Cross Country to operate Leeds-Glasgow via Settle services using HSTs?

[Glenn1969]

But the current XC pre Covid was grossly overcrowded at most times of day. I can see why XC want 2tph through Leeds if only there were the paths for it

 

[Bevan Price]

I always found it rather bleak for my taste.

I do wonder what it would have looked like in prehistoric times (obviously excepting the presence of the railway itself!)

Covered by a mile thick layer of ice for part of that time.

 

[tbtc]

But the current XC pre Covid was grossly overcrowded at most times of day. I can see why XC want 2tph through Leeds if only there were the paths for it

...in which case we should be throwing any spare resources at imroving capacity on the existing services - and I say this as someone who used to commute daily to Leeds on XC - they tried to divert the "Donny" services via Leeds instead but were told that there are no paths - but then Arriva's winning bid for Northern was based on an hourly Sheffield - Westgate - Leeds path

If XC can get their hands on the majority of the Avanti Voyagers and EMR Meridians then they should just focus on using them to increase capacity on the current XC routes - keep it simple. Blue sky thinking about running 125mph trains over RIbblehead will get you a few nice headlines but it's not tackling the actual problems (however, I don't think hat some people are interested in problem solving, it's more about working backwards to come up with something to justify Putting Heritage Trains On My Favourite Scenic Route)

 

[Glenn1969]

I think Leeds East is as much of a bottleneck as Sheffield which may be where the S&C idea has come from

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

Why on earth are XC so concerned about the small Leeds to Glasgow Market?! They seem little concerned about the unbelievably slow trains from the south west to Birmingham. 3 and a half hours is poor. XC, please concentrate on improving your CORE routes and offerings without looking at daft proposals that only really benefit northern based enthusiasts.
Rant over

CrossCountry have been extremely proactive in recent years about trying to shave sufficient margins off their paths at key strategic points to enable significant overall savings, for example most recently taking approx. 25 mins out of some of their Reading-Newcastle trains, by leaving New St slightly earlier, then beating EMR out of Derby, thereby getting a better path at Sheffield, and ultimately getting ahead of LNER from Doncaster.

The problem with the Bristol/SW England paths is the rail connections through the south west side of Birmingham and unless you’re somehow suggesting that XC should be funding a high speed underground cutoff (as that is what it would take) I don’t know what you expect them to do. The existing infrastructure would permit a 1h15m Bristol-Brum journey time in theory but in practice the quicker you get to the outskirts, the sooner you just catch up the CrossCity stopper. The incremental gains just don’t translate into a big win as the capacity isn’t there.

 

[snookertam]

Not sure there’s enough of a market to warrant a through service over this route. There will be some Glasgow to Leeds traffic but it is most likely very easily accommodated by the existing XC service via Edinburgh, and by changing at Carlisle.

Would gladly be proven wrong and I suppose part of the aim would be to help develop such a market between the West of Scotland and West Yorkshire more generally, while taking pressure off other services.

 

[irish_rail]

CrossCountry have been extremely proactive in recent years about trying to shave sufficient margins off their paths at key strategic points to enable significant overall savings, for example most recently taking approx. 25 mins out of some of their Reading-Newcastle trains, by leaving New St slightly earlier, then beating EMR out of Derby, thereby getting a better path at Sheffield, and ultimately getting ahead of LNER from Doncaster.

The problem with the Bristol/SW England paths is the rail connections through the south west side of Birmingham and unless you’re somehow suggesting that XC should be funding a high speed underground cutoff (as that is what it would take) I don’t know what you expect them to do. The existing infrastructure would permit a 1h15m Bristol-Brum journey time in theory but in practice the quicker you get to the outskirts, the sooner you just catch up the CrossCity stopper. The incremental gains just don’t translate into a big win as the capacity isn’t there.

Id axe Totnes, Newton abbot, Tiverton parkway from the schedule for starters. Bare in mind the GWR London train runs 10 minutes infront of the northbound XC, people from these stations could use GWR to Exeter or Taunton and then join the XC train.
There is also a long wait in both directions at Temple Meads now which could be reduced.
Pathing into New ST I imagine would be tricky to improve - at the minute they tend to follow a stopper for final few miles, but if this could be looked at would save further minutes perhaps.
All in all I could see maybe 20 minutes at a push shaved off Plymouth to Birmingham , which would make a fair difference.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

Id axe Totnes, Newton abbot, Tiverton parkway from the schedule for starters. Bare in mind the GWR London train runs 10 minutes infront of the northbound XC, people from these stations could use GWR to Exeter or Taunton and then join the XC train.
There is also a long wait in both directions at Temple Meads now which could be reduced.
Pathing into New ST I imagine would be tricky to improve - at the minute they tend to follow a stopper for final few miles, but if this could be looked at would save further minutes perhaps.
All in all I could see maybe 20 minutes at a push shaved off Plymouth to Birmingham , which would make a fair difference.

