Govenment Briefing 23rd May - Reversing Beeching Cuts

[Bletchleyite]

In the new realistic world - running window gazing , optional services , might be just a service too far. No.

Does DalesRail make money, or does Lancashire County Council bail it out? I know it's effectively a charter.

 

[yorksrob]

I think Tiverton Parkway is on the site of the old Sampford Peverell, not Tiverton Junction.

It is, but it doesn't have the loops. Junction does.

 

[Mikey C]

You can't, honestly, be that naive. Surely? It was the most obvious attempt a a fillibuster you will ever see.

The only people talking about the railway part of that briefing are here. No one in the real world is

Which proves my point

Nobody in No 10 would have thought that Shapps talking about a few minor rail projects would make the media forget about Cummings, it makes far more sense that it was what Shapps had been lined up to say all along before the other story broke.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Where do the (Sundays only?) Dalesrail services normally "park up" at Hellifield before returning back in the Clitheroe direction? Do they just remain at the Down Main (Northbound) platform at Hellifield for half an hour or so?

 

[JonathanH]

Where do the (Sundays only?) Dalesrail services normally "park up" at Hellifield before returning back in the Clitheroe direction? Do they just remain at the Down Main (Northbound) platform at Hellifield for half an hour or so?

Settle Junction

Realtime Trains - 5M48 0949 Hellifield to Hellifield

Realtime Trains provides live realtime running information for the Great British railway network using open data.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Thanks!

Six mile round trip!

 

[Bald Rick]

I share @Bald Rick view that Skipton - Colne is unlikely to be commercially viable by itself, but like BordersRail, this one will be an explicitly political reopening if it happens - nothing wrong with that per se, as government is about making choices - but you'd be hard pressed to show that the BCR on £300m+ was going to put Skipton - Colne was going to put it ahead of a pile of more valuable schemes. NB, none of this is claiming that if Skipton-Colne had never closed we'd be talking about closing now on the basis that it is loss-making (ie, requires subsidy) - if that was the case, then most of the rural network would be a goner, and in my view, the country would be much poorer for it.

If it happens, it will only be for political reasons. There is nothing remotely like a decent case for it. Also, significantly, it can’t be made use of without considerable investment in the existing network.

I have never seen any hard evidence that supports the construction of this line, and by that I mean passenger demand modelling detailing where the passengers were coming from / going to, in what numbers, and what benefit they realise from the line. And how that justifies £300m+ capital expenditure and ongoing subsidy.

The old GNR station is just off London Road in St Albans and has been converted into a nursery. the old station site has been lost to development. So any development would begin with "First obtain multiple compulsory purchase orders". That's not impossible but for a scheme designed to boost Government MPs - not guaranteed to make them popular. Nobody disagrees that you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs - unless it your nest EGG they are breaking.

It would need a very significant consents process. There are at least 45 houses that are in the way before the line has even got out of St Albans. For those who don’t know the average house price in St Albans, it’s over £600k as a purchase price; in compulsory purchase terms that’s well on the way to a million, and that doesn’t include the cost of getting the consent in the first place, which would be well into 8 figures before any land costs. Then there’s the Galleria, and various houses and business in Hatfield that are in the way. It’s reasonable to assume that the cost of obtaining the land necessary would not be less than £100m.

Then there’s the problem of the old Great North Rd (Bridge still extant, railway under road) the A1(M) (bang on the level of the old line, 50 metres from the Gt North Rd), and then Cavendish Way. Sorting all that out is going to be at least another £100m.

Then there’s the issue of what to do where the line meets the ECML. Clearly it couldn’t run on the Down Slow, so that means a fifth track, with a new platform with all the relevant access to it, a new bridge for St Albans Rd, Etc Etc.

Then you have to build a railway.

At best, you’ll end up spending nearly half a billion quid on a single track line from a part of St Albans that isn’t of use to most people, to a part of Hatfield that also isn’t of much use, for at best a half hourly train service.

