLE specced for 140mph?

Perhaps because fashion and economic sentiment go in alternating expansive and contractive phases, and we were in an expansive phase at the time, unlike today.

 

[Nottingham59]

I think you need to show your working. Taunton to Reading takes 70 minutes via the Berks & Hants. 125mph running between Taunton and Bristol would save 3 or so minutes, and there's no way a train wouldn't stop at BRI. That leaves less than 40 minutes to get to Reading, which would need an average speed of 120mph to get there. Seems highly unlikely even with 140mph top speeds

Taunton to Reading is 76mins (or at least the 1944h tonight is timetabled to arrive at 2100h - other trains may be faster). A Voyager takes 31 mins from Taunton to Bristol TM (d1953h), so 28 after taking the 3 mins off. Leaving 48 mins to get from Bristol to Reading: corresponding to an average speed of 40/48*120 = 100mph. So it might be faster to go the long way round after all?

 

[Starmill]

The issue is that people expect running times based on the spikes and don't consider driveability, they then moan when a project doesn't deliver what they think it will.

Indeed, but what you refer to as "driveability" isn't likely to be relevant in Central Europe. They don't drive their trains anything like here.

Be quicker to go via OOC wont it? If you don't want to change then tough. What speed can a XC do and not catch up a intermodal between stops?

How do you know there will be a good service from Bournemouth to Old Oak Common?

 

[RobShipway]

isnt the big problem going faster that the faster you go the more energy you use, and it goes up quickly at faster speeds. That must surely eat into the viability of going faster. And thats on top of the costs of high speed signalling and the effect on the infrastructure.
I think there was a scheme to go faster than 125 between Penrith and Carlisle. What killed that off. or was it just Branson hyperbole

I have read several stories on the 140mph WCML, part of which was going 125mph between Penrith and Carlisle using the tilt functionality of the Class 390 Pendolino's.

Whilst there was some hype from Richard Branson, much of it was promises from Railtrack that they could not deliver with regards to increasing speeds on the WCML to be 140mph.

Other than the fiasco with electrifying the GWML, Network Rail have been pretty good and have learned lessons on how to be more efficient at electrifying routes to have OHLE. The problem that you have, is that there is not enough teams within Network Rail to enable the lines to be electrified at the speed that everyone desires.

Now, as the likes of @zwk500 have said the only way that you will get speeds over 100mph, is to be using OHLE and this can be done in sections where there is 4 tracks that can be used by trains going through the routes. The issue you then have is what will be the cost of doing that? Whilst you may speed up one operators trains which can do 125 - 140mph, other operators may only be able to get as much as 110mph out of their trains, that would be using the same tracks. So how do you time the trains such that they do not get in each other's way?

A good example is the London Paddington to Didcot Parkway service. Even though it goes through a few stations on the GWML like Burnham for example, the service is kept to the slow lines prior to Reading which means that it is kept to doing a maximum speed of 100mph, where the class 387 units have a max speed of 110mph. This is being done, to keep the fast line pathways clear for the class 387 London - Newbury & London - Reading services, plus any of the services being run by the class 8xx units. That having been said I notice that the 06:52 from Newbury this morning, is by the looks of it using the fast lines with going through platform 3 at Slough.

 

[Snow1964]

Be quicker to go via OOC wont it? If you don't want to change then tough. What speed can a XC do and not catch up a intermodal between stops?

XC speed is limited south of Basingstoke by freight
Between Basingstoke and Southampton capacity has been changed many times over the years.

From near Worting Junction towards Basingstoke used to be a 5th track run alongside the yard and round back of platform 4 which allowed overtaking of trains waiting for path towards Reading
Micheldever was a 4 track station so overtaking could happen there.
Wallers Ash loops were shortened during 1980s
During WW2 they nearly linked the Micheldever and Wallers Ash to make a four track section (but it is on a high chalk embankment so not easiest, not that a bright chalk embankment that can be spotted by Luftwaffe would be a factor now)
From Winchester Junction southwards the former line from Didcot gives 3 tracks, but layout was never altered to allow centre track to be used as reversible dynamic loop (but there is simbids basic bi-directional)
South of Shawford it is 4 track, recently extended, but not south of Swaything as originally envisaged (some bridges were done around 1910 eg Wide Lane and at Swaything can see how the platform buildings were altered to make these Island platforms.

So could have faster and inter-modal trains, Basingstoke-Southampton but capacity to overtake stopping trains at stations is not really there

 

[stuu]

Taunton to Reading is 76mins (or at least the 1944h tonight is timetabled to arrive at 2100h - other trains may be faster). A Voyager takes 31 mins from Taunton to Bristol TM (d1953h), so 28 after taking the 3 mins off. Leaving 48 mins to get from Bristol to Reading: corresponding to an average speed of 40/48*120 = 100mph. So it might be faster to go the long way round after all?

Even using those figures, it's not going to be a worthwhile saving. Especially when there are aspirations for more local services between Taunton, WSM and Bristol which already restrict the fast services

 

[Meerkat]

It doesnt come into it, trains will get pathed at the speed they can attain. If the Intermodal is getting caught its getting looped.