Axe Totnes - I agree would be justified outside of primary leisure periods. Newton Abbot is the key connectional interchange for Torbay, are you suggesting Dartmouth/Brixham/Paignton/Torquay no longer justify good access to long distance XC expresses? Sitting on the stopper for an hour to Exeter isn’t a good substitute, and the traditional alternative railhead is, ironically, Totnes. Tiverton Parkway is a parkway interchange for areas of north Devon with no rail connections at all (such as Ilfracombe), I kindof agree that at some times of day it’s not required but there is good usage at other times. (Maybe 3-4 northbound morning trains and similar back in the evening?)

All these things aside though, you wouldn’t be able to rework the paths to take advantage of the fairly marginal time savings by knocking some station calls out. You’d just end up sitting at Bristol TM for an extra 5-10 minutes which doesn’t achieve your objective.

 

[The Planner]

Derby remodelling helped them out no end.

 

[HSTEd]

Covered by a mile thick layer of ice for part of that time.

I'm thinking more of the pre Neolithic clearances that deforested most of the British Isles, still long after the ice age.

 

[Ianno87]

But then that'd probably get a reaction about how it's not possible because there are no spare paths from Carstairs into Glasgow (which is the problem when someone suggests something relatively modest - people point out the bottlenecks etc - yet when you suggest something left field like running 125mph trains up the 75mph S&C almost fifty years after they were built, people are happy to overlook practicalities)

Actually is an issue. Departing Glasgow the XC departures are at 0900/1100/1300 etc, which fills the space on the opposite hours to the Avanti Euston via Birmingham departures at 1000/1200/1400.

 

[YorksLad12]

...in which case we should be throwing any spare resources at imroving capacity on the existing services - and I say this as someone who used to commute daily to Leeds on XC - they tried to divert the "Donny" services via Leeds instead but were told that there are no paths - but then Arriva's winning bid for Northern was based on an hourly Sheffield - Westgate - Leeds path

Touching on something I've been suggesting, which is to send both XC services via Doncaster and create two (Nottingham-)Sheffield-Westgate-Leeds(-York) fast services. Arriva might have found a Leeds-Sheffield path that XC couldn't use because it would cause issues north of Leeds and south of Sheffield.

 

[quantinghome]

Touching on something I've been suggesting, which is to send both XC services via Doncaster and create two (Nottingham-)Sheffield-Westgate-Leeds(-York) fast services. Arriva might have found a Leeds-Sheffield path that XC couldn't use because it would cause issues north of Leeds and south of Sheffield.

So no direct Leeds-Birmingham trains? Removing any direct rail connection between the West Midlands and West Yorkshire?

 

[Neptune]

I’m banging my head against a wall wondering why so many people want to cut XC trains either northbound out of Leeds or now even to go to Leeds full stop. The markets it serves on the Leeds service is extensive in either direction. The path is there so why can people not just leave it alone. I’ve said it so many times but the problem heading east of Leeds is that there are too many TPE’s, not the single XC service, but that’s the one everyone wants to cut out.

 

[JonathanH]

I’m banging my head against a wall wondering why so many people want to cut XC trains either northbound out of Leeds or now even to go to Leeds full stop. The markets it serves on the Leeds service is extensive in either direction. The path is there so why can people not just leave it alone. I’ve said it so many times but the problem heading east of Leeds is that there are too many TPE’s, not the single XC service, but that’s the one everyone wants to cut out.

Part of it is that Cross Country don't currently have the most suitable rolling stock for running on the electrified railway north of York and could better use its Voyagers southwards to increase capacity. The Williams Review recognised that services need to be cut north of York.

Multiple train operators bid to operate more services between York and Newcastle in 2015 than the infrastructure can manage.
This led to congestion, delays and poor customer service that impacted trains as far as Manchester.

There is no specific reason why XC, rather than TPE (or even LNER) should connect Leeds and Edinburgh so long as one of them does.

