HS2

[melmerby]

28 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

DOWN with the trees

 

UP with the OHLE masts !!

 

Brit15

String the wires from the trees

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, Trog said:

 

I thought that it was while they were younger and growing fastest turning CO2, sunshine, etc into wood that they soaked up the most CO2?

Having read two articles just now, one said "young trees absorb less CO2 than mature trees", the other said "mature trees absorb less CO2 than young growing trees"

Both were in favour of planting trees but had different claims on the actual benefits.

So take your pick

[TheSignalEngineer]

On 06/03/2020 at 17:25, woodenhead said:

 

I can also work in the dead of night when my brain is at it's most focussed and sometimes it is the best thing to overcome a difficulty or resolve being wide awake at at 4am.

On several occasions I got up at some unearthly black hour to write down an idea for solving a work problem that had been bugging me for days.

[jamie92208]

46 minutes ago, melmerby said:

String the wires from the trees

Just use the method that the Midland used in 1907. Use Wood for thebposts with steel only for the cross pieces. I belive that they used Norwegian Spruce. I could even lend the design team some engineering drawings.

 

Jamie

 

 

Edited March 11, 2020 by jamie92208

[Mike Storey]

8 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

 

I also wonder if we're starting to get certain sections of fringe politics seeing HS2 as a bad thing purely because it's being backed by the current Government and PM (despite all 3 parties having been involved in its development and supporting it). 

 

Maybe, on the environmental side. But the, by far, greatest block of objectors, or at least their representatives in Parliament, are rather more inclined the other way. Whereas, with most things in life, you might see them decrying the efforts of tree-huggers and similar, they have remained surprisingly quiet about their activities as regards HS2. But when the tree-huggers move on, the more conventional objectors will remain.

 

So, all in all, a fairly balanced set of objectors politically. Funny world, ain't it?

[corneliuslundie]

Thanks for correcting me. I was assuming that because they were small they would not be using so much.

Jonathan

[KeithMacdonald]

17 hours ago, billbedford said:

 

I'm not sure how 'ancient' these woodlands are. Certainly most will have been managed for growing timber and hazel rods. Whether any pre-date the 18th century enclosures I'm not sure of.  

 

A lot of what gets called "our precious natural landscape" is in fact an artificial landscape. The result of 100s of years of management & manipulation by humans. Something that may surprise people is that "Ancient Woodland" does not mean the same as "old trees".

 

Quote

In most ancient woods, the trees and shrubs have been cut down periodically as part of the management cycle. Provided that the area has remained as woodland, the stand is still considered ancient. Since it may have been cut over many times in the past, ancient woodland does not necessarily contain very old trees.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_woodland

 

The truly ancient trees, usually oak and yew, are well-documented, mapped and respectfully venerated.

https://herbaria.plants.ox.ac.uk/bol/ancientoaksofengland/Explore

 

Down to individual tree locations. e.g. near the HS2 junction east of Birmingham

https://ati.woodlandtrust.org.uk/tree-search/?v=1665918&ml=map&z=12&nwLat=52.536298837048925&nwLng=-2.064902607550574&seLat=52.39804576151132&seLng=-1.5382455030583864

 

 

 

[KeithMacdonald]

After a walk in the woods, getting back on topic:

 

Al Beeb has drone footage of Curzon Street railway station
 

Quote

 

Drone footage showing HS2 preparatory work in Birmingham has been released. Work to create a new intercity terminus on Curzon Street is well underway, with archaeologists excavating the historic site. The original Curzon Street station building, known as the L&BR terminus, officially opened in 1838 and is grade I-listed.

The new terminus will be the first new one built in Britain since the 19th century and will have seven platforms, a public space and be part of an extended tram network. A spokesman for HS2 said the footage shows the former platforms of the Grand Junction Railway and goods yard from when it was converted to a single goods station in 1854.

 

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-birmingham-51821079/drone-footage-of-curzon-street-railway-station

[melmerby]

Which is what I linked to on Tuesday at 19:01

[KeithMacdonald]

6 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Which is what I linked to on Tuesday at 19:01

 

Don't worry, it's the BBC, they're always showing repeats.

