Windermere line: suggestions to improve services on this line

[Meerkat]

If the line was electrified how much power would be available - enough for a local train and a Pendolino (assuming a dynamic loop is put in)?

Ps the tram would inevitably involve a change. So if it went along the main road it would have no real advantages over changing to a bus at Windermere.

PPS is there any through booking - ie a guaranteed connection onto a booked seat on a bus to Ambleside etc?

 

[Meerkat]

As long as the connection could be guaranteed does it matter if it is cross platform interchange or not as Oxenholme has ramps (I think) between the platforms so is accessible and other places have non cross platform interchanges on to branch lines which work fine.

I am thinking in terms of getting a long train’s worth of old folk, and their luggage, onto a line of coaches (herding foreign tourists can be even harder!!) . Across a platform would be a lot easier than up and down ramps.

 

[The Planner]

Consider the fact that if you want medium to long distance services to Windermere it would likely end up becoming like Rugeley, trains would be span at Oxenholme to recover the service. Self contained with decent connections at Oxenholme would be more robust.

 

[VT 390]

Consider the fact that if you want medium to long distance services to Windermere it would likely end up becoming like Rugeley, trains would be span at Oxenholme to recover the service. Self contained with decent connections at Oxenholme would be more robust.

I would agree with this, I would think that an ideal solution would be to electrify the line with a passing loop and have an half hourly service between Oxenholme and Windermere.

 

[adamedwards]

As long as the connection could be guaranteed does it matter if it is cross platform interchange or not as Oxenholme has ramps (I think) between the platforms so is accessible and other places have non cross platform interchanges on to branch lines which work fine.

Yes there are ramps but the issue is then space for the coaches on the narrowish access road. There's little need for a Kendal bypass as any bus goes into the south end of the town, but then out to the south junction on the bypass as this is far quicker than the hideous one way system round the town centre. On the strike saturdays on Northern, the bus did Oxenholme to Windermere in about 30 mins, admittedly out of season.

 

[Bletchleyite]

PPS is there any through booking - ie a guaranteed connection onto a booked seat on a bus to Ambleside etc?

No. I do wonder if this is one place where the RailLinks concept really would work (to Bowness and Ambleside) - a bus in the rail fare system considered a train for connectional purposes - i.e. a proper "virtual station" like Luton Airport, not the complexity of add-ons and PlusBus.

A lot of people will just put "Ambleside" into Trainline and give up when it can't find it.

 

[paul1609]

Ambleside, Grasmere and Bowness are all in the Windermere Plusbus area at a pricey £7 but the real issue for most outdoor enthusiasts (which was the suggested market upthread) is the lack of evening buses. Traveline shows three connections from Oxenholme to Ambleside after 18.30 and one of these is leaving the train at Kendal for the bus station.
I'm going to the Lakes next week via Carlisle and paying £13 for the overnight bus from London Victoria which also saves the extortionate cost of accommodation in the area for 1 night.

 

[30907]

Ambleside, Grasmere and Bowness are all in the Windermere Plusbus area at a pricey £7 but the real issue for most outdoor enthusiasts (which was the suggested market upthread) is the lack of evening buses. Traveline shows three connections from Oxenholme to Ambleside after 18.30 and one of these is leaving the train at Kendal for the bus station.

ISTR that the outdoor enthusiast market was your suggestion. I am not sure how it compares with general tourists - though it is more significant than the niche (international) market that I have discovered for Haworth to Hawkshead!
Edit: for those down south or otherwise not up to speed, the Brontes and Beatrix Potter (and Wordsworth?) seem to be set English texts in some Far Eastern countries.

Traveline throws up odd connections sometimes, and ignores the last bus from Windermere altogether (unless Stagecoach's timetable is wrong!)

 

[higthomas]

The solution to traffic should be a congestion charge on all non-local vehicles entering the National Park priced to encourage use of the buses and with the buses subsidised from the revenue. Exemptions for disabled drivers. All buses to have room for bikes on every route. ideally you want to discourage people taking their cars, not doing park and ride which means the M6 is full of traffic.

As for the trains, yes to restoring long distance links such as London. It could be called The Lakes Express!

