Future of the Intercity 125s

[tbtc]

Chopping services in half to make them more reliable is merely an idiotic artefact of privatisation IMO

Really?

There's many things you can criticise privatisation for, but improving the reliability of services? A bad thing?

 

[HSTEd]

Really?

There's many things you can criticise privatisation for, but improving the reliability of services? A bad thing?

In almost all cases this improved reliability has been purchased at the cost of journey times getting drastically longer or connectivity being removed. My home station no longer has the train to Derby and Birmingham it once did.

And the travel time to Nottingham aboard a Cl158 is several minutes longer, with no intermediate stops, than the original Sprinter timetable (using Cl150s) was with multiple intermediate stops.

EDIT:
And it appears so far that the Manchester-Crewe via Mauldeth road's limiting platform will be Gatley at just 75m, several others are at the ~105m range and then most of the remainder are at 160+m and could thus accept an 8-car train....
There goes that idea of running full 12 car trains throughout.

Unless you want to extend a load of platforms or make judicious use of UDS... although even that might not be enough at Gatley.

 

[AndyLandy]

I can quite believe the HST sets have another 10-15 years of life left in them yet, but don't forget, we aren't going to see the first IEP set hit our railways until at least 2017, so they'll keep going in mainstream service for another five years at least. By that point, we're only talking a 5-10 year lifespan left.

At that point, you start to displace the youngest HST sets with IEPs and refurbish them for DDA compliance with the intention of redeploying them on GW Cornish services and the extremities of the XC network. The oldest sets you keep going until the current batch IEP deployment is done and they'll essentially be life-expired.

The recently-refurbished sets should be good for another 5-10 years, particularly if you have enough sets to give them lighter service rosters, and can cannibalise some of the older, life-expired trains for spare parts.

There are some obvious sections of infill electrification that should be covered early in CP6 (if not squeezed on to the end of CP5), most notably Birmingham-Derby, Sheffield-Leeds/Doncaster and ideally Birmingham-Cardiff/Bristol too. With a couple of tweaks to the XC services, such as splitting Aberdeen-Penzance into Bristol-Edinburgh and Birmingham-Penzance services (Using HSTs on BHM-PNZ, and leaving ICEC and ScotRail to handle Edinburgh-Aberdeen services) you could in theory displace the entire XC Voyager fleet with new electric traction (ideally more IEPs). I'd even consider handing operation of BHM-PNZ over to GW and handing BHM-GLC back to XC.

At that point, you could use the displaced Voyagers to eliminate the last of the HST sets, or to add new routes to XC (or re-create old ones that have been lost). It could potentially even be possible to use all this 22x stock to avoid the need for hybrid IEP entirely. Even if they can't be hybridised, they're still a better use of stock that buying new hybrid IEPs.

 

[tbtc]

In almost all cases this improved reliability has been purchased at the cost of journey times getting drastically longer or connectivity being removed

Most of the long routes cut have retained the important links though - it's a hassle for people in Skegness wanting to get to Manchester Airport (etc), but that's not a big market

 

[HSTEd]

Most of the long routes cut have retained the important links though - it's a hassle for people in Skegness wanting to get to Manchester Airport (etc), but that's not a big market

But they don't apply this principle consistently, if cutting these services in half is such a benefit then numerous other services should have suffered from the axe. For instance, how many people travel the entire length of the XC Scotland-SW services? They should all logically be cut into two or even three pieces.

In reality it is just a way for companies to marginally improve on time figures in time to make big showy announcements, saving it for the time when they are unable to deliver actual gains or adding yet more padding to timetables becomes impractical.

 

[tbtc]

But they don't apply this principle consistently, if cutting these services in half is such a benefit then numerous other services should have suffered from the axe. For instance, how many people travel the entire length of the XC Scotland-SW services? They should all logically be cut into two or even three pieces.

In reality it is just a way for companies to marginally improve on time figures in time to make big showy announcements, saving it for the time when they are unable to deliver actual gains or adding yet more padding to timetables becomes impractical.

The Aberdeen - Penzance service is just one a day - a lot of the "tagged together" services were fairly regular in comparison.

Surely a reliable regular service is most important for the majority of people?

 

[AndyLandy]

The Aberdeen - Penzance service is just one a day - a lot of the "tagged together" services were fairly regular in comparison.

Surely a reliable regular service is most important for the majority of people?

And how many people ride that service end-to-end anyway? It can't be that many. If you're making a really long Intercity journey, a change or two isn't catastrophic, having the flexibility of a frequent service is surely more useful to passengers, hence my suggestion above for splitting that particular service. Especially if it means an increased frequency on the overlap sections, which are likely to be the busier corridors anyway.

