Will HS2 be unfit for purpose and should Euston be a through station?

[LesF]

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/possible-hs2-euston-station-de-scoping.213574

You gentlemen seem to be driving forwards to the inevitable conclusion that HS2 will not be fit for purpose and never could have been, ill-conceived as it was as a segregated railway serving a fraction of the country.

It's already been de-scoped (abandonment of the HS1 link, no direct trains to Heathrow) while the costs have multiplied and it faces more de-scoping.

As for Euston, has no-one realised it can never work properly as a terminus? It must become a THROUGH station and only needs two underground tracks with an island plat to take most of the HS2 traffic out of the existing station.

 

[JonathanH]

As for Euston, has no-one realised it can never work properly as a terminus? It must become a THROUGH station and only needs two underground tracks with an island plat to take most of the HS2 traffic out of the existing station.

Through station to where?

The answer is no. You would still need multiple platforms to allow for dwell times and the whole point of a terminus station for long distance travel is the time available for people to take time to get off the train, have the train serviced and reloaded.

Is there even a suitable route way for a rail line under London that HS2 could use between the existing tunnels?

 

[CW2]

OK, I'll bite...
If Euston were to be built as a through station, where would the lines go to, and how?
Bear in mind that much of Central London is riddled with deep building foundations and subterranean basements, so finding a cross-London tunnel route is notoriously difficult. Just ask the Crossrail planners how long it took them to come up with a route.

 

[BayPaul]

You gentlemen seem to be driving forwards to the inevitable conclusion that HS2 will not be fit for purpose and never could have been, ill-conceived as it was as a segregated railway serving a fraction of the country. It's already been descoped (abandonment of the HS1 link, no direct trains to Heathrow) while the costs have multiplied and it faces more descoping. As for Euston, has no-one realised it can never work properly as a terminus? It must become a THROUGH station and only needs two underground tracks with an island plat to take most of the HS2 traffic out of the existing station.

No, I think the general consensus on here (from ladies, gentlemen and everyone in between) (obviously there are those who disagree) is that HS2 is very fit for purpose, serves far more of the country than implied by the limited initial network (due to trains running onwards to other destinations, and due to released capacity), could probably use some minor tweaks to be ideal, and in particular that there is no possibility at all of, or indeed any real advantage to Euston being a through station.

There is nowhere to build said two underground tracks, the idea that a single island platform could take the foot traffic of a 400m train arriving and departing in each direction every 3 minutes (OOC has 6 platform faces to achieve just that, but for a planned 50% of the foot traffic capacity) is laughable, and where do you send long distance and long length trains south of London that urgently needs 18tph x 400m trains that are designed for long distance work?

 

[AM9]

So where would the 18 tph, (or any other realistic number) be terminated? Maybe you would put a loop at the southern end and send them back up towards Birmingham.

 

[gordonthemoron]

I suppose they could route all the HS2 trains through Crossrail with a terminus at Shenfield or Abbey Wood

 

[Ianno87]

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/possible-hs2-euston-station-de-scoping.213574

You gentlemen seem to be driving forwards to the inevitable conclusion that HS2 will not be fit for purpose and never could have been, ill-conceived as it was as a segregated railway serving a fraction of the country.

"Gentlemen" eh? Other genders are allowed to have opinions on trains too.

It's already been de-scoped (abandonment of the HS1 link, no direct trains to Heathrow) while the costs have multiplied and it faces more de-scoping.

Both of those brought significant costs with relatively few additional benefits, so rightly were taken out of scope.

As for Euston, has no-one realised it can never work properly as a terminus?

How so? Please explain.

 

[JonathanH]

I suppose they could route all the HS2 trains through Crossrail with a terminus at Shenfield or Abbey Wood

What rolling stock could be built that is suitable for both high speed running and a high capacity city railway? How would you manage revenue?

 

[Ianno87]

What rolling stock could be built that is suitable for both high speed running and a high capacity city railway? How would you manage revenue?

I don't think the Crossrail idea is an entirely serious suggestion...

 

[JonathanH]

As 'Bald Rick' observed in this thread
https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...terminal-in-london.168124/page-3#post-3587663

But it’s not feasible. There’s barely enough space at Euston to fit 2 platforms for Crossrail 2; after that the subterranean landscape at Euston is full.