Whilst I like it here, this sort of thing in isolated areas outside cities is a non starter. Now nation wide road charging on the other hand...!

 

[paul1609]

ISTR that the outdoor enthusiast market was your suggestion. I am not sure how it compares with general tourists - though it is more significant than the niche (international) market that I have discovered for Haworth to Hawkshead!
Edit: for those down south or otherwise not up to speed, the Brontes and Beatrix Potter (and Wordsworth?) seem to be set English texts in some Far Eastern countries.

Traveline throws up odd connections sometimes, and ignores the last bus from Windermere altogether (unless Stagecoach's timetable is wrong!)

Actually Meerkat suggested that there would be a market for through trains from Manchester and London aimed at the Outdoor enthusiast market not me. Travelines connections actually seem sound based on the Stagecoach App and does show the last bus for me. Im not sure why one connection is at Kendal rather than Windermere though. The real issue is there are 2 hours gaps.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Actually Meerkat suggested that there would be a market for through trains from Manchester and London aimed at the Outdoor enthusiast market not me

You mean like the through trains from Manchester that there are?

 

[Ken H]

Congestion charge would be incredibly unpopular and damaging to the tourism industry.
Much subtler to hammer the parking charges (can still give locals discounts)

When I say charters I am thinking of transport charters - ie a tour company charters the train with coaches to meet it. Less about the train trip, more that the train trip is quicker and more comfortable than doing the M6 in a coach.
However it is a fair point that Oxenholme could do the job, but that can’t be cross platform and really needs a Kendal Southern bypass

still loads of on street parking in t'lakes if you know where to look. Except Grasmere.
Try Station Road in Keswick (Need a parking disc) or Gillingate in Kendal. Or use the pay and display at Booths, Kendal, buy something cheap and the parking is free.

 

[Bletchleyite]

still loads of on street parking in t'lakes if you know where to look. Except Grasmere.
Try Station Road in Keswick (Need a parking disc) or Gillingate in Kendal. Or use the pay and display at Booths, Kendal, buy something cheap and the parking is free.

I have no issue with paying for parking, just with the awkwardness of needing change. With mobile phone parking and contactless my objection is withdrawn.

(I think there's a thread on that?)

 

[Clip]

It's easy to see that there is plenty of room for another platform alongside the supermarket car park. It wouldn't even need any land take beyond a row of parking spaces. The coping stones are even still there.

I dont think taking car parking spaces is a good idea as it may just encourage the people who park there for a train now to drive to their destination or even to Oxenholme itself to get their onward connections - and thats not going to be very good for the environment

 

[adamedwards]

Whilst I like it here, this sort of thing in isolated areas outside cities is a non starter. Now nation wide road charging on the other hand...!

USA national parks charge for entry. Most European countries have visitor taxes. The problem in the UK is rural areas having to find the costs of visitors out of low council tax revenues as they are low population rural areas. Expensive buses then compound that cost for local people. Perhaps there's a Cumbria Railcard for locals only worth looking at?

 

[Bletchleyite]

USA national parks charge for entry. Most European countries have visitor taxes. The problem in the UK is rural areas having to find the costs of visitors out of low council tax revenues as they are low population rural areas. Expensive buses then compound that cost for local people. Perhaps there's a Cumbria Railcard for locals only worth looking at?

USA national parks are rather different to ours - ours have far more residents, industry etc. I do however support a tourist tax which could, like in Switzerland, be spent on and pay for a free rover ticket for all local public transport, with cars heavily deprecated.

 

[si404]

You mean like the through trains from Manchester that there are?

4 a day isn't that useful. It's not nothing, but it's not that useful - especially as you can change off the Manchester-Scotland service onto the shuttle the other 11-12 hours.

USA national parks are rather different to ours - ours have far more residents, industry etc.

