Bernard Lamb

Some idle thoughts.

We need to acheive net zero by 2050.

One small problem is that does not mean acheiving that for 67 million people, but for around 77 million people.

That figure is based on governement projections.

That means a heck of a lot of new infrastructure.

That means that even with a massive road building programme new railways will be required.

Being but a simple soul I would have thought that building them now rather than at the last minute would be a good idea.

If private capital was required for the completion of Euston a clean sheet would have looked far more attractive. The constraints of what currently exists does seem to me to be rather limiting. 

Private investment in Coal Drops Yard alongside St Pancras station itself would seem to be a gold mine. If that concept had been pursued at Euston from the start then it might well have worked. I do not see room for a second such development  ten minutes walk down the road.

King's Cross St Pancras and Coal Drops Yard form a unified transport and shopping area. With other institutions taking advantage of the benefits. The chance to build the new Euston at Camden, with internal transport links to the old Euston and Euston Square seems to have been squandered. It is far too late to change the ideas on funding now.

I fear that OOC is here to stay.

Bernard 

34 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

I mentioned it several pages ago Bernard.

Thanks for bringing it back up though.

 

The link from Euston Square was more than just new connecting tunnels.

It involved creating a new underground concourse and ticket hall for the enlarged Euston station, to serve all the underground lines passing through the mainline station. 
Both the HS2 extension to Euston and the location of the new concourse and ticket hall, are very close to Euston Square underground, so the opportunity was being taken to finally link and integrate Euston Square into the wider Euston underground complex.

 

This part of the project has reportedly become a very expensive element in the Euston HS2 development and is apparently far more complex and problematic than it may appear at face value.

Costs have ballooned as a result.

 

Sadly, this whole element of the Euston project has been binned, leaving Euston Square as it was, a separate entity down the street.

Another wasted opportunity that may not present itself again for decades.

 

 

.

Thanks for the detailed explanation Ron X 3.

For 78 years I have travelled between Euston and Liverpool Street and also the reverse journey and never  managed to decide on what was the best route*. I was optimistic that at some point in the future there would be a definitive answer. Alas not now likely to even be a glint in somebodies eye in my lifetime.

Crazy.

* At one time you could get a train, at certain times of the day, that ran from my local station directly to Broad Street. Those were the days.

Bernard

1 minute ago, GordonC said:

 

I also note he was saying on the TV in the previous couple of days that he 'would not be rushed into a decision' and a 'decision had not yet been made' which would have to be nothing short of a complete lie.

There is a story doing the rounds that Rishi made the presentation video in Downing Street on September 29th. 

My apologies if this had been mentioned on here. I have just seen that the link between Euston Square and Euston has also been cut from the plan. Us poor users of the WCML at Euston are shafted once again.

Bernard

Let's not be so hard on Rishi.

He is only trying to comply with the DEI requirments by building a railway line with only one leg.

Bernard

2 hours ago, scottystitch said:

Man forced to sell home for HS2 has 'lost everything' https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-67006024

Typical anti HS2 reporting by the BBC.

The  property did not qualify for compulsory purchase. All subsequent events were down to him and nothing to do with HS2. I wrote long ago that people around Wendover are very pleased with how their situation has been resolved. Are you just repeating what the BBC say, or do you know that he was actually forced to sell his home?

If so who by?

HS2 has made a mess of some aspects of the work, but compensation has been dealt with very generously from what I have seen. That is part of the reason for the high spend. 

Bernard

1 hour ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

HS2 Ltd will not be building Euston.

 

Building the Euston station is to handed over to a new development authority.

 

.

Which makes it very convenient if you want to hide the cost.

Just move chunks of it over to another company and a seperate budget.

Not exactly welcomed with open arms on the local news just now.

Benard

37 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

Can someone explain to me where the money spent on HS2 actually ends up?

 

As far as I can see the state gets most of it back.

 

Many thousands of HS2 workers paying income tax, national insurance, VAT on a new fridge, car tax, fuel duty, council tax ... and buying stuff from firms who pay corporation tax, business rates, and pay wages to employees who are paying income tax, nat... ...

 

Buying masses of HS2 concrete and fencing from firms who pay corp... ...

 

Not paying social security benefits to workers not building HS2 or anything else ...

 

The same goes for building hospitals, repairing schools, and all the rest.

 

If you have someone capable of mixing concrete, how does it benefit the country to pay them to stay at home not mixing any concrete? When we need lots of mixed concrete?

