What changes do you want for the railway?

[Reorte]

30 minutes ago, KingEdwardII said:

I think that electric traction is by far the best option for railways. Period.

 

And I say that as an enthusiast for preserved lines with steam traction.

 

The UK is way behind in electrifying its railways.

 

Cost, environmental concerns etc., they can certainly add up to an argument for "best", but that still reads as more of a need than want view.

 

To take another example - plenty of people will do overtime for extra pay. Do they actually want to work more? Can't see many of them doing overtime if they didn't get paid for it!

[APOLLO]

5 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

Electrification.

Electrification.

Electrification.

 

For Freightliner though, it's

Dieselisation

Dieselisation

Dieselisation

As apparently electricity is far too expensive.

 

I just want simpler fares and most of all reliable trains.

 

Just had six months of pain and worry with Avanti & daughters daily journey Wigan - Lancaster for her final year at Uni. Come exams I drove her there as we just could not be sure of the trains.

 

Anyway, it was well worth it, she graduated with a First Masters in Physics.

 

Brit15

 

[Jeremy Cumberland]

Quite honestly, I don't much care whether Maryport has an electric train service, or whether it is diesel, or some sort of hybrid. I don't much care whether the train I catch from Penrith is a Voyager or a Pendolino, but given the choice I'd prefer a Voyager - you get slightly more room, and I can usually get my rucksack into the overhead luggage rack. Perhaps in a few years they'll develop hydrogen fuel cell propuslion for trains, and all this complicated electrification infrastructure will be redundant.

 

But what I do want is a train, turning up when it says it will, and making connections that convey me to my final destination.

 

In other places, I appreciate that the situation is different, and if you live in Rochdale or Barnsley or somewhere else with a population of quarter of a million your demands will doubtless be greater than mine in Cumberland, and more specific, and it is quite right that you expect infrastructure improvements. But my guess is that electrification is only incidental, and that new lines, relaid junctions and better interchanges are really what is needed to provide a better service. But even this is only of value if you get a reliable service.

[phil-b259]

On 20/07/2023 at 06:36, david.hill64 said:

 

It is a pity, though understandable, that Network Rail has opted for ETCS level 2 with fall back signalling. Railtrack's vision of adopting ETCS level 3 (no track circuits, no axle counters, no lineside signals) is a better way for a safe reliable railway. Shame it has taken 30 years to agree the specifications.

 

 

IT HASN’T!

 

And if you think that I do question your ability to make judgements in other areas.

 

The forthcoming ECML works will see all lineside signals removed.

 

Equally the Cumbrian pilot system which has been in place for over a decade saw all lineside signals removed.

 

The reason ECTS co-exists with signals on the Thaneslink core is largely due to the state of ECTS in the U.K. at the time the Thameslink upgrade was being designed - which viewed was viewed as an ‘experimental’ system and consequently it was thought unwise to remove all lineside signalling from the core given its intensive use. It’s fair to say that we’re the Thameslink core being resignalled today it wouldn’t have lineside signsls.

 

If ECTS is added to the GWML there is a strong possibility lineside signsls will be retained simply because it will be overlayed on what is still virtually brand new signalling equipment - the ECML application is in the context of the exsisting 40+ year old kit needing renewing anyway - though as more of the U.K. train fleet is fitted with ECTS there may well be options for removing lineside signals in future.

 

Now, you mention the the removal of track based train detection - well in ECTS terms relies on the ECTS system having a watertight guarantee that at any moment each and every train under it supervision entire train is still complete.
 

While this is easy to achieve this for multiple units (hence ideal for metro systems or dedicated high speed lines like HS2)  it’s a lot harder to do for freight trains whose length will vary and which can easily be reformed mid journey.

 

Now although I understand ‘end of train’ black boxes which transmit that information are considered acceptable on US freight only railroads, their adoption in the U.K. with the potential consequences should they not be used correctly and a detached freight wagon come to a stand undetected on a 140mph passenger railway means Network Rail is unlikely to go down that path anytime soon.

[The Stationmaster]

2 hours ago, BachelorBoy said:

 

Don't beat me up if this is naive..... but why can't there be an app that sits on top of the current complicated structure and simplifies it?

 

Because that won't suit the current Mayor of London - and it is he (and some of his minions no doubt) who want to ed Travelcards.   And the reason for that is simple  their share of Travelcard revenue would be replaced by people having to have Oystercards where they can directly control fares and, in effect, charge what they like when they like.

