Potential new services GWR could start?

[whole diary]

[CMRail]

Why don't  they renovate Cheltenham station by lowering the track creating 4/6 full and terminating platforms below the current station.

The current station station could be converted into a public space, with access to the real station below.

I've no idea of the cost, but this would make Cheltenham much more useful and allow many more local services.

Whilst knocking down the car park, a main road and a stagecoach depot. Not much you can do..

[Red Squirrel]

Why don't  they renovate Cheltenham station by lowering the track creating 4/6 full and terminating platforms below the current station.

The current station station could be converted into a public space, with access to the real station below.

I've no idea of the cost, but this would make Cheltenham much more useful and allow many more local services.

Whilst knocking down the car park, a main road and a stagecoach depot. Not much you can do..

How about sending terminating trains to a new Cheltenham Town station, near the junction of St George's Rd and Honeybourne Way?

Oops, I broke my crayon...

[Witham Bobby]

Re: Potential new services GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) could start?
« Reply #50 on: September 06, 2018, 08:50:40 pm »
   
You cannot have one train allowed to do 40mph on a heritage railway whilst the others are limited to 25mph! Its 40mph or 25mph. If the former then a vast expense on upgrading the track, signalling, staff training, maintenance and certification of the heritage set up will be required.

As one very closely involved with the re-opening of the WSR from 1974 to 1979, from the granting of the LRO, the sale of the line to Somerset County Council and lease to the WSR, to the stages involved in getting the whole branch passed for the running of passenger services, I can tell you that the 1975 LRO did in fact give authority for the WSR to run trains as differential speeds.  DMUs^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) were authorised fror 40mph, and everything else 25mph.

When we discovered that HMRI^▸ (Her Majesty's Railway Inspectorate) imposed a requirement that DMUs be maintained and inspected by the staff of British Rail (which kind of made sense -  two miles of the intended service would be over BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) metals) the option to operate the DMUs at a higher line speed was not taken up.  It would have been too expensive without the expected revenue from the Taunton service.  And that didn't happen because of the intransigence of the Western National bus drivers, who were represented by the NUR for historical reasons, and the blindness of the management at BR(WR) Divisional HQ^▸ (Headquarters) at Bristol, who just didn't want it to happen

[Andy]

Was the 25 mph limit an arbitrary choice back in the day or is there a specific reason for choosing that speed? Is there any reason why the limit couldn't be raised to, say, 30mph, or 35mph, allowing heritage lines to choose whether to keep 25mph as their own limit or adopt a higher one?

[grahame]

Was the 25 mph limit an arbitrary choice back in the day or is there a specific reason for choosing that speed? Is there any reason why the limit couldn't be raised to, say, 30mph, or 35mph, allowing heritage lines to choose whether to keep 25mph as their own limit or adopt a higher one?

Depends on which day you want to look back to. The 25 mph limit comes from the Light Railway Act of 1896 under which most heritage lines run - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_Railways_Act_1896 . Above that speed you (still) have an extra raft of regulations; sure heritage lines could choose a higher limit, but at a big step up in rules and regulation.  Moving the other goal post (getting the light railway act changed) would, I suspect, be so problematic that I mention the possibility only as a theory.

[SandTEngineer]

Just to be clear, Grahame.  The Light Railway Act 1896 itself does not limit the railway speed.  This is done in the Light Railway Order specific to each railway authorised under the act.

[grahame]

Just to be clear, Grahame.  The Light Railway Act 1896 itself does not limit the railway speed.  This is done in the Light Railway Order specific to each railway authorised under the act.

Ah - so there could be some flexibility then?

[grahame]

 ...
I also feel that a service to Kingswear would be beneficial ...

Churston and Kingswear have cropped up as ideas from time to time.   From in Your Area a suggestion that Kingswear could be added back to the National Network with the final miles being via connection onto a steam train.