 

[HSTEd]

The Aberdeen - Penzance service is just one a day - a lot of the "tagged together" services were fairly regular in comparison.

Surely a reliable regular service is most important for the majority of people?

If having to change repeatedly really didn't discourage people from travelling by train the system would look very different to what it looks like today. For instance there would be no London/XC trains north of Edinburgh since everyone would happily change onto a ScotRail service.

Remember changing trains also destroys end to end journey times.
The service may be more "reliable" (I don't see how breaking them makes them more "regular") but it is also less attractive to passengers, especially if you are expected to change trains in the pouring rain because many of these stations are not provided with complete trainsheds, or stand out in subzero temperatures in the middle of winter for 15 minutes.

And with the rise of the advance purchase ticket, I am not sure that very regular trains (and once again Ia m not sure how breaking trains would increase the end to end frequency) are anywhere near the boon they once were for InterCity journeys since the passengers have no real flexibility anyway.

 

[tbtc]

The service may be more "reliable" (I don't see how breaking them makes them more "regular")

Shorter routes mean that disruption in one place doesn't affect others. Passengers between Nottingham and Lincoln aren't delayed by problems at Birmingham New Street. Passengers between Birmingham and Shrewsbury aren't delayed by problems on the flat crossing at Newark.

That then encourages additional resources to be devoted to the sections of route that need them, rather than a "one size fits all" approach to frequency.

 

[AndyLandy]

Shorter routes mean that disruption in one place doesn't affect others. Passengers between Nottingham and Lincoln aren't delayed by problems at Birmingham New Street. Passengers between Birmingham and Shrewsbury aren't delayed by problems on the flat crossing at Newark.

That then encourages additional resources to be devoted to the sections of route that need them, rather than a "one size fits all" approach to frequency.

Clearly there's a balance to be found. Expecting to be able to do Penzance to Aberdeen in one go is possibly asking a bit much. Conversely, expecting passengers to change at Exeter, Bristol, Birmingham, York and Edinburgh is ridiculous. A change somewhere between Bristol and Birmingham and another somewhere between York and Edinburgh is however quite reasonable.

If you work on the basis that you should be able to make any long-distance Intercity journey in two changes or less, you've probably got a decent rule-of-thumb to work from.

 

[The Planner]

Depends how you weigh it up isn't it, and to an extent it is PPM/performance led. You have a long end to end service which has something occur in the first half or two thirds of it's journey. It gets terminated short or it then screws the diagrams return journey, knocking it all to cock for hours. How happy would you be if you were in the last half or final third and the train is cancelled ? Whereas if the service was split in two parts the scenario isn't as likely. Is reliability or convenience more important ?

Do people prefer a journey with no changes or one that does but is more likely to be reliable ? XC like to get from A to B as quick as possible then sit at B for a long time before doing B to C as quick as possible as it allows recovery. If you are doing A to C, would the big dwell at B put you off ? The whole convenience/change/reliability thing is an interesting debate.

 

[tbtc]

Clearly there's a balance to be found. Expecting to be able to do Penzance to Aberdeen in one go is possibly asking a bit much. Conversely, expecting passengers to change at Exeter, Bristol, Birmingham, York and Edinburgh is ridiculous. A change somewhere between Bristol and Birmingham and another somewhere between York and Edinburgh is however quite reasonable.

If you work on the basis that you should be able to make any long-distance Intercity journey in two changes or less, you've probably got a decent rule-of-thumb to work from.

That sounds like a sensible compromise.

The problem is that we have an attachment to certain longer distance links like Inverness - London regardless of the number of people who use it end to end.

 

[RAGNARØKR]

A simple fiscal measure such as? Massively inflated house prices (nope not worked), Costly to travel (either through congestion and/or higher fairs - nope not worked either), Moving government departments out of London (nope not work)

How about tax differentials? Or a tax that took account of locational advantage or disadvantage?

 

[AndyLandy]

That sounds like a sensible compromise.

The problem is that we have an attachment to certain longer distance links like Inverness - London regardless of the number of people who use it end to end.

That's true, I guess I'd not given it a great deal of thought, since my suggestions largely centred around XC services which don't have any London requirements.

I suspect the current system of running the very long distance IC routes fast from London is the best compromise there. Run a service to all major stations between Kings Cross and Edinburgh and a service that calls at all major stops between Inverness and, say, York, but which then runs fast into the capital from there. I guess it depends on how valuable a direct service between Inverness/Aberdeen and places like Grantham/Peterborough/Stevenage would be.

