winterbournecm Posted October 17, 2011 Share Posted October 17, 2011 This weekend coming sees an major blockade at Liskeard (4 days) for track relaying and viaduct work in the Liskeard area. Buses replace trains between Plymouth & Par, and lots of engineers trains out & about. Look out for class 59's making an appearance too. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Captain Kernow Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 17, 2011 Some of us are working on the contingency plan (almost) as we speak!! The block actually starts at St Budeaux, thus allowing the Gunnislake service to operate. Up trains will terminate at Par and cross to the Down platform (generally) via the east end crossover. The Structures and Track Renewals teams are linking up to do two jobs on the viaduct in the same blockade, both required. The viaduct needs waterproofing (membrane etc.) work, which obviously needs the track to be taken up, and the actual track over the viaduct was also in need of renewal, so it will be new track that gets put back down. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Stationmaster Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 17, 2011 No disrespect to you Cap'n but I sometimes wonder if anybody in the railway industry actually studies diary dates nowadays, and I know rail travel might not be as critical as it once was but why on earth have they chosen the first weekend of half-term for a long blockade like this? Is it because NR is so remote from the passenger business I wonder? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
edcayton Posted October 17, 2011 Share Posted October 17, 2011 Could they also have the NR trains terminate at Bodmin Road so as to generate some traffic to and from the steam railway? This would also mean a shorter bus ride. Ed Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Stationmaster Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 17, 2011 Could they also have the NR trains terminate at Bodmin Road so as to generate some traffic to and from the steam railway? This would also mean a shorter bus ride. Ed A distinct dearth of protecting signals in that vicinity Ed, plus there will no doubt be materials trains involved and standing somewhere at sometime. Lostwithiel would make sense in some respects but it could be awkward with any clay trains about plus the road access from the main road is not at all good, especially for coaches, and the station has 'very limited' facilities for staff and punters alike so Par does make quite good sense. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium phil-b259 Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Premium Share Posted October 17, 2011 No disrespect to you Cap'n but I sometimes wonder if anybody in the railway industry actually studies diary dates nowadays, and I know rail travel might not be as critical as it once was but why on earth have they chosen the first weekend of half-term for a long blockade like this? Is it because NR is so remote from the passenger business I wonder? Could it be something to do with the avaliabilty of rail replacement busses? I do remember reading something on a control log to the effect that during a early morning failure getting replacement busses was proving difficult as a significant number of companies contacted were tied up doing school runs, once these were done the number of avalable busses increased rapidly. The same problem ocurs in the afternoon of course but as the school day tends to finish a bit earlier tha the bulk of the evening peak, the situation is not quite as bad as in the morning. At weekends of course scheduled bus services run at alower frequancy producing more spare vehicles, Only yesterday I observed a number of London Buses doing the Thre Bridges - Haywards Heath run for example Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edwin_m Posted October 17, 2011 Share Posted October 17, 2011 Some of us are working on the contingency plan (almost) as we speak!! And after that you'll be back to blockading Boney in the bay of Biscay? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Kris Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Premium Share Posted October 17, 2011 Could it be something to do with the avaliabilty of rail replacement busses? I do remember reading something on a control log to the effect that during a early morning failure getting replacement busses was proving difficult as a significant number of companies contacted were tied up doing school runs. Let's face it, this is Cornwall and there are not that many trains that travel through the peak hours. This will mean that there are not huge numbers of coaches needed. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Captain Kernow Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 17, 2011 I can't say for sure right now (but I can check in due course), but the availability of buses may well have something to do with the school holidays. Having said that, you could also argue that fewer business people are travelling, so that's a better time from their point of view to do this work. Another factor will be the availability of the staff and resources (locos, wagons, traincrews) to do the job, because they will be tied up on other projects every other weekend. The TOCs are consulted as part of a structured industry consultation process (that wasn't a bad turn of phrase for this time of night!), so in other words, it won't happen if they don't agree. This blockade needs 4 days due to the complexity of the job, there are some 11 seperate engineers trains shown in the N-ROL system (the internal database for planning engineering trains), with some fairly complex movements inside the blockade - locos off one attaching to another, wagons of some trains from further afield being stabled in Tavistock Jct yard, to be collected by other locos later in the blockade, that kind of thing. Doing both the structures/waterproofing work and the track relaying work at the same time is sensible, though, thus saving the need for a further possession later on. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Stationmaster Posted October 17, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 17, 2011 Interesting stuff coming out here and the point about school 'bus needs is well made - it always was a problem if we suddenly wanted replacement 'bus services at school chucking-out time but I never came across it as a problem in connection with major planned blockades such as Westbury South which if my mind is working properly was done during school term time. The good Cap'n is absolutely right to point out the resources implications and involvement of the TOCS but the latter are the very people who should be drawing attention to things like school half-terms, pop festivals and such like and NR should be looking at jobs against those sort of events and their passenger business impact instead of just saying - if they're anything like Railtrack were 'don't worry we'll pay for some extra coaches' While appreciating that BR was a joined up railway the passenger commercial folk always (on the Western at any rate) ran their events and school hols etc diaries and always judged annual possession programmes against them - I don't think shutting east Cornwall for 4/5 days would have been on during half term. Railtrack often brow beat TOCs over possessions, especially big possessions, and part of the problem then - and possibly more so now? - was that TOCs lacked the guts or, more importantly, the knowledge to go back and them and say 'not that weekend but this one would be quite ok because there aren't any rugby matches or big soccer fixtures or motor shows or whatever and as you need X hours to do the job the alternative will be ok by us'. But then maybe that's why certain folk in the 'civils' on one Region were not too happy when I turned round and said 'no' to substantiial chunks of their annual plans which could easily be swapped with advantage to my employing TOC and no disadvantage to them (and when they got their PWay contractors in it was even better because they usually agreed with me ). Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold Captain Kernow Posted October 18, 2011 RMweb Gold Share Posted October 18, 2011 Railtrack often brow beat TOCs over possessions, especially big possessions, and part of the problem then - and possibly more so now? - was that TOCs lacked the guts or, more importantly, the knowledge to go back and them and say 'not that weekend but this one would be quite ok because there aren't any rugby matches or big soccer fixtures or motor shows or whatever and as you need X hours to do the job the alternative will be ok by us'. But then maybe that's why certain folk in the 'civils' on one Region were not too happy when I turned round and said 'no' to substantiial chunks of their annual plans which could easily be swapped with advantage to my employing TOC and no disadvantage to them (and when they got their PWay contractors in it was even better because they usually agreed with me ). By and large the relationship with the TOCs is pretty consensual as regards timing for big blockades. FGW are certainly prepared to point out if a proposed possession clashes with a half term or other major event, and we do try to accommodate these wishes, as it clearly makes sense to do so as far as possible. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.