Towns with no station - where there could be...

[Zamracene749]

Ashington, Bedlington and Blyth- large towns on freight lines, all with a big commuter travel flows to and from Newcastle.

Regarding the OP, I'm from Peterlee, but much as I'd love to see a station somewhere at Horden I cannot envisage people making the two to four mile journey along sometimes busy local roads to connect into the Durham coast service.

The main potential local rail travel destinations from Peterlee are Sunderland, Newcastle/ Metrocentre and Hartlepool, with smaller flows to Middlesbrough and Stockton.
Car drivers are unlikely to be tempted because all can be reached far more quickly, conveniently and cheaply by driving direct.

Public transport users are also unlikely to switch, again due to faster and in the case of Sunderland and Hartlepool more frequent bus journey times with no hassle of connections. Pensioners won't use the service- why pay and add the hassle of a connection when the direct bus is free?

Taxis in the area are also some of the cheapest in the country, making local group travel by cab very attractive- usually for 3 or more passengers a cab is cheaper than the bus and of course will take you door to door.

Long distance southbound passengers could be tempted if Grand Central or even an extended trans- pennine service stopped there but the far superior frequency of rail services from Durham would probably prove to be worth the extra 6 miles or so drive/ bus ride.

PS apologies to non local board users for the rather long East Durham based post

 

[PinzaC55]

The slow journey times account for why,on a Saturday,if you take the 7.57 Grand Central from Kings X you arrive in Sunderland at roughly the same time as if you take the 8.00 East Coast to Newcastle and then the metro. On GC you invariably end up sitting outside Hartlepool for at least five-ten minutes waiting for a Northern train to come through.

This will be partly addressed by the current resignalling work being done which will remove all of the manual signalboxes on the line and break up the ridiculously long Dawdon - Hartlepool block section, although it will not solve the rather silly "one platform" at Hartlepool, which is only because the luggage lift required replacement and BR didn't want to spend the money.

 

[sprinterguy]

The slow journey times account for why,on a Saturday,if you take the 7.57 Grand Central from Kings X you arrive in Sunderland at roughly the same time as if you take the 8.00 East Coast to Newcastle and then the metro. On GC you invariably end up sitting outside Hartlepool for at least five-ten minutes waiting for a Northern train to come through.

Yeah, it's difficult for the direct Grand Central train to compete with the well established East Coast service for the patronage of the good people of Sunderland with such a poor signalling situation: Good to know that work is going on to improve this situation, although why on earth the southbound platform at Hartlepool can't be brought back into use after so many years lying dormant is beyond me.

 

[142094]

Anyone know what the line speeds are between Northallerton and Yarm? GC always seem to go quite slow here, if the speeds were increased it would knock a good few minutes of the journey time.

 

[plannerman]

Saltney, west of Chester. To catch the town centre it'd be best placed west of the Wrexham line junction though.

 

[LE Greys]

Wooton Basset and Corsham are both possibilities, since both towns have a population of over 10,000. This would need an additional service each hour on the GWML (preferably Bristol-Oxford). Ideally, Wooton Basset would coincide with a junction upgrade.

On the ECML, Rossington is a possibility (population 13,000) but it would be difficult to accommodate without putting in loops. You could call it "Robin Hood Airport Parkway". Leeds semi-fasts might be able to stop there, but adding extra stops to ECML expresses doesn't sound like a good idea. The other option would be to extend the Leeds-Doncaster locals, but that would require turnback facilities (i.e. crossing the ECML on the flat).

 

[premier01]

Kenilworth is finally getting its station reinstated

That would be good-travel there on business from time to time and for the size of the town can't believe there's no train station.

Having to get taxi there from Leamington Spa is both annoying and expensive so station there would be good.


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Saltney, west of Chester. To catch the town centre it'd be best placed west of the Wrexham line junction though.

Another North West town would be Garstang between Lancaster and Preston.

 

[DarloRich]

Ashington, Bedlington and Blyth- large towns on freight lines, all with a big commuter travel flows to and from Newcastle.

