Great Western Coffee Shop

A mentioned elsewhere I did the UK Railtours Staines to York trip on Saturday.

Good run up 67 got up to 96 down towards Grantham.

Came back via Lincoln Sleaford using the southbound avoiding line, and Spalding.

Still semphore signals and lots of manned LCs.

Couple of questions where were under the control of semphore signals in London?

How many points on our outward trip would have needed to be set in a different position to get us to Paris instead. Assuming they'd put a 92 with TVM fitted on at Willesden.

two?

Between Old Kew and Kew East Jns?

Paul

Tim

No not 2.

Paul correct with Greenford and the GOB ones gone East Kew Jn box and? are as far as I know the last semaphores in London.

So a second question where is and a? As a clue I also bleieve these are the last AB sections in London as well.

Feels like it ought to be one point, somewhere after Camden Road. Instead of turning down the North London Incline and joining the ECML you would go straight on into the HS1 tunnel.

You need three sets of points - one to leave the North London incline and join the bidirectional (single track) NLL Connection, and the second and third being the crossover to join the down HS1/CTRL out of St Pancras? The second set in that sequence being to provide a route for trains heading from the up HS1 to the NLL Connection.  This is because the track arrangement presents the NLL Connection between the up and down HS1, rather than on the down side as you might logically expect.

Paul

I had no idea Greenford had gone, or have they just installed colour lights in the area to replace semaphores?

I'm not too sure on this, but is the freight only Dudding Hill route still semaphore?

Paul

Worcester pass is correct, one point at Camden Road Incline Junction would have needed to be changed to drop us down to HS1. It has been suggested to me that the point is actually OOU and is clipped towards teh ECML, so it may be a hypothectical switch at present.

Paul has eloborated what happens once the line connects with HS1. With the two single lines from ECML and HS1 making a single lead  junction with the North London line one wonders how many through Eurostars were planned. With the North London passenger service going to 15 minute interval in May it is going to very difficult to fit in the freights and get paths up/down to the ECML.

Paul is right the Dudding Hill Line is still semaphore with a couple of AB sections.

Intersting thought. if GOB and the Dudding Hill line were to be electrified how many other links in London would need to be electrified to provide wires (or one case third rails) betweenn already wired routes.

I make it 6/7 depending if you count the third rail as 1 or 2.

This would leave one London terminal with out any form of electrification.

When did Greenford go? There were still semaphores there five weeks ago when I was there.

Bobm must admit I was surprised to hear they had gone.

Will recheck with another source.

Still there last friday - see attached

Some were replaced with colour light signals a few years ago, but some still remain - particularly on the Wycombe lines through Park Royal.

I'll repremand my source!