USA national parks are almost entirely (there's some small amounts of a couple of newer parks) owned by the federal government and, as landlords who got there before development (most of the time), they can stop any development that doesn't meet the park's aims better than if they were mere planning authorities like UK national parks. Likewise they have a much harder time designating land that is developed due to the federal ownership of it all - while UK National Parks often skirt the edges of towns (eg the Buxton corridor jutting into the Peak District or the Ffestiniog hole in Snowdonia), they can include them if they want to - eg Windermere, Keswick, Lyndhurst, Lewes, etc

 

[Bletchleyite]

4 a day isn't that useful. It's not nothing, but it's not that useful - especially as you can change off the Manchester-Scotland service onto the shuttle the other 11-12 hours.

True. I do think Windermere is more justifying of the through service (at least in summer) than Barrow, the former being much more of a tourist destination, and the latter demonstrably mostly carrying local traffic and secondarily traffic changing to go to/from the South on VT services. Short of a portion worked hourly service to both (my preference) I would suggest that, following wiring, ALL Windermere services should operate through to/from Manchester Airport (hourly) using a new EMU, and Barrow[1] should become an hourly clockface DMU shuttle from the Lancaster bays. This would also minimise under-wires DMU running to sensible levels.

[1] As the Coast is now mostly hourly, I'd suggest the whole thing should go hourly "perfect" clockface, with smaller stations either skip-stopped or on request, with all services operating across Barrow and nothing at all terminating/starting there other than early morning and late evening. Windermere should be the same, with "minutes past each hour" wholly identical from start to end of service, which ties nicely with the WCML services themselves.

 

[Meerkat]

Be politically ‘brave’ to stop through trains for local people and businesses (Barrow) to let tourists have them.
Is there any platform space for portion splitting? Would mean longer trains on the Manchester outer suburban bit which would presumably be very welcome.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Be politically ‘brave’ to stop through trains for local people and businesses (Barrow) to let tourists have them.
Is there any platform space for portion splitting? Would mean longer trains on the Manchester outer suburban bit which would presumably be very welcome.

I understand from previous discussions that it might pose pathing issues at Lancaster, but could platform 6 be reinstated, perhaps?

But that would be my preference - 2 3x24m bi-modes of some kind operating hourly clockface Airport-Lancaster then splitting/joining for Barrow and Windermere. In that case all Cumbrian Coast services would operate Carlisle-Barrow only using Class 156s, timed for a good connection at Barrow in both directions.

 

[Ken H]

USA national parks charge for entry. Most European countries have visitor taxes. The problem in the UK is rural areas having to find the costs of visitors out of low council tax revenues as they are low population rural areas. Expensive buses then compound that cost for local people. Perhaps there's a Cumbria Railcard for locals only worth looking at?

the old peoples bus pass journeys should be charged to the issuing council. Its unfair rural council tax payers pay for people from far away to have free buses.

 

[Bletchleyite]

the old peoples bus pass journeys should be charged to the issuing council. Its unfair rural council tax payers pay for people from far away to have free buses.

I would be inclined to agree, though a tourist tax would also solve this a different way.

 

[Mountain Man]

One option would be to turn the branch into a tram and go onto the road at Windermere station. It's one of the two options I'd favour, though I prefer the idea of hourly through trains from Manchester Airport to both Barrow and Windermere using portion worked bi-modes or even better battery trains.

You're more likely to have subsidised helicopters flying from Windermere to Ambleside than convincing someone to put trams along the road from Windermere to Ambleside. That road is one of the congested roads in Northern England from May to September

 

[Mountain Man]

I bet it could.

It would have to be part of a concerted effort to get cars out of the Park (e.g. to a park and ride somewhere in the manner of the likes of Zermatt) - it couldn't realistically stand alone.

A park and ride wouldn't work. It's not a single destination road with everyone going the same place, it's an arterial route from North to South. You would end up causing mayhem by pushing traffic around it

 

[Ken H]

USA national parks are rather different to ours - ours have far more residents, industry etc. I do however support a tourist tax which could, like in Switzerland, be spent on and pay for a free rover ticket for all local public transport, with cars heavily deprecated.

US national parks have few people living in them and the land is government owned.
UK national parks are busy places, with farming and other industry in them, as well as many houses (incl mine). The land is mostly in private hands (some national trust). The main effect is stricter planning laws. But as most villages are conservation areas the effect is small.