 

[transmanche]

Run a service to all major stations between Kings Cross and Edinburgh and a service that calls at all major stops between Inverness and, say, York, but which then runs fast into the capital from there.

You've just described East Coast's current service pattern...

 

[AndyLandy]

You've just described East Coast's current service pattern...

Yup. As the saying goes, "if it ain't broke..."

 

[HSTEd]

That then encourages additional resources to be devoted to the sections of route that need them, rather than a "one size fits all" approach to frequency.

So its politics?

There is no reason you cannot have one train an hour doing the whole route and then have a shorter train running at the opposite side of each hour on the route sections that require the most capacity.

I am strongly of the opinion that long end to end trains are important because they encourage both new journeys that may not be immediately obvious and because they tie the country together.
The same thing that is used to justify services to London can be used to justify a wide range of long distance trains.

Being stuck on a line that only has service to the rest of the network via two changes is awfully isolating and will discourage businesses from siting there.
If we do want decentralisation of the economy we need more long distance XC services, not fewer.

For instance, take Liverpool-Norwich.

There is a measurable traffic along the route from Manchester and Liverpool to Norwich and Ely, it is actually quicker to take TPE North to Leeds and change onto EC to Peterborough and join the train there. (you overtake the previous EMT train just short of Peterborough if you time it correctly).

If the train was broken at Nottingham noone would ever take teh slower train along that route and it would push people from a relatively uncrowded South Transpennine to a very very crowded North Transpennine.

Likewise, if there is a slower, but possibly cheaper, direct train to Manchester running as a combination of the London-Crewe and Crewe-Manchester via Styal local trains then it might attract significant portions (even 5% would be significant) of the London-Manchester traffic and thus reduce overcrowding on the normal train.
The travel time using current timings comes out at maybe 3hr15, and once the 110mph running comes in and cuts down the London-Crewe time by up to half an hour (which seems very high to me but that is what LM claim) you could be looking at ~2hr40 or something, which is probably reasonably competitive with Virgin.

A turnaround normally takes 20 minutes or even more sometimes, you could even have the train wait at wherever both the original services used to terminate for 20 minutes before continuing if you really wanted, although I think in that casse breaking the padding time down onto numerous stations would be better.
That should compartmentalise the damage to a degree, although in many cases I doubt its really neccesary.

 

[The Ham]

How about tax differentials? Or a tax that took account of locational advantage or disadvantage?

Given that the cost to companies is massive to run in the SE (higher wages to pay their staff for higher cost of living, higher rents, etc.) tax differentials would still have to be huge for any noticeable difference.

Office rental charges per square foot (approx 0.1 square meters)
London - £30-£67
Birmingham - £25-£30
Cardiff - £6 to £22

 

[tbtc]

There is no reason you cannot have one train an hour doing the whole route and then have a shorter train running at the opposite side of each hour on the route sections that require the most capacity

You have to draw the line somewhere. For example, there's an hourly service from London to Swansea an a (roughly) hourly from Swansea to West Wales (not counting the Manchester services). Should all of the London services be extended to Milford Haven etc? Should all London - Edinburgh services (3tp2h) be extended to Aberdeen (hourly) or Inverness (1tp2h)? Should the half hourly London - Leeds service get extended onto the half hourly Leeds - Skipton service?

The answer for much of the day is "no" - especially as the stock required on one end of the route would be wasted at the other end (nine coaches with First Class/ Buffet etc).

Being stuck on a line that only has service to the rest of the network via two changes is awfully isolating and will discourage businesses from siting there

I don't know where you are talking about (Cardiff Bay or Stourbridge Town?)

if there is a slower, but possibly cheaper, direct train to Manchester running as a combination of the London-Crewe and Crewe-Manchester via Styal local trains then it might attract significant portions (even 5% would be significant) of the London-Manchester traffic and thus reduce overcrowding on the normal train.

But how much cheaper would it need to be to get people to sit on a 3+2 commuter EMU all the way from London to Manchester?

Have a "bargain" fare and you then undercut the London - Northampton/ Trent Valley fares that such a service would be the only option for.

Are the current Pendolini between London and Manchester really "overcrowded" (given Virgin have 35% seat occupancy)? Other than the fact that nobody wants to end up stuck sat next to George Osbourne, obviously

 

[HSTEd]

You have to draw the line somewhere. For example, there's an hourly service from London to Swansea an a (roughly) hourly from Swansea to West Wales (not counting the Manchester services). Should all of the London services be extended to Milford Haven etc? Should all London - Edinburgh services (3tp2h) be extended to Aberdeen (hourly) or Inverness (1tp2h)? Should the half hourly London - Leeds service get extended onto the half hourly Leeds - Skipton service?

