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49 minutes ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

But I have not suggested a single basket with regard to onward travel from OOC. Other baskets (extensions to the Bakerloo and H&C) could be provided more cheaply than the Euston deviation.

 

Nor do I believe that the resilience that you suggest is there. If there is a problem at Euston, OOC is not going to be able to keep the service running.

 

I am sorry to sound a bit ruthless but sometimes you need to force change through. I accept that there is some resistance but people do ultimately adapt. The Thameslink proposal about the Wimbledon services was entirely sensible. Why reduce capacity between Blackfriars and KXSP by running 8 car trains when they could all be 12 car? Not to mention the conflicting movements that you rightly identify. It's a luxury that the railway can not afford these days.

 

I agree that OOC would not be in a position to replace Euston in service terms - but last time I looked East Croydon was no substitute for London Victoria, and Stratford was no substitute for Liverpool Street!

 

If Euston was closed due to say, a fire alarm then HS2 would be forced to radically reduce the number of services they ran - just as Southern or Grater Anglia would be forced to do today!

 

However even with only 6 platforms at OOC, it would still be possible to:-

 

(1) Allow trains currently on route from Birmingham to complete their journey southwards rather than having to be revered all the way to Birmingham

 

(2) Allow a limited service to be maintained.

 

Then what do you do if Crossrail gets suspended - with Euston you have a backup to help shift the large number of passengers HS2 will eventually transport. Similarly if the tube gets shut at Euston then changing onto Crossrail can be offered as a way round the problem and try to ease the overcrowding around Euston.

 

Ultimately you cannot deny the reality that ALL of our current InterCity operations have ‘fallback’ stations within (or on the boundary of the London to provide resilience. There is ZERO justification for HS2 to not have similar provision.

Edited by phil-b259
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As the new line is coming into London in a tunnel, make it a loop line similar to the one under Liverpool and the Wirral.  Stations at Euston, Farringdon and Oxford Circus. Perhaps a couple of platforms at each to allow enough capacity for the extra stops.

 

 

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1 hour ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

No, I have only used it once in recent years (plus a couple of visits). But I have seen numerous TV reports where the concourse is amazingly crowded, the price of success in attracting so many more passengers to rail in the last 20 years.

 

So yes, an extension to the concourse at Euston independently of HS2. And the long-awaited works to link to the H&C at Euston Square.

 

But indeed, if Euston is already overcrowded, how does it make sense to bring yet more passengers there?

To start at the end.

They will not be going into the old station from HS2  AFAIK.

There will also be better access to Euston Square as you state. 

The problem in the concourse has been made worse in recent times by;-

a) No longer signing outer suburban trains to be accessed directly from the underground. They have even removed the timetable screen.

However those in the know take a gamble that the train they want will leave from one of these platforms and head straight to the barriers. 

b) Trains are not allocated platforms until a very short time before departure. This means punters should wait in the concourse area. However if you do that the chances of getting a seat unless you are an Olympic sprinter is roughly zero. As getting to a different platform means you have little chance of a seat if you are in the concourse or the outer suburban barrier area it makes little difference. 

With the temporary entrance to the underground a lot more people walk to Euston Square.

Bernard

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30 minutes ago, Siberian Snooper said:

As the new line is coming into London in a tunnel, make it a loop line similar to the one under Liverpool and the Wirral.  Stations at Euston, Farringdon and Oxford Circus. Perhaps a couple of platforms at each to allow enough capacity for the extra stops.

 

 

 

Mmmm?

I think you're about 12 years too late for submitting crayon drawings.

 

:dontknow::D 

 

 

.

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1 hour ago, phil-b259 said:

 

 

There is no plan for portion working*.

 

Under phase 1, the only two places which will be able to take advantage of HS2s  double deck 500m train length capacity (Euston and Birmingham Curzon Street) and building a tiny fleet of such super capacity trains is not economic. Therefore initially (please take note of that word) all services will be provided by the smaller, shorter trains that have to be used for services which transfer onto the classic UK network.

 

BUT.... when the HS network is COMPLETED you will have 500m double deck capability at Manchester and Leeds in addition to London and Birmingham. This means it becomes economic to order a fleet of long, high capacity double deck trains for the HS core and redeploy the shorter UK compatible trains to service other destinations off the HS2 network.

 

As ever the train plan makes perfect sense once you understand that HS2 is a railway NETWORK - not merely one line to get you to Birmingham a bit faster.