That seems a sensible one to me and should be done as quickly as possible - which means it wont happen! There is a market as these towns feed into Newcastle anyway and bus services, from what i can recall, are decent if not spectacular. The market for commuters is there i am sure. The lines already exist and there is an opportunity for cross Newcastle sevices linking into the Tyne Valley line.

I guess the main constraint would be Newcastle Station and the ECML between the Station and Benton Junction, Morpeth Junction and/or Butterwell Junction

 

[PinzaC55]

Yeah, it's difficult for the direct Grand Central train to compete with the well established East Coast service for the patronage of the good people of Sunderland with such a poor signalling situation: Good to know that work is going on to improve this situation, although why on earth the southbound platform at Hartlepool can't be brought back into use after so many years lying dormant is beyond me.

Not entirely. The GCT fares to York are virtually half of EC and it's a roomy direct train. If you go via Newcastle since the Metro was opened you have a choice of one NR train an hour or use the Metro in the company of screaming chavs then hauling your luggage up from the depths to Central station then over to the southbound train! Then of course you have to make your connection.....
I'd love to know how much southbound traffic GCT has creamed off from EC.

Regarding Hartlepool, as I said earlier the Up platform was taken out of use (about 1970 I think) because the Luggage Lift required replacement.About the late 80's the Lift and the footbridge were removed together with the Goods Lines.Then of course last year NR removed the remains of the canopy and the edge slabs from the platform rendering it impossible to use.
Aren't Britain's railways wonderful?

 

[142094]

That seems a sensible one to me and should be done as quickly as possible - which means it wont happen! There is a market as these towns feed into Newcastle anyway and bus services, from what i can recall, are decent if not spectacular. The market for commuters is there i am sure. The lines already exist and there is an opportunity for cross Newcastle sevices linking into the Tyne Valley line.

These towns, along with Washington, are ripe markets ready to exploit. Standing at Haymarket bus station you soon realise how many buses and people for that matter actually come into Newcastle from Blyth and Ashington. Even an hourly service or an extension of the Morpeth train would give a massive profit. All it needs is a few million of up front expenditure and it would be a massive success.

 

[sprinterguy]

Not entirely. The GCT fares to York are virtually half of EC and it's a roomy direct train. If you go via Newcastle since the Metro was opened you have a choice of one NR train an hour or use the Metro in the company of screaming chavs then hauling your luggage up from the depths to Central station then over to the southbound train! Then of course you have to make your connection.....
I'd love to know how much southbound traffic GCT has creamed off from EC.

True, Sunderland to York is considerably more convenient by Grand Central than East Coast, but over the whole length of the route I think the East Coast option from Newcastle wins: I don’t know about the walk-on fares, but the advance fares, which is pretty much all I purchase for longer trips, are comparable or slightly cheaper for East Coast from Newcastle (Plus the small cost of a Metro ticket from Sunderland to Newcastle, which I would have to pay anyway to get from my local station to Sunderland central to catch the GC service). Travelling with East Coast offers a considerably more frequent, more reliable and quicker travel option for destinations south of York IMO.

Just my humble opinion.

On other matters, there should certainly be a reinstated passenger service for Bedlington, Ashington and Blyth, which would be incredibly easy to do (Except sourcing rolling stock).

 

[DarloRich]

These towns, along with Washington,

Missed Washington off too! - the only problem with that is the state of the leamside line. Mind you if that could reopen that line you could run a service Boro -Ferryhill-Newcastle without impact on the ECML PLUS have a very useful freight line. No idea how it has been allowed to decay to the extent it has.

 

[142094]

The main reason it has been allowed to decay is short sightedness - even if it was mothballed but mainatined as a diversionary route, that would have made the biggest sense. If something happens to Durham viaduct for example, or anywhere in between Newcastle and Tursdale junction, imagine trying to route passengers and freight along the Durham Coast Line. Would be a nightmare.