 

Less convenient for the passenger and probably more expensive too -  hence Khan wants it.   So anything which makes an easy replication of the Travelcard is contrary to what his Khanship wants.  

[phil-b259]

21 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

The last time I looked HS1 was not owned by the UK Govt

 

 

Technically I think HS1 is actually owned by the U.K. Government - it’s just that like the Channel Tunnel or the M6 Toll road

 (or PFI hospitals etc) it’s been given to a private sector consortium (who can sell their interest on to someone else if they want) for many decades with the idea that eventually the construction costs will have been paid off through usage and when it does revert to Government ownership it will come with no debts.

Edited July 22, 2023 by phil-b259

[The Johnster]

I love our railways, and would like to see for them...

 

Money allocated to projects and ringfenced until the project is delivered, no backtracking from the Treasury.  This after the debacle of the GW electrification, which has left out Swansea and Exeter, and, insanely, Filton Bank, with diesel power through the Severn Tunnel despite a hugely expensive refurb.  I realise that this means that overrunning and cost increases are more likely since the project is ringfenced, but I think it's the only way to get things done; let's give the contractors genuinly incentivising bonuses for early or underbudget delivery!  There is not a single electrically hauled freight train running anywhere on the former Western Region, and, outside of the London area, no local services either.  We got a half-*rsed job only half completed, for twice the money (which in my book makes it a quarter of the value), in order to restore 1970s HST timings from nearly half a century ago after being promised 140mph trains. 

 

It promised increased 140mph timings on services to Exeter and Swansea, and has not been able to deliver on those promises.  Can you imagine the French doing this?  Or the Germans?  Certainly not the Japanese, or the Chinese come to that!

 

In this country, the investing classes are highly mistrustful of railways, the race memories of the Hudson Bubble and the Overend Gurney failure running deep in their collective subconcious.  Privatisation was supposed, through the miracle of monetarist capital, to overcome the lack of investment in railways that dated back to the Great War for which everything has been blamed all my life; I'm tired of hearing this excuse, something should have changed by now and nothing has.  This is the third decade of privatisation, and while I am fully aware that you have to play the long game in railways before you see the effect of anything, it is becoming obvious that it has failed, massively.  The risible Pacers have gone, to be replaced by even older Underground stock with bus engines, it's pathetic. 

 

We're British, dammit Carruthers, and we want a Pullman service for mileage rates, Buffalo Bill UK Enterprises PLC.  If you want something, and it costs a lot of money, you should pay for it or do without, not chisel away at it so that it costs less and doesn't work properly, that's a cowboy attitude.  The Treasury at the root of the problem; it's job is to provide money for needed national projects voted in by parliament under our half-*rsed excuse for democracy with it's appointed upper house (don't get me started), but it regards it's job as protecting what it calls 'the public purse' from fraud and abuse.  This is one of it's jobs, but not the primary one.  The GW electrification was typical; out to the lowest bidding contractor, overrun budget and the Treasury, suspecting that they'd have to actually pay what the job cost, pulled the plug with the bath half-filled, no sparkies to Swansea or Exeter.  Or trans-pennine, or Holyhead, or...

 

Meanwhile significant portions of the network are at path capacity and are unsafely overcrowded, and the only way to resolve this in the short-term (on railways even ten years is short-term) is to electrify, enabling faster section clearance and higher loads.  The long-term solution is to build new Highspeed lines to relieve traffic on the existing routes and enable 90mph running for local passenger and freight to ease pathing, but HS2 is already mired in the same sort of NIMBY controversy that prevented main line access to Birmingham and Stoke-on-Trent in the 1840s and is already suffering from the Treasury pruning shears. 

 

Would they do this in France?  Or China? Or even India?

 

We're never going to sort this out, because all we are interested in is short-term slash-and-burn profit, smash'n'grab, take the money and run.  This is the national culture, sorry guys, you're never gonna have even a half-decent third world railway, suck it up buttercup.  Or change the culture and start spending money for the benefit of your kids you collectively selfish 'stards even if it means sacrificing your next holiday or putting back your new car for a year, don't leave them a worse mess than my generation did while our homes quadrupled in value and we trousered the money because we were 'wise and clever investors who deserved the spoils' (we weren't, we were lucky, most of us anyway, circumstances dictated that The Johnster missed out on the bonanza, which may account for an element of bitterness and cynicism)!