 

What am I missing?

 

Martin.

As I wrote yesterday. I would like to see a figure for the actual cost.

For as long as I have been around, governments have used different methods of expressing 'costs' dependent on what result they wanted.

Bernard

Bernard

At one time they flew to Berlin.

I did use them once, that must have been around 1973.

I do remember that they were not very reliable, delays and diversions being quite common, so did not use then again. Thet did not last long after that anyway.

Bernard

2 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

I travel between Euston & MK. It seems like a complete lottery as to which sub-class turns up.

I think they initially tried to keep the /1s & /3s on longer distance services but then gave up.

Things then went down hill and quite often you now get a 319. As a young boy said during the school holiday. Look mum. The train has opening windows.

There seems to be a lot of withdrawn ? units stored south of Wembley and some new units nearer to Euston that I have not seen in use yet.

Bernard

1 hour ago, The Stationmaster said:

I don't know the figure but I know that various of the footpath fencing work in that general area was done incorrectly and another contractor had to then rerect a new footpath fence in the right place.  I also know that site management of fencing work can be best described as mis-management with jobs being cancelled at short notice and the contractor having to be compensated for the cost of hired machinery he had got to delivered to site ready for the scheduled dates - and those costs alone run into four figures for a week's work cancelled.

We could add to that the costs of the meetings concerning exactly when various stages of construction would occur and what changes to the design of a bridge were likely to be needed. That phase lasted at least two years.

I know from people involved with the work at Euston the scale of materials and plant that has been sitting around for ages. Ages more before any decision is reached I suspect. No doubt the people concerned had enough experience to have contracts draw up that cover them for just such eventualities.

The exact figures for this work, or rather lack of work, would also be interesting to see.

Bernard 

1 hour ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Ah, but this misses the point. HS2 is a general programme of local improvements which incidentally includes the building of a railway line. 

Correct.

One section of it is to provide local walkers and cyclists with a new route to be able to visit Waddesdon Manor without having to use the A41. The A41 is aslo having a bit of an upgrade in the area.

I would like to see a figure, extracted from the total, for the actual net cost of building the railway.

Bernard

4 hours ago, The Johnster said:

And the 16yo has been released on bail, so it sounds as if he had some part in whatever happened but that the 60yo is the main guy.  It will be illuminating to find out what his motivation for the act was; not many people hate trees...

Ever heard of Tik Tok?

Apologies if my spelling is wrong, it is not my scene.

Bernard

Just nattering at tea time with a few neighbours and I thought this was interesting.

Ther are 14 houses in the road and there are people working on HS2 from three of them.

Bernard

20 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Good oppourtunity for the government as landowner to earn rental income during the dithering decades ?

Which is exactly what happened with the M74.

There was a superb hotel near Lockerbie that was closed after being the subject of compulsory purchase. When the road upgrade was delayed they asked the former owner if he would lke to run it. He agreed, but could not care less about the profitability. as he was getting a set fee and was rather upset at the way he had been treated. He opened the hotel and offered various groups some fantastic bargain offers. 

Meanwhile back on the WCML the journey time into Euston yesterday was 27 minutes with a 4 car unit. 10 minutes down on what wasoften being acheived in recent months and also some trains cancelled so very crowded. 

Bernard

A very fine actor and a good bloke as well. 

He was also very knowlegeable on British Mediteranean stamps and was quite happy to chat about the subject, that being the area in which our paths crossed. 

RIP

bernard

I found a few odds and ends on Kreigsloks in the Baltic States.

52 036 was operating on the Brest - Litovsk Railway on 01 - 10 - 1944. Preumably it remained in the area after the war.

According to some quite old information Latvia also had 52 021 , TE 021 in preservation.

The Baltic States had a considerable number of Kreigsloks until the late 1960s early 1970s. However most were gone by independence in 1991. This included over 100 in either the strategic reserve or in use as stationary boilers.

TE 3368 was preserved in Estonia. This machine had been renumbered as 1042 238. Built 1943 by Krauss Maffei.

Latvia inherited 8 machines, but these were soon gone. Amongst these were :- TE 6747, TE 7528, TE 6761, TE 023. All noted in 1992. TE 023 is noted as being regauged to 1524mm on 27 - 04 - 1947 and was still working as a stationary boiler in 1992. Although reported as being in an extremely poor condition.

In Lithuania I have a note of TE 120, TE 4853, TE 7231 and part of TE 6955 in a scrap yard.