 

 

* Personally I think portion working along the lines of how some TGV services operate would be a good idea. In this scenario you could have a UK gauge train from Wolverhampton join up with a double deck train from Curzon Street at the Birmingham Interchange station for the run down to London.

 

Thank you. That clarifies the position.

 

So, a goodly proportion of the paths down the line from Birmingham Interchange to Euston will be used by 10 car single deck trains which, by my back-of -the-envelope calculation, is about 25% of capacity not used.

 

That would be like using scarce paths on the electrified WCML with 5-car diesel Voyagers. Oh, hang on. What was that Liverpool train I saw the other week at Watford?

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2 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

Personally I think portion working along the lines of how some TGV services operate would be a good idea. In this scenario you could have a UK gauge train from Wolverhampton join up with a double deck train from Curzon Street at the Birmingham Interchange station for the run down to London.

The Japanese manage it too, with the Akita and Yamagata services being portions on the Tohoku services. They run off the high speed lines on dual gauge routes on the old narrow gauge network, so they're built to a much smaller loading gauge than the trains they couple to for the zoomy bits to Tokyo.

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7 minutes ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

Thank you. That clarifies the position.

 

So, a goodly proportion of the paths down the line from Birmingham Interchange to Euston will be used by 10 car single deck trains which, by my back-of -the-envelope calculation, is about 25% of capacity not used.

 

That would be like using scarce paths on the electrified WCML with 5-car diesel Voyagers. Oh, hang on. What was that Liverpool train I saw the other week at Watford?

 

You are absolutely right, except that the lost capacity is probably nearer 15%, given the intended (2015) service pattern. HS2 should be extended to Liverpool (probably will be under NPR), Newcastle and Glasgow/Edinburgh. The cost of doing that should more than be covered by utilising the unused capacity..........

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20 minutes ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

Thank you. That clarifies the position.

 

So, a goodly proportion of the paths down the line from Birmingham Interchange to Euston will be used by 10 car single deck trains which, by my back-of -the-envelope calculation, is about 25% of capacity not used.

 

That would be like using scarce paths on the electrified WCML with 5-car diesel Voyagers. Oh, hang on. What was that Liverpool train I saw the other week at Watford?

 

Two things should be remembered

 

(1) The design of the trains has not yet started - because as with the exact service pattern, by the time the HS infrastructure has been built things may not be exactly the same as today. It’s entirely possible that as HS2 as a whole (not just phase one) gets to completion alternative operational strategies will emerge which could see alterations to train designs ( for example a reduction from 10 to 9 cars to enable portion working) as well as service plans. Like a service from Liverpool (via conventional network coupling to another from Preston (via the conventional network) to run to London.

 

(2) Railway infrastructure is what limits train design - not the other way round. Just because the politicians may want to operate HS2 in a certain way doesn’t mean it will always be thus. Although modernised over the years,  much of the original infrastructure on the Liverpool and Manchester line is still used today - and continues to pose limitations on the types of trains which can be used. It’s entirely possible that a future HS2 operator may well decide to move towards portion working and we should not be looking to constrain HS2 infrastructure simply because such operations are not presently envisaged.

 

Far too many of your posts seem to concentrate on phase one and nothing else! It’s not rocket science to conclude that under phase one HS2 will not be used effectively - but that IGNORES the fact that HS2 is designed to be a network handling trains between London, the West Midlands, the East Midlands, Lancashire, Liverpool, Manchester, South Yorkshire Leeds, the North East and Scotland. Once you add together all those services - and not just those which will transfer under phase one and thus be restricted in size, then the utilisation figures improve considerably.

Edited by phil-b259
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5 hours ago, runs as required said:

As a town planner (that had most expertise in rail) I would always argue for high density multi-use renewal in urban centres (cf Urban Splash in Manchester or Brindley Place in Brum) for a 40/50 year lower energy consumption future. The ready cleared HS2 terminal sites would be far more cost effectively redeveloped for medium/high rise mixed use and much cheaper shed-style OOC and Brum International stations used instead which would also be subsidised by the yields from the terminus sites.

Euston could get a decent Euston Square and a re-ected/recreated Arch.

West Midlands could then get its much desired integrated intra conurbation system.