 

[Glenn1969]

Cross Country have a long standing aspiration to serve the quite big Birmingham- Sheffield- Leeds- York- Scotland market twice an hour but have been repeatedly blocked by lack of paths. Why should they not suggest this as an alternative

 

[Bigman]

Would this not be a better fit for TPE? It is going across the Pennines of course, and TPE already operate Carlisle- Glasgow.

 

[tbtc]

I think Leeds East is as much of a bottleneck as Sheffield which may be where the S&C idea has come from

Well, paths were found for TPE to double their Leeds - Newcastle frequency, and for Northern to double their Leeds - (Garforth) - York frequency... (and theoretically for Arriva to introduce an hourly Sheffield - Westgate - Leeds service)... but XC couldn't get the same paths, which is a shame IMHO

CrossCountry have been extremely proactive in recent years about trying to shave sufficient margins off their paths at key strategic points to enable significant overall savings, for example most recently taking approx. 25 mins out of some of their Reading-Newcastle trains, by leaving New St slightly earlier, then beating EMR out of Derby, thereby getting a better path at Sheffield, and ultimately getting ahead of LNER from Doncaster.

The problem with the Bristol/SW England paths is the rail connections through the south west side of Birmingham and unless you’re somehow suggesting that XC should be funding a high speed underground cutoff (as that is what it would take) I don’t know what you expect them to do. The existing infrastructure would permit a 1h15m Bristol-Brum journey time in theory but in practice the quicker you get to the outskirts, the sooner you just catch up the CrossCity stopper. The incremental gains just don’t translate into a big win as the capacity isn’t there.

This is the problem with XC - you can trim a bit off here and a bit off there but still no change to the overall journey time (because you just get to the next bottleneck faster)

Actually is an issue. Departing Glasgow the XC departures are at 0900/1100/1300 etc, which fills the space on the opposite hours to the Avanti Euston via Birmingham departures at 1000/1200/1400.

That's what I mean - come up with some crayoning (fifty year old 125mph trains over Ribblehead!) and nobody worries about practicalities - but suggest something more modest and you come across actual problems

I’m banging my head against a wall wondering why so many people want to cut XC trains either northbound out of Leeds or now even to go to Leeds full stop. The markets it serves on the Leeds service is extensive in either direction. The path is there so why can people not just leave it alone. I’ve said it so many times but the problem heading east of Leeds is that there are too many TPE’s, not the single XC service, but that’s the one everyone wants to cut out.

I agree with the business of XC services through Leeds.

The only reasons for making cuts on the XC services at Leeds would be a combination of:

1. Since TPE are meant to be running two per hour Leeds to Newcastle (one of which extends to Edinburgh), you could extend the "via Donny" service to Edinburgh and cut the "via Leeds" service at Leeds, so there was a faster Birmingham/ Derby/ Sheffield - Edinburgh service, and you could use the three-ish Voyagers freed up to increase capacity south of Leeds - i.e. if the deal was that the service from Leeds to Birmingham etc was eight/ nine/ ten coaches instead then there'd be some compensation. The problem with this is that the services currently pass at Leeds, so you'd have to occupy a platform for most of the hour to work (and, if the idea is to use doubled up Voyagers then you certainly aren't going to accommodate them in the bays at Leeds - you'd be tying up one of the long ones instead, so there are clearly some problems. And if the idea is to dump the train in Neville Hill for a layover then you are still using up a path through the throat east of Leeds (and crossing the eastbound line too), so you're not freeing up any paths on that section - in fact, the need to come out

2. The time penalty mentioned above - around twenty minutes - so the two XC trains per hour on the York - Newcastle corridor run fairly close to each other - which seems like a bit of a waste when XC are struggling for capacity elsewhere

However, I think the best thing would be to find the resources to ensure all "via Leeds" trains are doubled up (it's certainly a lot better than a franchise with no spare capacity being asked to run some nostalgia-friendly "express" over Ribblehead!) - if we have busy services then the solution should generally be to extend/improve those services whenever possible rather than trying to use it as an excuse to run something completely different which will only be of tangible benefit to taking passengers off the existing service

 

[Bevan Price]

There is a lot of speculation about what changes could happen to the services of XC, TPE, etc. But few seem to consider that when (if) "new GBR" comes into existence, fragmentation will cease to exist. They will all become parts of a national passenger network, maybe split into separate divisions for local & long distance services.