 

Now, that, in case you are in any doubt, was a rant!!!

Edited July 22, 2023 by The Johnster

[The Stationmaster]

I don't know how NR runs projects but n BR days if project money had been ring fencced there be an awful lot of part completed projects littering the railway.  And if the GWR had ring fenced project money in 1892 for the gauge conversion there would have been some incomplete signalling in the Dawlish/Teignmouth area.  

 

I can't really see how a large project can be managed without scope for variations and that scope inevitably means that money is likely to have to be moved around between projects unless the overall budget is increased to cope with variations.   GWML electrificatyion was cut back for several reasons - the Brostol TM and Oxford track layout changes being two but when the project money ran out the scheme could go no further, i.e. it had been spent up to, and beyond, the amount of mney allocated to the scheme.  Ring fenced funds wotk in two directions.

[John M Upton]

A lot of the problems stem from the lack of experience in managing in the industry now, many of the old hands of the BR era are gone, pensioned off and took a lot of knowledge and skills with them.

 

Then we have the vast swathes of money that is being wasted left, right and centre especially with rolling stock.

 

The 442 refurbishment debacle on SWR, the Class 701 introduction (or rather, lack thereof) fiasco, the GWR 769's for the Reading/Redhill/Gatwick route converted at a cost of millions and now destined for scrap without ever carrying a passenger, the re-engineering of traction packages on SWT 455's only for them to be announced as going for scrap almost as soon as the programme was completed and then there is the huge amounts of money wasted on seemingly ever increasing numbers of middle managers and completely irrelevant to the core business of running trains non jobs.

 

Sort out the waste, get in place people who actually know what they are doing.  It's not rocket science...

[Ray H]

2 hours ago, John M Upton said:

. . . . . .  get in place people who actually know what they are doing. 

 

That I fear is something that will become increasingly impossible as those that had at least a basic understanding of how everything fitted into the overall picture that was the British railway are gradually becoming thinner on the ground and once they're gone it'll take one hell of a lot to recapture.

 

It amazes me that there are a large number of people who don't realise that government monies come from a large chunk of the population and not out of some miracle supply that has no limits.

 

We need to learn that if we want hospitals and people to staff them, schools in good conditions and a supply of people who we'd have liked to have had when we were young to teach us and (as this is a thread on a railway centred forum) we'd better include railways (and any other form of transport that can be knitted together with rail to provide the population of the country with what they deserve) and . . . . 

 

If it costs another 2p in the pound or whatever on Income tax, then so be it. After all, there's no such thing as a free lunch. There comes a time when although you'd like to cut a bit more out of . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. (insert words of your choice) . . . . there just isn't any more to cut and keep it working.

 

And to wrap things up . . . 

 

Why can't we devise things that are the modern day equivalent of semaphore signalling (for example) that largely has a life span far, far exceeding the modern day stuff and doesn't need replacing every other day (or whatever) because some of the components available when it was designed/built/introduced is only made for a further few years and doesn't have a suitable replacement once it goes out of production thereby requiring another large lump of expenditure to replace something that probably only lasted a fraction of the time that what it replaced lasted.

[KingEdwardII]

9 hours ago, Reorte said:

but that still reads as more of a need than want view.

So as to avoid ANY doubt - I WANT an electrified rail system. Not need. You may not agree with me, but I think that electric traction for railways is by far the best.

 

Yours, Mike.

[APOLLO]

4 hours ago, The Johnster said:

while our homes quadrupled in value and we trousered the money

 

I LIVE in my house, it is NOT a bank. I have trousered NOT ONE PENNY.

 

Just because some unknown entity (thieving estate agent) has dared to value my house at a stupidly high price is NOT of my asking / doing.

 

Brit15

[Pete the Elaner]

What change would I like to see?

Going back to the attitude of providing a service instead of only when it suits the ToC.

When there was a problem, BR did what it could to get the passengers to their destination. The current attitude seems to be that if the service will lose money, it just gets cancelled & passengers have to sort out their own journeys.

 

An example of this was a few years ago when I had my bike with me in London. There was an incident blocking the line in Milton Keynes, so I got on a train to Tring with the intention of riding from there. MK is about 15 miles further than Tring, which has a reversing platform, so there was no reason to cancel that service, right? Wrong. It gave me the impression that if they encountered a problem, they just cut the services completely.