Perhaps we can put this one to bed.

"Commercial viability" isn't everything, as if it was the government during the last 50 years would have shut several more branch lines...

Agreed. However, socio-economic variability is important, as otherwise you are spending money on something which would have achieved greater social benefit elsewhere.

You can't, honestly, be that naive. Surely? It was the most obvious attempt a a fillibuster you will ever see.

The only people talking about the railway part of that briefing are here. No one in the real world is

The announcements were planned several days ahead, so it wasn’t a case of trying to bury bad news.

But I do agree that the only people talking about the railway news are the rail community. No one else gives a **** in the slightest.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Where do the (Sundays only?) Dalesrail services normally "park up" at Hellifield before returning back in the Clitheroe direction? Do they just remain at the Down Main (Northbound) platform at Hellifield for half an hour or so?

DalesRail services park up at Carlisle! I guess you mean the "one man, dog and bicycle" Lancashire Rambler?

 

[Bletchleyite]

The announcements were planned several days ahead, so it wasn’t a case of trying to bury bad news.

But I do agree that the only people talking about the railway news are the rail community. No one else gives a **** in the slightest.

And dualling a road that's already partly dualled, even if it's a good thing, is hardly that important.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

DalesRail services park up at Carlisle! I guess you mean the "one man, dog and bicycle" Lancashire Rambler?

Aye, that'll be the one!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Aye, that'll be the one!

I seem to recall that does two return trips (that's two trips per passenger, in my experience ). I don't get why they don't drop it to one and run to Carlisle. Literally nobody wants to go to Hellifield for a day out, and that sort of "coach trip on rails" (which is what DalesRail is like, if you've never been on it) demands a direct service. It's nice enough but it's just not enough of a tourist trap. It's slightly more of a destination than Dyfi Junction, but not much different.

 

[Glenn1969]

With the backdrop of the £300bn black hole caused by the pandemic will any of these schemes end up happening?

 

[mwmbwls]

Planner
Either:
Those who believe the view is more scenic and the air more bracing at Ribblehead than at Hellifield - (which away from the station is very quiet.)
or:
You missed off " apart from occasional summer tourists" in your original question.

 

[DarloRich]

Which proves my point

Nobody in No 10 would have thought that Shapps talking about a few minor rail projects would make the media forget about Cummings, it makes far more sense that it was what Shapps had been lined up to say all along before the other story broke.

The announcements were planned several days ahead, so it wasn’t a case of trying to bury bad news.

But I do agree that the only people talking about the railway news are the rail community. No one else gives a **** in the slightest.

I am not suggesting Grant Shapps/Michael Green/Sebastian Fox/Whatever name he is using today came up with these schemes on the way to the briefing. I simply say he was pushed out to deflect and deny and try to waste time so that the government didn't have to answer questions about Cummings and his behaviour. His soporific droning on about stations was overly long and detailed and was designed to bore people so they switched off before the questions. It was both laughable and disgusting. He should have been pulled and replaced by a senior minster or the PM and these announcements delayed. It has also meant that important announcements, like the A66 dualing, have been lost or made fun of.


It was a maddening & urine extracting fillibuster. Pure and simple.

 

[BJames]

It has also meant that important announcements, like the A66 dualing, have been lost or made fun of.

This is a good point despite everything else that went on during that briefing - a lot of my friends found it very funny that Shapps was talking about so many things that were so irrelevant to them, when all everyone wanted to do was talk about Cummings. A shame as well because it's meant that the journalists weren't able to extend any transport questions to him either. I too would love to know how many of these schemes will actually be in progress in a few months, or which ones will be quietly dropped, put down to a lack of funds.

Edit: sorry the funds comment echoes one above but point is the same. Funding is going to go on essential schemes and not any projects seen as non-essential.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

With the backdrop of the £300bn black hole caused by the pandemic will any of these schemes end up happening?

Transport is always way down the pecking order so the cynic/ realist in me says no.

