East West rail, Bletchley to oxford line

[Pannier Tank]

On 15/12/2023 at 13:28, rodent279 said:

Thought this might be of interest to those reading this thread:-

 

 

 

From this timetable:-

 

 

I was hoping to find an old timetable to compare Steam Timings with the current Timetable. 72 Years ago Bletchley to Kempston Hardwick was 33 Minutes, today it's 31 minutes.

[mikejames]

1 hour ago, Pannier Tank said:

 

I was hoping to find an old timetable to compare Steam Timings with the current Timetable. 72 Years ago Bletchley to Kempston Hardwick was 33 Minutes, today it's 31 minutes.

little unclear what more you want -but there are numerous Bradshaws available on line

[Pannier Tank]

15 minutes ago, mikejames said:

little unclear what more you want -but there are numerous Bradshaws available on line

 

I will take a look at Bradshaws, thank you.

 

A lot of my books are currently in storage so I was unable to compare current timings with the past and rodent279's posting allowed me to do that.

[Nearholmer]

I doubt that basic inter-station run times have changed much at all. Steam auto-trains were pretty nippy, with a decent power-weight ratio to permit quick acceleration, and it’s only really when the very high installed power and aggressive braking  typical of electrically powered metros gets thrown at things that routes with a lot of closely spaced stops get much quicker.

 

Where things ought to get appreciably quicker is if limited stop services ever re-materialise, because the permitted line speeds and available power ought to be a lot higher than the LNWR/LMS had available.

 

What would, I think, be quite interesting would be to see the limited stop timings achieved with the LMS three-car diesel set in the late 1930s. One of the first-year trainers when I was training as an engineer had worked on the train, both as it was built and then as “travelling technician” while it was bedded-in on public service, and he reckoned it left the steam services standing if given a clear road. It had 250hp/car, whereas I think the Cravens units only had 150hp/car.

 

 

Edited December 19, 2023 by Nearholmer

[rodent279]

3 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

It had 250hp/car, whereas I think the Cravens units only had 150hp/car.

Comparable with the later Swindon Cross-Country and Inter-City units I think.

[melmerby]

ComCAST (NBC/Universal) have confirmed the rumour of a possible UK theme park in Bedfordshire

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-67761926

[Pete the Elaner]

32 minutes ago, melmerby said:

ComCAST (NBC/Universal) have confirmed the rumour of a possible UK theme park in Bedfordshire

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-67761926

 

I have read elsewhere that it is proposed to be near Kempston Hardwick. I think that was one of the stations which they planned to close to allow both a fast & slow train in each direction every hour. If that was the case, it would incite a re-think.

[melmerby]

11 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

I have read elsewhere that it is proposed to be near Kempston Hardwick. I think that was one of the stations which they planned to close to allow both a fast & slow train in each direction every hour. If that was the case, it would incite a re-think.

I would guess the whole line between Bedford & Bletchley might need a rethink, it could if it goes ahead, create a fair bit of extra rail traffic.

Imagine that. On a train from Oxford, off at Kempston straight into the theme park, or from the E Midlands down the MML

Maybe a new station like Birmingham International, called Kempston Universal?🙂

Maybe Universal might like to contribute, after all it would help promote the theme park?

 

I bet it doesn't happen, even if the theme park does open, it'll be bus shuttles because of staff shortages, congestion on the line etc. etc.

[melmerby]

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

What would, I think, be quite interesting would be to see the limited stop timings achieved with the LMS three-car diesel set in the late 1930s. One of the first-year trainers when I was training as an engineer had worked on the train, both as it was built and then as “travelling technician” while it was bedded-in on public service, and he reckoned it left the steam services standing if given a clear road. It had 250hp/car, whereas I think the Cravens units only had 150hp/car.

 

The LMS unit had a pretty respectable power/weight ratio of over 10bhp/ton and weighed only 2/3rds that of a Swindon 600hp 3 car Cross Country unit (Class 120).

[Arun Sharma]

3 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

I have read elsewhere that it is proposed to be near Kempston Hardwick. I think that was one of the stations which they planned to close to allow both a fast & slow train in each direction every hour. If that was the case, it would incite a re-think.

It would also have an interesting possible effect on the somewhat sparse road system around there as well as a perhaps justifying  an increase in train frequency between Bedford-Bletchley-MK.

[jamie92208]

This video has just appeared on Youtube. 

Jamie

[Pete the Elaner]

3 hours ago, Arun Sharma said:

It would also have an interesting possible effect on the somewhat sparse road system around there as well as a perhaps justifying  an increase in train frequency between Bedford-Bletchley-MK.