The current lack of service between Bletchley & Bedford is another example. London Midland seem to view this as an unwanted part of their franchise. When the company providing maintenance for the new class 220 units ceased trading, they simply cancelled the service & replaced it with buses. ToCs running similar units in Wales & the Isle of Wight found a way to keep them in service, so if the will was there, they could have done it.

[david.hill64]

14 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

The forthcoming ECML works will see all lineside signals removed.

 

Now, you mention the the removal of track based train detection - well in ECTS terms relies on the ECTS system having a watertight guarantee that at any moment each and every train under it supervision entire train is still complete.
 

While this is easy to achieve this for multiple units (hence ideal for metro systems or dedicated high speed lines like HS2)  it’s a lot harder to do for freight trains whose length will vary and which can easily be reformed mid journey.

 

Now although I understand ‘end of train’ black boxes which transmit that information are considered acceptable on US freight only railroads, their adoption in the U.K. with the potential consequences should they not be used correctly and a detached freight wagon come to a stand undetected on a 140mph passenger railway means Network Rail is unlikely to go down that path anytime soon.

I should have said fall-back train detection, not signalling (of which train detection and signals form parts).*

 

I agree that train integrity detection is a key issue for moving block railways, but it has been done on mixed traffic conventional railways. Bombardier installed an ETCS level 3 look alike system in Kazakhstan. I say look alike as it uses TETRA radio instead of GSMR.

 

In theory ETCS level 2 could remove the need for axle counters if there was a safe method of train integrity assurance but nobody would do that as axle counters are cheap and assured. The Bangkok BTS uses a system based on ETCS level 2 (Eurobalises to transmit information and for location reference points) but with a different type of radio transmission system. It has no track circuits or axle counters on the main line, relying on self location reporting only, but it is fixed block. Movement authorities are not optimized but given only to where a block section marker would be if installed. (They are not).

 

I have written, or reviewed, safety cases for a number of systems using moving block technology. All of them had a back up system of fixed block axle counters. Even with MRTs operating fixed consist EMUs, where train integrity is an integral part of the onboard ATP system, back up axle counters are used. The main reason is for recovery from severely degraded modes where a number of trains may have become non-communicating. 

 

Siemens has a nice solution in which their moving block Trainguard system can coexist with an ETCS level 2 solution and automatically fall back seamlessly to fixed block working. They proposed this for the Marmaray project but in the end a hybrid system was chosen with moving block signalling for the EMUs and ETCS level 2 for the freight.

 

So I go back to my original statement. It is understandable that NR is moving to ETCS level 2. It's a low risk option and saves them the cost of funding and installing train integrity detection on those trains that don't already have it. Railtrack's vision, 30 years ago, was the right one, but they could not have foreseen that it would take 25 years to agree the specification for ETCS level 3.

 

I haven't fully understood your comment 'And if you think that I do question your ability to make judgements in other areas.' 

 

*Edit. On reflection, having just mulled this over on a long walk, I agree that the standard ETCS level 2 solution for NR is probably the correct one. Nothing to do with the train integrity detection issue with ETCS level 3, for which SIL4 solutions are available, but just down to recovery from degraded modes. I still bemoan the fact that it takes so long to agree standards.

 

Edited July 23, 2023 by david.hill64
Additional thoughts

[The Johnster]

2 hours ago, APOLLO said:

 

I LIVE in my house, it is NOT a bank. I have trousered NOT ONE PENNY.

 

Just because some unknown entity (thieving estate agent) has dared to value my house at a stupidly high price is NOT of my asking / doing.

 

Brit15

 

I didn't mean you, or anyone, personally, but collectively as a generation and a society we have sold our kids' down the river.  They can't get decent secure jobs, they are less likely to get on the first rung of the housing ladder, they and their children are going to suffer the consequences of global warming, which will decrease the amount of productive land and ultimately lead to severe harm to their standards of living.  We have not discharged our moral responsibilities to them well, and then on top of having ruined their world, we complain about their tastes and habits and describe them as feckless and irresponsible.  We sold them the lie that education would be the answer to all their problems; what do you say to someone with an Masters Degree?  'Can I have large fries with that please'. 