 

[Irascible]

Well of 20 years I lived in Devon and a Yorkshireman tells me summat about the county's railways. Thanks! But the line to Tiverton didn't feature I don't think.

Tiverton Jct ( which is now Tiverton Loops ) had a branch to Tiverton town which was a Beeching casualty - once that went the station became rather awkwardly placed, hence Parkway opening at the end of the link road to Barnstaple. Main memory of getting trains at Jct as a kid was the stink of Lloyd Maunder's abbatoir...

I think there's still room at Wellington station for loops - I'd imagine Cullompton station being on a new site, the old area is under the motorway services. Are they really necessary though? it's not a particularily busy bit of line.

Would extending Cardiff/Bristol-Taunton down to Exeter be doable all day? is there enough stock around? I guess alternating between Parkway & Cullompton on the intercity services might not annoy locals that much.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

With the backdrop of the £300bn black hole caused by the pandemic will any of these schemes end up happening?

I am sure that the Treasury, after the current pandemic is over, will consign all these wonderful aspirations to their version of "Room 101".

 

[Bletchleyite]

With the backdrop of the £300bn black hole caused by the pandemic will any of these schemes end up happening?

Depends if we want a job creation scheme.

 

[Joseph_Locke]

... Woodhead.

BINGO! (sorry I'm late).

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Depends if we want a job creation scheme.

For consultants , as that is as far as things are going at present. Bit of NR input of course ....

 

[ChiefPlanner]

BINGO! (sorry I'm late).

With the obvious London Extension known as the Great Central , - the route which some "worthy" thought was derelict ,went to Brum and was an HS2 substitute.

 

[cogload]

Best thing for the St Albans branch is to convert it tbh. A long way off though. The list seems to be post hoc cobbled in order to take the heat off the gummint in regards to wandering SPADS and is basically incoherent.

 

[Class 170101]

If it happens, it will only be for political reasons. There is nothing remotely like a decent case for it. Also, significantly, it can’t be made use of without considerable investment in the existing network.

Surely Colne to Skipton would be a joining up of two existing services, that between Colne and Blackpool South and that between Skipton and Leeds or am I missing something?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Surely Colne to Skipton would be a joining up of two existing services, that between Colne and Blackpool South and that between Skipton and Leeds or am I missing something?

Wires?

 

[Class 170101]

Wires?

Bi mode trains maybe?

 

[Bald Rick]

Surely Colne to Skipton would be a joining up of two existing services, that between Colne and Blackpool South and that between Skipton and Leeds or am I missing something?

Wires?

And the timetable, and choosing which of the 4tph that terminate at Skipton would go through, and how that then balances with the resource plan, etc etc.

 

[Ianno87]

Surely Colne to Skipton would be a joining up of two existing services, that between Colne and Blackpool South and that between Skipton and Leeds or am I missing something?

Presumaby, to get a business case to fly, it's looking at a half hourly service minimum, requiring upgrades. Plus whatever is needed to make it a black hole for freight capacity as per the people really clutching at straws for its usefulness.

 

[Bald Rick]

Bi mode trains maybe?

They’d have to be good ones to keep up with existing electric timings up the Wharfe Valley. Which means new trains. Which means buying a whole fleet, just for the purpose, which therefore lands on the business case.

Presumaby, to get a business case to fly, it's looking at a half hourly service minimum, requiring upgrades. Plus whatever is needed to make it a black hole for freight capacity as per the people really clutching at straws for its usefulness.

Which must include doubling some part of Burnley - Colne. Can’t see a half hourly service working down there.

Suddenly the capital cost of Skipton-Colne is possibly nudging half a billion...

 

[swt_passenger]

I treat that list with a large pinch of salt. I’m aware of at least a dozen schemes that were submitted that aren’t on that list, an I haven’t seen the full list of those submitted.

All a bit random wasn't it. I think the chap posting it was trying to keep up with a bit of a moving target across various sources...