[eastglosmog]

29 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

A lot of what gets called "our precious natural landscape" is in fact an artificial landscape. The result of 100s of years of management & manipulation by humans. Something that may surprise people is that "Ancient Woodland" does not mean the same as "old trees".

 

 

The truly ancient trees, usually oak and yew, are well-documented, mapped and respectfully venerated.

https://herbaria.plants.ox.ac.uk/bol/ancientoaksofengland/Explore

 

Down to individual tree locations. e.g. near the HS2 junction east of Birmingham

https://ati.woodlandtrust.org.uk/tree-search/?v=1665918&ml=map&z=12&nwLat=52.536298837048925&nwLng=-2.064902607550574&seLat=52.39804576151132&seLng=-1.5382455030583864

 

 

 

The thing that matters is the soil and the seeds within it.  One of our quarry clients has successfully transplanted an ancient woodland soil onto a tip (although it was an awful lot of bother) and English Heritage are quite happy with it.  Unrelated to the transplantation, but some years ago, there was a fire in the ancient woodland and our clients offered to replant the burned area, only to be told it was ecologically far better to leave the woodland to regenerate on its own (which it eventually did).  There are no ancient trees in that bit of ancient woodland!

[Ron Ron Ron]

Are those circular artefacts, the foundations of wagon turntables ?

 

 

.

[roythebus]

10 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

Are those circular artefacts, the foundations of wagon turntables ?

 

 

.

Probably carriage turntables, they seemed to abound in the 1800s. Kings Cross and euston had then when originally built.

 

[melmerby]

9 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

Are those circular artefacts, the foundations of wagon turntables ?

 

 

.

The original station had carriage turntables, when carriages were no longer than a typical 4 wheel wagon.

Link to plan of original station:

[roythebus]

I've not been following all this thread but my views expressed elsewhere are that HS2 is necessary to ease congestion on the WCML. It has been badly presented as a new high speed railway; I think had i been promoted as a conventional railway with high speed facility, say 125mph, it would have been more acceptable. Just promoting the 20 minutes shaved off the journy time from A to B just doesn't seem to wash any more. But you just can't seem to get that point across to people at all.

 

My cousin lives near the line of route and owns the historic Berkswell Windmill, so is rightly concerned as to how HS2 would affect her historic building.

 

My younger son is one of the "tree huggers" as part of XR. XR need to be educated as to the benefits of any railway line. A lot of railway people support their aims and views, but NOT when it comes to interfering with the environmentally friendly transport trying to save the planet!

[Siberian Snooper]

11 minutes ago, roythebus said:

Probably carriage turntables, they seemed to abound in the 1800s. Kings Cross and euston had then when originally built.

 

 

As did Paddington.

 

 

[corneliuslundie]

But early locomotives were small. I am just typing up an article written in the 1960s (not by me) but never published and there is a mention that in 1849 the Shrewsbury & Birmingham sent back one of its first locos because it was 6 inches too long for the turntables. I haven't worked out which Birmingham station they would have been using.

And the official definition of an ancient woodland in Eng;land and Wales is that it was existing in 1600 - the dates are later for Scotland and Ireland, because that was when the first decent maps were produced showing extant woodland. (courtesy of the same book mentioned above), And as has been said most woodland has been managed for centuries, either for grazing or for wood production.

Jonathan

[melmerby]

The S&B originally intended to come into Birmingham on the Stour Valley line but due to a hostile LNWR it allied with the GWR and eventually became part of it.

[Zomboid]

10 hours ago, roythebus said:

It has been badly presented as a new high speed railway; I think had i been promoted as a conventional railway with high speed facility, say 125mph, it would have been more acceptable. Just promoting the 20 minutes shaved off the journy time from A to B just doesn't seem to wash any more.

As I'm sure you already understand, if it had been designed as a 125mph railway, then it would cost pretty much exactly the same, take pretty much exactly the same route and not offer any meaningful improvement to journey times. Particularly to trains from Leeds and Newcastle, where going via the outskirts of Birmingham would be much longer and therefore probably result in slower journeys, so wouldn't offer any worthwhile relief to the ECML.

