Marylebone closed on 9/9 due to tunnel "defect"

[AY1975]

Not sure whether this belongs in Infrastructure & Stations or Railway Discussion, but according to this report from PA Media on the MSN website Marylebone station was closed for most if not all of Wednesday due to a tunnel "defect":

MSN

"London Marylebone railway station closed due to tunnel ‘defect’

London Marylebone railway station has been closed due to a problem with a tunnel.

National Rail Enquiries said no trains will enter or leave the west London station on Wednesday morning.

Chiltern Railways, which serves the station, told passengers on Twitter there is “a defect in the tunnel to/from London Marylebone”.

The station connects the capital with locations such as Birmingham Moor Street, Oxford and High Wycombe."

Does anyone know exactly what happened here? Were call Chiltern trains cancelled throughout, or did they run an Aylesbury-Amersham shuttle and terminate Banbury and Birmingham to Marylebone trains short (or divert any of them into Paddington as they occasionally do during engineering works)?

 

[Horizon22]

Nothing diverts into Paddington any more. That hasn't happened for years and even it did, I would guess that all drivers have lost competence; even the West Ealing parliamentary didn't run during Covid. Trains were llikely just terminated short instead. And it's not as easy as it once was with all the Elizabeth line services running. I doubt think it will be a viable diversionary route any longer.

Not sure what a tunnel defect means exactly - perhaps flooding or obstruction within the tunnel.

 

[swt_passenger]

RTT suggests it definitely wasn’t closed all day, limited numbers of trains were running mid morning, then you’d have reactionary delays and cancellations for a few hours. Looked sorted by the evening peak:

Realtime Trains | Departures from London Marylebone between 0600 and 2000 on 07/09/2022

Train information at London Marylebone between 0600 and 2000 on 07/09/2022. From Realtime Trains, an independent source of train running info for Great Britain.

www.realtimetrains.co.uk

I think often these sort of news reports are guessing about what will happen later, but aren’t ever updated in real time.

 

[The Planner]

Any area of loose brickwork was found in one of the St Johns Wood tunnel shafts.

 

[sammyg901]

I travelled from Aylesbury, nearly all the trains ran to Harrow-on-the-hill which is really not a big trouble for anyone needing London.

I was aiming for the 8.13 from Aylesbury Vale Parkway, I had missed it anyway but when I checked it had actually departed 2 minutes early which was rather odd! I took the 8.45 from Aylesbury which did actually go through to Marylebone much to the drivers surprise (first he knew of it was a green signal at HotH!) but I bailed for the Met as I needed to touch in and my final destination is Aldgate

A colleague told me it was different story on the "mainline" - very little information about what was running and when, journeycheck just wasn't being updated. Judging by Twitter (who knew nothing) what did run to South or West Ruislip was very busy especially earlier in the morning. I'm surprised they don't have an "off the shelf" plan for a Marylebone closure from start of service that they can quickly publish.

No point diverting these days as they can't get into Paddington, Ruislip stations are just as convenient for onward connections to central London on the Central Line

 

[CyrusWuff]

A colleague told me it was different story on the "mainline" - very little information about what was running and when, journeycheck just wasn't being updated. Judging by Twitter (who knew nothing) what did run to South or West Ruislip was very busy especially earlier in the morning. I'm surprised they don't have an "off the shelf" plan for a Marylebone closure from start of service that they can quickly publish.

I'm sure there is such a plan, but it almost certainly relies on having sufficient staff in the right places to implement it...which is unlikely for start of service.

 

[20Man]

My wife and I travelled from High Wycombe to Marylebone, we had intended to travel on the 07:51. The station was reasonably busy with people wanting to travel north and a good few waiting for information about services to West Ruislip. The station staff were getting very little info, but were being as helpful as they could with what little information they were getting, of 3 trains that had headed inbound non-stop they had expected 2 of them to stop, non of them were overly busy as they passed. We were eventually told that a train was expected to stop at around 08:30 and would call all stations to West Ruislip for onward travel on the Central line. The train wasn't very busy at all, many people had given up and gone home or gone to Amersham. We actually had to go to Marylebone so used the Bakerloo line from Oxford Circus and arrived at Marylebone at around 10:00. Trains were just starting to show on the indicator as running but they were waiting for stock to come in.

Over the years I have always been surprised that Chiltern never seem to be able to react quickly, or sensibly, to incidents. A friend at Chiltern is less than complimentary about how they deal with incidents.

 

[miklcct]

Is it possible to divert Marylebone-bound trains into Baker Street or vice versa?

 

[Kingston Dan]

But we could reopen the GC instead of wasting money on HS2...

 

[The Planner]

But we could reopen the GC instead of wasting money on HS2...

I hope the dots represent the folly of that.

 

[Falcon1200]

Over the years I have always been surprised that Chiltern never seem to be able to react quickly, or sensibly, to incidents. A friend at Chiltern is less than complimentary about how they deal with incidents.

The problem with an incident like this is that no-one knows its severity or duration until it is over! 'Loose brickwork in a tunnel'; Does that mean the tunnel is about to collapse, closing the line for weeks, or is it minor and the line can re-open after inspection? Until then Control has to decide what to do with the train service, is it feasible to keep sending trains towards a line blockage of unknown length?

 

[mister-sparky]

But we could reopen the GC instead of wasting money on HS2...

It would probably cost twice as much as hs2 to rebuild the old gc line up to modern standards!

 

[philthetube]

Is it possible to divert Marylebone-bound trains into Baker Street or vice versa?

no, neither stock cleared of any route knowledge for drivers, I suspect that the stock would not be able to cope with the curved platforms at Baker St.

 

[30907]

no, neither stock cleared of any route knowledge for drivers, I suspect that the stock would not be able to cope with the curved platforms at Baker St.