 

I’d do the same flanking alignment around Great Manchester, use the old route around to Staleybridge and on into Yorks, avoiding huge amounts of Piccadilly and M Vic reconstruction.

Evergreen tree shield planting would lessen environmental impact (true also around many existing intrusive urban rail line 

e.g. in S London)

I'm surprised you say that as a town planner.  I'm not one but do work a lot with transport planners, and I think most are agreed that getting the main rail station in the centre of the city is the best option not only for regenerating the city itself, but for maximizing accessibility to long-distance services via the city's existing public transport network.  A station in the suburbs is inevitably going to encourage access by car (which some people will do anyway, but most of the ones who might use public transport won't have that option).  Also a station in the city centre is far more attractive for incoming visitors, who are probably bringing in more prosperity than the affluent car-borne locals who drive to the station to travel to London.  

 

4 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

 

That usefully brings up another question that I have about HS2. The trains on the route itself are supposed to conform to the European norm: 20 coaches, about 500 metres long. So, apart from other gauge issues, trains that are compatible with the rest of the railway system are going to need to be shorter, 10 coaches. So if capacity is going to be used fully on the Birmingham Interchange to Euston section, there is going to be a need for portion working. Where would the trains be joined/separated and how are the timetablers going to deal with the unreliability that portion working always introduces? 

 

4 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

 

There is no plan for portion working*.

 

Under phase 1, the only two places which will be able to take advantage of HS2s  double deck 500m train length capacity (Euston and Birmingham Curzon Street) and building a tiny fleet of such super capacity trains is not economic. Therefore initially (please take note of that word) all services will be provided by the smaller, shorter trains that have to be used for services which transfer onto the classic UK network.

 

BUT.... when the HS network is COMPLETED you will have 500m double deck capability at Manchester and Leeds in addition to London and Birmingham. This means it becomes economic to order a fleet of long, high capacity double deck trains for the HS core and redeploy the shorter UK compatible trains to service other destinations off the HS2 network.

 

As ever the train plan makes perfect sense once you understand that HS2 is a railway NETWORK - not merely one line to get you to Birmingham a bit faster.

 

 

* Personally I think portion working along the lines of how some TGV services operate would be a good idea. In this scenario you could have a UK gauge train from Wolverhampton join up with a double deck train from Curzon Street at the Birmingham Interchange station for the run down to London.

Before you argue about them, please get your facts right!

 

The European norm is 200m length with the ability to run coupled as a pair.  Only Eurostar has a 400m fixed formation. 

 

HS2 also plans to order 200m units that will run coupled at times, so the new platforms will be nominally 400m not 500m.  All of the initial order is planned to be of the same type, compatible with the existing 25kV British rail network, although the batch ordered for Phase 2 might only be suitable for the new routes once there are enough new routes to make that worthwhile.  400m trains are planned to run northwards up the WCML from HS2 to split (probably at Carstairs) for Glasgow and Edinburgh, and others may run the short distance off HS2 into Crewe to split for various destinations.  So a very few existing stations need to be compatible for 400m running, which can be achieved with fairly minor modifications.  

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The 14 tph is the initial capacity.

The line has been specified for a minimum of 18 tph and the specification for the train fleet talks of a minimum of 18tph.

As all train services running on the dedicated HS2 lines are to be run under ATO, what do you experienced guys think is feasible?

 

 

.

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10 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

I would hope that HS2 isn't run at full capacity on day one. It needs to have room for many decades of passenger growth, so we don't have to build another main line to the North for 100 years. 

 Hence why it’s being built to accommodate 400m long double deck trains even though initially all trains will be of the shorter UK gauge single decked type.

 

 

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14 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

The 14 tph is the initial capacity.

The line has been specified for a minimum of 18 tph and the specification for the train fleet talks of a minimum of 18tph.

As all train services running on the dedicated HS2 lines are to be run under ATO, what do you experienced guys think is feasible?

 

 

.

I believe that a 3 minute headway, thus 20tph is perfectly feasible.  ISTR sitting at Bletchley one rush hour and counting 30 northbound expresses between 17.00 and 18.30.  

 

Jamie

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15 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

The 14 tph is the initial capacity.

The line has been specified for a minimum of 18 tph and the specification for the train fleet talks of a minimum of 18tph.

As all train services running on the dedicated HS2 lines are to be run under ATO, what do you experienced guys think is feasible?

 

 

.

