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Noisy coal trains in Scotland


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Looking at the BBC Scotland newspages tonight a subject attracted my attention ,local residents are claiming that coal trains to Longannet Power Station are making their lives a misery.They claim that when the line reopened they were told that no trains would run after late evening,but for the last four years they have run overnight.A group has been formed and have attracted the services of a solicitor ,they must smell money and a chance to appear on tv.Transport For Scotland have erected noise barriers at some locations and have placated people but this lot are after compensation,dont they want electricity for their homes?But as usual the BBC have dug around their archives and come up with a photo of BR merry go round hoppers not the current rolling stock! This craving for compensation seems to be growing and also it is noticable on the house renovation programes an adjacent rail line is a no no ,but a busy road thats okay.Just how long would a coal train take to pass and is the vibration as bad as these people claim ,a busy road is a constant noise combined with vibration.It would seem that this group look at rail as an easy target lets hope the traffic to the power station is not stopped as we are short of power stations ass it is.

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I could understand them being upset if class 56's were still screaming down to Longannet, but class 66's are a lot quieter. The modern bogie hoppers are a lot heavier than the four wheel MGR hoppers were, so maybe there is a bit more vibration from the trains. Definately sounds like a legal bottom feeder is pushing for a fee here.

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Guest Max Stafford

Nimbys who only care about it because it's on their doorstep. If the coal got transferred to a fleet of tippers passing through another part of town they wouldn't be giving a toss.

I live about 100 yards from the WCML just south of Kingmoor Yard. The action goes on all night and yes, there's a bit of vibration but in 13 years here, it's never really been an issue.

 

So stuff 'em!

 

Dave.

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.They claim that when the line reopened they were told that no trains would run after late evening,but for the last four years they have run overnight.

 

Exactly, they don't run "late evening" they "run overnight" - case dismissed.

 

I used to live on the approach to Manchester and Liverpool airport, you very quickly get used to common sounds

 

 

Definately sounds like a legal bottom feeder is pushing for a fee here.

 

My thoughts too

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There was a big hooha in Eastleigh a few years back when the Yeoman stone trains started running - not so much the timing of them but the fact that they had built some large, detached, very expensive houses nearby which literally did shake when the trains went by.

 

There were some extreme cases where cracks appeared in the houses, ISTR that the solution was a strict speed limit applied to these trains on that part of the line.

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I live about 100 yards from the WCML just south of Kingmoor Yard. The action goes on all night and yes, there's a bit of vibration but in 13 years here, it's never really been an issue.

 

Max Stafford 7/9/12

 

 

The railways will complain about you eventually Dave.

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I do wonder why house builders persist on building so close to a railway line only for people to move in and then complain about the railway line.

If these people are so bothered may be it would be a good idea to close the power station at night and then they wont have any power. See how they like it then.

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Perhaps if those people don't want coal delivered to power stations because it disturbs them would be happy to have their electricity cut off when there is not enough being generated.

 

David

 

Edit - I see Steve made much the same point just before me!

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I seem to remember something similar alongside the resurrected Great Central, when there were complaints about trains running next to houses that had been built alongside the line.

I believe one of the comments was something like "We didn't think they would be so big". Exactly how big did they expect a 12" to foot railway to be?

 

 

There was much the same sort of hoo-haa some years ago next to Birmingham Airport.

 

A load of new houses were built in the land on the NE of the runways.

The houses were sold.

The people move in.

The people complained about aircraft noise.

 

Didn't they notice the airport right next door?

"We didn't think the aircraft would be so noisy"!

 

Keith

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Definately sounds like a legal bottom feeder is pushing for a fee here.

 

Interestingly, the article states that Thompsons are representing the aggrieved residents which is somewhat ironic as they are the firm that ASLEF uses for the legal services it provides for its membership. I think a quiet word about the possible threat to the jobs of their members and a possible conflict of interests might be in order.

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Quiet news day? This surfaced some time ago (a year or two?) in nearly the same emotive language.

 

Network Rail can permit the operation of trains pretty much without restriction. It may choose to say a few honeyed words to local communities about what trains will or won't run from time to time, but its network licence - unless my memory is very badly flawed - doesn't preclude the use of routes at certain times or for certain traffic, just to appease the neighbours. It doesn't have a communications remit to publicise the timetable to the general public.

 

NR has the authority to permit traffics to run, paths are not allocated as a result of a public referendum or beauty contest.

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Some people really need to get over it.

 

I live 34.89 metres away from the middle platform of a fairly busy station. After a few years you get used to the noise. Unless it is a noisy 37 or 20 on a nuke train. :yahoo:

 

I would assume that the line was in a mothballed state that could be used within a few weeks of asking for it. So would have been there when they moved in.

 

If we look at a freightliner 66 with 19 HHA coal hoppers on the back of it:

 

hopper has a capacity of 74 tonnes; so 19 x 74 = 1406 tonnes.

 

An articulated lorry can't weigh more than 44 tonnes, so unladen 15 tonnes so a capacity of 29 tonnes.

 

1406/29 = 48.48 lorries lets call that 49 for ease.