Slight difference of traction mode too

 

[philthetube]

Not actually a problem to run diesel over 4rail system, but the fumes would certainly prevent it.

 

[Watershed]

Is it possible to divert Marylebone-bound trains into Baker Street or vice versa?

Physically, yes - for trains that are coming from Aylesbury. Practically, no - because none of the Chiltern drivers sign into Baker Street, and because the Chiltern trains aren't fitted with in-cab signalling.

But even if those problems were dealt with, I doubt LU would be over the moon about having diesel trains belching out fumes at Baker Street...

 

[CyrusWuff]

Physically, yes - for trains that are coming from Aylesbury. Practically, no - because none of the Chiltern drivers sign into Baker Street, and because the Chiltern trains aren't fitted with in-cab signalling.

But even if those problems were dealt with, I doubt LU would be over the moon about having diesel trains belching out fumes at Baker Street...

At least the Met platforms at Baker Street are in the open.

Ignoring the lack of route knowledge for a moment, I would have thought gauge clearance for a 165 may be an issue, though the 168s should fit.

As an aside, does the rollout of CBTC completely preclude future heritage operations on the sub-surface railway? Obviously there are still going to be "lights on sticks" between Harrow and Amersham for Chiltern, but what about Harrow to Baker Street?

 

[Dstock7080]

Obviously there are still going to be "lights on sticks" between Harrow and Amersham for Chiltern, but what about Harrow to Baker Street?

No lights on sticks for Harrow-Finchley Road, as already none south of Finchley Road.

 

[Southern Dvr]

Why was divert to Paddington via Greenford Branch not an option?

 

[SynthD]

Why was divert to Paddington via Greenford Branch not an option?

There isn’t the capacity for Chiltern beside the Elizabeth line. Has anyone combed the HS2 law to see if it extinguishes the right (or requirement, as it was a Parlimentary) for them to run into Paddington?

 

[The Planner]

There isn’t the capacity for Chiltern beside the Elizabeth line. Has anyone combed the HS2 law to see if it extinguishes the right (or requirement, as it was a Parlimentary) for them to run into Paddington?

Apart from the the parliamentary services, they only ever had contingent rights so if they didn't fit then they couldn't go in.

 

[Watershed]

Why was divert to Paddington via Greenford Branch not an option?

Because Chiltern no longer sign beyond West Ealing. And in any event, it's only a small number of drivers and guard-trained RPIs at Aylesbury that sign as far as that.

 

[JohnRegular]

With any luck, Chiltern will get bay platforms at Old Oak Common to which they regularly run trains via the New North Main Line and so an occurence like this will be much less of a problem.

 

[Watershed]

With any luck, Chiltern will get bay platforms at Old Oak Common to which they regularly run trains via the New North Main Line and so an occurence like this will be much less of a problem.

Unfortunately there are no plans to build such platforms as part of the construction of Old Oak Common station. But there is passive provision for them AFAIK.

 

[swt_passenger]

There isn’t the capacity for Chiltern beside the Elizabeth line. Has anyone combed the HS2 law to see if it extinguishes the right (or requirement, as it was a Parlimentary) for them to run into Paddington?

It wasn’t actually a parliamentary service as far as previous discussions have suggested. It fits the modern use of the term as a rare service, but it wasn’t required by their franchise specification.

 

[philthetube]

At least the Met platforms at Baker Street are in the open.

Ignoring the lack of route knowledge for a moment, I would have thought gauge clearance for a 165 may be an issue, though the 168s should fit.

As an aside, does the rollout of CBTC completely preclude future heritage operations on the sub-surface railway? Obviously there are still going to be "lights on sticks" between Harrow and Amersham for Chiltern, but what about Harrow to Baker Street?

I would not have thought that they would fit the platforms as the cars are much longer, I don't know actual lengths but a 5 car Chiltern is approx the same length as a 8 car Met, the baker St. platforms are pretty curvey.

 

[Bald Rick]

Physically, yes - for trains that are coming from Aylesbury.

That depends on your definition of ‘Physically!”

I think the first 165 to head down the Met tunnel would end up with some rather bent bodywork…

 

[Dave_Cardboard]

no, neither stock cleared of any route knowledge for drivers, I suspect that the stock would not be able to cope with the curved platforms at Baker St.

Physically, yes - for trains that are coming from Aylesbury. Practically, no - because none of the Chiltern drivers sign into Baker Street, and because the Chiltern trains aren't fitted with in-cab signalling.

But even if those problems were dealt with, I doubt LU would be over the moon about having diesel trains belching out fumes at Baker Street...

Are the mainline trains equipped with tripcocks...? IIRC the stretch of LUL route between HOTH and Finchley Rd still requires them.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 12 Sep 2022 ==

Unfortunately there are no plans to build such platforms as part of the construction of Old Oak Common station. But there is passive provision for them AFAIK

With any luck, Chiltern will get bay platforms at Old Oak Common to which they regularly run trains via the New North Main Line and so an occurence like this will be much less of a problem.

This is rapidly becoming an urban myth that just refuses to die (like reopening the GC line.) Get a map and some crayons and see where the alleged "space" is at Old Oak for some Chiltern line platforms and it's approach lines and crossings. It just ain't going to happen without knocking down part of Well House Road or reinstating the plan to fly the GWML Up Relief/Crossail on a fly over (which now isn't happening.) If someone has access to plans that show the alleged "passive provision," it would settle the debate.

 

[miklcct]

Are the mainline trains equipped with tripcocks...?

Aren't they already required to run between Amersham and Harrow-on-the-Hill?

 

[philthetube]

Harrow on the hill to Amersham requires tripcocks, Chiltern do not ned them south of there.