 

I have no reason to believe 18tph is not achievable - particularly given it’s going to be quite a while till the railway has finished being built and the advances in signalling technology/ train control in the interim.

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It's a trade-off between capacity and resilience.  

 

I believe the original 18TPH was made up of groups of nine paths at 3min intervals then an empty path.  That way if a train started its HS2 journey a few minutes late and missed its path (quite likely if coming in from the wider network) it could be slotted in to the next one and all subsequent trains delayed by 3min until the next empty path, with everything to time after that.  With no flat junctions there would be no conflicts with opposite direction trains to worry about, and 3min delay ought to be absorbable by recovery time or turnaround at destination, so only the original delayed train might be seriously out of course.  

 

It's not clear whether the 14TPH is spacing the paths more widely than 3min or introducing more of these "firebreak" paths.  The latter would help if, for example, several delayed trains were expected to need the same stretch of track at the same time.  

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2 hours ago, Edwin_m said:

It's a trade-off between capacity and resilience.  

 

I believe the original 18TPH was made up of groups of nine paths at 3min intervals then an empty path.  That way if a train started its HS2 journey a few minutes late and missed its path (quite likely if coming in from the wider network) it could be slotted in to the next one and all subsequent trains delayed by 3min until the next empty path, with everything to time after that.  With no flat junctions there would be no conflicts with opposite direction trains to worry about, and 3min delay ought to be absorbable by recovery time or turnaround at destination, so only the original delayed train might be seriously out of course.  

 

It's not clear whether the 14TPH is spacing the paths more widely than 3min or introducing more of these "firebreak" paths.  The latter would help if, for example, several delayed trains were expected to need the same stretch of track at the same time.  


AIUI, all trains will run with the same performance, stops and timings south of Birmingham Interchange so it then doesn't kill the whole service pattern if one train from further afield arrives onto HS2 already carrying a serious delay - which, face it, will happen from time to time. 

Conceivably the worst case is this makes the 2 or 3 subsequent trains run a (diminishing) couple of minutes late until that event is absorbed, but with OOC and Euston all designed deliberately to handle high capacity throughputs it will be quickly absorbed.

It won't be like the existing network where if you present a (say) Inverness to Penzance train 10 minutes late somewhere early on it's run you run a large risk of following a local or a freight for miles, increasing it's delay and causing further knock-on delays in all directions....

The bigger risk I'd have thought is if inbounds from one direction arrive with delays significant enough to prevent them turning at Euston and getting back out on time - that risks putting a delay back onto the existing network.

It might be that with a compatible fleet you can keep a hot spare in one of Euston's platforms as a contingency against that kind of thing.
 

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Just a random musing on delay recovery Southbound - if parts of the route and the trains themselves end up cleared for higher speeds than they may in reality run, and with OOC not really needing trains to wait for set departure times Southbound, you could conceivably speeds up the trains ahead of your delayed one (so arriving at OOC and Euston early) - plus your delay train.

Effectively you'd be actively moving the trains ahead of and including the delayed train "forward" into path gaps rather than passively allowing subsequent trains to move "backwards" into path gaps...

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21 hours ago, 62613 said:

Well, there are already 6, or is it 8, tph on the WCML south of Rugby at the moment. Avanti have plans to increase services to/from Liverpool to haf-hourly asap; then we get the trains from the Northern part of the MML and ECML, which are planned to use HS2 once complete. It soon adds up!

 


I think it's 9 at present.

3x Birmingham, 1 of which extends to Glasgow
3x Manchester
1x Liverpool
1x Chester
1x Glasgow (direct)


Then add Sheffield, Leeds and Newcastle trains....




 

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4 hours ago, Rugd1022 said:

Does anyone know if the bulk of the route, or indeed any of it, will be signalled and laid out for bi-directional running, just as the Midland between Leicester and Wellingborough is...?

 

 

With no lineside signals to worry about, bi-directional comes pretty much as standard with ERTMS Level 2.  I don't imagine it will be used much for service trains (maybe the last one of the night to allow a possession to start a bit earlier) but handy for engineering trains and for recovery from any problems.  There are also some quite long empty stock runs (the depot for Manchester is nearly at Crewe) which will all be depot to terminus in the morning and back in the evening, so the first/last of these can run "wrong line" if necessary.  

Edited by Edwin_m
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9 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

By ignoring half of our H&S laws and running roughshod over land acquisition most definitely! 

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