 

So it needs to be a properly high speed railway to provide the maximum benefit to all the northbound lines from London. A new 125mph route would help on the WCML, though.

[Mike Storey]

11 hours ago, roythebus said:

I've not been following all this thread but my views expressed elsewhere are that HS2 is necessary to ease congestion on the WCML. It has been badly presented as a new high speed railway; I think had i been promoted as a conventional railway with high speed facility, say 125mph, it would have been more acceptable. Just promoting the 20 minutes shaved off the journy time from A to B just doesn't seem to wash any more. But you just can't seem to get that point across to people at all.

 

 

 

All very well, except that the construction of the new line as a conventional speed railway would have had no business case at all. That is, unless the new, promised version of the Treasury's "Green Book" does allow for such thinking, but I doubt it. If you had been following this thread, or the one that preceded it, you may well have noticed that, the faster the trains run, the more frequent they can be, without having to build and run a lot more train sets. There are (conflicting) arguments about the energy efficiency and maintenance/life span issues around that, which I am sure will continue, but the fact remains.

 

And it is not "20 mins shaved off". It is at least 38 minutes (between London and Birmingham) and up to an hour for origins/destinations further north - that does still seem to wash with virtually all the folk up there.

 

So, whilst capacity for extra trains is very important, it is not enough (in Green Book terms) to justify such a major build as this, without the added incentive of significantly reduced journey times. We may talk of increasing capacity within the railway community, as we all know it is vitally needed, but it does not wash its face (adequately) with the great accountants in the sky. And to a degree, with some good reason.

[lmsforever]

Were does  38minutes come from surely that means some very fast speeds above what is invisaged ,also the gains above Crewe will be suspect due to non tilting on the many curves on the way north.Also what will happen to the TPS services plus locals ie from Kilmarnock Doubtless HS2 will demand thier clearence from the line so as their units have priority over the surviving wcml expresses.If this happenns many existing passengers are going to be hacked off losing services and finding slower trains.

[Edwin_m]

30 minutes ago, lmsforever said:

Were does  38minutes come from surely that means some very fast speeds above what is invisaged ,also the gains above Crewe will be suspect due to non tilting on the many curves on the way north.Also what will happen to the TPS services plus locals ie from Kilmarnock Doubtless HS2 will demand thier clearence from the line so as their units have priority over the surviving wcml expresses.If this happenns many existing passengers are going to be hacked off losing services and finding slower trains.

The time savings are easy to find if you search for them.  You're entitled to your opinions but they'd be a lot more convincing if you demonstrated some understanding of the facts about what is proposed.  

 

The expresses to the northern part of the WCML will all run via HS2, so those at the south end will benefit from more trains when the WCML no longer has to accommodate them.  

Edited March 12, 2020 by Edwin_m

[black and decker boy]

24 minutes ago, Edwin_m said:

The time savings are easy to find if you search for them.  You're entitled to your opinions but they'd be a lot more convincing if you demonstrated some understanding of the facts about what is proposed.  

 

The expresses to the northern part of the WCML will all run via HS2, so those at the south end will benefit from more trains when the WCML no longer has to accommodate them.  

You’re wasting your breath. LMS Forever has been told all these things hundreds of times on these threads but simply doesn’t want to see, listen or learn.

[KeithMacdonald]

1 hour ago, lmsforever said:

Were does  38minutes come from surely that means some very fast speeds above what is invisaged ,also the gains above Crewe will be suspect due to non tilting on the many curves on the way north.Also what will happen to the TPS services plus locals ie from Kilmarnock Doubtless HS2 will demand thier clearence from the line so as their units have priority over the surviving wcml expresses.If this happenns many existing passengers are going to be hacked off losing services and finding slower trains.

 

I refer my honourable colleague to the official (and highly detailed) HM Gov HS2 Plans and Route Profile Maps

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hs2-plan-and-profile-maps-chetwode-to-handsacre

 

Or, if he prefers a simpler version, the HS2 layer on Rail Map Online.

 

http://www.railmaponline.com/UKIEMap.php#

[melmerby]

I don't think this has been posted before.

Apologies if it has:

https://www.nodrogvlogs.uk/news/birmingham-curzon-street-station-round-house-hs2