 

I was born in the UK in 1952, which might be a better place and time to have been born as any in history, and it might never be that good again.  I had the best education, best standard of living, the benefit of the NHS and welfare state, no wars to fight, no diseases to worry about, the best music, and plenty of casual sex before AIDS spoiled it.  I had the best chances possible; kids terday would give their right arms for half of them, we were probably the luckiest of all generations.  I mucked it up through a combination of my own stupidity and poor judgement, for which I am to blame and accept full responsibility, and being shafted by my ex-wife and ex-best mate (oldest story in the book), for which I am not to blame or responsible, just bad luck.  But my generation as a whole did pretty well for themselves, while the current one will pay the bills.

 

 

[jjb1970]

5 hours ago, Ray H said:

 

That I fear is something that will become increasingly impossible as those that had at least a basic understanding of how everything fitted into the overall picture that was the British railway are gradually becoming thinner on the ground and once they're gone it'll take one hell of a lot to recapture.

 

It amazes me that there are a large number of people who don't realise that government monies come from a large chunk of the population and not out of some miracle supply that has no limits.

 

We need to learn that if we want hospitals and people to staff them, schools in good conditions and a supply of people who we'd have liked to have had when we were young to teach us and (as this is a thread on a railway centred forum) we'd better include railways (and any other form of transport that can be knitted together with rail to provide the population of the country with what they deserve) and . . . . 

 

If it costs another 2p in the pound or whatever on Income tax, then so be it. After all, there's no such thing as a free lunch. There comes a time when although you'd like to cut a bit more out of . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. (insert words of your choice) . . . . there just isn't any more to cut and keep it working.

 

And to wrap things up . . . 

 

Why can't we devise things that are the modern day equivalent of semaphore signalling (for example) that largely has a life span far, far exceeding the modern day stuff and doesn't need replacing every other day (or whatever) because some of the components available when it was designed/built/introduced is only made for a further few years and doesn't have a suitable replacement once it goes out of production thereby requiring another large lump of expenditure to replace something that probably only lasted a fraction of the time that what it replaced lasted.

 

Whilst I agree with much of this, there's another important aspect, investment should be used efficiently and to good effect. Would I happily pay an extra 2p in the pound for better services (education, health, transport etc)? Yes (noting it is hardly a choice, we're obligated to pay whatever taxes we are legally required to pay). Would I happily pay an extra 2p in the pound to fund more bloat, waste and stupid decisions? No (not that I'd have much choice). One of the great questions about things in the UK is how much of the mess is down to a lack of money and how much to what money is available being wasted. I've had quite a lot of experience of defence programs, energy and work with DfT (not railways) and my impression has always been that the money wasn't that short if it had been well spent. 

 

I know some have heard this multiple times but the ultimate example was working on an NHS energy project which was given to an HR manager to manage for her personal development who proceeded to prohibit her technical experts from communicating with outside vendors because she was paranoid about her authority, with entirely predictable consequences. My employer went from instructing me to be mindful it was the NHS, give them good service and don't be rapacious to a position of telling me to let her have the rope she wants to hang herself and let her spend ££££££££££££££££££'s as they got fed up of pandering to an alice in wonderland culture of madness. My employer did very well out of it, the NHS wasted a fortune.

[APOLLO]

8 hours ago, The Johnster said:

 

I didn't mean you, or anyone, personally, but collectively as a generation and a society we have sold our kids' down the river.  They can't get decent secure jobs, they are less likely to get on the first rung of the housing ladder, they and their children are going to suffer the consequences of global warming, which will decrease the amount of productive land and ultimately lead to severe harm to their standards of living.  We have not discharged our moral responsibilities to them well, and then on top of having ruined their world, we complain about their tastes and habits and describe them as feckless and irresponsible.  We sold them the lie that education would be the answer to all their problems; what do you say to someone with an Masters Degree?  'Can I have large fries with that please'. 

 

I was born in the UK in 1952, which might be a better place and time to have been born as any in history, and it might never be that good again.  I had the best education, best standard of living, the benefit of the NHS and welfare state, no wars to fight, no diseases to worry about, the best music, and plenty of casual sex before AIDS spoiled it.  I had the best chances possible; kids terday would give their right arms for half of them, we were probably the luckiest of all generations.  I mucked it up through a combination of my own stupidity and poor judgement, for which I am to blame and accept full responsibility, and being shafted by my ex-wife and ex-best mate (oldest story in the book), for which I am not to blame or responsible, just bad luck.  But my generation as a whole did pretty well for themselves, while the current one will pay the bills.