 

if all the stations coal is transferred to rail its 15 trains per day ( 1 every 98 minutes) or 735 lorries. (31 lorries an hour - 1 Lorry every 1 minute 54 seconds)

 

It doesn't really have much of a contest really!!

 

15 trains a day provided by this link

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I do wonder why house builders persist on building so close to a railway line only for people to move in and then complain about the railway line.

If these people are so bothered may be it would be a good idea to close the power station at night and then they wont have any power. See how they like it then.

 

The main issue for a lot of these people is that the houses in which they live were built next to an abandoned railway line before it was rebuilt. Even though there was a single line stretch of track in situ, from the late 60s onwards a part of it had only been used very occasionally ( a short stretch for whisky traffic to Cambois if I remember correctly), and from circa 1990 onwards not at all, ergo it was heavily overgrown, especially the section near Alloa. For many, many years the chances of the line reopening seemed extremely remote to say the least.

 

Whilst the majority of us on here may welcome a railway being (re)built at the bottom of the garden, that doesn't mean to say the rest of the populace would.

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Whilst the majority of us on here may welcome a railway being (re)built at the bottom of the garden, that doesn't mean to say the rest of the populace would.

 

To which the simple answer is don't buy one which has just such a railway.

 

I don't know about (house) searches in Scotland but one of the guys I work with was looking at buying a house in Leiston and was warned about the disused railway - it's been disused for years, no track, no connection to the main line, it was only a siding anyway and the industry it once server has closed.

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The main issue for a lot of these people is that the houses in which they live were built next to an abandoned railway line before it was rebuilt. ....

Whilst the majority of us on here may welcome a railway being (re)built at the bottom of the garden, that doesn't mean to say the rest of the populace would.

 

Broad Street (New Inn Yard to be truly accurate) to Dalston Junction was an object lesson in precisely of what you speak... Abandoned, protected corridor with long term aspirations for reopening. Would have appeared on any property search, yet the strength of feeling and objections in certain quarters once the rebuild got going... I could write a book.

 

To which the simple answer is don't buy one which has just such a railway.

 

I don't know about (house) searches in Scotland but one of the guys I work with was looking at buying a house in Leiston and was warned about the disused railway - it's been disused for years, no track, no connection to the main line, it was only a siding anyway and the industry it once server has closed.

 

I was once asked at a wedding if and when Rugby - Peterborough was likely to reopen, by the future purchasers of Lilbourne station building!

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To which the simple answer is don't buy one which has just such a railway.

 

I don't know about (house) searches in Scotland but one of the guys I work with was looking at buying a house in Leiston and was warned about the disused railway - it's been disused for years, no track, no connection to the main line, it was only a siding anyway and the industry it once server has closed.

 

Estate Agents being what they are, I wonder how many would actively say something along the lines "by the way, that impenetrable jungle beyond the garden fence is actually a stretch of railway line disused for decades, you should know that one day in the future, maybe, but mostly unlikely, there's a chance that it'll reopen with coal trains thundering past day and night, this will annoy you and your family and most likely affect the resale value of your house - just so you know".

 

Don't get me wrong, anyone who moves next to an active railway/airport/docks/industrial premises and then complains about the noise has absolutely no sympathy from me, but I would suggest that this case is quite different.

The solution? Well noise screens etc at the worst affected areas would probably be a start and maybe a PSR if there are vibration issues, but aside from that there's not a lot you can do.

These trains have to run, and the only alternative is to send them via the E&G and the Forth Bridge, which is of course a complete non starter due to pathing issues and train weights on the Forth Bridge (two of the principal reasons for reopening the Alloa line).

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Estate Agents being what they are, I wonder how many would actively say something along the lines "by the way, that impenetrable jungle beyond the garden fence is actually a stretch of railway line disused for decades, you should know that one day in the future, maybe, but mostly unlikely, there's a chance that it'll reopen with coal trains thundering past day and night, this will annoy you and your family and most likely affect the resale value of your house - just so you know".

 

The Estate Agents aren't in the picture here though, are they. As a prospective purchaser, you retain the services of solicitors to carry out a search. This will reveal the status of the linear jungle running beyond your garden fence. And whether the presence of rails within it is a matter for possible concern.

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The Estate Agents aren't in the picture here though, are they. As a prospective purchaser, you retain the services of solicitors to carry out a search. This will reveal the status of the linear jungle running beyond your garden fence. And whether the presence of rails within it is a matter for possible concern.

 

But how many people either know/think about doing such a search (I'm sure we call it something else up here, if we have it), or are inclined to stick their head over the fence and dismiss the bundle of weeds as an impossibility - most I'd suggest.

 

We do have to remember that with regard to most facets of everyday life and certainly all things legal, social and economical, the general public are inherently stupid and ignorant.

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Guest Max Stafford

I live about 100 yards from the WCML just south of Kingmoor Yard. The action goes on all night and yes, there's a bit of vibration but in 13 years here, it's never really been an issue.

 

Max Stafford 7/9/12

 

 

The railways will complain about you eventually Dave.

 

Chance would be a fine thing Jim!

Top marks for that one though mate! LOL

 

Dave.

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