High Speed Rail - a bit further West!

[whole diary]

[willc]

While the original point was somewhere across the Atlantic, the point about Plymouth was quite clearly  about journey times, not frequency, train length or anything else.

I was talking about ECML^▸ (East Coast Main Line) times as they are now, not what they were in the late 80s and early 90s. Electrification was not as much of a step change as you seem to suggest, certainly nothing like the impact of 125mph running from 1978, fully exploiting the earlier route improvements. Same as FGW^▸ (First Great Western) fastest times aren't what they were 20 or 30 years ago. London-West Yorkshire times now are scarcely any different from 1978 - I ought to remember, I lived in Yorkshire then. And it certainly doesn't suggest any striving to speed things up as suggested above.

National Express East Anglia London-Norwich times are not what they were post-electrification either but then they are trying to cope with a doubling of passenger numbers in the past decade, a similar situation to that facing FGW. What do you suggest they actually do, beyond moaning about longer journey times, when much of that is down to added stops to cover rising demand?

And how do you propose to achieve a great step forward, with the same trains operating on the same infrastructure as the late 1970s, including a London-Reading section far more heavily used than it was then? No-one will be doing any leaping forward until Reading station is rebuilt, wires go up and new trains arrive.

[IndustryInsider]

No-one will be doing any leaping forward until Reading station is rebuilt, wires go up and new trains arrive.

And even then, I'm not sure that the possible journey times quoted by Hitachi for the Bristol and Swansea routes will be what's reflected in the actual timetable. Not unless/until 140mph running is introduced on suitable sections of the route.

[woody]

Interestingly with the East coast back under direct government control I see that they want to re-introduce a sub 4 hour Kingscross/Edinburgh service and reduce the standard KingsX/Newcastle journey time to 2 hours 50 minutes and the standard KingsX/Edinburgh time to 4 hours 20 minutes in order to take on the airlines on that route.Likewise on Anglia Liverpool street/Norwich route there are now calls by for a headline 90 minute journey time.The need for speed has always been a precursor of economic development generally and the Westcountry is no different.Any region that does not keep up with the pack ultimately looses out.

[thetrout]

Fully agree with your last point willc. Ireland does indeed have some of the slowest inter-city services, as well as Europe's slowest 'international' express!

I thought the slowest Intercity grade service was this bundle of fun

http://www.glacierexpress.ch/theglacierexpress.php

*edit* - Open for correction of course

[JayMac]

Agreed, trout. However my response was in answer to willc suggesting there was an island off the coast of Europe with a not too great inter-city service. (I think he was thinking of somewhere other than the Emerald Isle!)

Switzerland is just an island of sanity within Europe! 

[woody]

Reference Forthcoming improvements on the East Coast check this link out.
http://www.eastcoast.co.uk/travel-information/Eureka/
 As i have repeated said the world keeps moving on even if FGW^▸ (First Great Western) is not.

[willc]

Reference Forthcoming improvements on the East Coast check this link out.
http://www.eastcoast.co.uk/travel-information/Eureka/
 As i have repeated said the world keeps moving on even if FGW^▸ (First Great Western) is not.

And Virgin made many bold promises about Operation Princess on XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) routes in 2002 - compare the network then with what XC runs on those routes now, or, in a number of cases, doesn't - moved, yes. Backwards.

Many of these changes on East Coast are to allow for extra trains, not necessarily notably faster ones, including open access services, which don't exist hereabouts. And they are pulling out of Glasgow. 'Moving on' perhaps, but in a positive direction?

The EC speed-up is being achieved by removing padding that has been added in, just like FGW, to make punctuality figures look better. If it all goes wrong, like Operation Princess, what will happen? They will bring back the padding. Come to Oxford some time and watch northbound XC trains sit in the platform for five minutes at the top of every hour, courtesy of their timing allowance.

With Reading rebuilding getting under way, Crossrail and electrification, is it realistic for FGW to do the same as EC in the next few years? I doubt it. And if they did, then what would surely follow, with that amount of major engineering work and resignalling going on, would be a pattern of late running, doing nothing for the railway's reputation just when they most need to keep passengers on side.

And what practical suggestions do you have for speeding up Plymouth services. No-one is queuing up to build the new line that would be needed through Devon to make any significant difference to times to Plymouth. You keep banging on about speed - that's the easy bit - but how do you actually propose to go about it? Do tell us.

You might also note Brompton Rail's post here  http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=6138.0

[Tim]

We sometimes forget that speed isn't just about how fast the mainline trains go.  The passenger is concerned with door to door speed.  For some journeys you could increase door to door speed by:

1) better connections or ore "though trains".
2) modest line speed increases on the branch lines
3) improved travel to the station (more reliable buses, easier and quicker parking for drivers, bike racks, opening access to both sides of the station for pedestrians)
4) faster ticket selling or Oyster^▸ (Smartcard system used by passengers on Transport for London services) type arrangement or allowing purchase of tickets on the train.

All of the above things would be cheaper to do, but the trend is in the opposite direction in many places.  - for example there are plans to re-develop Bath station which involve removing the pedestrian gates from the car parks and the South of the station so to require all passenegers to enter through the single gateline and use the stairs or lifts to the platforms, for many passnegers this will add a minute or two to each journey - longer if with luggage, pushcahir, wheelchair).  To my mind this is as stupid as adding a minute or two in padding to the timetable.  I realise that revenue protection is an important issue, but it needs to be done properly.  If FGW^▸ (First Great Western) doubled the number of ticket barriers at BTM^▸ (Bristol Temple Meads (strictly, it should be BRI)) for example so as to eliminate delays in the peaks, it would save many "passenger minutes" and it less cost I would have thought than electrifcation or line speed upgrades. 

[woody]

Speeding up Plymouth services is certainly not a national priority and I agree there is little FGW^▸ (First Great Western) can do about the infrastructure especially between Exeter and Plymouth.Faced with a similar dilema Virgin West Coast went for tilting trains,perhaps the Berks and Hants route could also benefit from tilt or would that be too expensive as well.While aviation is a niche market now in the far south-west that may not always be the case. 

[Zoe]

Speeding up Plymouth services is certainly not a national priority and I agree there is little FGW^▸ (First Great Western) can do about the infrastructure especially between Exeter and Plymouth.

With the exception of the sea wall, line speeds are not too bad as far as Newton Abbot.   West of there however you are down to 55/60 mph all the way to Plymouth except for an 80 mph section around Hemerdon.  FGW though run trains on infrastructure owned by Network Rail so there is very little FGW can do to speed up services short of removing calls on some trains.

[IndustryInsider]

But hardly a great step forward in 35 years.

It certainly strikes me as a pity that when you consider our three main routes out of London, the WCML^▸ (West Coast Main Line), ECML^▸ (East Coast Main Line) and GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) that the two former operate trains that are designed for 140mph running and the latter is so well engineered that it has the potential to operate at over 125mph for large sections.  Signalling issues not withstanding, hopefully better use can be made of this potential over the next 35 years!

[Electric train]

But hardly a great step forward in 35 years.

It certainly strikes me as a pity that when you consider our three main routes out of London, the WCML^▸ (West Coast Main Line), ECML^▸ (East Coast Main Line) and GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) that the two former operate trains that are designed for 140mph running and the latter is so well engineered that it has the potential to operate at over 125mph for large sections.  Signalling issues not withstanding, hopefully better use can be made of this potential over the next 35 years!

MML^» (Midland Main Line. - about) GEL BML PML four more main routes out of London