The only task for the private sector will be to act as contractor to supply the trains (and staff ?) for whatever GBR chooses to operate -- and after a while, those might differ considerably from current routes & service patterns.

 

[Halifaxlad]

I quite like the idea especially if it means I could be eating a meal whilst passing over Ribblehead.

If running additional services between Leeds and Skipton is a problem. I wonder if Aventas could (eventually) be freed up and used with a few going to Northern to operate the Carlislie stopper, that way they could split/join at Skipton. Everything will by this point should be more coordinated (in theory) with 'Great British Railways'

 

[Bald Rick]

I quite like the idea especially if it means I could be eating a meal whilst passing over Ribblehead.

You can do that now.

 

[Halifaxlad]

You can do that now.

Yes but you have to book ands I'm sure it's significantly much more expensive than an ordinary service train.

 

[Ianno87]

Yes but you have to book ands I'm sure it's significantly much more expensive than an ordinary service train.

You can buy a Tesco Meal Deal and eat it on a 158.

 

[Bald Rick]

You can buy a Tesco Meal Deal and eat it on a 158.

Or make your own packed lunch! A nice chicken and bacon baguette and a bottle of Montagny 1er. Bliss.

 

[matacaster]

Perhaps part of the reason could be to help avoid bustition which is widely reviled as passengers have paid lots more to travel by train. With Great British Rail, would that not allow the possibility of passengers being diverted to Cross Country trains (and likely other operators further south) when WCML and ECML or both are closed due to 'operational difficulties' or indeed possibly allow greater flexibility for maintenance work on ECML / WCML?

 

[Ianno87]

Perhaps part of the reason could be to help avoid bustition which is widely reviled as passengers have paid lots more to travel by train. With Great British Rail, would that not allow the possibility of passengers being diverted to Cross Country trains (and likely other operators further south) when WCML and ECML or both are closed due to 'operational difficulties' or indeed possibly allow greater flexibility for maintenance work on ECML / WCML?

But the existing Northern service fulfils that purpose - you just need to change at Carlisle.

 

[matacaster]

But the existing Northern service fulfils that purpose - you just need to change at Carlisle.

Not late in the evening as far as I remember.

 

[Ianno87]

Not late in the evening as far as I remember.

That can be solved by introducing an evening service. Not some elaborate plan involving HSTs.

 

[BrianW]

All goes to show the difficulties in balancing priorities on a constrained network, and with more 'political interference' to come? No XC or TPE etc to 'argue the toss'.
Business/ passenger and freight 'demands' and 'projections' into the future, whether near or far, are problematic, by definition.
Is the present a good guide for the future, or the past?.
The introduction of HS2 and a and b?? -and HS3??- into the mix adds more variables on top of the Covid- 'legacy'.
Can 'bottleneck' reductions be justified- wondering what the government 'perspective' with hindsight on Castlefield might be? Williams-Shapps seems to me suggest caution and dare I use this term- 'conservatism'?
For me (and Shapps?) the trend will be for fewer but regular and reliable services- fewer paths with longer trains and more interchanging. Closer to Takt. 3-4 tph approx 10 mins interchange into and out of? He's MP for Welwyn- how has Thameslink worked out for him and his constituents, once the rushed timetable fiasco was 'sorted'?

 

[Killingworth]

I'm baffled by some of the ideas brought forward.

The HST preservation lobby I can understand, but contemplating the operation of 50 year old trains, designed for 7, 8 and 9 carriages, running at 125mph, over the bleak S&C on a scheduled inter-city service seems fanciful, even if reduced to 4 car. Great to operate a few HST charter rail tours, maybe regular Jacobite style where timings are not critical, but that's a different animal. (I like HSTs and the S&C as much as anyone.)

Alternative traction for a regular service runs up against capacity constraints.

But the clincher is surely the volume of traffic likely between Leeds and Glasgow. Where else along that route is there volume that's not reasonably well served already?

Currently there are a very few direct trains by XC taking about 4 hours, Leeds-Glasgow, otherwise connections are needed. 2 years ago there were 2 tph between Birmingham and Newcastle via Doncaster. They provided me, and all to the south, with the quickest journey between Sheffield and Newcastle but they've disappeared, along with hourly stops at Chesterfield.

Before diving off into these ideas how about restoring routes and services that already had a market until very recently? Then iron out ways these services can better link up to help more people to get to more places more quickly, including the few who want to go from Leeds to Glasgow or vice versa?