The answer for much of the day is "no" - especially as the stock required on one end of the route would be wasted at the other end (nine coaches with First Class/ Buffet etc).

Well if there was going to be electrification to Milford Haven and other destinations in west wales, I might agree, but extending services beyond the electrification may cause other issues.
And there are other places in West Wales that would deserve some of the "action" if you were going to start extending services beyond Swansea.
(For instance several trains per day each to Milford Haven, Fishguard and Carmarthen would be far more reasonable than all of them heading to Milford Haven, you could also detach the front portion of a 10-car IEP lashup if you really wanted).

A better example is perhaps connecting the Manchester-West Wales services with the Manchester-Scotland services, although this would imply running long distances under the wires unless some sort of EDMU was available.
South Wales-Scotland leads to all sorts of interesting journey opportunities.

But how much cheaper would it need to be to get people to sit on a 3+2 commuter EMU all the way from London to Manchester?

Aren't the sets normally assigned to Crewe trains configured for 2+2 operation anyway?
And since the normal service on the styal line is only 3 cars and much of the time not even fully loaded, I am pretty sure that a 12 car 350 would have plenty of seats even in 2+2 configuration.

Additionally it occurs to me that for large parts of South manchester such a service may end up being quicker overall thanks to the rather dire state of public transport in south manchester, wtih busses from didsbury and fallowfield taking rather long periods to get anywhere.
You potentially turn Mauldeth Road and East Didsbury into London bound railheads.

Have a "bargain" fare and you then undercut the London - Northampton/ Trent Valley fares that such a service would be the only option for.

Well the London-Crewe trains will soon be avoiding Northampton.... and don't the Trent valley stations have several trains per hour to choose from rather than just one?

Are the current Pendolini between London and Manchester really "overcrowded" (given Virgin have 35% seat occupancy)? Other than the fact that nobody wants to end up stuck sat next to George Osbourne, obviously

If they aren't crowded at all and aren't expected to be..... why are we building HS2? :P
Can't have it both ways.

 

[thaitransit]

Im sure if they are 1435mm guage and going cheap countrylink in new south wales australia could use them to boost capacity and frequency on there long distance rail services.

They current have a number of trains similar to intercity 125s but they are very worn out as they are used on trips that are 2000km for a return run. Some extras would help improve on time running and hopefully put an end to running hours behind the timetable.

 

[yorksrob]

Are the current Pendolini between London and Manchester really "overcrowded" (given Virgin have 35% seat occupancy)? Other than the fact that nobody wants to end up stuck sat next to George Osbourne, obviously

Very good point. Could it be that Virgin trains haven't been managing their yields appropriately.

 

[AndyLandy]

If they aren't crowded at all and aren't expected to be..... why are we building HS2? :P
Can't have it both ways.

Oh, I dunno. I think you can.

1. HS2 is being built for projected capacity, we don't need it right now, but we will need it by the time it's finished.
2. HS2 is for additional capacity on the London-Birmingham corridor. It's reasonable to assume that London-Manchester could have lower loadings, it just so happens that the two destinations are on the same main line.

My own experiences of travelling on EUS-MAN services is that they tend to be busy, but I've never seen one overcrowded. However, I've yet to ride a EUS-CTR Voyager that wasn't packed to the gills!

 

[tbtc]

Aren't the sets normally assigned to Crewe trains configured for 2+2 operation anyway?
And since the normal service on the styal line is only 3 cars and much of the time not even fully loaded, I am pretty sure that a 12 car 350 would have plenty of seats even in 2+2 configuration

You want to replace the three coach EMUs on the Styal line with twelve coach ones?

Additionally it occurs to me that for large parts of South manchester such a service may end up being quicker overall thanks to the rather dire state of public transport in south manchester, wtih busses from didsbury and fallowfield taking rather long periods to get anywhere.
You potentially turn Mauldeth Road and East Didsbury into London bound railheads

Given that Manchester Piccadilly has three trains an hour to London, Stockport has three trains an hour to London, Wilmslow has one train an hour to London and Crewe has two fast trains an hour to London (ignoring the slow LM service), you're not telling me that "south Manchester" gets a raw deal in terms of London links?

If they aren't crowded at all and aren't expected to be..... why are we building HS2? :P
Can't have it both ways.

HS2 is about the next few generations - meeting long term demand (not just undercutting 2012 services with cheaper slower services). It's also about a lot more than just the current Virgin route (London - Yorkshire etc).

 

[RAGNARØKR]

Given that the cost to companies is massive to run in the SE (higher wages to pay their staff for higher cost of living, higher rents, etc.) tax differentials would still have to be huge for any noticeable difference.