 

The road system is not too bad: A421 is a grade separated dual carriageway from M1 J13 to the Black Cat roundabout on the A1. An upgrade of the Black Cat has recently started to transform it into a free flowing interchange.

The addition of a decent rail service would still be a bonus though.

[KAR 120C]

The approved new station on the MML on the western side of the Wixams development (south of Bedford and to the east of Kempston Hardwick) will also play an important part in transport links.  Although there will be no fast trains stopping there (only twin track) and no services after 10.00 p.m. to allow regular engineering works, there will be direct links to London, Luton Airport, Bedford and points north.  In addition the new station will be within spitting distance of KH.  My personal opinion is that some of the local roads will still have to be improved as they rapidly become ‘country lanes’ off main roads like the A421 and A6.

[big jim]

On 19/12/2023 at 16:07, melmerby said:

ComCAST (NBC/Universal) have confirmed the rumour of a possible UK theme park in Bedfordshire

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-beds-bucks-herts-67761926

there’s a map of the proposed site on this

sky news link 

 

https://news.sky.com/story/universal-studios-confirms-plans-for-first-uk-attraction-and-buys-huge-site-in-bedford-to-build-it-13034123?dcmp=snt-sf-twitter

 

Could have a new excuse of a train delayed due to minions on the line

[melmerby]

28 minutes ago, big jim said:

there’s a map of the proposed site on this

sky news link 

It was on the first link I posted.

[Bernard Lamb]

This turned up on facebook.

Well done all of them.

Bernard

 

[VarsityJim]

2 hours ago, Bernard Lamb said:

This turned up on facebook.

Well done all of them.

Bernard

 

Is that where the ‘join up’ took place?

[Siberian Snooper]

Looks like the broad gauge is making a comeback!!

 

Hat, coat and heading for the door!!!

 

[stewartingram]

Was there a Golden Spike?

[Ron Ron Ron]

This looks like an earlier view, looking east, towards Winslow.

 

This is the bridge over HS2.

The Calvert HS2 infrastructure depot will be built on the left of the frame.

At the top right hand side, you can just make out the earth embankment being formed, to carry the the link from EW Rail towards Aylesbury.

 

 

Edited December 21, 2023 by Ron Ron Ron

[KingEdwardII]

On 19/12/2023 at 07:30, Pannier Tank said:

hoping to find an old timetable to compare Steam Timings with the current Timetable

The really sad thing is to check out the old timings from Cambridge to Oxford. Well over 4 hours. It is much quicker than that today to take a train from Cambridge to Oxford via London (~ 2h 30mins).

 

So for EWR to be a useful link between the University cities, they will have to find an inventive way of getting much faster times than of old.

 

Yours, Mike.

[The Stationmaster]

4 hours ago, KingEdwardII said:

The really sad thing is to check out the old timings from Cambridge to Oxford. Well over 4 hours. It is much quicker than that today to take a train from Cambridge to Oxford via London (~ 2h 30mins).

 

So for EWR to be a useful link between the University cities, they will have to find an inventive way of getting much faster times than of old.

 

Yours, Mike.

The time it took was one reason why through workings between the university cities gradually vanished from the timetable.  Although it involved a transfer between stations the journey via London was of far better quality and not much different in overall time (even quicker if you took the fastest trains).

[KingEdwardII]

Oxford to Cambridge is around 87 miles by road, using a route roughly equivalent to the planned EWR route. The road journey takes about 2h 30m.

 

What you'd ideally like to see is a train with a similar timing, stopping only at St Neots, Bedford, Bletchley and Bicester (say). Whether that will ever come to pass remains to be seen. However, this is what is required for the route to be competitive in terms of speed.

 

I wonder if anyone could get their minds around a more ambitious express route starting in Bristol then via Oxford and EWR to Cambridge then onwards to Norwich. Connections are all very well, but they usually lose a lot of time - nothing like having a direct train.

 

Yours, Mike

[Edwin_m]

The official site doesn't quote the Oxford-Cambridge journey time (reflecting the expectation that few people will travel the whole route).  It quotes 45min from Oxford to MK and 35min from Bedford to Cambridge, so the end to end time is likely to be somewhat under 2hr.  

 

https://eastwestrail.co.uk/benefits-of-ewr

[Davexoc]

4 hours ago, Edwin_m said:

It quotes 45min from Oxford to MK

 

That sounds a bit slow, especially if the intermediate stops are only Bletchley, Winslow and Bicester, but then if it had been electrified it could have been so much quicker. I don't know the rail route mileage, but by road it is only around 40 miles depending on which way you go....