I am afraid that small increases in speed dont help journey times much . what really helps is eliminating permanent speed restrictions. the more severe the restriction that is eliminated, the better.
I doubt there are very many "quick wins", most have been picked off already. You need to be looking away from the 100 110 to 125 stuff as you note, also anything that is going to need a re-alignment. You need to look at approach control, conditional double reds, flashing yellows etc, don't ignore getting loop entry and exit speeds up either but they are not seen as sexy items.
Newark crossing may be an easy win, as it is 100mph in a 125 stretch. (Or it was, I may be out of date)
All stuff I said is not going to get a look in as they are too expensive or don't deliver much. Newark is 100 mph for 18 chains (so 2 seconds faster at 125mph) so you probably get 10 seconds max once you factor in braking and accelerating.
A very sensible and (one would hope) relatively cheap solution. The wiring of the branch platform at Oxenholme was designed to facilitate wiring towards Kendal.
The whole area is a mess. The A46 is single carriageway round Newark, the only bit between M1 Leicester and Lincoln that isn't dualled. The A46/A616/A617/B6326 roundabout is a horror, made worse by the level crossing on the B6326 by Castle Station. And Sugar factory traffic in summer.
Not a quick win as such, but on value for money Morpeth has to be up there.
Highways England has a current plan to dual the single carriageway section of the A46 and improve the junction with the A1. When I last looked it did not include a rail flyover. See page 4 of this thread (which was reopened at my request in February):
It might save as much as three minutes, but so much new land would be needed.
They may not be the sexy ones but they are the ones where there's still a lot of scope. But there are also quite a lot of cases where re-alignment would help — look at the gains from the re-modelling of Derby and Reading, and even from the small changes totally within the existing formation at Leicester. As for larger re-alignments, what about doing the Carstairs job properly, building a new curve at Westerleigh, etc, to get rid of very low restrictions in the middle of otherwise high-speed sections. Most of the "quick wins" on the London lines probably have indeed been picked off already, but there's still scope for action on the principal cross-country routes (it would be intersting to re-visit the route-upgrade plans that were the part of the Operation Princess grand scheme never delivered).
The Goole line gets a notably more frequent service though, plus you'd need to wire Micklefield - Selby in order for TPE to benefit from Selby - Hull wires (you'd probably want to chuck wires on the Hambleton Curve and Gascoigne Wood - Church Fenton to get the Yorks onto EMUs). Not that I disagree that it should be wired at some point though.
With that one I suppose I was in maximum crayonista mode (for this country, at any rate — there are other places where this sort of deviation would be considered as part of a route-upgrade scheme).
This curve-radius would allow 100 round the corner, and switches for those speeds are well-established railway technology these days.But like I said earlier, this sort of stuff isn't going to get a sniff in the short to medium term. Value management is going to be thrown around like confetti for a while. I know of one well developed re-signaling scheme that nearly got pulled and another in early development that has basically been told to not expect much more than a "like for like" scenario.With that one I suppose I was in maximum crayonista mode (for this country, at any rate — there are other places where this sort of deviation would be considered as part of a route-upgrade scheme).
What else can we expect when government cuts back on the capital budget. That's £1.5 billion that's not coming back.
Oh indeed. It's just that acquiring the farmland for solar generation suggests it wasn't that expensive to negotiate purchasing. Now the price of the land will be far higher.
I seem to remember that in a previous thread someone suggested diverting the Nottingham-Lincoln line from Fiskerton (for Southwell) to south of Newark Northgate. It would still be mega-expensive, and as well as the roads it would cross it would need also to span the Trent, and also fly over the ECML before dropping into Platform 3 (and a new 4?) at Northgate. This would eliminate not only the flat crossing, but also the pain in the bum that is Newark Castle level crossing. The question is whether the benefits to both road and rail traffic in Newark would be enough to justify the expense.
Need to bend the laws of physics to get 10 minutes for that. Its about 22 miles with most of it 75mph already. You would be lucky to get 5 even if you sorted out Droitwich etc...
Well, maybe down to 23 minutes? An average stopper takes 31/32 minutes for 22 miles now. Level crossings an issue, also Kiddy viaduct has 60 restriction which should go. Allowing for faster acceleration and deceleration of electric traction plus 90 max from Worcester Tunnel to Droitwich would save 2/3 minutes. 90 from Droitwich junction to Kiddy would save 3 minutes and again from Kiddy to Stourbridge Junction 2/3 mins shaved off. The trackbed is broad gauge so canting curves and realignment is not impossible. As a comparison non stop diverted voyagers do it in 20 mins restricted to 75mph eg the Totnes to New St which has just gone through......
All of this would cost a fortune, especially if you start asking why Kiddy viaduct is 60. Shrub Hill to Droitwich is 5½ miles even with instantaneous acceleration you cannot do that in less than 3 minutes 40 seconds. 90 is 4 minutes 24 seconds. Droitwich to Kiddy is 9½ miles and 75 all the way on the down, get that to 90 and it saves just over a minute. Kiddy to Stourbridge is 3½ miles, so 30 seconds saving at 90 over 75. There aren't the gains you think there are, basic maths tells you that.
Except for the southern region lines.
What about the North Downs Line?
Why the Brighton Line? you're not going to get above existing linespeed until you're on the Quarry lines which is halfway to Brighton so you'd save a handful of seconds, especially after stopping at Gatwick and Haywards Heath. 100mph and conversion to OLE would be nice but is very much not a priority.
The gains are really marginal for what is very much a secondary line. In an ideal world extending the 3rd rail to Shalford and using battery units so they just have to manage Reigate-Shalford and Ash Vale-Wokingham off the juice would make the most sense.
Obviously you would divert the Lincoln-Nottingham line over the ECML. Under would be inviting inundation. See my post #40 in this thread, and the link there to another thread. According to people there with knowledge of previous investigations, a diversion alongside the present line, on the NW side, would be possible, despite the current road proposals which would occupy the SE side of the line. You would be doing it for reasons of capacity on the ECML, not speed.