Office rental charges per square foot (approx 0.1 square meters)
London - £30-£67
Birmingham - £25-£30
Cardiff - £6 to £22

Thanks for those figures. There is an interesting consistency about them. The Birmingham figures are around £10 higher than the Cardiff ones and the London ones about £40. Now supposing that a propert tax was levied in proportion to the difference, ie Cardiff paid next to nothing, instead of the present UBR (which is proportional to the values you have quoted), and there was a very substantial increase in income tax thresholds, it would be relatively much more attractive to set up in Cardiff than it is at the moment, since such a tax would create "tax havens" in the least attractive areas, thereby providing a counter-balance to the tendency to move to London and the South East.

This should help to even out the populations a bit more. And when the GW main line is upgraded and times to South Wales are reduced, the rents will go up and under the arrangement I have just described, the infrastructure improvements would give rise to additional tax revenue.

The Jubilee Line Extension produced a land value uplift of three times the construction cost. HS2, if it is worth building, should do the same. Crossrail claims on its website that it will produce a land value uplift of just one-third of the construction costs, which means either that the figure is grossly underestimated or that the scheme is bad value for money.

 

[asylumxl]

Thanks for those figures. There is an interesting consistency about them. The Birmingham figures are around £10 higher than the Cardiff ones and the London ones about £40. Now supposing that a propert tax was levied in proportion to the difference, ie Cardiff paid next to nothing, instead of the present UBR (which is proportional to the values you have quoted), and there was a very substantial increase in income tax thresholds, it would be relatively much more attractive to set up in Cardiff than it is at the moment, since such a tax would create "tax havens" in the least attractive areas, thereby providing a counter-balance to the tendency to move to London and the South East.

This should help to even out the populations a bit more. And when the GW main line is upgraded and times to South Wales are reduced, the rents will go up and under the arrangement I have just described, the infrastructure improvements would give rise to additional tax revenue.

If businesses chose where to be based purely on economics then they would already be moving to places such as Birmingham or Cardiff en masse would they not?

London, whether people like it or not, is the place to be. Businesses must feel the pros outweigh the cons (particularly the costs), otherwise they would not be there.

 

[Nym]

Just to answer the OP with a picture rather than anything else...

After approximately 2025:

 

[HSTEd]

You want to replace the three coach EMUs on the Styal line with twelve coach ones?

Yes, this is pretty much what I said.... or atleast one per hour of them, so half the trains with 12 coach ones.

Given that Manchester Piccadilly has three trains an hour to London, Stockport has three trains an hour to London, Wilmslow has one train an hour to London and Crewe has two fast trains an hour to London (ignoring the slow LM service), you're not telling me that "south Manchester" gets a raw deal in terms of London links?

Have you ever tried to get to Manchester Piccadilly, Stockport or Wilmslow from most of South Manchester using public transport?
Large parts of it are at least half an hour from all of those places, assuming traffic conditions are good. (And in the case of Wilmslow the changing trains there costs you 20 minutes or more since youon an AP ticket most people are not going to leave less than that for changing)

Additionally the trains at Crewe are Virgin ones which are rather expensive and rather heavily loaded or it is the one I am proposing to extend to Manchester.....

HS2 is about the next few generations - meeting long term demand (not just undercutting 2012 services with cheaper slower services). It's also about a lot more than just the current Virgin route (London - Yorkshire etc).

This generates additional seats to London, it doesn't just "undercut" existing services with cheaper slower ones.
It also reduces the travelt ime from significant parts of south manchester, and all it costs is the marginal cost of running a 240m train to Manchester from Crewe and back once an hour instead of a 69m train.

 

[RAGNARØKR]

If businesses chose where to be based purely on economics then they would already be moving to places such as Birmingham or Cardiff en masse would they not?

London, whether people like it or not, is the place to be. Businesses must feel the pros outweigh the cons (particularly the costs), otherwise they would not be there.

That's economics. But where a business needs to be depends on what they are doing. The right sort of tax reform would make it easier to do business at less desirable locations. Which in turn would take the pressure off the more desirable ones and, to get back to the original subject, take the pressure off the infrastructure, including the railways. If fewer young people had to move far from their home areas to find work, then there would, for instance, be less of a rush at weekends as they went home to visit their friends and folk.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Just to answer the OP with a picture rather than anything else...

After approximately 2025:

Thereby throwing away ten years' value.

 

[The Ham]

Just to answer the OP with a picture rather than anything else...

After approximately 2025:

So in CP6 we'd better get on and electrify a load more IC routes so that there is no need for diesel intercity trains.