Not necessarily a huge problem; as it is ATW already run under the wires between Birmingham International and Wolverhampton en route to the Cambrian Coast and Chester - running under the wires all the way to Shrewsbury would only be an additional 30 miles or so.
And there's always the possibility of bi-mode trains in the distant future; like the AGC used by SNCF.
Of course diesels under wires is nothing new but in the case of Wolverhampton-Shrewsbury, even if Pendolinos were able to use it, any such service would be sparse - you wouldn't suddenly get an hourly London service running. Even if the LM stoppers went to emu operation, effectively half the service - the ATW trains - would still be diesel, unless you cut them short at Shrewsbury and make everyone change trains there.
Doesn't sound like a great case for electrification or passenger satisfaction to me.
A regional bi-mode train is a long-term possibility but there's more wiring to do and a lot of dmus with plenty of miles left in them before we reach that point. Remember there are other possibilities for some routes, such as the new Bombardier Aventra design, offering an option for batteries, allowing operation off the wires.
It's this sort of thinking which is why this country is so buggered. :roll:
The existing DMUs would run under the wires. Shock.
New EMUs would in time replace London Midland's DMUs on the Shrewsbury-Birmingham route. Shock horror.
Really, I do despair.
Well I'll tell you what makes me despair. People making posts here along the lines of 'they should just do x, y and z' - see assorted threads about IEP/GW wiring.
As I said above, I lived in Wolverhampton during the period the current operating pattern was established, I also had strong links with South Shropshire and the Welshpool area and travelled up and down on trains in the West Midlands, Shropshire and Mid Wales in the 1980s and 1990s, so have plenty of local knowledge to draw on in taking the view I do.
You, and others, seem to want to wire a route on which half the service would continue be worked by diesels, unless, as some seem to suggest, it's quite alright to create carnage at Shrewsbury station by cutting off direct services from Wales to Birmingham most of the day, in order to have a London service.
A service for which Virgin has only ever shown any enthusiasm when bidding for franchises - 1990s and 2012 - or when there was the threat of competition - W&S - which says to me that, just like BR before it, that virgin does not believe there is some huge unfulfilled demand for travel to and from London.
Wiring might affect the sums to some degree but even in the 'glory' days of Intercity operating through to Shrewsbury, there was a train roughly every couple of hours. As far as I'm aware, the proposals made by Virgin and First Group during the West Coast franchise bidding didn't even offer that, never mind hourly London trains. Hardly justification for electrification.
If a London service does start, somehow, using diesel traction at first, running at times people may actually want to travel to and from London, and is packed to the doors all the way, so the frequency is stepped up, and when the 158s and 170s are nearing the end of the line, then you might start to look at wires.
