Hello everyone I'm new to this forum.
The front page of the Telegraph and Argus today caught my attention, with claims that new rail operator ARH have a new Bradford Interchange to London Euston via Manchester Victoria route planned using newly built 'duel fuel' trains that would reach 140mph once past Crewe towards Euston.
See below for what is welcomed news in Bradford after years of playing second fiddle to Leeds.
A rail operator has revealed plans to introduce new 140mph inter-city services between Bradford and London and major cities in the north.
Alliance Rail Holdings has published proposals for direct services every two hours between Bradford Interchange and London Euston via Manchester Victoria, Crewe and the West Coast Main Line (WCML).
The company also wants to restore Bradford’s long-lost direct rail links to two major northern cities by operating a Hull to Liverpool Lime Street service via Bradford every two hours.
In the final part of its three-pronged bid, Alliance wants to run direct services from Skipton and Ilkley to London Kings Cross via the East Coast Main Line (ECML), providing a boost for passengers in the Aire Valley and Wharfedale.
Alliance, owned by Berlin-based Deutsche Bahn, one of the world’s biggest transport companies, is holding talks with train manufacturers with a view to building a fleet of 140mph trains to operate the services.
The ‘duel fuel’ trains would be capable of operating from overhead electric wires on the main line and then switching to their own power provided by onboard diesel engines on non-electrified routes.
Ian Yeowart, managing director of Alliance, said the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) was aware of his company’s plans and will be asked to approve them.
Mr Yeowart said: “Subject to the proposal being accepted by the ORR, it is planned to begin the roll out of new services on the WCML from December 2013, with ECML services and Pennine services following soon after.
“There’s a huge amount of investment backing up these service groups. These proposals are well thought-out.
“No other operator has ever introduced a fleet of new trains, which makes this an exciting proposal.
“In the first phase of work on the WCML, we want to offer a frequent service down the Calder Valley, which has been quite neglected. We’re looking at a high-quality commercial link between Bradford and Manchester Victoria, then on to London.
“For Bradford, it starts to create a high-quality intercity link between itself and Manchester which has been long lost.
“Phase two of the service proposition will be for services serving London King’s Cross from Skipton and Ilkley. Skipton and that area has been deprived over time by GNER and its successor.
“We are looking at a third phase with services that would link Hull and Liverpool right through the Calder Valley.
“That would mean an hourly fast train between Bradford and Manchester.
“Although we don’t anticipate many people catching the train all the way from Hull to Liverpool, we think there’ll be a real demand for the intermediate journeys, from Hull to Bradford, or from Bradford to Manchester or Liverpool.”
Mr Yeowart was heavily involved with Grand Central’s successful bid to introduce a Bradford Interchange to London King’s Cross service before he left the company.
Grand Central, which introduced its new Bradford to London service on the ECML earlier this summer, said: “Grand Central welcomes new entrants into the market as this shows that open access operators are able to meet passenger demand for new journey opportunities that franchised operators are unable to.”
I must say that with Deutsche Bank on board (the second-largest transport company in the world and largest railway operator and infrastructure owner in Europe) this looks like being more than just pure fantasy.
The new 'duel fuel' trains that they hope to use look amazing.[/QUOTE
Grand central welcomes compition, that is untill they attcualy have com
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it states it is via retford calling at worksop and retford......
Aye- we've got two 140mph classes running on the main network, on the ECML and WCML, already that aren't allowed above 125mph as that's the limit of the signalling system. Unless Yeowart has a source of funds to resignal the route they propose to use, including fitting all the existing trains that run on the route with the required equipment, they're not going anywhere near that fast.
As far as i`m aware the only reason that i`ve heard for not being allowed to run above 125mph is that it is supposed to be imposible to see a signle coming towards the driver at a higher speed, even though the signal starts in the distance and gradualy gets nearer, would another 15 mph really make a differance to safty i doubt it.
If BR had implamented 140mph running for the class91 as it had intended to do instead of costing the finacial side of such speed over the benifits then the bench mark for incab signaling would be 140 mph instead.
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