 

[Cambus731]

I do like the idea of having a link to HS1 if it isn't prohibutively expensive, so that some trains could run say from Manchester to Ashford, but I see no need to run it through Euston. I'm trying not to get into crayons territory here, but there could conceivably be say have an hourly service during the day say from Manchester or Birmingham to Dover. There would be no need for such a service to call at a central London station at all. I personally don't think the often mooted international passenger train service would be practical, but concievably a domestic Kent - West Midlands/North West service may.

 

[HST43257]

If the ground wasn’t full of tube routes and whatever else, I’d suggest a 4 track tunnel from OOC to Stratford International, via ’Euston Cross’. Kennington loop sort of thing for HS2 at Stratford International, and there’d also be HS1, plus a Cardiff - Bristol - Heathrow - London - Stansted - Cambridge route using the tunnel.

HS2 would have 2 of the tracks and HS1 + HS4 would share the other 2.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/possible-hs2-euston-station-de-scoping.213574

You gentlemen seem to be driving forwards to the inevitable conclusion that HS2 will not be fit for purpose and never could have been, ill-conceived as it was as a segregated railway serving a fraction of the country.

An error in the first premise there. It's not segregated and serving a fraction of the country. It's serving all destinations (bar North Wales) the WCML presently does.

 

[swt_passenger]

If the ground wasn’t full of tube routes and whatever else, I’d suggest a 4 track tunnel from OOC to Stratford International, via ’Euston Cross’. Kennington loop sort of thing for HS2 at Stratford International, and there’d also be HS1, plus a Cardiff - Bristol - Heathrow - London - Stansted - Cambridge route using the tunnel.

HS2 would have 2 of the tracks and HS1 + HS4 would share the other 2.

The completely unaffordable and unbuildable Euston Cross?

 

[Ianno87]

I do like the idea of having a link to HS1 if it isn't prohibutively expensive, so that some trains could run say from Manchester to Ashford, but I see no need to run it through Euston. I'm trying not to get into crayons territory here, but there could conceivably be say have an hourly service during the day say from Manchester or Birmingham to Dover. There would be no need for such a service to call at a central London station at all. I personally don't think the often mooted international passenger train service would be practical, but concievably a domestic Kent - West Midlands/North West service may.

Trouble is that each service sent to HS1 is at the cost of sending a potential path to Euston...
And a Euston path will always be more valuable.

 

[Cambus731]

Well I've always felt that assuming it isn't prohibitively expensive there should ideally be an HS1 - HS2 link, if only for future proofing, and why not experiment with running a direct passenger service outside of the peaks rain say from Dover to the West Midlands or North West? And as I said there would be no need for it to stop in central London. It could conceivably run non stop between Ebbsfleet and Old Oak. I'll put my crayons away now.

 

[camflyer]

Well I've always felt that assuming it isn't prohibitively expensive there should ideally be an HS1 - HS2 link, if only for future proofing, and why not experiment with running a direct passenger service outside of the peaks rain say from Dover to the West Midlands or North West? And as I said there would be no need for it to stop in central London. It could conceivably run non stop between Ebbsfleet and Old Oak. I'll put my crayons away now.

One reason why the HS1-HS2 link was descoped was that there wasn't sufficient Birmingham/Manchester to Brussels/Paris demand to justify the additional cost beyond a foot connection at "Euston Cross". The other reason is that it would involve a lot more disruption in Camden (who have quite an influential MP and who could be PM in a few years time)

 

[Cambus731]

One reason why the HS1-HS2 link was descoped was that there wasn't sufficient Birmingham/Manchester to Brussels/Paris demand to justify the additional cost beyond a foot connection at "Euston Cross". The other reason is that it would involve a lot more disruption in Camden (who have quite an influential MP and who could be PM in a few years time)

Sadly i think you are correct. I do think however the absence of a link between the UK's only High Speed Rail lines will be seen by future historians as an opportunity lost, I would be mainly in favour of it for future proofing rather than a specific potential passenger service

 

[CW2]

I was involved in the initial design and investigation of the HS2 - HS2 link from Old Oak Common. The challenges of getting a route from sub-surface Old Oak Common to viaduct level at Primrose Hill within acceptable gradients and curvature was a significant challenge. There was a certain dog-in-the-manger attitude amongst NR staff who resented the possibility of losing one of the two tracks linking Primrose Hill to Camden Road on a permanent basis - regardless of the greater good. Finally, the market for such an expensive piece of infrastructure was vanishingly small. Providing a smooth connection from Euston to St Pancras for the occasional international traveller was the better option. So it was not an opportunity missed, but rather an opportunity inspected at length and rejected with good reason.