Bernard

3 hours ago, rockershovel said:

OOC to BNS will be completed in some shape or form and any contracts currently let, will be more-or-less honoured. 

 

The government has never worried about the construction industry. It precipitated a catastrophic collapse in the industry during 1990-91 and will do so again if it is expedient

 

I would remark that there is a substantial water pipeline project ongoing. It doesn't get the publicity of HS2, probably because the government doesn't wish to draw attention to the population assumptions underpinning it, but it is big work. 

 

There is also a major programme of power cable Crossings, partly concealed by wind farm works. The REAL energy security plan seems to be "buy it from people better organised than we are". 

Which is part of the reason why we need an alternative to the WCML. With a fit for purpose station at the end of it.

Bernard

12 hours ago, burgundy said:

A selection of the outdoor exhibits follows. As always, additional detail would be appreciated! 

I believe that Riga had a factory to supply multiple units within the Soviet Union, although with the collapse of communism, this had fallen on hard times. Can anyone add more please?

Best wishes 

Eric 

The Kriegslok, originally 52 036 was built by Henschel in late 1942.

Bernard

18 hours ago, burgundy said:

Bernard 

Thank you. My knowledge was considerably expanded by the trip. I had not appreciated the involvement of the Royal Navy in the independence of the Baltic states at the end of WW1 - or the involvement of a British General responsible for a German army unit confronting the Red Army! Similarly, in WW2, the conflicting loyalties, created by being taken over again by Russia following the Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement and then invaded by Germany, must have been horrific. 

Memel was, of course, Prussian, and therefore European gauge, but I understand that the gauge elsewhere was changed by the advancing German army and then changed back by the advancing Red Army. Quite a lot of narrow gauge field railways also seem to have been built. 

There are a couple of photos of  Memel/Klaipeda on the "Ships" thread. 

Best wishes 

Eric 

Good afternoon Eric,

An area with a complicated and sometimes violent history. The history of the partisans during WWll is worth reading about. If you can find a true (ish) account that is. For obvious reasons they kept quiet about what they did, being uncertain of who would be in charge after the war.

There are remains of field railway tracks and infrastructure all along the Baltic coast and these stretch right across Poland and into Germany. My brother in law lived near Malchin in Mecklenburgh and in the forest behind their house were various remains. They extracted gravel in the area that was used in the building of the U Boat pens. These lines tended to be feeder lines to a local full size line, but some stretched for a fair few kilometers.

I have heared stories from people of the previous generation who experienced the war in that part of the world. It must have been pretty grim. Having walked across a bay in the Baltic Sea several kilometers wide that was frozen solid and gradually feeling the cold creeping up my legs I have some idea of what the weather can be like. Add in being shot at and having very little food must have been close to hell.

Bernard  

We used to use it twice a year for short trips. One day trip and one overnight, mainly for shopping.

The current fares make that a non starter, besides the effect of that other business.

Benard

It looks as though you had an interesting trip. Thanks for posting.

It is a very much neglected area as far as railways go.

My knowledge is very limited, although I do have ethnic German friends who came from what they knew as Memel but is now Kleipeda. At the end of the war they decided that staying put , with the Russians in control, was not a good idea. The locals also were not exactly friendly. Going back to Germany, within the new boundaries, was the best option and even there they were viewed with suspicion. It was many years after the collapse of the Soviet Union before they had the courage to return and even then just for a visit.

You mention the railways being to the Russian gauge. I don't know to what extend the advancing Germans converted them to standard gauge, but they did operate German stock in the area, so some were converted. I have heard stories about the conflict between the local partisans and the Germans, which is where some of the problems between various familes and ethnic groups originated. Another phase of history that seems to have been hushed up. 

My apologies as I am straying into what some people consider a dodgy subject. 

Bernard

My German, former GDR area, layout has a station called Rode.

There is no such place, but there is a childrens TV program that features a staion with the name. It became a cult program and is known as The Little Sandman. 

Bernard 

17 hours ago, Adi said:

Such a long wait 

Seeing that one of them was based at Hawick a local word comes to mind. Huntigowk.

Bernard

13 hours ago, exmoordave said:

Now that the weather has turned, I've decided to put up a marquee in my garden and inside are some flashy lights and funky music.

This will be the winter of my disco tent........

Never mind the son of York.

You will have Andy himself to contend with if you persist with jokes that are that terrible.

Bernard