Instead of bailing Irish banks out with a £7bn loan, even if we spent just 10% of that we could reopen a whole load of lines and build new stations.

 

[PinzaC55]

The main reason it has been allowed to decay is short sightedness - even if it was mothballed but mainatined as a diversionary route, that would have made the biggest sense. If something happens to Durham viaduct for example, or anywhere in between Newcastle and Tursdale junction, imagine trying to route passengers and freight along the Durham Coast Line. Would be a nightmare.

Instead of bailing Irish banks out with a £7bn loan, even if we spent just 10% of that we could reopen a whole load of lines and build new stations.

Again the problem with the Leamside Line is privatisation.In BR days it was owned and used by BR. Nowadays, if it was reopened by NR the TOC's who wished to use it would be expected to stump up cash to both reopen and use it. If EC wanted to use it they would be expected to either pay for it to be electrified or pay for diesels to haul their trains so - "cost of diesel + cost of route training for driver and guard or cost of Pilots for driver and guard". The alternative is to put their punters on buses = cheap and nasty, but they get the same money for tickets.Which would you choose if you were EC?
If the ECML problem was short of a disaster i.e really bad damage to the catenary, CrossCountry and Northern Rail and TPE are all diesel so they are not affected. TPE are owned by First who own a massive fleet of buses so it's no sweat to them.Nor to CrossCountry owned by Arriva who also operate buses!
BTW regarding Washington in the 1960's there were far fewer cars than today but from about 1960 to 1963 (closure of Penshaw to Newcastle) the station only had ONE train a day in each direction! It may not be as busy as people think if it was reopened?

 

[wjp]

Portishead, population c. 22k.

 

[BTP]

On the ECML, Rossington is a possibility (population 13,000) but it would be difficult to accommodate without putting in loops. You could call it "Robin Hood Airport Parkway". Leeds semi-fasts might be able to stop there, but adding extra stops to ECML expresses doesn't sound like a good idea. The other option would be to extend the Leeds-Doncaster locals, but that would require turnback facilities (i.e. crossing the ECML on the flat).

Rossington used to have a station on the level crossing where you can see where the 2 platforms were. (Hopefully the link below will work):

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=ros...d=B7v_WCcp4Knp4aeeANN8OA&cbp=12,139.73,,0,9.5

About 3 miles south of Rossington is the town of Bawtry where there also used to be a Station, could there be scope for a Leeds-Retford Via Doncaster stopping service?

 

[mr williams]

There could be a case for re-instating local services at a number of former local stations between Newport and Abergavenny.

Caerleon is the most obvious candidate, then there is Llantarnam, possibly Ponthir. I remember reading a couple of years ago that there were ideas of opening a couple of new stations in the suburbs to the south of Pontypool, eg Sebastopol

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Could there be a case for re-opening the old Long Eaton Town station ( or whatever it was called ) on the Erewash Valley, given that is is centrally located and would be much more convenient for shoppers than Long Eaton station ( which I hasten to add is ideal for the large residential area it is in )?

It could presumably be served from Derby as an all stations service calling at Spondon, Long Eaton, Long Eaton Town, Langley Mill, Alfreton, terminating at Chesterfield?

 

[Trog]

How about Roade (HNR only), now quite a large village, has space for a vast carpark and is on a main road. Might make a good park and ride station for the area south of Northampton.

 

[The Planner]

Already thought about and studied, went in the bin a few years back. Northampton station (buildings) is meant to be getting a re-build in the next few years.

 

[AutoKratz]

Washington with a population of 53,400 should really have a railway station.

According to ATOC (2009), re-opening the Leamside Line has a high benefit:cost ratio with an estimated cost of opening the line and constructing a station at Washington (Station Road or Glover Road sites) at £86 million.

The line might have other benefits for freight, or for diversion during engineering works with value for the Seven Day Railway. (ATOC, 2009)

Interesting to note is that Leamside has a significantly higher benefit:cost ratio than Ashington, Blyth and Tyne dispite the lower expediture cost for ABT.