 

[HSTEd]

Through station to where exactly?

It would be a horrendous amount of work to find a place to send 18 400m formations every hour.

 

[Bald Rick]

As for Euston, has no-one realised it can never work properly as a terminus?

To be fair, it’s worked as a terminus for the last 183 years; I think that’s long enough now to accept that it works just fine.

 

[The Planner]

To be fair, it’s worked as a terminus for the last 183 years; I think that’s long enough now to accept that it works just fine.

Probably time to burn this thread and put the ashes in a small receptacle...

 

[Ianno87]

Sadly i think you are correct. I do think however the absence of a link between the UK's only High Speed Rail lines will be seen by future historians as an opportunity lost, I would be mainly in favour of it for future proofing rather than a specific potential passenger service

I'm convinced if they were called things other than "HS1" and "HS2" no one would be in the slightest bit bothered about them not being connected.

 

[SynthD]

This is crayons before paying passengers and their destinations.
However, didn’t they say Euston would be a poor HS2 terminus if Crossrail 2 wasn’t opening at the same time?

 

[Bletchleyite]

However, didn’t they say Euston would be a poor HS2 terminus if Crossrail 2 wasn’t opening at the same time?

Some concerns were raised about the ability of the present Tube accesses to handle the arrival of a 400m train, roughly twice the number of passengers as a Pendolino. But I don't see why Euston as a through station would be any different, unless you were going to build a high speed Thameslink type affair with multiple stations including one directly serving the City?

 

[CW2]

However, didn’t they say Euston would be a poor HS2 terminus if Crossrail 2 wasn’t opening at the same time?

Depends on who you mean by "they". Anybody against HS2 might say such a thing. Nobody within HS2 or TfL did so.

Probably time to burn this thread and put the ashes in a small receptacle...

To be fair, I think it's probably self-combusting.

 

[HSTEd]

unless you were going to build a high speed Thameslink type affair with multiple stations including one directly serving the City?

I could get behind such a scheme!

I'll show myself out

 

[BayPaul]

Sadly i think you are correct. I do think however the absence of a link between the UK's only High Speed Rail lines will be seen by future historians as an opportunity lost, I would be mainly in favour of it for future proofing rather than a specific potential passenger service

It's a lot of money to spend on future proofing. As I understand it, in many ways it is future proofed anyway -there is space available in Old Oak Common to connect to such a link if one was ever needed in the future. But really, as others have said, apart from the similarity in name, why connect to HS1, rather than, say, the Brighton Mainline, or SW mainline, or, much more sensibly, nothing. The tube and Crossrail are well set up to handle cross-London journeys, and the journey time improvement from using HS2 will mean that even to stations to the south of London the journey time will be very competitive.

 

[Ianno87]

It's a lot of money to spend on future proofing. As I understand it, in many ways it is future proofed anyway -there is space available in Old Oak Common to connect to such a link if one was ever needed in the future. But really, as others have said, apart from the similarity in name, why connect to HS1, rather than, say, the Brighton Mainline, or SW mainline, or, much more sensibly, nothing. The tube and Crossrail are well set up to handle cross-London journeys, and the journey time improvement from using HS2 will mean that even to stations to the south of London the journey time will be very competitive.

And you could spend a fraction of the money and create a high quality surface interchange route/boulevard between Euston and St Pancras, benefitting every single passenger interchanging between Euston, and St. Pancras/King's Cross (not just between HS1 and HS2 services).

 

[BayPaul]

And you could spend a fraction of the money and create a high quality surface interchange route/boulevard between Euston and St Pancras, benefitting every single passenger interchanging between Euston, and St. Pancras/King's Cross (not just between HS1 and HS2 services).

Well quite! For that kind of money you could provide pedo-cabs in perpetuity for every passenger!