 

 

 

"WE" (the average Joe) have not sold our kids down the river, but the following certainly have

 

Banks, (The VERY big ones) & no, not really the high street ones.

Politicians of all parties, the lot of them, in all countries also.

The rush to computerisation, robotisation, etc (Started with the industrial revolution).

Big corporations, swallowing up smaller ones, asset stripping and mass loss of jobs / transfer of production to China etc, This happens with small companies also - (Hornby). Pure greed.

AI - already here and more to come, much more.

No doubt there are many more reasons to add, of varying degrees.

 

"WE" are not completely blameless though I admit.

 

One planet, too many people (and increasing) all wanting "The Western Lifestyle", not enough resource on the planet whatsoever to even faintly achieve this, and these resources dwindle by the year. And now, just after the devastation Covid wrought we have the multiple whammy of Putins war, an energy crisis (mostly self inflicted), a cost of living crisis, and an increasing, and worrying upcoming food crisis. Mostly driven by stupidity and greed. (Like ASLEF & others!!).

 

And I must add climate change, even though I'm a tad sceptical. (The trillions of tons of CO2 we have put out since James Watts developments and Rudolf (cough, splutter) Diesel etc MUST have some affect on climate, and not a good one either). Simple last fact, we are slowly (perhaps rapidly) running out of Oil & Natural Gas. Perhaps another 40-50 years - Now THATS an inconvenient truth !! (Source BP Statistical yearly review - Google it)

 

Gaia will have her revenge, and will win.

 

Brit15

 

[BachelorBoy]

4 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

mass loss of jobs / transfer of production to China etc, This happens with small companies also - (Hornby). Pure greed.

 

Hornby is clearly awful at fulfilling those greedy needs, because, despite transferring production to China, it loses millions of pounds.

 

 

[Mike_Walker]

On 21/07/2023 at 15:21, The Stationmaster said:

I wonder when that last happened on Britain's railway network -if ever?  Must have been before continuous brakes became compulsory as there were different, incompatible, braking systems in use back then (in 1889) and that has continued ever since although it as actually got better in the past 30 years.  Different coupling types don't have such a long history, starting really I s'pose in the inter-war years after the Grouping, and things have really only got bad there from around the time HSTs first appeared back in the1970s but they've got much worse in more recent years.

 

So hardly a new problem but at least teh Dellner coupling seems to have become the norm for auto couplings on new stock which is a step forwards.

But...  The Dellner couplers have to be the same height to ensure interoperability.  On the GWML we have three classes, 345, 387 and 80x, working alongside each other all with Dellner couplers but all fitted at different heights despite two of them coming from the same manufacturer.

 

Seems whoever drew up the standards for rolling stock omitted to specify this basic item!

[Mike_Walker]

18 hours ago, The Johnster said:

This after the debacle of the GW electrification, which has left out Swansea and Exeter, and, insanely, Filton Bank, with diesel power through the Severn Tunnel despite a hugely expensive refurb. 

The Severn Tunnel is electrified and the 80x trains pass through it on juice except on the rare occasions when there is a problem.

[ess1uk]

In answer to the OP

Electric traction on as much freight as possible with a reliable passenger service 

[Mike_Walker]

12 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

What change would I like to see?

Going back to the attitude of providing a service instead of only when it suits the ToC.

When there was a problem, BR did what it could to get the passengers to their destination. The current attitude seems to be that if the service will lose money, it just gets cancelled & passengers have to sort out their own journeys.

 

An example of this was a few years ago when I had my bike with me in London. There was an incident blocking the line in Milton Keynes, so I got on a train to Tring with the intention of riding from there. MK is about 15 miles further than Tring, which has a reversing platform, so there was no reason to cancel that service, right? Wrong. It gave me the impression that if they encountered a problem, they just cut the services completely.

The current lack of service between Bletchley & Bedford is another example. London Midland seem to view this as an unwanted part of their franchise. When the company providing maintenance for the new class 220 units ceased trading, they simply cancelled the service & replaced it with buses. ToCs running similar units in Wales & the Isle of Wight found a way to keep them in service, so if the will was there, they could have done it.