No problem. Replace the Voyagers with slower trains to push the through passengers onto HS2

 

[zwk500]

Whilst you may speed up one operators trains which can do 125 - 140mph, other operators may only be able to get as much as 110mph out of their trains, that would be using the same tracks. So how do you time the trains such that they do not get in each other's way?

110 and 125mph trains can mix fairly easily, especially if you have regular junctions so that the 110mph trains can drop off without getting in the way.

No problem. Replace the Voyagers with slower trains to push the through passengers onto HS2

XC will still want to run at linespeed on the Cherwell Valley, Birmingham-Southampton is a fairly big market.

 

[cle]

110 and 125mph trains can mix fairly easily, especially if you have regular junctions so that the 110mph trains can drop off without getting in the way.

XC will still want to run at linespeed on the Cherwell Valley, Birmingham-Southampton is a fairly big market.

I would also think that a future Chiltern EMU could do 110mph+ , and that is quite a nice stretch of non-stop running north of Banbury it could also benefit from, at 2tph each way. Possibly the odd Stratford too! As well as the XC which hopefully are also back to 2tph each direction, by then - if not much much sooner. Oxford-Moor St might be a thing through there eventually too, although I doubt that will run over 100.

 

[Tobbes]

Thinking a bit politically if you want to win the Central Belt from the SNP it would be a good idea to propose

Precisely this.

 

[Nottingham59]

110 and 125mph trains can mix fairly easily, especially if you have regular junctions so that the 110mph trains can drop off without getting in the way.

I'm still trying to understand the implications of mixing different speeds on one line. Can anyone please tell me what is the difference in running times from Preston to Glasgow for the following?

1. a 125mph EMU with tilt, e.g. Pendolino
2. a 125mph EMU without tilt, e.g. 80x
3. a 110mph non-tilting train like class 350

 

[zwk500]

I'm still trying to understand the implications of mixing different speeds on one line. Can anyone please tell me what the difference on running times are from Preston to Glasgow for the following?

1. a 125mph EMU with tilt, e.g. Pendolino
2. a 125mph EMU without tilt, e.g. 80x
3. a 110mph non-tilting train like class 350 or the proposed HS2 stock

It is the speed differential that is the issue, not the speeds themselves. Given how little of a line is ever actually cleared for 125mph (EPS or not), the 15mph doesn't make a lot of difference. FWIW 125mph is 3 seconds per mile faster than 110mph. The actual capacity effect is determined by stopping patterns, junction placement and headways as well.

 

[Boodiggy]

The Chat Moss definitely not, the local services already slow down 100mph trains so 125mph trains would be worse. Leeds to York is already as high as it can reasonably go, given the geometry constraints.

Wolverhampton-Shrewsbury just doesn't justfiy the costs of upgrading and maintaining the line above 100mph. Crewe-Chester is damned twisty and pretty short, so the benefit of an upgrade is very limited.

Remember, 100 to 125mph is 8sec/mile. You also generally need 3 or 4 minutes between trains so to get the benefit of an extra path you need to save 6 or 8 minutes journey time (3/4 minutes behind the first train and 3/4 minutes behind the extra one). That means to save 6 minutes you need to be able to upgrade 45 miles of 100mph running to 125mph. Now also consider an extra mile or so each side for acceleration and braking (acceleration being the harder as the power required curves upwards, 1-60 is easy, 60-100 is harder, 100-125 harder still), you really are running out of areas with 50 miles or more between stops that haven't already been upgraded.
A related question here is could you save more time by not going as slowly in other places? A lift from 50mph (72s/mi) to 75mph (48s/mi) saves half as much again (12s/mi) as the 8s/mi of 100 -> 125mph. Knocking a stop out of a 100mph section of line saves about 4-5 minutes on it's own.

Also consider the mixed traffic problems - track canted for a 125mph passenger train is going to behave very differently when a 60mph 2000 tonne freight train runs over it, or cause serious problems for passengers of a local train stopped at a heavily canted station. Look at Wolverton, on the WCML here (and this platform is only 90mph! https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/wolverton-buckinghamshire-england-april-11-2017-1193404771). In addition, if the railway is 2-track you will not be able to run faster than the train in front, so have you got junctions, loops, or termini at the right point so that your very expensively speeded up train does not then encounter yellow signals? Spending millions upgrading the track doesn't help if the trains ahead of you are stopping at every station.

Of course, you can remove trains from in front of you by diverting them or changing stopping patterns, but that will cost revenue so if the additional revenue from running faster worth it? Then consider the cost of maintaining higher speed track. It has tighter tolerances and needs to be inspected more often as even the smallest crack could multiply quickly. Is the value of the 125mph running repaid by train revenues?

Wolverton slow line platforms at 70mph with 90mph either side.

 

[Ken H]

It is the speed differential that is the issue, not the speeds themselves. Given how little of a line is ever actually cleared for 125mph (EPS or not), the 15mph doesn't make a lot of difference. FWIW 125mph is 3 seconds per mile faster than 110mph. The actual capacity effect is determined by stopping patterns, junction placement and headways as well.

What about acceleration? Maybe the slower train gets to 110 before the faster one, so some of the 125 capability is used up catching the slower train. And getting from 110 to 125 can take a while.