TOCs do not decide what services to operate or not, neither in the original franchise days or under the current contracts.  The service levels and timetables are specified by the DfT.  Disruption of service can sometimes cause seemingly unrelated cancellations.  You have to have full knowledge of the bigger picture.

 

LNwR did not use the collapse of Vivarail to suspend the Marston Vale line as perusal of the appropriate RMweb thread will show.  When VR collapsed it was the administrators who took the decision to stop supporting the fleet at Bletchley depot and make the staff redundant leaving LNwR with no alternative but to suspend the service.  They can not operate services with out maintenance support and could not simply employ the BY depot staff directly as the company does not hold the relevant safety certification.  Yes, the could have taken steps to get that but it would probably still have been a work in progress, it takes a long time.

 

Instead, they provided a replacement bus service and set about sourcing suitable alternative rolling stock which, for a variety of reasons, means Class 150s.  Sadly none were immediately available but three sets are booked to move from Newton Heath to Bletchley tomorrow.  There will then be a period of training before they can enter service.  The company is progressing things as quickly as it can.

 

As for the other operators of VR sets, the situation is very different.  The IoW units were delayed entering service because of delays in completing the infrastructure upgrade.  The trains are maintained by the TOC staff at Ryde as were the previous units and are working reliably - they are pure electric units.  In the case of the Welsh units, the Welsh government purchased the sets outright (to try an shore up VR's finances) and took the decision to award their maintenance to Stadler at Birkenhead North.  Reliability of the TfW sets has so far been dire.  Like Scotland, transport is devolved responsibility in Wales and therefore different rules apply to England.

[The Stationmaster]

14 hours ago, Ray H said:

 

Why can't we devise things that are the modern day equivalent of semaphore signalling (for example) that largely has a life span far, far exceeding the modern day stuff and doesn't need replacing every other day (or whatever) because some of the components available when it was designed/built/introduced is only made for a further few years and doesn't have a suitable replacement once it goes out of production thereby requiring another large lump of expenditure to replace something that probably only lasted a fraction of the time that what it replaced lasted.

That is an interesting idea.  As far as the actual signal are concerned I don't think there's much difference between the lifespan of a well maintained semaphore signal and that of a well engineered and maintained colour light signal.  Apart from updating the signal head to modern methods with lower power consumption and needing less maintenance I could readily post pictures of colour light signals which have been in use for anything between 50 and just over 60 years and some of them will probably still be there in 10 years time..  I knew of, and even have photos of, some semaphore signals which had a similar lifespan, possibly even longer.

 

When it comes to control systems etc the oldest I'm aware of for something associated with colour light signalling was a relay which was only taken out of use due to a resignalling scheme 74 years after it was manufactured.  But equally some wiring installed i the 1960s was ina  dangerous state by the mid -late 1980s -  a lot depends on the quality of material used in the first place and its suitability for railway use.

 

As far as the actual controls are concerned lever frames can have a quite long life but need regular maintenance and component replacements in theh locking to enable them to achieve it.  But equally some types of signalling control panels  - again with proper maintenance and component replacement due to wear rtc have managed, and are still managing, over 60 years in regular, heavy, everyday use. 

 

So in terms of lifespan there probably isn't too much difference providing there is good maintenance, proper materials have been used, and spare parts an be obtained.  But when it comes to running costs and basic maintenance needs the mechanical stuff is definitely more demanding.  Mechanical is, on balance, probably cheaper to install, but more more expensive to staff and properly maintain.

[Mike_Walker]

And we currently have 80x units stopped because the microswitches under the DSD pedals are no longer obtainable!

[ess1uk]

13 hours ago, david.hill64 said:

 

 

Siemens has a nice solution in which their moving block Trainguard system can coexist with an ETCS level 2 solution and automatically fall back seamlessly to fixed block working. They proposed this for the Marmaray project but in the end a hybrid system was chosen with moving block signalling for the EMUs and ETCS level 2 for the freight.

 

So I go back to my original statement. It is understandable that NR is moving to ETCS level 2. It's a low risk option and saves them the cost of funding and installing train integrity detection on those trains that don't already have it. Railtrack's vision, 30 years ago, was the right one, but they could not have foreseen that it would take 25 years to agree the specification for ETCS level 3.

 

 

Siemens ran Level 3 on the ENIF test track with the class 313